My husband Bill and I just took a very quick trip to Virginia, mainly so I could say goodbye to my dad, who is on his death bed.  Virginia is my home and I felt comforted by that when we landed in Norfolk, though that was my first experience with the Norfolk airport.  I was amazed by all the pretty trees and distinctive Virginia accents I heard over our too brief trip.

I’ve already delved into what’s going on with my dad on my main blog.  Here, I want to focus on travel.  Bill and I had to arrange for a very sudden trip, which would  have been very expensive had we not had plenty of Delta Skymiles to burn.  I can be grateful to the Army for that, at least, since we had enough for two tickets from Houston to Norfolk by way of Atlanta (80,000 miles).  Had we not had those miles, it would have cost us about $1100 to fly from Houston and over $2000 to go from San Antonio.

We live about three hours from Houston, so we were already a little travel weary once we got on our flight on Saturday.  Yesterday’s trip home from Houston was even more tiring, since we got there just in time for rush hour.  It felt like being in D.C. again and took almost an hour to get beyond all the congestion.

I have to hand it to Delta.  I was afraid Bill and I would be separated on the plane and seated in the ass of the aircraft.  Actually, we weren’t.  There was only one leg where they tried to split us up and that was easily rectified.  Naturally, I didn’t get frequent flyer miles for this trip, though I will get credit for buying Internet access.  Usually Delta’s Internet works well, but this time I had some issues with it– at least when I tried to access it on my iPad.

We stayed at the Hampton Inn right across the street from Sentara CarePlex Hospital in Hampton, Virginia.  My dad is a patient there, so it was very easy to cross the street to visit him.  We were given a nice room appointed with a shower, couch, microwave, and refrigerator.  The couch came in handy, because a couple of uncles and a cousin and his wife showed up on our second night for a visit.  Internet was free and there was a pool and fitness room, though I didn’t try either.

CBN… Pat Robertson’s empire in the Norfolk area.

I wasn’t all that impressed with the breakfast at the Hampton Inn.  It wasn’t well stocked on the first morning, which was the only time we ate it.  The hot items weren’t too appetizing and the juice and coffee weren’t very good.  Fortunately, we will soon be living in a place where breakfast at hotels generally doesn’t get messed up too much.

I wish I’d had time to stay longer, though we did enjoy a visit at Fort Monroe’s beach and a restaurant near Buckroe Beach that was right on the water.  The Hampton Inn is conveniently located in a quiet area and as long as you have a car, you can easily get to restaurants and shopping.  There’s also a lot to do in the Hampton Roads area.  I grew up there, so I don’t appreciate it the way a non-local might… but maybe I appreciate it more in other ways…

We discovered a nice pizza restaurant at the Atlanta airport on Concourse A.  It overlooks the tarmac, so you can watch the baggage handlers.  That turned out to be very entertaining, especially when the bags fell off a plane… or maybe it was a truck.  It looked like the plane.

Given the shit that has happened this month, I almost wish I could just move back there and forget about Germany.  I’m serious.  This international move shit is really getting me down.