Chanel Adams agreed to drive us to the airport. I told her it would be early but she agreed anyway. We left the house at 5:45 am driving our car; Chanel planned to return it to the garage at home, that way we would pay the tolls and not have to worry about reimbursing her. And we wouldn’t have to worry about a big parking bill at the end of our trip. Yay for Chanel.
The security area at the airport is slated to be reconfigured, so United's Global Service had been temporarily moved around the corner from United’s check-in area. It was a bit crowded, but we managed to get our bags checked and boarding passes printed.
Since getting Global Entry, I have gotten pre-check every time except for today. And everyone else in the family had pre-check except for me. Boo. But since so many people get pre-check now, the regular line got me through security faster than the rest of my peeps. I watched as the drug sniffing dog followed a guy in front of me. He would stop following every so often and then go right back to the guy. Not sure what happened, but I bet he got the benefit of some additional security checks.
We stopped at the United lounge for a quick bite of food and then headed to our gate to board. The plane had been changed since Chris first selected our seats so now we were no longer sitting together.
I have decided that the adjustable air feature on airplanes is specifically designed with women in mind who are experiencing hot flashes. I am not enjoying this particular time in life.
We had a three-hour layover in Houston where we planned to leave the airport, meet up with Kevin, and have lunch. To our surprise Grandpa Kline was waiting at our gate to greet us when we arrived. Pleasant surprise. It was also the first time we brought out Flat Amy to take a picture with us. I had a brainstorm a couple of weeks ago that it would be fun to bring a picture of Amy along with us on our trip since she wasn’t able to come with us. Kristen made it before we left and Chris posted our first picture on Facebook. Amy thought it was hilarious when she first saw it. We hoped that she would enjoy the fun pictures even though she couldn’t come with us and was pretty sad.
Kevin took us a short drive away to a Mediterranean restaurant called Awlidi. The girls were just happy that there was a Subway close by. We took a picture of Kevin and Flat Amy as he dropped us off at the airport.
Unfortunately for me I still didn’t have pre-check. Luckily the airport in Houston was not busy either. Our gate had been changed since last night and so we walked from E gate to C8 (which happened to be right where Kevin had dropped us off). Oh well, with a long flight ahead of us, the walk was good for us.
Chris was upgraded and would enjoy a lovely ten-hour flight to Munich. We FaceTimed with Amy just before taking off. She loved Flat Amy. Her friend, Liz, thought we were weird.
Though we didn't get the lovely dinner service that Chris enjoyed, we were served lemon sorbet.
