Day 242, 123 To Go

August 30, 2013

It's here. Travel day.  Time for vacation.  Time for hell on two wings.  Yes, it is time to fly with the triplets!  Are you scared?  I am.  Seriously, how bad can it be?  No matter how bad it ends up being, I will do my best to be positive, because the alternative for the next three weeks would be me working.  No matter what hell I must fly through to get some time off, I will do it!

But first, let's get the run out of the way  Here are my numbers:

Time: 25:00

Distance: 2.74 miles

Pace: 9:07/m

Max Pace: 8:19/m

Calories: 326
Avg HR: 140

Max HR: 150

I felt good, but I held back, blah, blah blah.  Who cares.  It's day 242 of the same shit.  I ran, no I am done.  Now I need to pick up our rental car.  We rented a mini van because we figured that would be the only car that would fit 7 people and six full size suitcases, two carry-ons and a variety of smaller bags.

We made our way to Budget rental car at the Melbourne International airport.  No, not the Melbourne in Australia, the one in Florida.  We get there and attempt to check the car out, but they will not accept the credit card we actually paid for the car with for the deposit.  Unfortunately, that is the card we had all our money on.  Fuck you Budget.  I have never had to put a deposit on a rental car.  So, we had to drive home, get my mom, and use her credit card.  Once again, I say, fuck you Budget.

Anyway, since we had done most of our packing and it was still early, we were ok.  We finished up the packing and we had a couple of hours to rest before we left.  Throughout the day I had slowly packed the van.  I first put in the four car seats, then I packed the trunk.  Then when that room was filled up, I put suitcases in between the seats.  The in front of the seats.  Then, I was done.  The only problem was, how do we get babies in!  Well, Honey climbed over the suitcases, and I handed her one baby at a time.  Before we knew it, we were on our way.  But first, we stopped at McDonald's for a dollar menu meal.  I figure, if you are flying, you mind as well eat the worst possible food for you because it not only may be your last meal, but it tastes good and you are not likely to get anything close to good food on the plane.

We get to the airport without any issues and unload everything and everyone onto the curb at the Gol airlines terminal.  Never heard of Gol?  Me either, but they were cheap.  You get what you pay for, I suppose...

My mom returned the vehicle while Honey and I, Kaylee, Ayla, Joshua and Derek go inside to check in.  We fill up two carts ($5 each...really!) with the suitcases and three baby car seats (we left one near the garbage since it was old and crappy and we had a better one at our destination).  The line was not too long which was good, because it was hard to wrangle all the kids.  We had these cute little backpacks on each of them with a leash attached to it.  Still, it is like herding cats trying to get all of them to go in the direction you want.  It would have been easier, if not a bit cruel and illegal, to just drag them behind us.

We have like 100 passports since the kids all have US and Brazil passports.  Most of our bags passed the weight test (32 kilos or 70 pounds) but the two carry-ons were too heavy.  Seriously, they weighed the carry on bags!  They had to be 10 kilos which is like 20 pounds.  The bag itself probably weighs 10 pounds to begin with.  We were well over on one and slightly over on another.  If we had a third carry on, it would have been easy, but we didn't take any more because we couldn't fit them in the car and we didn't think we could handle another bag with all the kids.  So, we redistribute as much as we can and we finally pass inspection.  I will say, they let us get away with a little because both were slightly over and we were only allowed 8 bags (two each) and they counted the car seats as a piece of luggage.  Of course, most airlines do NOT count car seats as luggage, or at least, they didn't used to.  Nowadays, they find as many ways to screw you as possible.  So we had six bags and three car seats.  For those of you not mathematically inclined, that is nine.

We make our way to the gates and we have to go through the xray thingy.  Actually, it looked liked they had one of those machines that can see through your clothes so they basically see you naked!  They didn't make us go through that because we had 40 children with us.  It was a struggle taking our shoes off and to get all of our stuff in the little crates while holding onto the kids (they didn't make the kids take their shoes off at least).  We got through and there was a backlog of stuff on the belt and one of our crates turned over.  It caused something in Honey's carry on to leak which got all over me.  It turned out to be a pretty smelling travel sized disinfectant soap (you know, the one that evaporates when you rub your hands together).  That was nice.  I smelled pretty while I attempted to put on my shoes one handed while holding three children's leashes, all of which were trying to go in different directions.  Joshua was chocking himself with his leash around his neck, but he didn't care, because there was something that he just had to try to break in his sights!

We got through the security checkpoint and I had to pick up Kaylee because she decided that walking was beneath her.  Or, it was the fact that her diaper has gotten too wet because when I picked her up I felt something wet and warm on my stomach. Yay!  Baby pee.  Now I was sweaty, smelling like flowers from the soap, and now full of pee, and I hadn't even gotten on the plane yet!

