red-ee to red-eye!

This past Sunday night, I embarked upon a 3-week trip, which includes staff training and Christmas with both of our families. And I learned my second lesson in red-eye flights: never take the red-eye out of Las Vegas on a Sunday night. The first lesson is that sleep aids are your friend, but that's another story.

Red-eyes are no fun, any way you slice it. I mean, it is really nice that you can fly overnight, and wake up on the east coast. It just stinks that you're only in the air long enough to get your drink from the drink cart, take your Benadryl (or other pill), wait for it to work, wait for the person sitting next to you to stop fidgiting, actually fall asleep for maybe an hour, and then get shocked awake when they announce that the plane is on making it's initial descent before final descent. You get to the airport, delirious, wishing that you would have just flown during the day, get to your ride, try to stay awake to make conversation, get to where you're staying, and then crash for anywhere between 3-6 hours, depending on how much sleep you didn't get on the plane.

Even worse, though, is flying out of Las Vegas on a Sunday night. I'm sure flying into Vegas would be a thrill (Nathaniel Thompson has told me so). Everyone is a little jolly, making jokes, and ready to party it up in Sin City. Whereas, Sunday night, after having gotten no sleep since Friday night when they landed, after having played blackjack or video slots and blowing their life savings, after having had as much to drink as one would normally drink in a month (or possibly a year), and then they get on a plane... back home... back to the real world... to go to work Monday morning. Needless to say, they're not in the best mood.

The other problem: the plane is packed..

And nobody is nice to each other...

Well, I actually got about 2.5 hours of sleep on our 3.5 hour flight, arriving in Atlanta at 5:30 EST, which for those of you doing the math is 2:30 PST (better know as "my body time"). And then I had to wait to be picked up at 9:30 to go to the conference center. So I sat with my luggage in the main terminal of the Atlanta airport... and I sat... and I sat. Then I caught a train from the south side of town to the north side of town.

Clif Wilcox picked me up, and I'm glad that he carried the conversation, or at least I think I remember him carrying the conversation. It was a good conversation, as well. After dropping me off at Simpsonwood, I checked in and proceeded to sleep for 4 hours.

Long story short, I'm writing on Tuesday night, and I think that my body clock is almost on the east coast. If not, tomorrow night should feel pretty good.

So off to bed for me; it's a big day of Covenantal Theology with Ben Inman!