Day Twelve - Longest day of my life

Backblip #12

With all the cancelled flights out of Sydney, United decided to bring in a "ferry" to take all the stranded passengers to Los Angeles, California. Being an airline employee, my husband found the flight and booked us on it. It wasn't a flight that anyone could have purchased apparently. It was just designed to clean up the horrific mess of two full 747's being cancelled. It was a dream come true for us.

After a 13-hour flight, we landed in Los Angeles and began a desperate attempt to find flights home. Flying standby on the weekend is NOT an easy task with a family of four, and all the flights were booked to the rim. We considered every option possible to get out of LAX. I then remembered we have several thousand miles still to use on Alaska Air and by the luck of the universe, found two sets of 2 seats on a flight heading for Portland. I booked the seats and then waited 12 hours in LAX for our flight to board.

I hope I don't offend anyone, but I absolutely hate Los Angeles. I took this shot sitting on a bench outside of LAX. There were hundreds of people around me. We were inhaling gallons of car exhaust, cigarette smoke and apparently forest fire smoke. LAX is my most unfavorite airport in the world and was created long ago with no idea of what it would become. I wanted out of there more than you can know.

So this diptych represents what I saw (left) and what I "see" (right) if you know what I mean.

Since this day doesn't end until tomorrow, I'll finish it up tomorrow. :)