  As I have been whining over the past several weeks, I was stupid enough to schedule two flights back to back, giving me only 3 hours in between them, rather than the day I had expected. Okay, fine. I was going to deal. This is what happens when you don't have secretaries to check dates for you. Flight 1a: Los Angeles to Charlotte. It was a redeye.
Always painful, but I was in First Class, and therefore had that much more room to toss and turn. And we arrived an entire hour early. Yippee! I got to watch the sun rise in the airport! Always so much fun. In the depressing sort of way.
Flight 1b: Charlotte to Providence. Uneventful, though it was amusing that the pilot was a little late because he got stuck in traffic trying to get to the airport. No matter, we arrived on time (even though we left thirty minutes behind schedule). And my bag was one of the first off the airplane, what a plus! Best part was having my friend Kate pick me up. Not only did that mean I saved oodles in cab money/parking fees, but then she repacked my bag for my next flight.
That's right. I threw a bunch of clothes on the floor, and she folded them and neatly put them into my carry-on while I stood in the middle of my apartment being clueless. Who needs servants when you have friends you can pay with lunch? And she even brought me my belated Christmas and birthday presents. It was awesome. Back on the road...
Flight 2a: Providence to Washington, DC. Again, uneventful. Little did I know what was in store for me. Flight 2b: Washington, DC to Charlottesville - no, wait. Make that Washington, DC... back to Washington, DC. The flight should have been only a short 20 minutes.
The plane that we were flying on was a particularly small prop plane, in that it was only 3 seats across, and even 5'8 me (that's with heels on, of course) nearly brushed the ceiling with her head. About 12 minutes into the flight, the pilot announces something to the effect of "one of the engines is malfunctioning so we're turning back to Dulles. " I looked out my window, and what did I see? The propeller next to my seat had stopped moving. That's right, the pilot had turned off the engine to keep it from blowing up. Note that the engine was conveniently located next to my seat.
That meant if anyone died first, it was going to be me. To add to the gravity of the situation, the flight attendant actually made sure we figured out where the nearest emergency exit was, and showed those located near the exits how to actually open them. She told us to prepare for an "abnormal landing," telling us to put away glasses, pens and other pointy objects that could potentially hurt us in a turbulent situation. This included high heels, which of course, I was wearing. Oh well. If anything happened, I was dead anyways, my heels weren't going to make or break the deal.
Then as the plane landed, she had us grip our ankles and put our heads between our knees, just like in those little emergency cards located in the seat pocket in front of you. Except this was real. As with many of my stories, the ending is so much less dramatic than the proceedings. We landed quite nicely and securely, although it was rather discomforting to note that there were four fire trucks and two ambulances, lights ablaze, on our runway, just in case anything happened. Say, in case the engine next to my seat decided that it wanted to explode anyway, just for kicks. I would have been dead, and it would have been all crankypants fault for going to school in the South, where normal big planes don't fly.
Then some guy sat next to me while we were waiting in the terminal for a plane switch, and decided to regale me with all the fabulous flights he had been on that went awry. Please, sir, may I have some more? Flight 2c, this time from Washington, DC to Charlottesville, went fine - once they had refueled the plane after we had all boarded. Ah, it's never too late for a little mishap! The flight attendant was great, though - calm throughout the emergency, and then gave us free alcohol. Since it was such a short flight, there was only so much I could drink.
Oh well. But all is safe and sound, and I'm once again ensconced in the bright den of light crankypants likes to call his apartment. (I just counted. There are SEVEN lamps on, 1 being a chandelier with 5 bulbs, 1 one of those three-headed lamps, and the rest all singular bulbs. ) It's a wee bit ridiculous. 
