Time travel and lost fudge brownies arriving a day early

[Chuck Bao]

I made it back to Bangkok just fine, no thanks to the four-hour delay at DFW after the previous night’s storms in Chicago had delayed flights until the next morning.

I wasn’t too impressed when the woman at the boarding gate who said: “I hope you know you’ve already missed your connecting flight to Tokyo and here is your boarding pass for that flight.”

What did she mean and why did she re-assign me to a middle seat on a flight already gone when I already had my boarding pass with my requested aisle seat? I stewed about that while waiting another two hours on the tarmac.

Mom, big bro and I left our home at 2:30am on Tuesday morning so I could be there two and a half hours early for the 7am flight. So, I was not in a good place in my mind.

I got the best advice from the flight attendant who told everyone missing connections to look at the monitors and run to the gate where the next flight to that destination will be leaving. I did and I got the last seat on a Tokyo flight and I was the last one to board. They also said that there was no way that my luggage would make it.

In Tokyo, I ran through the airport again and caught my original flight, thanks to a mechanic malfunction that delayed departure. This was a Thai Airways flight and they seemed angry with United for allowing me to catch up with my original schedule when all odds should have been against it. They did a search for my bag and said that it would be following me the next day.

So, I made it back to Bangkok in fine shape. I immediately went to the lost baggage department to give them my apartment address. They did a search and they said my bag couldn’t be found, but we should at least go to the carousel and see if it had arrived. It had and I’m not sure how that worked out, but it did. Maybe I don’t run so fast as I think I am.

I wasn’t stressed about that because I was returning home. I mean it would be great if the brownies mom and I baked for my office colleagues arrived and they did.

I went into my office today and my colleagues et up all the frickin’ fudge brownies. I’m not doing that ever again and I’ve learned my lesson. Last year, I picked the pecans from the pecan grove behind mom’s house, cracked and shelled them and put them in the brownie mix. My mistake. My colleagues were all about me not coming back without some.

This time I bought the pecans and I was in a pretty bad mood. So, I was like listen up, this is from a stupid cake mix and if you don’t like them, then well tough.

Not pretty or nice, I know, but I am like that.

What really gets me mad and I’m really, really mad now is that I somehow got the return trip days all wrong or I was so confused on the passing the international date line or whatever. I was supposed to return midnight on Thursday night. I was going into my office to get back on track of the important stuff on Friday. Anyway, I found out in the afternoon that today was Thursday and not Friday. I wasn’t supposed to be here yet. Now, I have to work tomorrow!!!!

How did that happen? Me and lost luggage of fudge brownies arriving a day early. Maybe Ike and his big collider thingy can explain about that stuff. I can't.

[Chuck Bao]

My time back home was too, too short. I almost cried when it came time to say goodbye my grandma.

My nephew did cry. Okay, he cries a lot being the spoilt little loveable 5-year old brat that he is. Hopefully, he grows out of that leg wraparound goodbye thing.

My most embarrassing goodbye, though, was hugging my 15-year old blond (no pink or purple streaks this time) niece and my attempt at patting her on the back actually wound up patting her on the butt. She had grown up a lot since my last visit and is now taller than I am. She will surely tell everyone about her perve uncle.

It was hot and by hot I mean really hot compared to Thailand.

I didn’t help out much on the farm. Everything had burned up and dried away by the time I got there. So, they baled the hay already. I did spend a day on a tractor moving hay off of my meadow and got summarily burnt to a crisp.

I did get my dad’s old Harley out and ride it around a bit. That was pretty great. BUT, you should not ride a Harley with shorts. I repeat, you should not ride a Harley with shorts. I did not learn my lesson last year after returning to Thailand and spending a week in the hospital. This is a pic of me riding the Harley in shorts.

http://img5.ranchoweb.com/images/kanunu/georgeandharley.jpg

I did my semi-annual thing and paid my respect to my granddad’s and dad’s graves. I started that like 10 years ago and it was mainly about getting grandma involved in picking out the flowers and stuff. I’m determined to keep it up despite the whole picking out flowers thing. Alright, I should just pay someone to do that because I don’t want to be known as the flower arrangement guy. Mom was like Oh they’re so fluffy. Pffffft.

Grandma will be 98 next month. She is doing fine. I could tell the difference in the short time I was there, because she was eating two dinners and I was checking her out of the nursing home every night to go to my mom’s house for the family get-together. She spent a few days in the hospital the week prior to that after the nursing home discovered that her blood pressure was zero. I don’t know how many future half-year visits I can keep doing that. She enjoys it a lot, I know. This is the grandma that wrote me a letter everyday for the first 15 years I was in Asia. Bless her heart. She is now committed to crocheting me doilies for my new condo.

My other niece is “supposedly” engaged. Nobody had met the fiancé and she didn’t even bother to say hi to me in one of her fill her plate, eat shoots and leaves, so I bitched a bit. The family finally got to do the 100 questions and with that out of the way, she brought the boy over. Unlike the underwear model, this boy actually eats real food. He’s Native American and wants to be a physical therapist. That’s all I know. My niece has changed her major from retail merchandising to Kinesiology. Oh, they’re taking a humanities block course together at the higher ed center in Ardmore. Apparently in the very first class, my niece cracked her knuckles and the lecturer stopped class to ask if she wanted to continue. She was upset about that whole thing and complained that the girl next to her was making more noise eating potato chips. The boyfriend was ready to whoop the lecturer’s ***. Chivalry is not dead. And, I suppose Knuckle Kinesiology rocks.

I live on the other side of the world and they all live within two miles of each other. I bring them together. They say that while I’m gone they will play cards or dominos once a month, but they don’t. We played Mexican dominos every night for the 10 days I was home. We had uncles, aunts and the blond non-purple or pink hair streaked niece playing at times. A few times, it just my mom, brother, sister and me playing and getting issues resolved as is our indirect way.

[StoopTroup]

Sounds like they miss you.

Glad everything went good.

Your gonna keep the Harley right? :D

When your done in Asia...you should claim it IMO.

Great Read...Glad your travels worked out for you.

ST

[OUHOMER]

Sounds like all in all a great trip home. Glad you made it home safe. But I dont think the airlines care anymore about their customers. Shame you coundnt take your dad's old Harley back with you. You could run over all the little bikes.

[Chuck Bao]

The Harley is mine. My dad gave it away before he passed away, like he did everything else. It's a '98 Heritage Soft Tail. I mentioned letting my mom sell it and everyone else in the family pitched a fit because my dad was a rebel and a biker and it wouldn't be right to sell it. We are a really traditional family.

[Chuck Bao]

Oh, riding my little, bitty Kawaski now was hard that first day going back to work. I don't know how to describe it. It wasn't like riding a moped, more riding a go-cart. But if I were to ship the Harley over here it would be stolen in the first day.

[StoopTroup]

The Airline Management have huge problems with Labor.

They forget they are a service industry.

[Chuck Bao]

Seriously, there used to be a great divide between Asian and US carriers. Not anymore.

The worst flight of my trip was on Singapore Air, which is supposed to be amongst the best airlines in the world. Okay, they still do the free booze and serving wine from bottles and cognac service in economy after the meal. However, it is so expected now and the flight attendants are just mean and surly. On the Singapore Airline flight the mid 12-hour flight the guy next to me go instant noodles instead of a sandwich. I asked for the same and got a "well I could" attitude.

US airlines charge for the booze in economy class. This time I gave them a hundred bill and told them no need for change, just keep the booze coming. And, they did. No need for surly, meaness or attitude or waiting for the cart to come through.

I'm warming on the US airline.