Day 1

I don't particularly start packing till the night before i leave. Pri understands. We start the evening before, to barely finish the packing about an hour before leaving for the airport. No particular reason, it just makes it easier to dump everything I need at the last minute than start ages beforehand, only to remove stuff as I continue to use them, thus forgetting to take them with me. Inspite of this, I forgot to pack the camera and socks heh.

Left home at 6:15am to get to SNA at about 6:45. Morning flights from there are usually full and it takes forever to get thru the security check. I'm loving the kerbside check in btw.

Walked in to the security check at about 7:00 only to find a grand total of 6 people in the line *groan*

So after verifying my name and image with my passport, I was asked to take off my belt, shoes and jewellery before walking thru the security screen. I then find my gate is not too far away. *sigh* and also found out that no food is served on the flights...there is stuff for breakfast, but that it needs to be bought

Flight takes off at about 8:45am and that was one horrible journey. I got seated between 3 screaming kids and their mum. My offer to swap places so that they could all be together resulted in my sitting between the mother and another strange person who promptly decided to fall asleep on my shoulder. *sigh* Did I mention the screaming kids?

Four and a half hours later, I landed at Atlanta and fell in love with the airport. Thats when the drama started. Atlanta is 3 hours ahead, so we landed at 4:15pm and my connecting flight to Daytona Beach was at 5:21pm. Or so I thought.

Walked around the airport, called Smitha and my bro, got some food, had a smoke, and then rocked up to the gate half an hour later. Thats when we are told that there seems to be an electrical problem with the aircraft, and that we would be delayed by 45 mins. *collective groan by waiting passengers* And on top of that, we are told not to venture out too far or for too long (no more than 5 mins) as Delta would begin boarding as soon as the problem is fixed.

So called my bro again, and then called Abby (who was in turn dealing with the issue of killing the mice she needs to do her experiments on) and mum...wasted another 20 mins admiring the airport and having another smoke.

At 5:50pm, Delta kindly informs us that the problem with the aircraft seems to be taking a lot longer than expected. ETD 7:30pm. *bigger groan with a coupla angry exclamations*

If we left at 7:30pm, I'd get to Daytona at 9:00pm...which at that point seemed way too too damn late. Then mum calls me back and in her usual fashion as checked the weather conditions online (i have no idea why and how that realted to said electrical problem delaying us) and informs me that there are two major hurricanes heading towards FL and thats prolly why its being delayed.

While talking to her, the nice lady behind the counter apologetically informs us that the problem seems to be more serious than expected and has gotten us a new aircraft at a different gate. *sighs quickly changing to groans as we realise that it could be in a different terminal* Atlanta's airport is massive! Thankfully, they bump people scheduled to leave from the gate next to us to Terminal A and we proceed to get on the flight.

The flight to Daytona Beach takes 55mins...but we are 12th in line for take off...so we have to sit pretty in the aircraft, taking a scenic albeit slow 'tour' of the airport runways *grin*

Daytona Beach is hot and humid. My bro picks me up and we head to an Irish Pub with his girlfriend, her sister, Tom and Jess. Tom's the vocals for their band and is with the paper as well. Had a nice relaxing time playing pool and drinking raspberry beer and Irish Hoeegarden. But the chicken wings....mmmm...now that was brilliant! We then went to a 24hr Kmart, got chips and ramdom strange things and headed to Tom's place for a movie, The Barbarian Invasions, spilt red wine on a whie carpet, ate far too many chips, had far too much wine and had a lovely time. Tom looks like a 6ft version of your Dan with a strange goatee and long curly hair. His girlfriend Jess was a lil er...demanding, but proceeded to fall asleep as soon as the movie started coz she didn't want to read the subtitles. *sigh* Tom's cool, he has a lovely voice but can't remember lyrics to save his life, which doesn't bother him...he proceeds to substitute the original lyrics with whatever comes to his head heh but still carrys the tune...he's from Claifornia too and we are going to San Diego with him for the Street Fest.

Stumbled home at 5am and crashed.