Flashbacks of the Final Four Fiasco

It's been a long day! So forgive any grammatical errors in this post - my hands and my brain are not in sync. Evidenced by the spilled chocolate milk on JP's brand new white tennis shoes. Like I said, I'm uncoordinated and a clutz right now. Although, I am pretty proud of myself. In typical Raquel fashion, I asked the worker at the Pomme de Pain counter about the "chocolate viennoise"... in FRENCH! And I understood her response. Wow, I guess I did retain something after four plus years of studying the language. So, that brings me to the fact that we are at the airport in PARIS... not Milan, as originally planned.

Our flight leaving Tampa was delayed by about 50 minutes because of rain/lightning. To start with, we only had an hour layover in Atlanta. So while we were a bit concerned, Justin said, "it's just the stress talking." Well, about 45 miles from Atlanta the pilot announced we would be circling the area for about 20 minutes because there was no room for us on the ground. But that was okay, we'd already strategized our plan. You see, we've been here before. In 2006 we tried to go to the Final Four in Indianapolis. The Gators were playing for the National Championship title (which they won!). But, we never made it there. We got stuck in the Philadelphia airport... and ended up watching the game at the Philly Gator Club bar. We can laugh about it now. :)

As soon as we landed, I checked the flight status from my phone. Boarding. Perfect - Justin was going to run with his backpack all the way to the gate to hold the doors open for me. I was going to grab the two bags and alert the gate attendant that we were on the way. Of course, we were at the back of the plane AND had to go from gate A to E... clear across the Atlanta airport - a one mile sprint.

I can only imagine the sight. JP's running a 6-minute mile and preggers here is wearing a shirt with "what's kickin'" on it and lightly jogging with two rolling suitcases. Let's just say I was breathing heavy. We got our workout in at CrossFit Airport.

I finally catch up to JP and it's not good news... he's walking back from the gate shaking his head. We missed the flight. Off we went to the service counter to find an alternate route to Milan. That brings us to Paris. And let me tell you, we pulled the prego card as much as we could. No such luck.

We already have crazy stories from the Paris airport, but I'll post it later. We need to get to the gate. Au'revoir!

PS- Still figuring out this blog thing. I can't get the right pictures to post or move them around. I'll work on it when we have more time.