My day so far

[mrissa]

1. The alarm was supposed to go off at 4:50. It did not.
2. timprov, miserably awake due to his sleep disorders, knocked on the door to wake markgritter and me a bit after that, or Mark would have missed his plane. Mark dashed for the shower. I threw on jeans. The dog cried: why were all her monkeys running around and turning lights on in the middle of the night? Why? (Cue Robin: "Stupid monkeys!"*)
3. Mark was the last person to check in on his flight, but he made it.
4. Last I heard, he was stuck in Denver waiting for his flight to San Francisco to be allowed to leave. SFO is stupid.
5. By the time I got home, there was no way I was going back to sleep.
6. Timprov had finally gotten to sleep, so I didn't get a chance to talk with him.
7. Ista, when I got her up at the usual time, was confused and clingy and kept looking where the Mark was supposed to be, but I had carelessly mislaid him. I suspect that being the dog's alpha female reinforces my own notions that I Should Be Able To Fix Things. This is not entirely positive.
8. She refused breakfast entirely.
9. I finished reading Ordinary Jack -- rereading, really, but for the first time in 15 years -- and was reading The Life of the World to Come. My eyes started to droop. I put down the book and put my head down on the couch for a nap.
10. Delighted, the puppy -- formerly sleeping, sleeping for most of the time since -- came to dance a joyful tarantella on my head and gleefully lick my ear.
11. I picked up both head and book again, in time to watch the dog vomit on the rug.
12. Twice.
13. I took her outside. She drank some water. She is now sleeping again. I am not, and will not likely be.
14. We are nearly out of milk. If I do nothing else today, I must get milk. I may well do nothing else today. It is not the least likely prediction a human ever made. I don't want to go get milk (shower, crate dog, drive car, pick up other things While I'm There, deal with strangers, drive car, deal with hyper formerly crated dog -- blerg), but I want to not have milk from today into tomorrow until I take Ista to the groomer even less, so there you have that.
15. I think the numbers are because I'm tired enough that I need thingers. You know, thingers. To make things go sensibly. Whatever the word is. Sensifiers is clearly not it, but I could use a sensifier right about now. Yah.

*I may have gotten myself in a bit of trouble. I was telling Ista stories at dinner and was conveying some of her reactions as "Stupid monkeys!" And Roo found it hilarious and started repeating it, giggling to himself. I hope his parents don't hate me by now.

Comments

[fiddledragon]

4. Last I heard, he was stuck in Denver waiting for his flight to San Francisco to be allowed to leave. SFO is stupid.

He's not flying United is he?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Heh. No. Frontier. This is not a problem with the airline but with the airport: let's build an airport in San Francisco where you can only use one of the runways if it's foggy! Good idea! Because it's never foggy in San Francisco!

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Be that as it may, it seems like a better idea than not building the airport. Non-existent runways land far fewer planes than foggy ones. People can choose other airports in clearer areas further away: Oakland and San Jose. I use SFO when I need to, though; I don't find fog delays all that common. Maybe he's had a string of bad luck.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We lived out there for four years (markgritter for six), and Mark's been traveling out there for two years since. This isn't new, and it isn't just our bad luck: SFO itself admits that over a third of their flights are delayed by weather, mostly fog and clouds.

The problem is not that they built the airport in San Francisco. The problem is that they built the runways essentially on top of each other, two pairs of double runways that cross each other, so four runways go down to one. It's subject to more fog delays than any other airport of any decent size in the US. One out of every three days, the average flight delay due to weather is forty minutes or greater. It's been a huge topic of discussion out there, whether to fill in some more of the Bay for an additional (better-spaced) runway or what. Also, Mark doesn't have nearly as much choice when he's flying for work as he would if he was flying on our dime. Sun Has Rules.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I don't experience anything like 1/3 delayed flights into SFO, but maybe I just have good luck.

And I'm sure Sun has rules, but given where their campus is I wouldn't think they would care one way the other about SFO vs SJC. But I don't know.

On the other hand, you'd think Sun would be used to it by now if 1/3 of their arrivals are delayed due to fog -- so at least no one will think it's anyone's fault.

