8-11 January 2013

Following the time in San Antonio where I was very fortunate to spend time with Liza Hunter-Galvan, Ariel, Haleigh, Amber, Taegan and Tristan, it was great to share a farewell meal with the family and sing happy birthday to my brother across in Ho Chi Minh on Skype while at an outdoor restaurant under heaters.

The joy of modern technology with wifi in restaurants. The availability of wifi access is brilliant across much of America as this is seen to provide a competitive advantage and is certainly appreciated by customers.

 
In leaving San Antonio I decided to visit Phoenix where my Dad’s ex-wife Carol lives and thought it would be good to spend some long overdue time catching up. At San Antonio Airport the airport dramas were just to get started with my bag overweight and after being instructed that I had to remove 20 pounds a United Airlines staff member decided to toss my bag on the belt prior to it being tagged.

I was instructed to wait for the bag to be returned and waited and waited for almost half an hour with the bag not sighted. It was closing on boarding time and my friendly assistant who had instructed me that there was no way the bag was leaving unless it was repacked had already vanished to board a flight. After waiting very patiently I then mentioned to the guy who tossed my bag on the belt incorrectly that there was a risk that I would miss my flight with boarding in 15 minutes and I was yet to go through security.

It was mentioned that the bag was being found and that he would take care of correctly ticketing the bag. I then went through security and was waiting for my flight when the notification was made for volunteers to offer up a seat for a free flight. While I was keen to get to Phoenix I was not i a major rush and every dollar counts right now especially when it comes to air fares.

The trade off was to wait for an additional three hours, have a complimentary flight and receive the bonus upgrade to first class for the short flight. I arrived into Phoenix to find that my bag had miraculously not made the trip with me and after lodging a missing bag with the airport I jumped on a Super Shuttle Bus to head into Scottsdale to meet up with Carol.

It was great to see Carol and we spoke for over three hours non-stop catching up on all the latest family and life news. Following a good sleep in the next morning after the hectic marathon schedule it was a relaxed first day in Phoenix where we enjoyed a good walk for over an hour around the local area and then lunch prior to the bag being delivered from United with the wheels almost detached from the bag and the delivery guy not the happiest guy in town. First class service!!!

There are lots of memories shared and one of my all time favourite meals growing up was Carol’s lasagne so it was with much anticipation that Carol’s sister Jan joined us for a home cooked lasagne. It is quite ironic that this is the final meal prior to picking up a terrible stomach virus where later that night I would be up for most of the night being very ill.

The next few days were very slow with a lot of time spent in bed recovering. Although this was extremely hard to handle physically and I was disappointed that I could not be more fun I couldn’t help but think how lucky I had been that this had happened when I was not running.

In the remaining time in Phoenix I was able to make it out to dinner although I was not in the best form to share Chinese and generally attempted to take it easy prior to heading towards Las Vegas for the Running From An Angel Marathon on Saturday.