The End of All Things (in France)

I remember the first blog update of this trip, all those days ago. I was sitting in Los Angeles International Airport, waiting for my flight to Paris. I guess everything does in fact come full circle, because I just got of my flight from Paris and now I’m waiting in LAX.

Now get the hell out.

The last few days have been such a blur, it’s hard for me to keep track that I’m no longer in France. I tried to check in my bags at the Southwest Airline counter, and I greeted the guy behind the counter with a smile and a “bonjour, monsieur.” He looked at me like I’m a crazy man (he’s probably not too far off).

So, since Orange, I’ve been traveling. I ended up having to take a horrible detour of a train ride to Marseille before heading home to Pau. So that added an extra 2 hours to a six hour train ride (was that Monday, or Tuesday? I’m not sure). Then, the train stopped on the tracks for a 45 minute delay, bringing the total train ride up to about 9 hours. Then, because of the delay, I had to catch a later train from Toulouse to Pau, which was the one that went the long way around, so the entire trip took 10 hours instead of 4.

When I returned to Pau with my 50lb duffel bag and my 30lb backpack, the busses weren’t running, so I got to hike the 2 miles to my hotel lugging all of that stuff. From the hotel I went back to see Stephanie and retrieve my second suitcase, and by the time I actually got settled into my hotel room for the night, it was already 1am.

That’s when I got the email that said my flight was not in fact at 11am the next morning, but at 7am, which meant I had to be at the airport around 5. So I resolved to stay up the extra couple of hours. Then, I realized there were no busses running that early in the morning, so I resolved to take a taxi. Then, I realized that the phone in my hotel room didn’t let me dial out to the taxi company, so I resolved to find a payphone. Then, I found out that there is no such thing in France as a payphone that doesn’t require a calling card, so I resolved to bash my head against a wall and see which would dent first (the wall, if you were wondering).

I was finally saved by my panic-stricken family and my cool-thinking cousin Sarah, who booked me a taxi from my hotel to the airport, all from the comfort of New York. So, now the ordeal of me trying to come home has become an international incident. Great.

Apart from the schedule change, the flights on Air France went off without a hitch. Well, okay, I had this stinky, weak-bladdered, no respect for personal space-type Frenchman sitting in the seat next to me all the way to Los Angeles. So that was pretty miserable. And the food on the plane was awful, except for a small dish of lamb and mashed potatoes (at least, I tell myself it was lamb and mashed potatoes, it really could have been anything). So my last real meal was McDonald’s for lunch in Marseille, which I believe was somewhere around 2:00 on the 20^th. I’m starving.

So naturally I wanted to check in my bags at Southwest and head up to the food court to grab a meal. But see, here’s the catch… I can’t check in my bags until 4 hours before my flight, so now I’m waiting for an hour and a half, and for some reason there’s no food until after you head through security. What the hell, LAX? Oh yeah, and about the lack of sleep. I’ve been lacking in the R&R department since Orange.

So by the time I get home at midnight tonight, my family’s probably going to be welcoming in an empty husk of what used to be Shelby. But, by then I’ll have internet, so if I’m still alive, I’ll probably post this and check in with Stephanie, who’s now alone in France for the holidays. Having been on my own for so much of this trip, I know how much that sucks. And she doesn’t even have awesome travel experiences to distract her, she’s stuck in Pau. And at this point I’m just rambling on to distract myself from the thought of food, so I’ll show some self-restraint and sign off for the day. See you all real soon!

UPDATE: Fantastic news everyone! My flight from LAX to Sacramento has been delayed, probably by an hour, but no one really knows for sure. I’ve not slept in forever! I want to cry!