Stuck in Canada

VANCOUVER, B.C. — I am not pleased.

Right now, I should be sleeping in my own bed at home. Instead, I am sitting in a hotel room in Vancouver, B.C. because British Airways can’t keep the trains moving on time.

It’s a nice hotel (I just checked and the cheapest room is $330/night), but it’s 6 a.m. and I can’t sleep, even after staying up for 24 hours straight trying to get home. And I’m sure there’s a reason, but there is a motion sensor pointed at my bed that blinks when I move. Problaby a good reason for it, but it’s kind of just freaking me out.

My last night in Dublin went well. I stopped by Gogarty’s and Knight’s bars because they always seemed to have some of the most reliable traditional music. I enjoyed my last pint of Guinness and walked across the alley to my hostel.

I got up early and hauled my gear over to Connolly station to catch a bus. Everything went fine in Dublin, then Gatwick slowed things down with the baggage and the ridiculous shuttle to Heathrow. I hurried through check-in at Heathrow and raced to the gate. Then learned my flight would be delayed an hour and a half because they towed the plane to the wrong terminal, which is a big deal at an airport the size of Heathrow.

So finally we loaded and it was a decent flight until the guy next to me all but stopped breathing. He had a bit of an asthma attack. The crew had to hook him up to the oxygen and try to force steriods on him and all sorts of nonsense. The crew was kind of intense because apparently they had a heart attack earlier in the flight and someone else died on another recent trip.

So I tried to stay out of the way and watch movies (300, Blades of Glory, TMNT and Hot Fuzz).

I got to Vancouver 30 minutes before my Seattle flight, but apparently getting from gate to gate is not simple enough to make that connection happen. I wanted to run for it, but they just stuck me in a hotel.

But it is nice to be back on Pacific Time. Hopefully, I’ll be home by 5 p.m. PST.