Episode 8 Transcript - I've Been Everywhere: Travel Stories
Episode 8 - Travel Stories
Rachel: [00:00:00] The content of this podcast, Generation Mom, is for entertainment purposes only. The views and opinions expressed by the hosts and their guests are their own and do not constitute professional advice. While we strive to provide accurate and up to date information, this podcast is not intended to replace or substitute for any professional, medical, financial, legal, or other advice.
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Pam: The plane was like, it was full of this billowing smoke. And the stewardess is, we're really there to serve people. And I also remember when that changed, when the stewardesses were like, I'm not here to be your waitress. I'm here to assure your safety. They didn't say that back then, Oh, and the dangers of an airplane [00:01:00] were really downplayed then. So it's like they didn't go through this whole seatbelt thing and the airbags and all of that stuff. They really didn't want you to even think that anything would happen. So that's really, that really changed too.
Rachel: Hello, and welcome to Generation Mom. I'm Rachel, the elder millennial who tries to stay grounded in all of the chaos of modern parenthood.
Pam: I'm Pam, the Bloomer Mom, to my two co hosts and Nana to their kids. I've spent And I'm here to share my generational wisdom with a touch of tough love.
Laurel: And
Pam: I'm Laurel,
Laurel: your Gen X voice of reason, stuck in the middle, ready to weigh in with unsugarcoated advice.
Rachel: Join us as we tackle life's big questions across three generations, sharing laughs and insights along the way. This is Generation Mom.
Welcome back.
Pam: We're [00:02:00] glad to be back.
Rachel: We are glad to be back and today we're back with a fun episode. We feel like we've had a heavy couple of weeks So today we're going to talk about travel.
We are a traveling family and we have lots of experiences good and bad, traveling around the world. But I wanted to set the stage today because we do talk about the generations and talk a little bit about how, really, air travel has changed. I won't go all the way back to the beginning of that.
The plane being invented, but Right
or stage coach travel
or anything that predates us like that.
But I will start. So I went to the air and space. Museum website, which I love that museum. It's my favorite place to go when I'm in Washington, D. C. I don't know why I love it so much, but it's a lot of fun to go to.
How
Laurel: often are you in Washington, D. C.? I used
Rachel: to be there [00:03:00] all the time for work. Oh. I have to go like once a year, once or twice a year for work, and I would always go to the Air and Space Museum, and they would have, they had, have like old planes from the like late 50s and 60s there and you can go in and sit in them and pretend you're traveling and style in the 60s.
But They have a great history of air and space on their website. In 1955, for the first time, more people in the United States traveled by air than by train.
By 1957, airliners had replaced ocean liners as the preferred means of crossing the Atlantic. Which is wild to me, because I don't even think about getting on a boat specifically to cross the Atlantic. You think we go on cruises as a family, but we don't, we're not really heading to a final destination.
We do these round trip.
Laurel: Yeah. I've been looking into all these manifests and everything. And it takes [00:04:00] weeks.
Rachel: Yeah.
Laurel: And in our case, at least it looks like there were various legs. So they would travel from one country to another. And then get on another boat and travel some more. So it took months,
Rachel: Laurel's son is an avid genealogist.
1958 to today, jet passenger service began in the United States in the late 1950s with the introduction of Boeing 707 and the Douglas DC 8 airliners.
The jet engine revolutionized air travel, powerful and durable jets enabled aircraft manufacturers to build bigger, faster, and more productive airliners. The effects of deregulation along with the computer revolution and heightened security measures, especially following the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, have profoundly changed the nature of the air travel experience.
From this [00:05:00] time of 1958 to today, which covers all of us jetting across the Atlantic briefly became highly fashionable and prestigious, and a new breed of travelers, the jet set, emerged. But falling fares in the 1970s allowed many more people to fly and undermined the exclusivity of jet travel.
Us riffraff came in to the picture. Sweeping cultural changes in the 60s and 70s reshaped the airline industry. More people began to fly and air travel became less exclusive. Between 1955 and 1972, passenger numbers more than quadrupled. And by 1972, almost half of all Americans had flown, although most passengers were still business travelers.
A small percentage became repeat travelers or frequent flyers. Since deregulation, travelers have benefited from [00:06:00] low fares, more frequent service on heavily traveled routes, and on other routes, fares have risen. So to offer low fares, airlines have cut costs in other ways.
Further reducing the luxury of air travel to offer low airfares, airlines have had to cut costs in other ways, often by reducing, eliminating, or charging for that air travelers once took for granted. Paying for your checked baggage, paying for snacks, paying to pick your seat. Basically you pay for everything.
Now, the internet has revolutionized how people plan trips, buy tickets and obtain boarding passes. And we mentioned already that heightened security, especially since. September 11th has made the airport experience more restrictive and time consuming. And I definitely remember, I flew home soon after September 11th from college, and [00:07:00] it was strange because we went from this time of, walking into the airport together, you could take someone right to their gate and watch the plane take off and wave.
And all of a sudden you have to have a ticket to get through security. They're making you take your shoes off and everything off and open your bags.
And it had definitely changed a lot
before we get into all of that, mom, can you talk a little bit about what it was like to travel? Did you travel when you were a kid?
Pam: Yes. I think the first time I remember traveling in an airplane, I was five, about five years old and we were going to New York City. And I remember it was a very big deal and everybody, we really dressed up.
I still remember the outfit I had on and it was a very fancy little velvet outfit that had, it was like a little jumpsuit and it had a little silk [00:08:00] shirt and it was green. You must've been so schvitzed. Remember I was in Michigan at that time, so
Laurel: it was.
They like didn't have air conditioning in the planes, did they?
Pam: I don't remember being too hot. Usually it was cold in the plane, just like it is today. But anyway, I remember this outfit and I had very long hair. My hair was down past my waist and My mother used to pull it way too tight into a ponytail.
So I remember I had my hair in a ponytail and I just remember it seemed as to a five year old, like it was a very luxurious this, I remember that there were fewer seats. It's not like today where you're like a sardine. The seats had more leg room and I don't think we, I don't think we flew first class, but I can't say that we didn't, but I don't think we did.
So I think we were in coach, [00:09:00] but it was very nice. And from the time you got on the plane until you left the plane, they were bringing you stuff. They bring you a little towel to wipe your hands with. They brought the kids like little wings, from the airline. They bring you, everybody would get a pack of cards playing cards And then all kinds of snacks.
