Funny How Things Happen

The way back from our wonderful vacation in San Diego was less than pleasant. Our day started at 4am, which is never a good beginning. I had booked an early flight thinking it would be nice to get back to our house in the early evening. We had a little hopper flight from San Diego to LA and were told that it wasn't necessary to get there really early, which is probably true most of the time.

My mom & sister dropped us off about 5:30am. We walked up to probably the longest line the airport had seen in a year. By the time we got to the front, we couldn't check luggage in time for our flight, so they booked us on the next one that was only a half hour later and still gave us plenty of time to catch our next flight. When we got to the very empty security line, the girl that looks at the IDs decided that I was a security threat because my driver's license still has my maiden name (I hate the local DMV) & my passport had expired recently. She made us go back to the airline counter. The airline people didn't understand why the security girl had a problem and they sent us back. We went back and forth and missed the next flight. Finally, the airline printed a boarding pass that said I needed to be patted down so she let us through. That took about 2 seconds.

The airline person at the gate told us we just might be able to catch our regular flight IF everything goes very smoothly. Fortunately, it did. We bolted across LAX and made our connecting flight. Lexi was asleep for the first hour and a half, which was great since I had bronchitis and was not feeling up to entertaining her. She woke up fussy and restless. The five hour plane ride was horrible from then on (for us and those around us). We tried walking her down the aisle, when we could. There was quite a bit of turbulence, which meant we had to sit with our seatbelts on (joy).

We finally got to MIA to discover our bags (all five, including Lexi's carseat) had not made it. While standing in the mile long line to fill out the paperwork, Lexi fell asleep. When I couldn't hold her any longer, I handed her to Steve. After about 2 minutes, he suddenly looked at me and said, "Take her, take her, take her!" He had a pee spot on his belly from her leaking diaper. I grabbed her and the diaper bag and headed for the bathroom.

That's where/when it happened...I had Lexi on the changing table and I heard a voice say, "You're Stephanie and that is Lexi, right?" It was the last thing I expected. She told me her name and it took me a while to jump back to reality. I actually had a real life encounter with a fellow Miami Beach blogger. Hi Sofi! Funny that this happened at the airport instead of anywhere on the beach.

I have to say that was the highlight of the day, because we ended up being in the baggage claim line FOREVER only to be told the bags might be on the next few flights that were in another hour. We ate airport pizza and waited to find that they weren't, so we headed home at 9pm (4 hours after we landed). Can you say Happy New Year's Eve? Our bags were located the next day, but 2006 ended with a day from Hell.

Tags: MIA, lost bags, airports