Kim Rossi

Things you do not want to see when landing at an airport.








Had a bit of a delay getting back from Atlanta on Sunday. In fact, I got home on Monday. Here is a photo from my seat on the plane. But you can not see what was following us on the runway. Looked kinda like this:

We were en route to NY from Atlanta when the Captain announced an emergency landing at Dulles in DC. The computer said the hydraulic system had a problem. I do not know what hydraulic systems do. I think they make things go up and down. Like carousel horses and airplane wheels and wing aelerony thingamajiggies. That stuff that makes an airplane go "ZOOM!" and remain high up in the sky. Hydraulics are important. We landed in dead silence without incident. Amen to that. Six hours later, the plane had been repaired! But the crew was no longer able to fly according to FAA regulations. So they can fly with cocktails in them as long as they are under the hourly limit but can't fly stone sober 11 minutes after the alotted work time. Go figure. We ended up in a cheesey Holiday Inn in Sterling, VA.

I met a lovely young woman I'll call, K. She was traveling alone and none too pleased about being solo at a hotel hundreds of miles from home. We hung out together, shared a cab and I got us hotel rooms with an adjoining door in case she needed to come in. I also had a long chat with her mom via phone, telling her to come to this blog and check me out. I'm really a Mom with girls and not an axe murderer. While we were walking to the cab stand a man approached us, "You need a ride? I can save you some money." I declined. K looked surprised. I explained, "You NEVER take a ride to save money as you'll spend far more than anything you save on the dry cleaning bills to get your own blood out of your clothes." Always go to the official cab stand where the people in uniforms put you into a legit cab. I felt very old and motherly!

Briefly on the conference, it was fantastic. If you have a child with autism this is the conference to attend. You'll learn a ton about treatment from the top docs in the nation. And you get to meet gorgeous women like Jenny McCarthy. She is filming a documentary of her book, "Louder than Words." She spent 3 days at the conference. Spoke with everyone, met with the kids, and is genuinely a funny, warm, gracious woman. Standing next to her I felt like I had eaten 24 fried Twinkies myself! I now know what a size 0 looks like. More later. Good to be back!