And I remember it was really a treat to eat a meal on a plane. Cause it was a wonderful meal only in miniature. So it was really fun, especially, for a kid, cause it was you're sized, as a kid of course they allowed smoking and that time and everybody smoked back then.
The plane was like, it was full of this billowing smoke. And the stewardess is, we're really there to serve people. And I also remember when that changed, when the stewardesses were like, [00:10:00] I'm not here to be your waitress. I'm here to assure your safety. They didn't say that back then, Oh, and the dangers of an airplane were really downplayed then. So it's like they didn't go through this whole seatbelt thing and the airbags and all of that stuff. They really didn't want you to even think that anything would happen. So that's really, that really changed too. And then as, Time went on and in the sixties, I was traveling back and forth to various schools that I went to at the time.
Cause I went to boarding school in high school and then I went to college. So I was doing a lot more. flying. And I remember at that point in the sixties, that's when the dress code really changed and it was a much more relaxed dress code. Although if you went [00:11:00] to the airport dressed up, you were more likely to get your seat upgraded.
Which so some of us did that so we could fly first class, but anyway yeah, so that's when things really changed and the whole hippie movement and the long hair and all of that, and that really affected air travel because people just weren't dressing up, as much as they were in the fifties, for example.
And then planes started to get. They were bigger, but they were more like sardine cans because they were trying to get as many seats in as they possibly could. And they wanted the The cost of air travel to go down, like you said. And so they started taking, all the amenities away and, we're, you used to get free snacks.
I don't think you get free snacks anymore. And how long
Rachel: your flight is. Yeah. [00:12:00] Delta will give you, the Biscoff cookie. Oh, you might get on another airline, like a small, tiny bag of pretzels. And then if you fly overseas. You get it usually get a meal of some sort.
Pam: This is a little thing, but I remember when they'd come around with the snack tray. They give you all three snacks that they had on there. Now you don't get that.
You, you get one. So you'd end up with, three little packs of, and then you could ask for more if you wanted it. And I remember a time when you didn't have to ask for the, like the can of diet Coke. They would just give you a whole can of Coke. And they don't do that anymore either.
Rachel: No.
It depends on the airline. Sometimes if you ask. They'll give it to you, but you have to ask cause they won't offer it to you. And then there was the whole thing about going through security. There was no security. We walked in, we gave our bags and then [00:13:00] we walked onto the airplane. And I remember when I was going to private school, my parents used to walk right, to the gate with me.
Pam: And I could, they could sit with me till my plane took off and all of that. You can't do that anymore. And then when we got off the plane, we just. We just got off and there weren't any walkways either. There are now you had to go down a staircase. And there was a time when people used to actually run out to meet the plane when the plane landed.
And I remember that when I was that first time I flew, I remember that when we got into New York, people ran out to meet the plane. Which they never let you do today. And so there was no security really at all. And they didn't care, what you brought on. They didn't care what you carry in your hand luggage, nothing like today.
So yeah, that's what it [00:14:00] was like. It was a really nice way to travel and, now I just can't stand it. It's I get so nervous. So stressful. I get so nervous in the airport now.
Rachel: Yeah. Anxiety. Yeah. Inducing. Do you remember your first plane trip?
Laurel: I don't know that I specifically remember my first plane trip but I remember in the beginning.
We did dress a little nicer. I remember I used to get the Delta wings. I do remember that. And I remember when we would land, we would clap for the pilot, and that was a thing. And by the time I went to college, like there was a stretch where I didn't fly for a really long time.
Laurel: And then. Towards the end of high school, we did a couple trips and then I went to college and I was flying every few months. Yeah, by then, that wasn't a thing. And, now when we fly, I'm in lounge wear, my kids are in PJs, and, make it as comfortable [00:15:00] As possible because it's miserable and you're squished in there and you have to pay for freaking everything.
Rachel: You have to pay for absolutely everything. And now even the security process, you can get your TSA pre check status, but now that's not even faster. Now you have to get clear, but sometimes that's not available. And now we're in Atlanta, the Atlanta airport, they have this super VIP. where you basically go to your own private terminal and wait there and then they drive you to your plane, but that costs like a million dollars or whatever.
That's for the celebrities who fly or really rich people. So it's they've taken air travel and they make you pay for everything. And I'm going to Spain in October. And even like that whole process. Bought the plane ticket. But if I want to go ahead and reserve my seat now, so I don't get stuck in the middle between two people all [00:16:00] the way to I fly to Amsterdam first, I have to pay money to reserve my seat.
And then I decided if I'm going to pay this much, I might as well pay this much to be in Delta comfort where I get a little more it's just, it's ridiculous.
Laurel: See, this is the difference between my husband and me because, he's got TSA. And the rest of us don't. And even the rules on that are confusing because some airports will let us all go together because he has it.
Some airports specifically will split us all up. And so it's weird how that works out sometimes. But he's got that. And then You know, he will only fly Delta. He's such a snob. And then he has to pay for the specific seat he wants. It drives me nuts. I am, like, southwest all the way, get my two free bags, sit wherever I sit, and, save my money, and
Rachel: even [00:17:00] Southwest has put away with the Cineroom seating.
Pam: You're your father.
Laurel: I know. She
Rachel: is her father. But
Laurel: it's not worth it. It's not worth the 200 extra dollars. It is
Rachel: to me. It is to me, too.
No, I get it. For a short flight, no. I'll
Laurel: If we're doing overseas, I might, but
Rachel: Yeah, if I'm going to be on a plane for six hours, even across the country, even going to LA or something, like if I'm going to be on a plane for a long time, I want to be comfortable. If I'm just flying for an hour or two hours, then no, I'm not going to pay to do that.
But
Laurel: most of my flights that I take are under two hours. And, the flight we did Overseas. I hadn't flown overseas since high school. That, that's how long that experience is for me. Whereas, I fly, to my in laws or up north or, whatever, frequently.
Rachel: And for that flight, I think I did pay for us to have, at least be able to choose our seats. So that we weren't
Laurel: sitting
Rachel: apart from each other and sitting The
Laurel: cost of the [00:18:00] ticket was part of our package. Oh, that's
Rachel: right. So
Laurel: we had some leeway there, too.
Rachel: But it is definitely a difference.
And how you're treated, especially overseas. So last year I went to Italy and flying there, I did pay to have basically I flew Air France or no, I flew KLM over there and I basically paid for their equivalent of Delta Comfort Plus or whatever. So I had more leg room.
