Never doing that again

I did something stupid.

I think writing my Homeward Bound post jinxed things.  I wrote it 5 weeks before it happened so that I could have all of my blogging set up before we left for vacation.  It all became a self fulfilling prophecy.

"No man needs a vacation so much as the man who has just had one."  - Elbert Hubbard

Elbert must vacation with us.  Or he too is a "seasoned traveler" or has flown on American, who cancelled our flight after letting the plane sit there for 8 hours, decided not to check it until 30 minutes prior to boarding.  That's okay, it was just 138 people you screwed, no biggie.  That was just the icing on the cake of a vacation.  The list of poo would be so long that you would stop reading and think I was making it up.

"It doesn't matter how long you're on vacation or how rejuvenated you feel before stepping into the airport...all of that starts fading away the second you return the rental car."

Well, rejuvenating was not at all what this vacation was but once we stepped in the airport it all went further into the chitter.  (I know Instagram looked much different but as a so-so superhero movie I watched recently said "Life is an endless series of train wrecks with only brief commercial-like breaks of happiness."  That was this trip in spades with Instagram being the commercial breaks.)

Actually, it faded the most when we realized after they cancelled our flight that we'd turned in the keys to the condo we were still paying for that night and had no way to get them back.  The kicker, they put us up in the hotel next door to the condo.  The universe laughs.

"inevitably there is always some crisis that is waiting for us."

I get an email at 5am, a mere one hour into our hellish "extra time" on the island..."the doctor said it's time to consider hospice care for Grandma, can you do the research?"  Yeah, let me get right on that in the midst of my full blown mental breakdown.  (Not even remotely joking about the breakdown... still happening)  Going into God's inbox for now.  No can adult more than one shitty sitch at a time.

"Come Sunday, we'll jump back into a planned program as we try to get jet lag under control and re-adjust to a 6 hour time difference."

Yeah, that didn't happen Sunday...or Monday or  Tuesday (except a long walk on my broken, battered feet) since we got home late Saturday, had nothing in the house and after being up for over 36 hours straight twasn't a priority.  If I'm being honest, it's still not.  So that doesn't bode well.

Jet lag has been quite possibly the worst I've ever had as it was preceded by the worst 2 days of stress I'd had in well, who am I kidding, the day our expensive video camera sizzled in salt water.  I literally looked at a website at one point and didn't know what button to push to make a phone call and have to have the Mr take care of it.  It was scary and if I could've evaporated at that moment, I would have.  Still feel that way.  We are still adjusting and it usually takes a full 7-10 days to recover given the length we were there.

So if you see I don't post something, it means our mutual depression over this crap fest of a month and the new reality with grandma as I get to delve into that means I am no longer capable of adulting which would include blogging.  Don't raise alarm bells until a week, month, when the smell starts seeping into the neighbors place, 6 months of no activity.

The post was published on 5/27/16.

We were actually scheduled to leave 5/25 but didn't leave until the night of, you guessed it...5/27.

I will never write a pre-coming home post again.  You guys have no idea how much we needed this and how much we got dumped on the two months prior to the trip.  For it to continuously crap on us and we're STILL getting charges showing up on the card as a result of it is just enough for me to well, I'm not even going to say it out loud.  It's not good.  I need a break and there's none in sight.  It could not have gone worse except the time the Mr's dad died.  That was literally the only thing worse than this trip.

Oh and please, if someone tells you their flight got cancelled and they are someplace others view as "fun", don't say things like "yay, you got a few more days!" or "not a bad place to be stranded."  I assure you...it was not fun and it's the worst place to be stranded.  It was a full day of being on the phone and computer and finally a trip to the airport to speak to someone in person with a line of 60 people behind you cursing you to get your damn seat assignments.  Just when you thought the assignments were secure, they weren't.  It's a nightmare and the extra time we had there was full of stress, tears, anxiety and panic attacks because no one would friggin' help us or give us a straight answer.   If someone says "we got a few extra days there on the airline" then by all means, celebrate or be jealous but I can tell you based on all of the screaming, cursing, crying and two people on the verge of death (for real) when that flight was cancelled, NO ONE was happy about it.  The next person that tries to put a unicorn spin on that gets throat punched.

I guess we can always shoot for something awesome for our 25th.  We can shoot for it, doesn't mean we'll get it.

In the meantime, long road trips for the next 4 years because airlines can suck it.

Got any airline/vacation horror stories to share?  Let 'em rip in the comments

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