home again, home again, jiggedy-jig

we made it home from thailand yesterday. the flights were a little brutal. actually, the bangkok-tokyo flight was not bad, got in some decent naps. but tokyo-portland was brutal. two little kids in the row behind us. that's not necessarily bad, but the mom and grandma were not exactly paragons of in-flight manners. you know, when they turn the cabin lights off its usually so people can sleep better. people sleep or watch a movie or read, and pretty much there is no talking. well, mom and grandma started yelling from one end of the row to talk to each other. and what a great time to tickle the kids until the scream! for the first 6 hours of an 8.5 hour flight. i didn't get any sleep.

then i had 6 hours in portland, so i got to see michele arntz and chloe and spencer. cute kids, and i can't believe chloe is so old already! she's definitely a real person now. crazy. and it was fall in portland, something i haven't experienced in awhile. cool temperature, which i was not prepared for since i was leaving a tropical country and ending up in phoenix (high in the mid-90s today). it was a good time in portland. i had my first real sandwich (salami) in 3 months! delicious.

then the flight to phoenix was packed. by that point i could not keep my eyes open, so most of the 2.5 hours was spent napping in uncomfortable positions and occasionally banging my head on the window as i dozed off. interesting story about boarding that flight. it was on alaska airlines, whereas the other flights had been on northwest. my boarding pass was printed by northwest in bangkok. it said something about only being valid with a flight coupon attached, which was not. so i asked someone in bangkok about it, they said no problem its a boarding pass. then i asked 2 people (one from northwest, one from alaska) in portland. no problem, see where it says boarding pass in multiple places? well, when i tried to get on the plane, the lady said, "oh, this won't work. you need a new ticket." umm, what? well, whatever, they just printed one in like 2 seconds, but still. and there was another guy who'd been on my flight from tokyo that had the same problem. (he was a whole day late due to a flight cancellation the day before in tokyo, he was getting on that plane to phoenix.)

ok, that's all for now. more later on our vacation adventures in thailand, and pictures.