I got this amazing travel pillow that I'll link to in the show notes that like gently cradles your head nicely so your head doesn't fall forward when you're sleeping and all that. And I had a really decent flight over and I think KLM's a really lovely airline. They're really nice to you wherever you are.
So that was actually a good experience. But on the way back, as I was checking in, I got an offer to upgrade to first class and it was a decent price [00:19:00] and I decided I deserved it and I treated myself and I upgraded to first class. And I'm ruined forever. That's right. That's right. Because first of all, I got to use the KLM lounge in Amsterdam during my layover there, which was amazing.
And you get There's a locker to put your stuff in. They have all sorts of food and drinks. And so I just sat there, take a shower if you want. Like they, so I had some champagne and I called my husband and the kids and talk to them on FaceTime. And then I I just had a great time in the lounge and then, your first class.
So I was like one of the first on the plane and I'm in my own little like cove kind of seat. And that's very nice. Flight attendant comes up to me and he's, [00:20:00] hello, ma'am. Welcome to KLM. Would you like some champagne? And I think I had two or three glasses of champagne before we even took off because he kept offering it to me.
And then, they bring you like the good food when you're. And so I had sushi, like good sushi. I was like, really? You're serving sushi on a plane. No, this was like fresh. I'd
Laurel: be concerned about fish. No,
Rachel: it was, the food was amazing. So usually when I fly and I eat the airplane food, I get horribly bloated and I feel awful.
No, this was like eating a lovely meal at a restaurant. I drank a lot on this flight. Wine with dinner and then an after dinner beverage. And I fell, I passed out probably, but I was watching a movie. And when I woke up, my seat had been reclined and they closed the little door and they had tucked me in the bed.
So I had [00:21:00] it was, and I woke up and I'm just and then he comes, he's I'm so sorry. I didn't want to wake you. So you missed our morning snack, which was like a burger, which I don't, who wants to eat a burger at eight in the morning after you've been flying all night, but whatever.
And then I guess it's a thing on KLM, but they have these little houses. They're like these little ceramic houses and they're filled with some kind of. Liqueur or something. And you get that as a parting gift. Oh my God. And I've been ruined forever. I'm like, I have to figure out how to fly first class again, but I'm not going to pay 10, 000 for a seat.
But I get offered it as an upgrade. I think that was worth every single penny that I paid for it.
Pam: I remember the first time I flew, I don't know if it was first class or business class, but they came with this dessert cart and you could have a hot fudge Sunday. I was. I was blown away because [00:22:00] I said, my God, I've never seen anything like this.
And they were making, and they actually had the big thing of ice cream and with the scoop and everything, and they'd give you as many scoops as you wanted. And then they'd put all the toppings on and everything. I was so blown away that you could actually get that. On an airplane. Yeah, I have the same experience, me I like to, at least business class now,
Laurel: you have some medical reasons for that too.
Pam: With my health issues, I really I really need to. But and I'm lucky that, I can afford to do that, but I just. It's just a different world. It really is. And I think it's better maybe not to know what goes on up there. So
Rachel: I feel like it's ruined me to know.
Laurel: That sounded very fancy even for first class.
Rachel: That was super fancy and I think it was just a KLM thing. Like I don't think Delta First class is [00:23:00] that luxurious. I think they just get bigger seats.
Pam: No. You get the champagne and the, I don't know that they'd tuck you in, but yeah, I was surprised at that. So much that
Rachel: I
Pam: don't think you get a
Laurel: personal room.
Rachel: They have, yeah, it's like a little door. You can, a lot of them are like that. Now you have a cubicle.
Yeah. It was like a cubicle, you've got your chair that fully reclined so you can lay it down and then. Like a bed. You've got your TV and everything and this had I don't know, it was really cool.
And then you get like the nice kit with the lotion and the toothbrush and like a little sleep mask and Socks. Socks. And you almost don't want to sleep because you want to like You want to enjoy it. Enjoy the experience, but I also knew that when I got home I was going to be parenting two small children, so I needed to sleep.
Pam: They also have a whole entertainment. Oh, yeah. Any movie. Any movie. Pretty much. Yeah. You get more movies than you get in the rest of the book. Yeah. Yeah.
You could not take part of [00:24:00] all the entertainment that they offer you. Because it's movies, it's podcasts, it's music, it's TV shows, you've got this menu that goes on and on forever.
Rachel: And it was funny, because getting on the plane, I, I went through, The line to check in and they pulled me aside, like after they said, Oh, you need to go over there. And I freaked out cause I thought Oh my God, they know I don't belong up here. I know that I paid for my upgrade and they're going to tell me , Oh, so sorry.
We're oversold. But I guess I got pulled out of the line to do a last minute. A screening, the one where they swab your hands to , make sure you don't have bomb residue on your hands or something like that. Probably because I did upgrade right before checking in, but, and I'm so suspicious looking, I won't put it out.
What about me? So I got on the plane. Actually, this does happen to both of us a lot. I [00:25:00] feel like
Laurel: a lot.
Rachel: Cause they think that I, and I get it. I do not look like the type of person that would do anything like that. And so I probably am the perfect person to do something like
Pam: I get pulled out of the line every single time.
Yeah. I get pulled. And my, my favorite one was I just had my foot and ankle operated on in, in New York. And I'm coming back and I'm in a wheelchair. They pull me aside. I had a cast on my leg from my knee, encompassing my foot and everything. And they said to me, you've got to take that off.
I said good luck. You got a saw because this is a plaster cast. I can't take it off. Just a minute. So two security guards come over and you really can't take that off. I said, no, [00:26:00] this is a cast. I can't take the cast off. A doctor has to do it. So then they came over with these wands and they're wanding me and everything and they're swiping my hands.
What did they think I was gonna do? I couldn't even walk. And they're going through my leg. Have you never seen a cast before? I don't know. I still to this day, I'm just flabbergasted as to how stupid that was. Really, and what am I going to do? I am totally unable to walk and they're suspicious of me.
So you can imagine when I can walk. It's really bad.
Laurel: I got into it both in Atlanta and in London. Because, I had bad security situations. The woman in Atlanta when we were leaving and we were like trying to make her plane, remember?
Before they then delayed it.
Yeah. I forget why, but we were worried we weren't gonna make it in time. And the woman like [00:27:00] kept making me go through, back through and she's fighting with me because I can't remember the whole thing now. Cause this was a few years ago, but I had taken out my.
