As seemed to be our luck lately, our plans to return to Wisconsin for the holidays did not go without one final hiccup. On Monday we went about our business of last-minute shopping and errands to get ready for the trip. Rick printed boarding passes, we packed luggage, and we made sure the garbage hit the curb that morning. When we returned from shopping that afternoon, we noticed that Gladys felt "sticky" like the old doll was having a hot flash. Oh, oh. Rick checked the thermostat, and the humidity in the house was close to 70%. He fiddled with the temperature, waiting for the air handler to send in some cool air. The key word is "waiting" because the fan never started and the system never delivered air movement of any kind. Great! If the system which was new only 2 1/2 years ago was going to break, why could this not have happened three days before this?
We called in a service man who, thankfully, promptly came. He and Rick worked with the system, noting that shutting it down and rebooting it did not have positive results. Error codes kept coming up, and although the system had power to the motor, the motor itself would not start. He said that we needed a new motor for the air exchanger. The good news is that the motor would be under warranty; the bad news was that the service calls and labor to replace it would cost us money.
That night we slept under a ceiling fan as the humidity slowly rose in the house. Steve had agreed to meet another service man the next day so that we would not have to rebook our flight and incur hundreds of more dollars to fly home at a later date. We are eternally in his debt and will gladly reciprocate if his property needs our watchful eye and help when they go back to Wisconsin in the spring or any time in the future.
To make a long story short, when the second service man came in, he reset the codes, and Steve reported that the system was working fine. He checked the house today also, and all systems are still running... for now. Since we saw the system fail three times in a row, Rick called the service center and talked to the owner. We agreed that something still may not be right with the system, so before Steve and Chris leave for the holidays, they will shut the system down. Gladys may get a little hot under the collar, but at least we know that nothing will freeze while we are away. We cannot ask any more of Steve and Chris. They have been wonderful. We will deal with any air handler problems when we return to Florida.
The next day, we have arrived safely in Wisconsin, and sadly the weather is living up to the "frozen tundra" moniker. Our journey home started early on Tuesday, December 10, when we heard our neighbor leave for work at a little before 5:30. We knew the airport Shuttle service would be around to pick us up by 7:10, so we arose early to have time to prepare for the trip. Showers, breakfast, medications, and final packing saw us ready by 6:30 a.m.
Miraculously, the Shuttle arrived a little early, and in the end we were thankful that it did. One woman was already on board. We received an automated call that the Shuttle would arrive in five minutes, so we locked Gladys, took our luggage, and waited at the end of our driveway. Our first indication that this trip would not be worry-free occurred when we saw the Shuttle driver slow down about four houses from us, looking for an address, when two people with luggage by their sides were clearly visible through the driver's windshield. Sheesh! Did he need a billboard, even? He crept up the street, helped us load our luggage, and we were off... at less than the speed limit. He was more concerned with looking at his company message monitor than he was in looking at the road through the windshield.
Our Shuttle ride took us away from the airport to pick up one more couple. They lived in a huge apartment complex with multiple look-alike buildings with tiny address plates. We wasted over 10 minutes just trying to find the right building. By this time, we were very frustrated because long stop lights, heavy morning traffic, and going less than the speed limit meant that we had been aboard the Shuttle for almost an hour. Added to those frustrations was the fact that the people had not walked to the entrance of the complex where we easily could have picked them up and been on our way. In fact, they had not even hauled their luggage outside as the Shuttle service requests. The drive had to go in, drag their luggage out, and get them boarded. How inconsiderate of them! By this time, the other woman and we were starting to get time urgency.
As we started to drive into Tampa, the driver kept getting more and more messages on his company monitor. Soon he was paying much more attention to those messages that promised extra fares for him than he was in watching the road. At one point, he had to slam on the breaks to avoid rear-ending the car in front of us. Thank God we did not get in an accident because we had little time to spare. The first woman on the Shuttle asked if he could go to Frontier Airlines first because she was now down to an hour before her flight to Denver, and she still had to print a boarding pass. As we approached Frontier's gate, I saw Southwest's gate two doors down the line.
"We'll get out here, too," I said, "since Southwest is just down the walk a bit." I figured that we could walk to Southwest far more quickly than the driver could make another stop and reopen the back to get our luggage. We were never so happy to get out of a Shuttle in all of our lives.
Once at the airport we were amazed to have our boarding passes quickly scanned and highlighted that we had pre-boarding approval. When we got to the check-in lines, we were directed to one line while others behind us were direct to another. While they had to remove shoes, unload electronics, and do all of the usual TSA checks, we were told to keep our shoes on, to simply put our luggage through the scanner, and to walk through a small scanner ourselves. OK. No beeps sounded, no one did a full body scan of me, no one checked my insulin Pod or questioned that I had 12 Pods with batteries in them in my luggage. We picked up our luggage and were on our way. While this was hassle-free for us, I really did not feel comfortable with the "security" measures to insure my safety. I was innocent, but were others who got the same pre-boarding approval?
After a slight altercation with a man who could not read boarding signs, we were aboard the plane. Thankfully, the plane was only half full, so I took a middle seat, Rick took the aisle seat, and no one was sitting next to me coughing or sneezing or trying to infect the whole plane. Thank God. The flight was smooth, I was tired and actually fell asleep for about 20 minutes, and we landed almost on time in Milwaukee. We left 80 degree weather only to arrive to 5 degrees above zero with a wind chill factor of -12. Hmmm. Why did we come to Wisconsin for the holidays?
Snow was on the ground and blowing a bit, so we had some concerns as to which highway we should use to drive north. We chose I-43 since it is less congested and a shorter drive, but it does have the potential to ice and have drifts since it runs along Lake Michigan. We encountered strong winds and a few flurries, but a couple of hours later we were once again in Green Bay.
I tolerated the flight well; however, by the time we got home, we were both exhausted. Rick had the added burden of driving north, but I was refreshed enough from my plane nap that we decided to take the rental back to the airport. Yesterday was the first time since mid-summer that I actually drove a car. I found that I can now drive without pain, so as long as I am not overtired, I can once again get from point A to point B by driving myself. I still would not want to drive for hours at a time, but I felt good about getting some of my independence back.
I have no qualms about the flight back to Florida in January. I know I will not have problems as long as my medications do not give me new side effects. We now just need some down time, away from all people, to try to relax and decompress after what has been an emotionally and physically painful late summer, fall, and early winter. While we did run into a couple of problems with the house in Green Bay, Rick was able to get them reconciled today, so we are hoping for a peaceful couple of weeks. I pray that will happen.
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