Fogging Around in Heathrow

The Journey so Far:

-- 4 1/2 hours on the road (from Bemidji to Minneapolis)
-- 12 hour wait at someone's house (supposed to be the airport. thank God for Good Samaritans)
-- 5 hour wait in Minneapolis airport
-- 2 hour flight to Chicago
-- 5 hour wait in Chicago's O'Hare Airport
-- 7 ++ hour plane ride to London ---it all lead to: Heathrow, Terminal 1: 7.21 a.m.
-- Next flight: 9 pm (*it would later turn out to be at 1.30 a.m., followed by a 1 + hour wait on the tarmac, due to 'high traffic'. A plane traffic jam. whoo.pee.)

Surviving in Heathrow:

1. Attempted to check in my suitcase 15 hours before my flight. That didn’t go over to well. Not entirely my fault. Cute check-in guy went through the whole process, gave me the boarding pass and so forth before realizing that my flight was 9 pm, not 9 am….From all smiles to an ‘are you seriously mental’-look. Sigh. There goes all hope with him. Why couldn't he have just told me Before all that, and saved me the embarassment? And I had already planned out our engagement party (but not the wedding, of course ; what do you think I am, crazy?)
2. Observation: Heathrow – a terribly hideous airport. But thankfully, the complete lack of any form of loveliness (or imagination, or creativity for that matter) is made up for by the very, very good looking travelers that use it as a pit spot in their globe trekking.
3. Realization: long hours of nothingness reduces me to a state of complete shallowness. It’s a form of survival ; by functioning at a reduced state of being, I need less to get by. And if ‘appreciating the scenery’ is all I need, then it’s a good thing I was at Heathrow.
4. Sat down for almost 12 hours straight, without leaving my seat. Now, it wasn’t quite by choice.because of the fog, the airport was a nightmare, jam packed with travelers. That I actually got a seat was a miracle. And I wasn’t going to give it up to the vultures that hung around, waiting for me to raise my bum slightly off the seat so that they could pounce on it like starved, rabid beasts ('it' being the seat, Not my 'bum'). Hah! I will not be defeated. I will instead sit here, cramped in pain, in desperate need of bladder release, food for my starved tummy, for that is surely more desirable than defeat.
5. Took about 15 naps. Managed to control not drooling by the 6^th nap.
6. Chatted with a lovely, 'distinguished'-looking elderly British lady, who reminded me so much of Dame Judi Dench. She so kindly lent me her cell phone so that I could call my cousins and let them know the status of my flight...and she offered without me asking!
7. Had a nice little conversation with a man from Hong Kong, who lived in Glasgow for 15 years but now works in Dublin. He had such an odd accent – and it’s no wonder...
8. Eves-dropped on about a hundred different conversations.
9. Noticed that people in Heathrow kiss a lot more than in any other airport I’ve been in.
10. Had a wonderful time chatting and colouring a Shrek picture-book with a 4 year old girl called Isla. The sweetest girl I've ever met. *Isla: "I don't have any cousins. Some people don't have cousins, you know. Oh...I'm sure you already know that" (said in a darling little British accent). *heart melts
    

**more of crawling through UK soon.