Computer and stuff. And so she yelled at me and told me to put it back in and then they sent it through and she's no, you've got to take it out. Like she's yelling at me the whole time. And then , they made me go back through and they're like, take everything out of your pockets.
So like I took my keys and whatever other But my wallet and stuff and meanwhile my wallet is going down
And you know they send me through again They're like no and in Atlanta like you stand and they like body scan you so it's not like you just go through and it Beeps and they send me back through again. The woman's yelling at me like each time I come through she's getting more and more angry with me And then they're like, You have something in your pockets.
What do you have in your pockets? You've got something in your pockets. And so I reach in the pocket, I have a receipt [00:28:00] and a mint or something. We told you to take everything out of your pockets! This stuff isn't metal! Usually it's just You know, and I remember yelling, do you have a belt on?
Take your belt off. I didn't have a belt on. I'm like, it's my button on my pants, I don't know. That woman was mean. And then in, in London, I basically had to strip by the time I got through there. They, cause that was a whole different, I'm used to how we do it here. And like I said, I hadn't flown internationally, since high school, so 30 years or whatever.
And, the woman's sending me through, first of all, I didn't grab the right bin that I was supposed to grab. And forgive me for not knowing the whole processprocedure. But so she yells at me and makes me fix that. And then, I'm taking off she wants me to take this off and take that off and, all my stuff I had and, then it was my glasses.
She wanted me to take my glasses off and I'm taking everything out of my pockets because I learned my lesson at Atlanta. I remember you're just [00:29:00] standing there watching this whole thing, and my shoes and my socks and my glasses and my hat and my bag and my, all my electronics and my, everything, like everything had to come out.
Rachel: They did not like you.
Laurel: No, they really didn't.
Rachel: And that trip, that's a shame that was your first international one in a while, because I think that's like up in my top five worst travel experiences.
Laurel: Oh, it was horrible.
Rachel: Ever. Because from start to finish, because we thought we were late to get on our first plane, and then it ended up being delayed.
And what I kick myself for Is not asking if we could get on the flight that left right before us.
Laurel: Yeah, because apparently we could have. That one was on time or something. And we could have stand by on that one. But by the time we figured that out, they had closed the door and we weren't allowed on.
Rachel: I thought I was being so smart.
And I had packed everything in a carry on for this whole trip. And then I ended up having to check the carry on because they wouldn't, it was too small for the first plane, or it was too big for the [00:30:00] first plane to go in the overhead. Even though it's a standard carry on, but for some reason,
Laurel: And I remember the woman yelling at you too, because we had gone up to ask, I think if we could stand by. And then we started to walk away and she starts yelling ma'am. And she's put your carry on in this
Rachel: thing.
Like the measuring thing. And then it was too big. And she's you have to check
Laurel: it. And then we're thinking, Oh my God, what if it doesn't get on the right plane? Or I'm asking
Rachel: her do I have to pick it up in Toronto? Or are you going to check it through to Iceland? We're going to Reykjavik. And she's we'll check it through.
But I didn't trust her. So then airlines do this now, which just, I don't understand why they do this, but they. Make your damn layover so short sometimes, like to the point where, when you're booking it this is gonna be impossible for me to get off this plane and get to the other plane in time.
And so we're flying, and the whole time we're both biting our nails, and, [00:31:00] Our flight had been delayed and we finally get to Toronto. And I don't think either of us had ever been in that airport before.
Basically our gate where we landed was across Canada. Yeah, they parked us out.
Laurel: And we had 20 minutes or something to get there. And we didn't know, when we landed, we had no idea where we were in comparison to where we were going. And it was like late at night.
Rachel: Oh, it was very late. So there was
Laurel: no one else there.
people that we had flown in with. There was no one in the airport
Rachel: and I don't know if
Laurel: this was right after you had your surgery or right before. So you were barely functional.
Rachel: I was like, cause since I didn't have a bag anymore, I was like I'll just run ahead and see where the gate is.
I didn't realize run wasn't really in my language anymore.
Laurel: Caught up with you at some point. Cause you were like, I can't do it [00:32:00] anymore.
Rachel: And it's just,
Laurel: and
Rachel: we had no idea how far it was. We were like, miles, little
Laurel: miles. I'm not even kidding. No,
Rachel: that's not true. This is not an exaggeration up, up things and down things and around things.
And we hadn't even gone through the passport checkpoint yet. And so there was literally
Laurel: no one in this building and we even went outside at one point didn't we? We had to walk
Rachel: outside and then back in. It was ridiculous.
Laurel: We were like, we're walking to Iceland. This was insane.
Rachel: We walked to Vancouver basically from Toronto and then.
And there was no one to ask. There was no one. No. And then somehow everybody we were on the plane with, they all disappeared. And so we're in this airport by ourselves. And finally, one of those baggage car things, or those people mover cars comes, lady comes driving down and I flag her down She was so
Laurel: nice, she lets us get on. Yeah,
Rachel: I tell her our situation, she lets us get on, but then she only drives us a few feet.
She basically takes us to [00:33:00] the So the passport checkpoint, which we get there and it looks like there's no one
Laurel: there, like
Rachel: not even a person to check our passport.
Laurel: We're like, what did we do? There's no one here to let us through. And it was locked.
Rachel: Yeah. And so we finally look around this wall and there's a lady sitting there and it was like, you had to go around this wall to then see the machine.
And so we get through that and then we start walking real fast to get to our gate. And we are literally the last people on the plane. But they were still
Laurel: letting people through. They were still
Rachel: letting people on probably. And
Laurel: there were people all of a sudden. Where did these people materialize from? I don't know.
Because there were people on our plane. And there were people waiting in line to get on the plane.
Rachel: We were behind a family.
Laurel: But we basically walked right onto the plane.
And then it took off.
Rachel: Yeah, and then we got to Iceland. And then we were And that security line forever in a day.
And then waiting in another line to get on the [00:34:00] bus to get to the,
Laurel: we had to go through customs. Yeah. We had to go through
Rachel: customs. Then we had to get on the bus, which took forever. And then we had to get on a, we had to go through the terminal to get on. We had to go through
Laurel: the terminal. That is not a smooth process.
