Parental Nerves Run Amok, or Sunday Afternoon

The house is very quiet tonight. And dark. The little person who normally runs around leaving lights and TVs on in every room is away this week. I loaded her on an airplane all by herself yesterday afternoon and sent her off to my sister's house for a week. It was a tiny airplane. She loved it.

Tiny plane.

We almost didn't make it to the airport. I'd spent the last week thinking her flight was at 2:35. Yesterday morning around 9 am, I printed out her boarding pass. I'm glad I decided to do it when I did, instead of waiting for the last possible minute to take care of it. Her flight was at 12:22.

I spent the next 15 minutes panicking. Luckily I made her pack the night before, and she only had to throw a few last minute items into her backpack. We both got dressed (I think the TSA would have frowned on us arriving in our pajamas), and bolted for the airport.

The last half a dozen or so times I've flown, I've used National Airport. This was the first time I've had to use Dulles since they installed the underground trains between terminals. First, I want to say how much I miss the old jetway busses that raised and lowered to the height of the plane. They were repurposed as shuttles between the main terminal and the newer terminals, but now they've been almost entirely replaced by the new train. Which is probably the least efficient airport transport system I've ever seen. Ever.

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with the train itself, but the security lines that bottlenecked us twice before we could join the labyrinth of escalators and hallways beyond the screening point leaves a lot to be desired. There are about a dozen different lines you're randomly assigned to, and then the lines are randomly shut down  from time to time.

Once you finally make it through the boarding pass/ID confirmation point, you're shuffled into one of half a dozen other randomly moving lines to go through screening. Luckily, the kid didn't have to go through the backscatter machine, so neither did I. Those things creep me out.

There were so many escalators beyond this point that they could speed them all up and call it an amusement park. I haven't been up and down that much since I rode the Tower of Terror at Disney last summer. I considered going back and taking a picture of each one, but I try not to act suspicious at airports.

I tried to take this picture in the least suspicious manner possible.

Just so you know I have nothing against the trains, I rode in the front car on my return journey to the main terminal. Nice view.

After the kid was safely airborne, I had to get to work at the Keys game. It was so difficult to work when the kid was sending me messages on my phone, and I'm not technically allowed to have my phone while I'm working. So sue me. I cheated yesterday.

She's having a great time at Girls Rock Camp this week. Her band formed today. They assign girls to bands based on their musical tastes and preferences, so hopefully she'll have a great experience. In case I haven't mentioned it before, she's the drummer.

They did team building activities today, including writing an advertizing jingle for Orange Aliens. She promised to write the lyrics down for me, and assured me it's hilarious. I'll keep you updated as they write their actual song this week. They get to perform in a real concert on Saturday. Fingers crossed for her.

Now that all that's out of the way, I used the unusual quietude around her today to finish the edits from the Magnificent Crit Partner of Magnificence. I can't think of anything else I want to change. Now I'm trying to convince myself that Running Down the Dragon is ready to meet the world. I'd hate to send it out in public only to find out its skirt was tucked into the back of its pantyhose or something.

I think I'll wait until the thought of showing it to agents and editors no longer causes respiratory failure. Yeah. That might happen. Or maybe I'll just wait one more day.