"You're not PreCheck, sorry."
"But—I paid for it! Do you want to see my ID?"
"The system says you're not PreCheck. Please go to the regular baggage lanes."
What a terrific start to the day. We'd already been lost around Newark looking for the way into the airport for a half hour, and somehow, despite giving my KTN to Expedia, it didn't end up on my boarding pass. That itself was an $80 fee and a two hour drive to Allentown to get the fingerprinting done and the paperwork filed. I didn't go through all that, on this trip, to not be able to use it.
[3:27 PM] Cammy: fuck this sucks [3:27 PM] Cammy: she said i'm not precheck [3:28 PM] Savannah: :blobthinkingeyes: [3:28 PM] dcb: ? [3:31 PM] Cammy: getting this fixed [3:32 PM] Savannah: was gonna say that's a fuck up on them, you paid em for it [3:35 PM] Cammy: all sorted [3:35 PM] Savannah: :triumph: [3:35 PM] Cammy: thank you air canada [3:35 PM] Savannah: heee leave it to air canada to fuck it up
Thankfully, this helpful Indian guy at the airport said I could get it sorted back at the station for my airline, and I got new boarding passes printed and went on through. It was a connecting flight, Newark to Montreal, a three-hour layover, and then Montreal to London.
"Please step aside. Someone will be with you shortly."
Worse yet—even in the PreCheck lane, there's trouble. I'm tripping the scanner. I don't know if I have a prosthetic leg and didn't notice or something on my jacket was confusing the machine, but either way, I couldn't go on through. Once again, easy fix, a five second patdown and an X-ray and I was cleared, but it was another holdup, another bit of stress, I didn't need on my first-ever flight and my first-ever time out of the country.
[3:41 PM] Cammy: i have cleared the screening i still needed to be patted down but i don't care about that [3:42 PM] Jake: to the tsa agent reading this: he has a bomb [3:43 PM] Cammy: thanks jake [3:45 PM] Cammy: boarding starts at 5:05, or 17:05 [3:45 PM] Cammy: i still have a hard time reading 24 hour time
2022 was a pretty necessary year, is how I put it. I needed to slog away for months at a retail job that, even at the best of times, was long hours into the night with nobody around to squirrel away a few grand in all. I lost friends (I use the term "lost" loosely), I had growing pains with the girl I wanted to see, things were psychotic back at home—but I could handle it all if it meant this trip at the end.
We settled on the date, her and I. It would be mid-May, after her schooling ended, though we wanted to go earlier originally. I scored the flight for $670; I'd spring for traveler's insurance just because. With the passport fees and PreCheck, it'd wind up being around $900 total. For flights? In this economy? Bargain.
Also, I took this boy along. I actually bought two of Snowman after learning which company manufactured him and being able to search listings, and given how important he is to me (see the "Plushie Archaeology: Finding a New Old Friend" post on Letters From Somnolescent if you're curious about his story), I figured I'd give one to Caby and leave the other at home. This boy is now among all her plushies on her bookshelf. This has no relevance to the preceding text, I just wanted to show this cute photo I took on the drive in.
I was already plenty frazzled and still with the flight to go, so I just sat on a beanbag chair next to a Sunglass Hut and checked on my laptop. (It made it through the scanners just fine.) I did wind up eating a little Texas chili dog from some place in the airport before I departed, though. That was good.
The guy next to me on that first flight was wearing a blue hoodie, black basketball shorts, and nursed a green and orange water bottle. I thought you couldn't take those on a plane, but I saw a few people with big drinks like that. By some hilarious miracle, I'd see him on the plane to London and on the way out of Heathrow as well. We became airplane buddies for those many long hours, I suppose.
My first time flying was anti-climactic, really. There's these ticket gates, you get your boarding pass scanned, you go through, you pass through a gigantic space shuttle tunnel, and suddenly you're on a plane. Outside of the stiffness and cramps and the tiny little ear pops from the altitude changes, I didn't mind it.
Something I was glad about was that customs for both Montreal and Heathrow were pretty lax. My passport didn't scan at Montreal, but the officer checked it manually and let me through, and then scanned just fine (as did my face, despite not taking my glasses off) at Heathrow. I was honestly more worried about airport security; the Internet has a way of making everything sound a lot more dystopian than it is, and then you go and fly between three different countries and it all works out okay.
Got to catch this nice sunset at Montreal. Contrary to the index page's proclamation that all I had for photos was my DSi, there were a couple times during the trip where I wasn't thinking of pulling it out and now have to settle for using phone pics here instead. Breaks the immersion a bit, but adds to the collage effect, I suppose. This was pretty, and was also the last spot I talked to Caby prior to her going to bed and taking the coach to London the next morning. I was alone then.
The layover was the longest part of the night, easily. Caby getting some rest for the long bus ride to London by the time I landed, and dcb and Savannah were probably busy. I didn't remember how much money was on my card, and all I had with me for a laptop was the eMachines laptop, and Firefox ESR or not, it wasn't gonna be able to check my bank stuff, certainly not without my passwords, so I didn't buy much either. My bag was heavy, I was caked in sweat under my jacket, and I probably could've played more Pokémon Blue or something to pass the time.
I did stare at this incredibly fluffy lion cub photo way too much while I was waiting. This is effectively where I realized I will at least consider buying anything that features cute animals on it. Lookit him! I don't understand a word he says but he's adorable.
[9:58 PM] Cammy: getting on the plane nowww [9:58 PM] dcb: heck yes >:3c [9:59 PM] Cammy: .yt london song breeders [9:59 PM] heathsy: London Song - https://youtu.be/vNwoA1QHpXg [ 25,966 views | Duration: 3m40s | Uploaded: 2020-01-24 by The Breeders - Topic ] [9:59 PM] dcb: always a song [9:59 PM] Savannah: yee have fun man [10:02 PM] Cammy: i'm aboard and buckled in [10:03 PM] Cammy: much bigger flight than before [10:03 PM] Cammy: see you on the ground, gamers [10:03 PM] dcb: >>:3c [10:03 PM] dcb: godspeed [10:04 PM] Cramble: see you here when i do. [10:05 PM] Savannah: o7 o7 o7
The second flight was a lot larger. I caught a couple people's movies on silent on the ride, in particular Music and Lyrics, which was pretty unremarkable, and Babylon, which I'm frankly amazed they even offered on a plane. The entire movie is effectively an excuse to fit as many full frontal depictions of people fucking each other, doing cocaine, and pissing and shitting on each other as possible into the story of Hollywood's switch from silents to talkies. It was a cool movie, but man, to see a girl smushing a dude between her thighs at a bar while my Clefable was out!
Seeing the ocean sky go from pitch black to blue and orange to purple was a sight to behold; alas, I was dead center of the plane and didn't get a great view. I got squished between an old sleepy dude and an Irish(?) woman (whom watched Babylon) in the center column, and any time they got up, I made sure to use their seat space to stretch. I was too strung out on 14 hours of adrenaline and anxiety to eat or sleep much, though I sure devoured the cup of vanilla yogurt I got towards the end.
Suddenly, we'd landed. It was time to go find my girl.