Rachel: And by the time we finally got through that and got to our state room, we had been up for
Laurel: a couple of days. Remember we got to our room and. We were just so relieved to be like in our room. And then do you remember the balcony door? All we wanted to do was go stand on the balcony and be like, we're here.
And I was like, break the door. I was so mad.
Rachel: Figure out how to open that door. And then we gave up and then dad came in and he was like, Oh, this is how you do it. And it was easy and simple. And
Laurel: it was exactly what I've been trying to do. And I remember you coming over and being like, here, let me try.
And then you're like, and I feel like you went that's fine. We just won't go out there.[00:35:00]
Total tantrums.
We just won't use the balcony.
Rachel: I don't even want to change rooms. Of course the balcony doesn't work. This is going to be a great trip.
Laurel: It was like the culmination of the whole experience.
The trip was lovely though. The trip was
Rachel: great. We had a lovely trip.
Pam: You want to hear my experience?
Rachel: Yeah.
Pam: This is a trip I was on with my sister Margo, your aunt. We were, we went to Egypt and we were in a group.
I think it was, overseas adventure travel or something. It was those days when I was, not as old as I am now. But anyway we're in the line to go through, security in the [00:36:00] Egyptian airport. I forget where we were going, but we were, it was like an internal flight in Egypt, we were flying from one place to another.
So everybody goes through, I put my bag up on the little conveyor belt and all of a sudden. I am surrounded by five huge Egyptian men who are surrounding me so I can't move. And they've got my bag, and they're opening my bag, and I'm trying to communicate with them, but they can't, communicate with me.
And Margot comes running. What's going on? What's going on? She runs and she gets our guide and our guide comes over and he's gesticulating and talking, to these guys and he's he's there, waving his hands up and down.
Like indicating my body and everything, like [00:37:00] probably look at this is Zaftig woman. What do you think? She's got, something. And then, they say she has gun. And so the guy says, do you have a gun? And I said, I don't have a gun. They can go through all my stuff.
I said, I don't need, I don't even have a hairdryer because, I thought maybe A hairdryer might look, under a scan like a gun. I said, I don't even have a hairdryer or a curling iron or anything. And they took my bag. And they dumped everything out, they separated everything, they cut the lining out of my bag, so they destroyed my bag.
And they are looking all in the lining and everything, and one of these guys just thinks, he's gonna pull me in the back. And so the, our guide is saying no. You can't do that. You can't pull her [00:38:00] in the back. Yes, she has guns. She had. Where was the gun? There was no gun.
So finally, thank God, this guy got them calmed down. And I had to travel throughout the next, the trip with this ripped up bag for the rest of the time. So I thought, okay, all right, that was a bad experience, but that's okay, I'll be fine. So we're leaving to go home, and I have to go through the security again at, in the Egyptian airport.
I think it was Cairo, and they stopped me. And first, they waned me, and then this person, They come up and they start patting me on the chest. And so they said to me, what is that?
So I said, my breasts? No, what's that? What's that? And they keep poking between my breasts. And I said, I [00:39:00] think it's my bra. And I said, I think it's my bra. No, that's not bra. I didn't know. So they pull me in the, behind these curtains. And they make me take my shirt off, and I took my shirt off, and it's my, I have a bra on, and they're poking it, they keep poking it and poking it.
What is this? What is this? It was a wired bra, and the only thing I knew is it was the wire. So then they wanted me to take that off, and I'm like, no, I'm not gonna take that off. You can arrest me, but I'm not taking that off. So they called somebody else in and they started examining this thing.
Turning it and twisting it and all of that. Have you ever seen a wired bra before? I don't know. So finally they handed me my shirt. I put my shirt on and then they go, What's this? And they touch me again on my [00:40:00] chest, and She goes into the, I had a pocket there. She goes into the pocket.
And there was a little thing of travel tissues in there. Okay. That's what they're up in arms about? So they confiscated that. I couldn't have my travel tissue. So Margo's going, could you not get into any more trouble? Really? And I said, it's not me. I don't know what it is that, they're so suspicious of me.
So we make it to the gate. And, how you're sitting here waiting for your plane for them to call your, that you can start board boarding. All of a sudden they call me and they call me up to this table. They make me open up my bag again and they start going through my bag.
And I had some AA batteries. I think they were. About six of them, in a sleeve, like they're sold. And so the person says what's this? I said [00:41:00] those are our batteries. Oh no. You make bomb on plane with these. Just feel keep them. I know. So I said, Okay, you know So he says Okay, this is what we do.
He gives two to margo. He gives two to me and he takes two Wife had texted him and said pick up some batteries on the way Do we have any double way batteries? So he puts everything back in my bag and goes, okay You go.
Laurel: So you and Margo can't collaborate.
Rachel: Apparently it takes six batteries. I
Laurel: guess so.
Rachel: And he's expecting Margo to be responsible and not to.
And he has two. So you can't make your mom because you only have four or two batteries. That was probably the worst time, that I've been through security. But I don't know what it is about me. I look so, and I [00:42:00] always get pulled out in Atlanta.
Laurel: What about our trip on our Caribbean cruise?
Oh,
Rachel: yes. That was awful. So we were flying out of Atlanta, which is the world's busiest airport. And it was like the busiest day. Spring break. Spring break. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Security was insane. So it was all wrapped all the way around. Yeah Margo's We're all in line together and then at some point the line splits. So you and Dana and Margo went to one gate person, not gate person because this was at the ticket check in.
Yeah. And this is before you had all the kiosks. And then we had to
Laurel: check our bags. So we had to check bags. We got
Rachel: filtered to another one. We got filtered to another one. And so you guys got like your lines moving and moving. Our line is moving at a snail's pace. We finally get up to the front and the gate person or the ticket person goes just a [00:43:00] minute and holds up their hand.
And then goes on a break. Yeah, they left for lunch. And
Laurel: they didn't put you in another one. No,
Rachel: they left a whole line of people. So we have lines on both sides of us just going. So we're watching you disappear. You guys are leaving. And then we finally, I think, Got moved to another line, but we, I can't remember what happened.
Oh, people were
Pam: arguing. Oh, yeah. Because they actually snaked us in front of these other people and they wanted to fight, that they were in line first and oh, it was just a mess. It was a mess. So
Rachel: We finally check our bags. We go through security, which is another whole line.
Yeah, which took a while. And you guys are long gone again. And then we get through, and you guys had gotten on the plane, right? Yeah. You guys had gotten on the plane, and the plane left without us. Yeah, [00:44:00] we're watching the plane taxi away. Yeah.
