The flight to NY was uneventful, which is good. I watched 500 Days of Summer, which was pretty good. Katie did some homework, listened to her I-pod and slept a little. I tried to sleep and maybe did for a few minutes, but it was nice to just rest for awhile. With so many little things to do to prepare to travel, I enjoyed the rest. We met up with my mother-in-law, Pat, in NY and we just ate dinner and are now waiting for our plane to Dubai. How cool is that?




We just arrived at our hotel in Dubai. Lots of good things to report and a few glitches, as well. The flight was uneventful and loooong. We flew Emirates, which is a very nice airline. If you are going to be stuck in a plane for 12 hours or so, they try and make it as nice as possible. Each seat has its own screen and an enormous list of movies, t.v. shows and games to choose from. Katie was so excited about the movie choices that she joked the flight wouldn’t be long enough. She did change her mind after about 7 hours passed. I watched the movie, Julie and Julia, as well as several episodes of Arrested Development. I never did any reading and slept only a little bit here and there. Not as much as I had hoped. The food was actually very good. We had 2 meals, dinner and breakfast. They had pillows and blankets ready, they passed out hot towels for our hands and my glass of wine was no extra charge. The flight was not overly crowded, so there were lots of extra seats. Unfortunately, we did not grab them quickly enough and stayed in our assigned seats most of the time. I got a little jealous when some people had 3 or 4 seats to themselves and we were scrunched together, but no worries. I watched the plane’s progress as it traveled and it was a little unnerving to be flying over cities that have made the news in recent years for being hostile.



One little hint for future travelers. Please, please lock the bathroom door when you go inside. I had the joy of opening the door to find an older man sitting on the pot. He grabbed the door and closed it quickly. Now, come on. It’s not my fault. Everyone knows to move the latch over once they’re inside. Now I have that visual in my head and it’s not a good one.
Once we landed in Dubai, we got our passports stamped, which was cool. The airport is clean and beautiful. It’s easy to find your way around there and luggage carts were free. Here’s one of the glitches. 3 of our 4 bags were waiting. For you Mathematicians out there, that’s 75%. I was hoping for 100%. The tub of orphanage donations remains MIA. So, off to make a report I went. Now, that’s really what I wanted to do after 3 flights ½ way around the world. But, it really just took about 30 min. I just hope they find the tub. It has a lot of toothbrushes, toothpaste, toys, etc. for the orphanage. Note to self....wearing the INDIANA sweatshirt screams "tourist".



Another glitch was that our hotel did NOT have a shuttle, which I thought for sure that they did. So, we exchanged money, took a taxi to the hotel and checked in. We all had some snacks and now Katie and Pat went out to go buy some bottled water and soda for our stay here.
All is well. I’m one day closer to holding my daughter! I’m thankfully off to bed.