Delayed Gratification

Arriving in Atlanta Late Last Night- Granddaughter Not Pleased at Delayed Reunion

Yesterday I was waxing poetic (as much as I am capable of) about how I was monitoring the flight status of the California’s contingent re-deployment to the East Coast. I posted that on Frail Deeds and literally two minutes later I noticed the flight status had changed to “canceled”! I was still processing this dire news when I received a text from my daughter reporting they canceled the flight just as they were arriving at LAX. I think there is no more convincing contribution to the burgeoning body of evidence that living in Los Angeles is just too inconvenient to be tolerated.

On the Upside She Got to Fly with a "Woof"

They returned home with a rebooking for a flight through Minnesota today arriving in Boston at 9:30 tonight. That was before the aptly named Wingman got a hold of them though. His long and pervasive history of flying around the world came into play and he worked the phones incessantly until they had a better deal. They flew out yesterday afternoon with a narrow window to a connecting flight out of Atlanta. They missed that flight and spent the night in an Atlanta hotel but at least they were out of LaLa Land and not depending on a Minnesota connection which has a huge winter storm bearing down.

Breakfast This Morning

I hesitate to declare it but they’re back at the Atlanta Airport this morning and everything seems to be on track, well except for an encroaching diaper shortage. My Favorite Panamanian and I will be leaving shortly (with a diaper resupply) to pick them up in Hartford instead of Boston (part of Wingman’s magic). I asked my daughter how the Frist Blog Reader did during all this back and forth. Her answer was a qualified “pretty good” which wasn’t exactly a ringing endorsement. Nothing can dampen our enthusiasm however for having them with us in short order.

With the free evening and my wife’s need to get me out of the house so I wouldn’t further deteriorate the pristine condition thereof we headed to the movies. We took in Passengers which I really, really liked. I know it’s getting skewered by the critics but this was sci fi done very well because the people were the important focus and not just the technology. If there was any doubt (none here) about Jennifer Lawrence’s screen presence this movie should eradicate it. Chris Pratt is very serviceable and likable for the first part of the movie but Lawrence dominates when she appears. They play two passengers who should be in cryosleep for a 120 year voyage to a new planet. Pratt is woken up early when the ship blunders into a very large asteroid which leads to a maddeningly slow failure of the ship. Alone for over a year Pratt does what any young man would do he wakes the hottest fellow passenger he can find. While I treat that issue glibly the movie does not which brings up the interesting moral questions of the dilemma. While the movie does stumble to the finish line it was uniformly entertaining, so blow off the critics and go see it.
UPDATED FLIGHT STATUS:  THEY ARE ON THE PLANE!!!!!!