Monday, March 11, 2013

The Typically Hungry Return Trip



Room Service Tray

As a celiac, I diligently pack food for a trip TO someplace so I don’t end up really hungry on the flight or totally without food options if I get stuck somewhere.   The problem is always the return trip…usually I don’t have anything for the return so I scrounge a salad at the terminal or buy the overpriced cheese and cracker box on the plane and just eat the cheese.
 
Travel is fraught with challenges aside from dietary issues, specifically air travel.  Take my return trip home yesterday.  First off, it was the weekend we “spring ahead.”  Typically my phone does that for me, but as I was watching Saturday Night Live…my phone did not spring ahead.   On Saturday, New York was two hours ahead of Arizona and on Sunday it was three hours ahead?  Did you know that parts of Arizona do not “spring ahead?”  I did not!  Luckily, I relied on a wake up call and just muddled around until I asked the front desk what time it was and why.

Portable Lunch
My trip home was challenging in other regards too.  I had the aisle seat…yeah!!!  But the gentleman in the middle seat was so large that I could not put the arm rest down between us.   The guy across the aisle was chatty, loud and his politics were to the right of Rush Limbaugh.  The guy next to him had multiple facial piercings that kind of made my stomach buckle with queasiness because most of them looked really painful.  Four rows ahead, a little girl who I saw in the terminal chowing down a monster breakfast burrito and 20 ounce lemonade regurgitated it all over the place due to our incredible turbulence.

Fun and games for five hours in flight!

But, here is the great news.  It was my return flight and I was not hungry.   Early that morning I had selected a gluten-free English muffin from the room service menu at the Hyatt Regency in Phoenix.  I had a GoPicnic Lunch from my time at Expo West and I even had a snack, my favorite Walnut Cappuccino True Bar!

Snack time
Typically when I land, I am just racing for home and the gluten-free snack cupboard.  This time, I strolled in and chatted with everyone, found out about the weekend’s basketball games and opened up a bottle of wine.  Dinner was an hour later and for the first time ever, waiting for dinner after a return flight wasn’t a big deal at all!

Kendall Egan

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