Ups and Downs of Traveling

Posted by Dar | May 5, 2010 .

Hey everyone! Remember me? It has been a crazy couple of weeks. I have been working and traveling a lot and unfortunately haven't had much time to spend here or at Weight Watchers. And boy have I needed my meetings. I sure do miss everyone and miss the support and it really shows! Lots of confessions so hang on!

Two weekends ago I went camping. I have a pop-up camper so it is quite comfortable and very enjoyable. My biggest problem of course is Food! I mean really...How do you eat healthy around the campfire when everyone is cooking juicy steaks, hamburgers, potatoes, smores. I don't even want to talk about the casseroles and desserts in the dutch oven! I reasoned, justified, and found just about any excuse I could to eat what everyone else was eating. My packaged WW snacks and Boca Burgers just didn't cut it over the open fire. I just couldn't get excited about it no matter how hard I tried. So I gave in and said it will be alright and just ate what everyone else was eating...I have to say it was really good! Anyway, pretty much the whole weekend was off program.

I came home Sunday, unpacked, washed clothes, worked 11 hours on Monday and flew out Tuesday to Omaha, Nebraska for a work conference! The conference provided all of my meals while I was there and...you guessed it...once I again, I found reasons why it was okay to eat what I was eating. I mean, how do you go all the way to Omaha and not have Omaha steaks? And of course I can't imagine I would be back again in Omaha so I have to have fresh Omaha steaks, burgers, and ribs! And, no it wasn't all at the same meal...Geesh, give me a little bit sanity! Anyway, I just have to confess up front that I have discovered that I do not do well with eating healthy and making good smart choices when I am traveling. I am not sure why it is so hard, but it was a definite challenge for me. I had no time to prepare and I really had a hard time passing up all the great looking and smelling food that everyone else was eating. It was really hard and I struggled.

Whew, I had to get that off my chest. It is really frustrating that I can be successful in just about anything I put my mind to, but I can't seem to conquer this food issue. I have such a difficult time when faced with tempting food. Especially, when traveling!

Okay, so let's get to the actual traveling part! First...despite all my food issues over the last couple of weeks, I actually have a celebration! It was something so exciting for me that I had to hold back my emotions. This is the first time I have flown since I have lost 45 pounds (okay it might only be 35 since this last week, but it doesn't matter!). I flew in four different Delta planes and I only used my seat belt extender on the first plane! I may have actually used it the first time just out of habit! I couldn't believe it! I got on all the other planes and I buckled up no problem! Of course I immediately thought they had changed out all the seat belts with larger ones, but I was assured that they had not. WhooooHoooo....No more seat belt extender! At least not on Delta...but hey it's a start! For anyone who hasn't had to use one of these before, this is a huge non-scale victory! I couldn't believe it. Check out my confession about my need to wear one. What a great win for me. That was worth the whole trip right there. And these were the tiny planes! You know the ones...they have a capacity of only 50 passengers. There is one seat on one side and two seats on the other side. Anyway, I was soooo excited!

Now for the wonderful trip back! Our flight left out of Omaha at 5:45 PM with a connecting flight in Detroit at 9:45 PM (includes time zone change). Our plane is pretty late getting to the gate so we started to worry about missing our connecting flight. Of course, I am already worried that because I ate so much this week I was going to have to sit in the back of the plane just to make sure the nose of this small plane could lift up to get in the air! Anyway, our plane pulls up and immediately the people exit the plane in a panic and the crew is on the ground looking at the intake of the right engine. Finally they announce that the flight will be delayed because the plane sucked in a bird or two into the engine and they have to clean it out! What? Are you kidding me? They call maintenance and here comes this 70+ year old looking man, bent over and walking with a limp. He breaks out this huge ladder and puts it up by the engine and looks in...he proceeds to make several trips up and down the ladder to remove the bird (s) and scrub out the engine with a scrub brush and Windex (that's what it looked like anyway). They then say, they "think" no damage was done because the bird(s) was small! The plane will be boarding momentarily! I say..."Where is Sully, I want him flying my plane! If there is going to be a miracle in the Great Lakes, he is my pilot!" We finally, hesitantly, board the plane and leave 1 hour 20 minutes late....Fortunately it was a relatively smooth ride and I was still on a little bit of a high from not having to use my seat belt extender again! So we land in Detroit to an empty airport and run 1/2 mile to the opposite side of the terminal only to miss our flight by 5 minutes. In fact, almost everyone with connecting flights missed them.

Delta immediately issued us a new flight for the next day! And being so generous and apologetic, they give us a coupon to stay at the local Best Western for $60! What? It's not free? The airline representatives in Omaha assured us of a free hotel if we missed our connecting flights! I think I burned off 100 calories from my boiling blood level! So we gather our thoughts and sanity (but not our luggage!) and caught the shuttle bus to the hotel that was packed full of Delta passengers who missed connecting flights. Keep in mind our luggage was in Delta land somewhere as it was automatically routed to our connecting flights! So no luggage, no clothes, no toiletries, a day late and it cost $60 on top of that! We finally make it home the next day around noon without incident! Whew...what a trip back!

An exciting couple of weeks for me...some ups, some downs, but never boring! So excuse me now...I must go get on the treadmill and walk until Saturday to burn off my last two weeks!

Posted under Challenges, Confessions, Food, Travel | 2 Comments Like this article? Subscribe to our RSS feed

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2 Comments so far

Debbie May 6, 2010 6:35 pm

We are glad that you made it back and hope to see you on Saturday.
Just Me May 7, 2010 5:19 am

Darlene, Darlene, Darlene, Your still my HERO, you went off your program, had the guts to say so, and got right back on. You go girl. See ya on Saturday.