Pam: Without us. But our bags made
Laurel: it on the plane. Yeah, we picked up your bags for you.
Yeah. And I remember being scared at the airport, because we were like, let's grab their bags. And I was scared they were going to check at the airport and make sure we had the baggage tags for them. No one cared. We could have walked out with everybody's bags, but, we grabbed all your bags for you and got them on the boat.
But yeah, and I remember like we, it wasn't like we were running for the plane. We sat, and I remember sitting and fretting are they coming? Are they coming? Are they coming? Margo was not bothered at all. I'm like, should we let them know? Should we go look for them? And Margo's no we're just going to sit here.
And then when they called us, I'm like, what do we do? She goes, we get out on the plane. She was not concerned.
Rachel: So we watched the plane leave and we go to the counter and we say, we missed our flight because of you all, because of the airline. And we explained to them what happened with the just a minute.
And. [00:45:00] They, and I said, is there another flight and then they just said, sorry, there's no more flights today.
Pam: And we can get you on a flight in two days. Yeah. I said, in two days the boat is gonna be out, somewhere where we can't reach it. We've got to get there so we can get on the boat.
Laurel: And this is when we were going to Puerto Rico or something, right? You were flying? Yeah, we were gonna
Rachel: fly you, yeah, because we were getting on the boat in Puerto Rico. Because
Laurel: usually if
Pam: it's Florida, we're just driving. So I said that is unacceptable. We've got to get on this ship.
boat and we've got to get on a plane to get us to Puerto Rico. So she says, well, you can go back out to the beginning where the desk is, the big desk is, and you can talk to them there. So we walk all the way back. Yeah. And we go to the desk and they're like we don't know what we can do because there's not another flight [00:46:00] for two days to Puerto Rico.
And I said that's not gonna help us in two days anyway. The boat isn't gonna be there.
Rachel: The boat's gonna leave. And I burst into tears. She burst into tears and I'm crying and I'm like, Arthur. Family's all right there in Puerto Rico. And we've been waiting to go on this trip and I just, and it's your fault that we didn't make it on the plane.
And isn't there another airline you can book us on or something? And I think. I think they were just,
Pam: they just wanted to get rid of me. She went and got a supervisor or something and the supervisor comes and you know she's not a beautiful crier. Her face is red and I'm snotty. And she's doing a great job though because you know everybody's concerned that she's so upset.
So the supervisor came and she was great.
Rachel: She got us first class to Puerto Rico Oh, that's and [00:47:00] then the accommodations that night and then a plane from Puerto Rico the next day Yes to st.
Thomas to meet the boat.
They put us on an American Airways flight to Puerto Rico and they could not have been nicer. American acted like it was their fault, they were treating us so nicely.
It wasn't them. And it was another. Very large airliners,
but they were fabulous
Pam: and we had the nicest accommodations. Now we had no clothes, but we had the nicest
Rachel: and they gave us a toothbrush and stuff. Yeah, I think it was an air hotel that was attached to the airport cause we didn't have to go. It was
Pam: very nice. Oh, and we had vouchers for food and then they put us on first class The next day to fly to this was here in atlanta.
Rachel: No. No, we in puerto rico So they still
Laurel: got you to puerto rico. They got us to
Rachel: puerto rico that night the next day. Yeah so other [00:48:00] airlines all of a sudden Airline materialized well because they weren't looking at other airlines till I was that
Pam: was the Last time that I flew the same day that the boat was going to leave.
That's what I learned from that is that you go a day ahead and, book a room and get on the boat the next day because that was so stressful. Even
Laurel: going a day ahead doesn't manage medical emergencies. No. That's
Rachel: true. That's true. Should I tell that story?
Laurel: It's all the boats
Rachel: we missed. Oh my gosh. We were supposed to go last year in January.
Yeah. In January on a Disney cruise, our first, my first Disney cruise, definitely my kid's first Disney cruise. Not your first Disney cruise. Cause they all went on a Disney cruise when I was very pregnant with my daughter and I couldn't go.
Laurel: But And [00:49:00] we planned to drive down the night before. We planned to drive down
Rachel: the day before. And I was sick that week anyway with a, with sinus stuff. But, I was the whole week, I'm feeling tired, but I'm attributing it to being sick with the cold and like frantically getting everything ready for our family of four to go out of town.
Because I have a heart, a mechanical heart valve from this surgery, I have to take blood thinners every day. And the morning we're all excited. We're going on a Disney cruise and the kids are excited. And that morning I wake up and I go in the kitchen and I feel really dizzy, like I'm going to pass out and throw up and I run to the bathroom.
And I throw up and if you're a queasy listener, then just fast forward ahead a bit. But it looks like coffee grounds. And they say. You [00:50:00] ever vomit and it looks like coffee grounds, you're probably bleeding internally. And I know this because they give you lots of talks when you start blood thinners to be on the lookout for stuff like this.
I see that and you called me. Before I called you, I thought to myself, I'll be okay. This isn't really anything. I think I was just, I think I just drank too much coffee yesterday. And so I get up and I go to Finished getting ready and a few minutes later, I feel faint again. And I throw up and this time I say, to my husband , you need to call 9 1 1.
And all the time, while in my head, I'm thinking, I'm just going to go to the emergency room. They're going to give me some vitamin K. Help me clot again. And then I'm going to be able, we'll probably just have to drive down tomorrow, like we're still going to make it to this cruise. And so I call mom [00:51:00] and Laurel and I say, I'm, I think I'm bleeding internally.
The paramedics are on their way to take me to the hospital. But I think it'll be fine. I'll keep you guys posted. Hopefully I won't be at the ER too long because I'm in total denial.
Laurel: We can still make it by tomorrow. We definitely have to drive down tomorrow,
Rachel: I'll keep you guys posted. So, they're taking me in the ambulance to the hospital.
And I'm, saying to them I'm telling everybody that I have a cruise to get to and. They're looking at each other like they know that I'm not going on any cruise. And so I get to the ER, which I feel like we could do a whole episode just on how we've been treated poorly at hospitals.
Laurel: Especially you.
Rachel: They don't believe me for some reason that I've been vomiting up blood and other things and they don't believe me [00:52:00] until they do like an examination and it's very clear that I am bleeding internally and then they start taking me seriously. Now I show up in an ambulance but apparently people just do that for fun.
