Good morning! I’m flying to Anchorage this afternoon. Tomorrow I’ll be taking a bus to Seward where I’ll spend a couple days before my 7-day Alaska cruise on Norwegian Jewel.

My parking starts at 10 but I’m going to get there around noon. That’s more than three hours before my flight. Normally I book the DFW offsite parking for around $60-70. This time the price was high. The cheapest lot was around $115. I went back to The Parking Spot for $77.

Hopefully I can use this Lyft discount in Anchorage. Sometimes I have these things expiring when I’m not traveling. This is why I go Lyft over Uber when the price is close. They give me discounts. Uber doesn’t.

If I had a roofing company, this could be it.

We have arrived at The Parking Spot. They gave me a specific row to park on but there were no empty spaces on that row. I found my own space. 

The downside to finding my own space is the shuttle bus driver didn’t know where to find me so I had to do a little walking until he saw me.

DFW is generally an easy airport for both arrivals and departures but today was extra easy. There were no lines for anything.

I wish I heard what started it but there was a brouhaha at the bag drop line. The guy in the white shirt was yelling at the counter agent in the white shirt. The guy in the white shirt started screaming “There’s no need to be rude!” He screamed it over and over. Then he was asking who his supervisor was.

I added extra items in the suitcase this trip since there’s a chance for rain and cold. I came in right at 40lbs. That would’ve been the limit on Spirit but here it’s 50.

The kiosk asked if I’d be willing to accept an offer to give up my seat and what amount it would take. The options were $600, 900, 1145. I was looking at that $1145 for a second but I resisted. I mean this is a time I could do that. It’s Saturday and I don’t have any firm major plans until Monday.

I can’t stand it when people don’t use headphones and think it’s fine to subject everyone in a public area to whatever they’re watching or listening to on their phone.

There was no plane yet when I arrived here. That’s how early I am. 

I found a quiet spot down at another gate to make some phone calls to family before my flight.

The plane is here. Boarding begins in 20 minutes.

It’s like a male retirement community in here.

That’s my seat by the window.

I paid extra for a seat with no seat in front of me.

That’s the standard legroom.

If there’s a downside I guess it’s that I don’t have a USB port like the other seats do. I wasn’t expecting one. I have a mini iPad and a couple of portable chargers along with my phone so I’m going to be fine.

Why does she only have one leg?

We were supposed to take off three minutes ago.

I think I’ll get the Wi-Fi. $15 for a long flight and maybe I can stream the Saints game.

Finally we’re going to take off.

I dropped my phone on takeoff and it went behind my seat. The lady behind me got it and I guess gave it to her husband because he handed it to me. I said thank you twice.

Then like two minutes later I heard a “you’re welcome” behind me. It was too long to be in response to my two thank yous and it sounded like it was accompanied by some head shaking and attitude. I’m guessing she didn’t hear my two prior thank yous.

Do I tell her I already said thank you twice? I just said it a third time and let her think I was ungrateful or whatever.

Make yourself comfortable.

The lady next to me knitted for the entire flight. 

They had a ton of inflight entertainment. Live TV that included news, Olympics, Espn/Espn2, and preseason football on NFL Network.

They also had a ton of movies. Movies that were in the theater as recent as this spring.

Life was good until this.

About an hour and a half into the flight they got to us with the paid snack service. 

Behind them was the free beverage service but they had to put the cart up before it got to us for 30 minutes due to turbulence.

They didn’t have Diet Coke. I got a Coke Zero. They also passed out those biscotti things. I gave mine to the lady next to me. She seemed extremely…peckish.

Announcement: “I know you all have to go to the bathroom because we just did beverage service but we need to keep the aisle clear for safety.”

I bought the Wifi and got to see the Saints first posession.

Then we lost Wi-Fi for the rest of the first quarter.

We picked it back up in the 2nd quarter. 

A second free beverage service with choices of water, coffee, tea, or juice. I was going to get coffee but they said it was badly watered down so I went with water.

Nice mountains. 

I thought we were over Idaho but I guess these are Canadian mountains.

Here we go again.

What did he do to that phone? Hit it with a hammer?

Wifi went out again before halftime.

It looks like I missed a lot. It was 3-0 and now it’s 13-7.