Honey changed the babies on some benches while I got some milk and a chocolate milk shake for Derek at Cold Stone (so yummy).  We then walked to our gate, which was the last one, of course, and sat down.  They decided to board the plane early too.  So, we had no time to rest yet.  We got on the plane and made our way to row 21.  We got as settled as you can while the plane boards and finished unpacking the necessities for the flight.  The seats were not roomy, that's for sure.  The babies were being good so far, but they were getting whiny.  It was close to 9 now and that is well past their bedtime.

Then we took off and the crying began.  Now, I am not ashamed to admit that we did give the kids some cold medicine.  Sure, be judgemental, but they were still suffering from some cold symptoms (especially Kayelee who has a steady stream of snot running out of her nose...and onto my shirt to go along with the pee, sweat and flowery soap).  We gave them this before we got on the plane in the hopes they would go right to sleep.

They didn't.

For the next hour or so, we struggled to get them to sleep and finally, they were asleep.  Kaylee on the seat between me and Honey, Joshua on my mom, and Ayla with Honey.  Derek was sitting next to my mom in an empty seat, but he was getting tired so he started to whine and cry, now that the babies had finally shut up.  Eventually, it was quiet, but the plane was now descending to stop in Santo Domingo, which was our one stop.  We were staying on the same plane and the stop was only an hour, so we figured it wouldn't be that bad.  Actually, I figured that.  Honey decided it would be a good time to tell me how she TOLD me that it was a bad idea when we bought the tickets (I bought, actually...but whose counting...ok, me!)  "Relax," I said, "We'll be back in the air before we know it!"

So, as we are landing, they tell us we all have to get off the plane.  What?  Why?  The second flight had the same flight number which means it is the same plane.  It is the same fucking plane, why do I have to get off?

Because it isn't the same fucking plane.  Thanks Gol Airlines!  Seriously, we had to drag three sleepy, cranky babies, a super cranky four year old, two carry on bags, two other heavy bags (my carry on which was basically a laptop bag and Honey's diaper bag which as you can imagine, had a lot of diapers, etc.) out of the plane, down an escalator, up a flight of stairs (why!) and over to a NEW gate to wait to board another plane.  There was no milk to be found anywhere.  So unless we were going to give the babies water, Pepsi or beer (maybe not a bad idea) we were out of luck.

We dragged our circus onto the plan and settled ourselves again and we took off again.  Now everyone was wide awake, cranky and crying.  We got some powdered milk...they didn't like it.  We got some orange juice...they didn't like it.  We got some water...that sort of worked to quiet them down, but they weren't going to sleep.  So, it was time for more cold medicine.  I gave it to Joshua first.  It was a bit of a struggle, but he got it down.  Meanwhile, Honey complained that I should not "force" it on him.  Then she started to give it to Ayla.  I heard a few gurgling screams coming from Ayla, but she wasn't forcing it...noooo.  Then, She got Kaylee.  I was in the seat behind and across form her, but all I could see were two little legs kicking frantically in the air as Honey administered her the medicine (but she wasn't forcing it, of course).

In about 15 minutes, Kaylee was asleep in grandma's arms.  It was about an hour later and Joshua was still awake and playing with this three bottles (powdered milk, orange juice and water).  Ugh...finally, in about another 30 minutes, he started to get tired and I got him to go to sleep with only a few (150 or so) screams.  Then Honey mumbled something about how it would be a good idea if I took Ayla (who was still awake and intermittently screaming...and let me tell you: She.  Can.  Scream!!!!) and gave her Joshua.  For some reason, I did.  I was sleepy and gullible, I guess.

After another 20 minutes, Ayla finally fell asleep.  Derek had fallen asleep on the two empty seats next to me, so there was nowhere for me to lie down.  Honey was lying down with Joshua, but she had to hold his head in exatcly the right position or he woke up and screamed, and I sat upright while Ayla slept in various positions in my arms, like this one.

Needless to say, I didn't get much, if any, sleep.  None of us did except the kids.  But, we finally landed!  It was still a chore to get out of the plane with everyone, but we consolidated our carry on bags into our carry on luggage and we carried the babies.  When we got to immigration, they let us all go together.  Normally, as an American, I would go to a different line than Honey and the kids, but they had pity on us.  One thing I will say about Brazil, they treat mothers and families better than the US does.  Pregnant women or women with small babies go to the front of the line.  You know what gets you to the front of the line in the US?  Money.  That's it.  Anyway...

We got our luggage and loaded it onto two carts again (free!!) and we got through customs without any issue.  Not that we were carrying thousands of dollars of electronic equipment bought by Honey's brother or anything...um...but it is amazing what three babies will allow you to get away with!

We met Honey's mom and made our way to the cars (needed three of them since most of the cars are small in Brazil...you could fit all three inside some of the SUVs in the US) and drove to Honey's house!  Yay!  We were there!

I immediately start experiencing allergy symptoms.  It is either the cat or some flora here.  Whatever, I am here and oh...wait...that means it is Saturday...guess I have to stop now..this goes in tomorrow's blog!  Not much more to report, but I can say I am looking forward to going for a nice run today!  I need a nap first though...a long one!!

Run for Life!!