B

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, Mark is not "in trouble" at work over this. It's just annoying.

Their rules involve taking the lowest fares their system spits out for the parameters. So if Mark tells them he's flying in to work in Palo Alto today, there's only so far he can mess with the flight times to get what he wants out of what they're willing to hand him. He can say "must be after 6:30 a.m.", but if their thing keeps spitting out SFO flights on Frontier for all of his time parameters, he's stuck.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Wow. I just might quit if my employer tried to make me fly Frontier.

B

[markgritter.livejournal.com]

Theoretically American is one of Sun's contracted airlines and I should be able to fly them through San Jose. But only theoretically as far as I can tell.

Flying Frontier through SJC is not entirely feasible because they don't have afternoon flights back--- I have flown into SJC and out of SFO once or twice on Frontier.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I fly either NW or AA between MSP and SFO/SJC. I can fly out there on AA and arrive around 11:00 AM at either airport. There's a 3:00-something return out of SFO if I'm running late. And there are a reasonable number of flights out of SJC, which is faster for me.

I need flexibility. A direct flight is nice, too, but AA treats me well enough to put up with changing planes.

B

[ladysea.livejournal.com]

Yikes! An eventful morning.

*hugs*

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

Whenever I lie down Siggy must come and inspect me and meow loudly. I'm not sure whether she's afraid I'm dead or is just complaining about my monkey sloth.

Lists are soothing, numbered or otherwise.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Slothful monkeys!

I am a slothful monkey today, mostly because of my slothful puppy. She's napping most of the time. If this continues tomorrow -- well, I'll have her in at the vet's anyway to be groomed, so I'll just ask them then. She's not having really dramatic symptoms. She's just a little sick.

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

I just thought of another possibility for the nap inspections. Maybe she's critiquing my form. It might translate to This would work better with one paw over your face. Bring your hind legs up. Now twitch your ears...

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

A handy piece of trivia for dog and cat owners is that they don't get colds. When I worked at a vet hospital, we often had people come in with extremely sick pets, saying, "Her nose was running so I thought she had a cold." It's an understandable assumption. People get lots of colds, and they are mostly a nuisance. She's probably just a sleepy growing puppy! Baby animals sleep quite a lot.

Now ferrets--they get colds and flus. It's one reason they are popular research animals. Poor critters.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

She seems to be doing better tonight (which meant a little bit of brattiness!), so it was probably either a passing thing or something she ate disagreeing with her, or else her little system being upset and barfy because of her sleep being disrupted by stupid monkeys running around in the middle of her night. I get nauseated sometimes when my sleep is interrupted, so whatever; she appears to be fine now, and the groomer will say if she's outside normal parameters tomorrow (since the groomer is at the vet's).

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

Dogs do a lot of puking. I recently learned that they have voluntary control over all the muscles of their esophagus, which means they can vomit any time they want. It's a recreational activity. If it were my dog, I'd just keep an eye on her and try to wait it out. Any respiratory symptoms like runny nose, coughing, or difficulty breathing are big going to the vet right now kinds of things. But GI symptoms in a dog...meh.

Both of my kitties got very sluggish within twenty-four hours of getting vaccines. The vet told me (over the phone thank goodness) that it happens and just to watch. I don't know if Ista had any shots recently, but it's a theory.

I want more Ista posts! Give me details. Is she the Tyrant of Toes? Has she chewed anything up? What sorts of painfully adorable stuff does she do. Does she cuddle a lot? Is she housebroken yet?

[timprov.livejournal.com]

You should be reading her LJ: missista.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Um. Wow. I'm sorry.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

The entire nation's commercial avaition system is a mess today; storms in the Northeast yesterday cancelled hundreds of flights.

I'm stranded at O'Hare as I wrote this, for example.

B

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

We didn't fly yesterday because of weather. This is not unusual, in the world of general aviation and rented airplanes. What was bizarre, was the the approaching storm causing us not to fly was part of an occluded front running all the way from New York state to us in Phoenix, AZ. One of the flight instructors save the image of the weather map, because he'd never seen anything like it.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

And today there's barely anything where it is supposed to be. American's standby list from ORD to LGA is 90-people long.

B