The start of the second leg of our trip.

Whose bright idea was this? DO NOT TRAVEL on December 23 when Christmas falls on a Monday. It is busy.

The man at the checked baggage screening area will make you lift your 50 pound bags over a stack of other bags for no apparent reason. He could simply move the other bags as they were ON A WHEELED CART! You will have to do this despite having thrown out your bad back the day before filling said bags with gifts for ungrateful family.

There will be a crazy lady who holds up the line searching for who knows what in her purse (which was the size of Swell). She will then tell the ID/Boarding pass lady that "Christ is coming back", when the screening lady asks "when?" crazy lady will respond; "today". Glad I'm not on her flight.

You will use the self-check-in screen and learn that the perfect flight - the flight that Swell agonized about trying to find - the flight that cost a few more dollars than other choices - the flight that was to get you to E'Town at a good time - in fact a good enough time to go to Boston Pizza - is delayed. No, not the first flight. They've already delayed the connecting flight by almost an hour. Why? Dunno. How do they know to delay a flight that doesn't leave for 4 hours? Dunno.

Great day so far. At least they have free internet at PDX. Long live the Pacific North West.