The voyage is underway

Last night Kathryn got a call from my brother-in-law, who offered us an unexpected ride to the airport. He was heading to work not far from the airport either way, so we didn’t feel like we imposing too much when we accepted his offer, and we were grateful not to have to find our own way there.

I’m not sure what’s going on right now, but I’m surprised just how busy the airport is today. Perhaps I don’t fly often on Saturdays.

The check-in counter for Delta was quite busy, although a lot of the agents’ time was being consumed by two women — let’s call them “mature” — who appeared confused by absolutely everything.

The TSA checkpoint had a relatively long line for Precheck, but it moved relatively quickly. This time is was a large family that caused much of the hold-up.

Not that we didn’t contribute a bit of the TSA checkpoint delays ourselves. I had forgotten I had my smartphone in my pocket when I passed through the metal detector. That was my bad. Kathryn had to have a secondary search because they found a beverage bottle on x-ray that wasn’t, in fact, a beverage bottle. That was TSA’s bad.

Apparently, though, I’ve been spoiled with my last few airport visits. When I looked at my watch after the TSA checkpoint, it’d been less than an hour since we left the house. Since we live about a half-hour from the airport, the delays were minor.

Earlier this year, knowing that we had several flights planned in the coming months, I decided to get a “premium” airline credit card as a one-year experiment. I’m not sold that they’re worth the money, but this seemed like a good year to find out whether I’m wrong about that. The upshot is that we’re spending our waiting time in the Delta SkyClub.

A small second breakfast of eggs and sausage.

Phoenix isn’t a Delta hub, so I was thinking the SkyClub would have, at most, some cold snacks. We were therefore delighted to discover some hot breakfast items offered. We ate breakfast about an hour before we left the house, but with a long flight to JFK in front of us, we had a little more to eat. Just to be safe.