As I write this post, I sit at gate C12 in Laguardia Airport waiting for my flight to board.  I am going to Chicago.  I am meeting my boyfriend there and we are staying with his sister and her husband for one night before driving to Michigan tomorrow.  While in Michigan, we will celebrate Christmas for two days.  On Saturday, his extended family is having their annual Christmas dinner (Smith Palooza) and on Sunday, we will be celebrating again with his more immediate family.  Sunday, in case you didn’t know, is also my birthday.  Although I am excited to spend Christmas with my boyfriend for the first time, I am slightly sad that my birthday will take second fiddle.  I’m getting old though so it’s not like I need to be reminded about it!  Especially since I am several years older than my boyfriend… Anyway, on Monday, I believe we will be visiting with some of my boyfriend’s friends from high school and college, although I am not certain of that.  I think we might also be running a 5K on Saturday morning.  While I am slightly afraid of running in Flint without a bullet proof vest, I have a feeling I am going to be eating a lot more than usual this week and so a run will definitely do my body good.  On Tuesday, Christmas day, we will drive back to Chicago, have dinner with my boyfriend’s sister and her husband and then we will have the next two days to explore Chicago by ourselves. I’m totally excited about that because I’ve never been to Chicago.  Unless you count the 24 hour trip I took back in 1996 when I was sent there for training on a trademark docketing system.  Since I didn’t have time to see anything besides the airport, my hotel and the training room, I don’t count it.  This time, I will truly experience Chicago.  I can’t wait to get my hands on some real Chicago deep dish pizza! I also heard that Chicago makes one hell of an Italian hot dog and Italian meat sandwich.  Yeah, I will definitely need to run while I am away… I want to see “the bean”, shop the Miracle Mile, check out some of the architecture and at least drive by Wrigley Field.  I am sad that we are visiting in the baseball off-season as I really want to see a Cubs game at Wrigley Field.  I am a Yankees fan but I love visiting different stadiums.  On our last night, we will be going to a Second City show. I remember from the cruise I took a couple of years ago that the Second City is a hilarious improve show and I can’t wait.  

The trip has been uneventful for me so far.  Last time I travelled during the holidays, everything that could go wrong did. Well, I guess I shouldn’t say that since the plane did eventually arrive in Jamaica and I was alive and well when I got there – that’s something. But between being delayed and ultimately booted off my initial flight, spending  the night at the airport Ramada, arriving in Jamaica a day late and welcomed by torrential downpours, I was a bit tentative about traveling this time of year.    Not to jinx myself but so far, so good.  My flight is leaving at 2 and I had my car pick me up at 11:45 in case of traffic or long security lines.  There was no traffic, I checked my bag at the curb and went through security in record time and arrived at my gate at 12:30!  I’m hoping the flight leaves on time, I am not sitting next to anyone with horrid breath or body odor, there is minimal turbulence and I arrive at Ohare safe and sound.  I also hope my bag is waiting on the carousal when I get there!  My poor boyfriend is already having a rough time.  First he missed his bus to the airport and had to take a cab.  Then the flight was delayed by an hour only to be extended by several more hours.  He was supposed to arrive an hour before me but it looks like I will get there well before him.  His sister is meeting us at the airport.  Hopefully, she’ll be game for having a beer while we wait 🙂

I really need this vacation as I have been super stressed out lately.  Work has been insane!  One of my clients has some extra money in its budget for the year and so I was instructed to do some last minute, time-sensitive projects for them.  My other clients were also super busy.  I’ve also been trying so hard to keep up with the promotion of A State of Jane.  As my fellow authors can probably appreciate, I’ve been obsessed with my sales rankings on Amazon.  I had a really good week or two in late November/early December but, based on my numbers the past few days, my sales have dropped.  I am trying not to focus on it so much because we all have bad days.  I promised my boyfriend I would relax this week and not focus too much on the writing stuff.  I hope to keep that promise for his sake and mine because the stress is just ridiculous!  My third book is with a fellow author friend.  I am waiting with baited breath to get her comments. One beta reader really liked it so far and one has been suspiciously silent which, of course, has made me super paranoid.  I’m really hoping this author friend has encouraging words because I’m really proud of this book and would hate to find out that my instincts have been way off.  That would be a waste of almost a year of writing!

OK, the gate is getting crowed which leaves me to believe we will boarding soon.  Hooray!  I will be back later.

Update: First my boyfriend texted to tell me that all flights in and out of Chicago are being cancelled at 5.  His flight is still scheduled to arrive earlier than that, but who knows?  Then there was an announcement at my gate that my flight was being delayed from 2:00 to 3:10 due to weather issues in Chicago. I also hope to arrive by 5! Ugh.  It’s dejavu all over again…

 Another update:  I am happy to report that while both of our flights were delayed, neither were cancelled and we are now together in the state of Illinois. I am happily drinking my second glass of Shiraz, comfy and cozy on the couch with my boyfriend next to me.  More later! 🙂