People do that all the time you know. So you know they don't believe it until they run their own tests and see oh yeah She is very clearly bleeding internally. And you're sitting in the ER and they're not really telling you much. And I was, I'm in and out at this point cause I had lost so much blood and my husband gets there and I'm like, I, they'll probably just give me some vitamin K and then we can go home and.
And my husband's looking at me like, I don't think they're just going to give me some type
Pam: of pay. You were white as a sheet. Oh I
Rachel: was, my gums were white. My like nail beds were all white. My lips had no color. And I'm just, I'm not, I'm clearly not doing well. And so I [00:53:00] tell one of the ER nurses about our cruise and she looks at me and she goes, Honey, you're not going on a cruise.
And I burst into tears. I was like, I'm supposed to go. And so it does turn out I had an ulcer. It was a bleeding ulcer and it was bleeding cause of the blood thinners. And I'm in the hospital for days and days. I like 10 days, I think. We didn't go.
Pam: Daddy and I ended up not going. We were at the hospital with you.
Rachel: I told them to go. I said, you should go and have fun. And they stayed, but. So Laurel had been talking to the travel agent who
Laurel: was it me or
Rachel: was it you?
Laurel: I booked it.
Rachel: Yeah.
Laurel: For all of us and thank God I used a travel agent. For whatever reason, we never did the travel insurance,
we got a good deal, but it wasn't cheap and, what are we going to do and how, how are we getting our money back and everything. [00:54:00] And, meanwhile, like we're like driving and, I'm going slowly going from. Oh yeah, they'll just give her some antibiotics or something to like, okay now she's not coming.
Okay now mom and dad aren't coming. Are we still going? And I remember texting being like, should we, turn around? And, dad being like, no, you go. But then at the same time it was like, how are we going to fix this for you guys? And, I spent the whole eight hour trip or whatever, plus time while you know in the hotel with on you know talking to this travel agent who at first was You know, I don't know that there's anything we can do and
Pam: I still don't know how you did it
Laurel: She was wonderful
Pam: because Disney generally
Laurel: doesn't Lisa at Dreams Unlimited.
Yes, we have Lisa.
Rachel: Thanks,
Laurel: Lisa. She did a wonderful job because she really initially was like, I don't know that I can do anything for you. And I think, I first was texting with her, and then I called her and talked to her. [00:55:00] And, she's let me see about this. Let me see about this.
It was really late at night. And she said, okay we can offer them, that much money towards a future cruise within 12 months or something like that. And then, yeah, you had to produce proof and you had a deadline to produce the proof too, right?
Rachel: And so I'm in the hospital trying to figure out why I'm bleeding internally. They still didn't know and they couldn't do the test to find out what was bleeding till there's this thing called INR. So your blood has to be, in a certain range so that it clots and doesn't, you don't bleed out when they're doing whatever diagnostic tests they need to do.
So anyway, I'm in the hospital dealing with all of that. And I, and also at the same time, I'm like searching Disney cruises to see when we can go again, because I know how disappointed my kids must be that they can't go. And I'm like looking at emails from Laurel talking to. Lisa about what we can get [00:56:00] back.
And so they say we need proof that. You're bleeding internally. And so I think at first I gave her like all of my chart stuff. I'm like, I have all of this stuff from the hospital. She's no, we need a letter from your physician. And so I asked every single person that came in my room, every single nurse that was on duty and they all knew my story.
Everybody coming in the room, every nurse was like, I heard you're missing your Disney crew. And, then some of them are, Oh, we had so much fun on our cruise. I hope you get to go. And I'm like if you can get me a note from the doctor and they're all like we'll try and I need it by, eight o'clock tomorrow morning to have
Laurel: it before the ship took off or something
Rachel: like that.
And everybody, everyone comes in the room. Do you have the letter yet? They're like, Oh, we have your results. I'm like, I don't care. Do you have the letter yet? So they finally [00:57:00] bring this letter. And it
Laurel: was to the deadline.
Rachel: My husband could have made this letter at home on our printer and forged the doctor's signature.
It wasn't even on like hospital letterhead. It was literally just a typed up, uh, maybe one of the nurses just took pity on me and finally And luckily I was fine. I survived. I'm here to tell you, it was a rough
Laurel: couple more months.
It was a rough
Rachel: couple more months, but we did get to go last September and it was magical and it was fun. And I was worried up until the day we left for the cruise. And even when I was on the cruise, I was worried about What's going to go wrong this time?
Pam: And I won the costume contest. You did?
Rachel: She did.
We should post
Pam: pictures.
Rachel: But all the doctors did say I was lucky it happened the day before. Because if I had been on the cruise, I may not be here to tell the tale. And one of the doctors was like, you do not [00:58:00] want to have this happen on a cruise. They pull whatever, doctors in retirement onto those ships and they're, they're to treat like stuffy noses, but not internal bleeding.
So I was very lucky at the timing, but yeah, that was, that's also up there. One of my top five worst.
Laurel: My Both first, only first class experience and we missed the plane story was my honeymoon. And okay, listen, if you are getting married.
Rachel: This is our advice. This is my advice.
Laurel: Do not think in your brain.
Oh, I have to leave for my honeymoon the next day. That was the stupidest thing I've ever done. But I was up against the start of school and I don't know. I thought you just left on the next day. I missed out on my. Day after brunch, cause I have an eight o'clock flight or something. So I had about maybe two hours in the gorgeous honeymoon suite that we had.
Where, I was [00:59:00] exhausted and we get my, one of my bridesmaids picks us up, six in the morning or whatever, and take us to the airport. We get to the airport, we're flying Delta to say Galveston, Texas. And, so it's a. Atlanta Airport, regular airline, and we get there and it was like the terminals were all down.
And the people needing to check in with their tickets were wrapped, and Atlanta's a long airport, were wrapped all the way down one end of the terminal, wrapped around and all the way back. And we're standing in this line that isn't moving. And getting longer and longer. And I'm like, what is going on here?
And I'm standing in the slime going, I'm going to miss my honeymoon. I'm going to miss my honeymoon. I'm, again, a boat situation. And I don't remember what happened. Someone started coming around like with, It's the equivalent of an iPad at the time [01:00:00] and, checking people in manually that way and flagging us through.
I get to security and again, had been in the room for two hours. It's, I was there long enough to take off my dress. My hair was still all done. From the wedding. And I had little like metal flowers woven. My hair was braided and I had little metal flowers woven in my hair. So I'm going through security and we're trying to rush as fast as we can, cause we're going to miss our flight.
