HURRAY IT’S MY BIRTHDAY !!!!!!!!
Today Gabrielle flew back for North Carolina after a short visit with her mom. Of course, as with every return flight she was delayed. I swear it is a curse with her and planes, but if that is the worse thing she ever has to bear with the airline industry she is doing well. After checking her flight status I finally decided it was time to go to O’hare to get her. Well, as most of you know it was pouring with rain and as I got to close to Mannheim Road on Irviing Park Road I saw construction and no cars moving. OH Great! I thought to myself construction in this weather what will they think of next…I couldn’t have been more wrong. One of the drainage ditches for the runway across the street was flooded over and Irving Park Road had a nice 300 foot across 4 foot deep river running across it. The traffic had no choice but to cross it. We had no way to get across the median to get to the westbound side of traffic. So I’m thinking this was my titanic moment. Everyone knows my dislike of large bodies of water and that I don’t know how to swim and now I’m faced with crossing this river in my Saturn Mid-sized SUV, as I gaze upon the stranded cars in the water. Having very few options, I put the truck into second gear and slow entered the water. The truck was being pushed to the side by the current. Steam was rising off the hood of the car as I drove into deeper water. The water level reached the top of the engine hood. Fortunately I made it through and lucky enough as I drove up to the United Airlines terminal, Gabrielle has just gotten outside and didn’t have to wait very long.
After all that we headed off to Elgin for Bob and Jen’s after wedding celebration party. Now, I couldn’t go back the same way because of the flooding and as I exited O’hare several other options were closed due to flooding as well…sheesh…so for a short while we ended up going the wrong way. Actually, we ended up heading toward Wisconsin for a short while until we could find a place to turn around. It all ended well though, there was a lot of flooding though and many accidents. When we got to Juli’s (where the party was held) we had a great time. Food was good and it is always good to see our friends and after some laughs and cheer we headed home to the cats.
I got some great birthday cards, so THANK YOU everyone for your lovely thoughts.
TTFN