CHANGING PLANES AT O'HARE

Today is the beginning of an unusually busy stretch of travel, with 10 flight segments in 24 days. Today's destination is Grand Rapids, Michigan, where we will meet up with our son and his family. This is Terminal 3, the American Airlines part of O'Hare Airport in Chicago, where we change planes. The cow is enigmatic, which is why I liked it.          

STL DPB IN THE AIR - SURREALIST ART AT O'HARE

I just love changing planes at O'Hare airport in Chicago. It's something we've had to do a whole lot of times since American Airlines took over TWA, which was St. Louis' home town team. The blue sign on top of the cow promotes wearing masks, which precious few people were doing (our family being some of the exceptions).

So we flew from St. Louis to Chicago to Lansing, Michigan, which was the nearest airport to where our son and his family used to live except they moved to another town last week so now it's not the nearest airport. Plus there was an emergency landing at O'Hare that shut down a main runway for some time which stuck us in the smallest and most uncomfortable regional jet used in the US for more than an hour before we could take off. Then 90 minutes drive to where they live now, take the new house tour, have dinner, drive 45 minutes to a cottage on a lake which used to be near where they live but isn't now. And that's today's occasional rant.            

STL DPB ON THE ROAD - YOU CAN'T BE TOO CAREFUL THESE DAYS

Like many of my online friends, people who don't wear masks in public make me angry. Our family, even the little ones, are with the program. While waiting for the next flight at O'Hare, Ellie, Lambie and her favorite doll, Aliane (pronounce it the French way - we think she is Québecois because the card that came with her says she likes poutine) are full of respect for their fellow travelers. Hard to see in these pictures but Ellie put a little bottle of hand sanitizer on each of their left wrists. Not everyone in the terminal was so respectful despite the Illinois state mandate.        

STL DPB ON THE ROAD - O'HARE AIRPORT

Changing planes at Chicago's O'Hare airport. Saw this on our way between gates and I don't get it. Recreational marijuana is legal in  Illinois if you get it from a licensed dispensary. So if you brought it in from somewhere else you shouldn't technically be taking it out of the airport. But if you got the stuff through security in carry-on luggage at your home airport, do you really think you have to worry about it on the streets of Chicago? Or is it for people leaving Illinois? I doubt this gets a lot of use.

Lansing, Michigan, Thursday night, then up to Clare to see the family on Friday. 

BEEN A LONG TIME

An old photo of the main concourse of the American Airlines terminal at Chicago - O'Hare. There was a time in my life when it was a rare month that I didn't fly somewhere. Now it's been six months since we set foot on an airplane.

We have one grandchild in STL, the redoubtable Ellie. But there are two more in central Michigan we see all too rarely, my son's kids, Audrey, almost 5, and the well-named Atlas, close to a year and a half. We researched this thoroughly and we decided it's okay to visit. (Ellie and our daughter Emily are going along.) Very short flights from here to Chicago and on to Lansing, Michigan. We are on smaller jets with 2-2 and 1-2 seating, no middle seats. We got a stash of N95 masks (Chinese, so we hope they are not fake, but at least they enclose the mouth and nose tightly.) We got sterile, disposable plane seat covers and tray table covers.  We got sterile wipes out to here, purchased before things got bad. We have  an Air BnB cottage with no one else around. So, volare...              

O'Hare To Heathrow

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One more flight to go. We're sitting in a lounge at Heathrow waiting for our flight to Nice. So far, so good.

These are fuzzy iPhone pictures of the last two airports. Above, American Airlines main concourse at O'Hare. Below, a shot from the shuttle bus riding from Heathrow's Terminal 3, which American uses, to BA's enormous Terminal 5.

Menton tonight.

Airports and Airplanes

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Sorry, this is sort of filler, but greetings from O'Hare International Airport in Chicago. In an hour we board our flight to Delhi. By the time this post goes up Friday morning in the US we'll be over Russia or the Middle East or Something-astan or I don't know what. I've loved airports since I was a child.

When I was growing up in Queens, my friends and I would ride our bikes to La Guardia and JFK (Idlewild back them). There were observation decks on the terminal roofs. The international airport was my favorite. In the background of this picture you can see the livery of United, Swiss, Aer Lingus, Turkish, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic. American, our regular airline, is up front.

AND A BIG HOWDY FROM DELHI! We just got to our hotel. Smooth flight, good service. So far, so good but my brain isn't completely screwed into the socket at the moment.

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