Back in the USA - NY

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JFK

After my wonderful First Class flight experience, I found myself in JFK, an airport I had previously felt could go either way. Tonight, it went south, fast. Our flight was delayed about 40 minutes, which gave me just over an hour to get my luggage (already checked to Rochester), reload it at baggage check, check in for my flight and get to my gate for the last flight of the night. I was a little nervous after the last time I had to wait for luggage at JFK - same thing. 40 minutes!!!! This gave me a half hour. I loaded everything up myself and tried to find where to check through. When I finally found the Emirates counter, three employees were standing around gabbing and seemed very reluctant to help me. "Oh, well those bags aren't going to make this flight so your best bet is to take them to the other terminal and check in from there." Yeah, giant bags by myself to another terminal. I told them I definitely would not make it if I did that. So then their excuse to physically not move from their talking spots was "Well, we can't guarantee that they'll get there tonight." FINE!!!! Just check them!!! I'll gladly pick them up tomorrow as long as I make the flight. Lazy idiots. Then, I had to RUN to the next terminal and by my pedometer, from the time I got off the plane to the time I got to my gate, I walked/ran 1.3 miles. Fortunately, I had my ticket on Jet Blue, but the agents at the security line did not let me through because I had three items not two. I promised I would only put one in the overhead but she was having none of it and made me transfer everything into two bags. Then an agent AND another guy tried to cut in front of me at the security line and saying they were late for their flights. Me too a-holes! One of the guys was on my flight. Fortunately, our flight was delayed half an hour, so I made it in with about 10 minutes to spare. I was soooo thirsty at this point and a tiny bit hungry, so I stopped at a juice bar. Oh, the food court closes at 10pm. W.T.F. There were at least twenty flights that were leaving after this point - what sense does that make. I was so angry.

Welcome to America!!!

One of the rare high points of getting back to my wonderful home country was the pilot on our Jet Blue flight. He came out into the aisle and spoke on the intercom, apologizing for the delay and making fun of people from not coming from his hometown. He correctly asked us to not take it out on the attendants or ticket agents, so I felt better. When we finally took off, the other highlight was seeing the incredible moon out the window. It was so beautiful.

My brother-in-law, Michel, picked me up. I'm not sure how long he had to wait, but he helped me fit my gianormous luggage into his tiny car. We got to his home and had a beer, chatting, before we went to bed. In the morning, I got to see my sister and nephews before they left to start their day. My father came to get me and off we went home to Geneva. It was a pleasant drive and so great to see my family again.

I was in town for a couple of days, just relaxing before my parents and I set off to visit my other sister in DC. I was planning to stay with her and nanny for the next six weeks. About two hours into the drive, she calls us to say their house remodel was still ongoing and would we take the kids for a week instead. No problem. So, we stayed the night and the next day back to Geneva we went. In order to alleviate the potential boredom, we decided to camp a couple of nights in the Adirondacks - Old Forge. I even went back to Rochester to pick up Emry so he could spend the weekend with his cousins.

Old Forge

The drive was shorter than we thought, at just a couple of hours, and beautiful going through these quaint towns in the foothills of the mountains, seeing the deer and lakes. I thought the campground would be more in the mountains, but no mountains were to be seen. Oh well, it was a nice, busy campground. We cooked s'mores the first night and the next day, my dad and I went to town to scout their water park, which was one of the reasons we came. $30!!! $30!!! I could not stop exclaiming this. We are in a podunk town in upstate New York and they want $30 for entry to this water park! Even for little kids!! $30!!!!!! That's not much less than the Disney water parks, and this place ain't no Disney! There would have to be at least two adults to watch them, so that is $150 and I'm sure you aren't allowed to bring food in here and the food is most likely astronomical. I was bummed, but there is another play park right next to it, Calypso something, with mini-golf and race cars and such. It showed just a $6 entrance fee so I was thinking we could go there, until I read the tiny print: "Pay as you go games" So they want you to pay $6 for the privilege of just going in. And there were no prices shown for the individual activities, so you know what that means. Where the heck are we??? How do people afford this place? For a weekend camping experience, you're talking hundreds of dollars! And for what?

I felt so bad when we broke the news to the kids that we just could not pay that kind of money for what would probably be just a few hours at most on a crappy day. Did I mention it was cold and rainy the whole time? Instead, I suggested the paddle boat on the lake and they got excited. So, for $6 I took all three kids on the paddle boat and they loved it. I think it was their favorite thing all weekend. Afterwards, they swam in the lake at the roped off area. The lake was freezing and the weather was cold so I was not going in unless I needed to. Fortunately, the roped area was basically just above my knees so they mostly splashed around.

More s'mores that night and we left pretty early the next day. This place is a huge tourist trap. I think we were all disappointed, but that is one of the few low points of exploration - they can't all be winners.

So, we got back Thursday afternoon and took the DC kids to visit their other grandparents who live a whole block away from us. We kept Emry for the night. The next night, Dana and Michel and Olivier joined us - Dana and Michel went to a wedding while we watched the boys. We were going to go to a winery for a light dinner and views of the lake. Unfortunately, everything closes by 5 or 6, so we wandered around until we finally just went to a playground on the lake. They loved it and we were going to get ice cream afterwards. However, when I took Olivier off the merry-go-round, he started getting really upset. So I carried him and was trying to play with him at the same time. I guess Mom and Emry were behind me and he wanted her to pick him up and when she refused, he ran to see if I would. Only I didn't know and he ran in front of my legs so I tripped over him with the baby in my arms and the three of us sprawled in the middle of the park. Fortunately, I was able to push Olivier to the grass so just Emry got scraped up. Poor kid, but needless to say, they were too upset for ice cream! We were a mess and I could not stop laughing.

And such was my first nanny experience…..Duhn duhn DUHN!!!

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Photos

Emry liked to roast marshmallows and sticks
didn't care much for s'mores

Comments

[Josevich]

Reunions
such a fun read :)