And of course, the metal detector goes off. So I'm standing. In front of this metal detector, pulling these things out of my hair, Eric's pulling them out of my hair, the security guards pulling them out of my hair so I can get through the metal detector. And, so now my hair's and my beautiful hairdo.
And and it was of course like hairspray to hell cause I've got perfectly straight hair and it just, and then I, we run down to the. To the [01:01:00] desk. And of course we've missed our flight. And so here I am, I've just had the most stressful day of my life. Maybe a half hour of sleep and it's hours later now.
And I just burst into tears. I'm like, this is my honeymoon and I just got married and this is supposed to be my honeymoon. We're going to miss it. And, just burst into tears and the woman just looks at me. And she's let me see what I can do. No, it's no use. The boat's gonna leave without us.
And so she, she gets us booked on some other flight. I don't even remember if it was the same airline or not. And she books us first class. She upgrades us to first class. And, I'm sitting there the whole time between the flights, like just, a mess crying because I think we're going to miss everything.
And we finally get on the plane and we get these lovely first class seats and I fall asleep the instant the [01:02:00] doors close and I get woken up once we're there and come on, we got to go. And yeah, I slept through the whole flight. I was exhausted, exhausted. And, we get on the, we have a little shuttle or whatever, to take us to the terminal from the airport.
And we get on there and I've, my hair's a wreck. And I've been crying. I'm exhausted. And we get, through the check in, which was, went very smoothly, actually. And we get in our room and I remember I went to go take a shower, because all I wanted to do was take a shower at this point.
I get out of the shower, and my husband is like spread eagle, face down on the bed, completely out. I think I unpacked, and then I got in the bed too, and just crashed. And that is my experience getting on my honeymoon.
Pam: We have about a hundred million of
Laurel: these stories. we do. [01:03:00]
Rachel: So lessons learned.
Always leave a buffer before you're getting on a cruise. Always or try to stay awake in first class and enjoy it. Don't travel to Egypt with mom.
Laurel: Empty your pockets.
Pam: And don't carry anything that looks like a gun, knife, anything.
Or travel tissues. Or travel tissues. In your bag that you're, the handbag that you're taking on the plane. Because you'll get stopped.
Rachel: We can share something Goods, I wanted to start just with a shout out. I already mentioned them but klm airlines
Pam: Oh, and
if you'd like to sponsor us,
oh, yeah, we'd be very happy
Rachel: and fly me first class somewhere KLM, not only were they lovely in first class, they were lovely in economy and there was a family with a baby.
And [01:04:00] at most I've flown with the baby and it's not fun and everybody on the plane hates you. And on a lot of airlines, the flight attendants aren't very nice either, but the KLM flight attendant on this flight was super nice. so accommodating to them. Ask them if they needed a bassinet because they have those bassinets you can hang.
Ask them like if they needed water for formula. This flight attendant, I just saw how kind they were. I wish I got their name so that I could write a note to KLM, but I have never Usually you don't really feel cared for by the flight attendants anymore on flights, but I felt like they really cared.
And they also have lovely lounges, which sometimes you can, even if you're not flying first class, you can pay a daily fee to get into the lounge. And I say, if you have a long layover, do it. It's worth it. It's worth every penny. And it's nice to have a comfy place to be while you're on your layover.
So that's my. Favorite [01:05:00] thing for this episode.
We recently we're slowly basically rebuilding our house one floor at a time. And this summer our project was, one of the projects was to change our back door and add a screen door to it, which was desperately needed.
Laurel: And now that it's getting a little cooler, not a lot, but in the evening, it's lovely. And I've been opening up my back door, and there's my screen door, and I just, and I get a little breeze, and I hear the birds, and, the dogs barking out there. And, My cats all line up in front of it, so they love it too, and it's just, it's been so pleasant, and I just look forward to the fall and the spring with this, and I hate that I waited this long to do this, because I wanted to do this for years and years, and it's just been so pleasant, and everything I dreamed it would be, and I should have done it a long time ago.
Pam: Mine's unrelated [01:06:00] too and since I'm a grandmother. I like to brag about my grandchildren and we just babysat for Rachel's two little ones and the littlest one is going to be four next week two, two weeks and two weeks. And he is a really remarkable kid. And when we got there, I think I told you before that, he's given us lectures about the solar system.
And so we got our lecture about the solar system again, which was even filled with more details. But then he said to me, Nana, do you know what the square is of four. And I said yeah, I think I do. Do you know what the square is a four? He says, of course it's 16. [01:07:00] So then I said you're so smart.
What's the square of six? And he thinks for a minute and he says, 36. Let me show you. And he has these little blocks square. They're tiny.
Rachel: They're little, they're called math link cubes. I'll link to those in the show notes. And
Pam: He made me a six by six square. And my husband, his grandfather was blown away because he's, he said to me, that is remarkable.
And I said he's very smart. He said, no, you don't understand. He said, not only does he know at his age, that six times six is 36. He says he understands the square. And That it is a square and he can show it to you [01:08:00] and he knows the concept. He said, usually when we learn these things, we memorize them.
He's not memorizing. He's understanding the concept,
Rachel: he understands the concept. We watch a show called number blocks. And it's the best show. It's the best kids show. It is adorable and it's 10 minute long episodes. You can watch it on Netflix and it starts out you just are learning the numbers.
There's, the first season I think is just one to ten, but they've kept making seasons and they keep teaching them these more and more complex Nothing's like squares and square roots, and he just absorbs it all, and he really understands it, and he really gets it, and he loves it.
Pam: He understands it.
He absolutely does, because he was making these squares of all those square roots.
Rachel: Oh this was so fun today. [01:09:00] We have a couple episodes left.
And so we are looking forward to next week, and we're hoping
Pam: that more of you. Start engaging with us because we would love Yeah, we'd love to leave
Rachel: reviews Pass it on to know
Pam: people are listening and we'd love to interact with you. All right. See you next time. Bye
Rachel: And it had definitely changed a lot,
but I want to back up a little bit and just start off with mom.
It wasn't a a nose blow, but it was scratched. But I want to back up before, Laurel, everybody's scratching today. She
Laurel: made me want to scratch. It was
Rachel: contagious. You can hear her scratching. I
Laurel: can't
Rachel: edit it [01:10:00] out.