Monday, March 1, 2010

First plane ride as an ostomate...sat in a window seat!

Oscar and I took our first plane ride together on Friday night. I am a member of "Healing Well" a forum based web site for people with a bunch of medical issues and asked what I should bring/do as an ostomate getting on a plane. A resounding "bring extra supplies in your purse" rang out and I put 2 extra pouches as well as a skin barrier and a bunch of paper towels into a baggie and was set.
I am always "randomly selected" for pat downs and thought..."hm, a pat down with Oscar? this should be interesting" but it never happened. I felt a little disappointed because I love showing him off whenever I get a chance. For the first time in 13 years, I sat in a window seat. In fact, I politely asked a man if we could switch seats, he was all for it because he liked having the extra leg room an aisle seat affords you. I'm short, really short according to all of my family so I don't need leg room. Anyway....about an hour into our flight (3:15am) with the entire plane sleeping, I realize I need to use the washroom. Not a panicked "I need a washroom NOW" but a "hm, I may have drank too many bottles of water and need to use the washroom" I felt horrible having to wake up my snoring husband and the man next to him, but I felt wonderful knowing I just had to pee.
Our 12:30am flight into Toronto was delayed until 2:15am, we missed our connection at Pearson into London and ended up having to rent a car and drive like maniacs down the 401 in a blizzard to get to the family photo for noon. We left Toronto at 10:00am and made it to London at 11:55am. The entire time Oscar was great. I cleaned him whenever the chance arose and marveled at how easy travelling is when you aren't worrying about a washroom. After the family photo, Neil and I decided to return our $300.00 rental car. The rest of the afternoon was great, Oma's birthday was wonderful and it was really nice to see all the family, especially my 2nd cousin Crystal who I haven't seen in 22 years. She's just awesome.
Sunday afternoon we watched the gold medal hockey game and had to leave for the airport just as the US scores to tie up the game at the end of the 3rd period. Crap. Standing in line in the London airport we here cheers from the lounge and hear that Crosby scored the winning goal in Overtime. Canada wins the gold. YAY!
Once on the plane to Toronto we realize we don't have seat numbers on our boarding passes. We get off the plane in Toronto and ask at the ticket desk. We are informed that the plane has been over-booked and we don't have seats. WTF??? After a nervous hour wait, we are given seats in the back of the plane in different aisles. No biggie. We arrive in Edmonton, ecstatic to be home and realize, our bag is MIA. After the week-end from hell (flight/driving wise) our bag is no where to be found. Awesome.
Today, Air Canada sends us our bag, yippee. We dig out our Avis car rental bill and get on the phone to dispute all the charges, then we find out we are charged $144.00 for GAS!! In a freakin Dodge Avenger. Insane. I'll keep you posted.
PS: the best part of everything...is always Oscar. He's wonderful.

1 comment:

  1. Allie, I`ve just discovered your blog. I`m ashamed to say I didn`t know much about the specific difficulties you faced before Oscar. I`m so happy that Oscar has made such a huge change in your life. I loved seeing both you and Neil too. Thanks for the nice words....Christel :)

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