Cruella de Lambert

My first experience on a flight out of LaGuardia was...interesting.

Well, first of all, security took like 15 minutes to get through. I didn't have to take my shoes off, or my laptop out of my bag, or go through one of those body scanner things.

And here's the kicker. I completely forgot that the pepper spray gun that Jim gave me before I left in August (the one that shoots 90 MILES PER HOUR) was still in the bottom of my purse until Mom, Holly, and I were halfway home and it came up in conversation...so somehow I unintentionally got through airport security and the carry-on bag x-ray screen thing with that in my bag, but Holly got her conditioner taken away. I'll definitely be bringing it back to New York in my checked bag, though!

And then the flight came. We didn't board on time because the airline oversold the plane and everyone actually showed up (I hate it when they do that, the airlines, not the people). And then, I was supposed to be in the last row of the plane but then a party asked to be moved together so they moved me up six rows. I was sitting waiting for boarding in a chair right next to the gate desk, across from these parents and their teenager girls. We're just waiting for board when all of a sudden, this guy struts up and he's dressed like Adam Lambert (the singer from American Idol) with a Cruella de Vil fur coat and gloves. The dad across from me and I looked at each other and just laughed.

We finally board, and who is my new seat partner? Cruella de Lambert. (I called him that when relaying the story to Mom and she almost cried from laughing.) And he insisted on sprawling out his fur coat all over the place so I had to dig and dig for my seatbelt.

Normally, when Mom and I are in the car together, we plug in my phone and sing together, but my phone battery was very low by the time she picked me up because I had to block out several things on the flight. First, there was the expected screaming children. Plus, Cruella talked to himself the entire flight. And to top it off, there was this mom sitting right in front of me and her two pre-teen/young teenage daughters across the aisle from her and from the second they sat down, she was leaning across the aisle talking to them and asking them questions and handing them things. Except she didn't talk to them like they were 13 (or around that age, however old they were). She talked to them like they were 4. "Here's a sandwich, sweetie. Do you want Mommy to unwrap that for you? Here, hand it back to Mommy." The ENTIRE flight. Mom's response when I told her about this lady? "You would have BITCH-slapped me if I talked to you like that."

So yeah, that was certainly the most interesting flight I can remember. We'll see if I have any stories to tell on the way back home to NYC.