Saturday, 20th December

"In the bleak mid-winter, frosty wind made moan ...
Snow had fallen , snow on snow "
We attended the final two concerts for the Midwest Clinic in the morning and packed our bags ready to leave, after lunch, for the airport. The weather really was bad and they were warning people only to go out if they had to. However, the shuttle managed to get us safely to the airport for David to check in for his flight to Munich. then he helped me with my luggage to find the place for the shuttle to my nearby hotel the Hyatt Rosemont http://rosemont.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels/ which I had got for $76US via www.hotwire.com
It was a lovely hotel, but I was feeling very sad at having to say goodbye to David and also strange because I was coming home the next day. My room was huge and the hotel had a nice coffee shop and restaurant with reasonably priced meals , which meant I did not have to go out. This was fortunate as there was nothing nearby and the place was covered in snow. After dinner I finally found something decent to watch on TV- a documentary on Pavarotti . However, every 15 minutes it was interspersed with a 10 minute advertisement break for the CD's and the DVD that everyone must have , so I got sick of it and went to sleep instead.
Slept in and checked out at 12noon in time for brunch and then to catch the shuttle back to the airport . Becasue I was a Star Alliance member I got priority security check-in and also my overweight luggage was allowed through . However, there was quite a bit of chaos at the gates with lots of changing , because planes were being delayed and diverted with the bad weather. The temperature outside ,with the wind chill factor, was minus 30 degrees F.
After waiting at two different gates , the third time I was lucky and my plane left only an hour late. As we boarded we had to be very careful not to stand in the tunnel between the plane and the terminal as thye were frightened of us freezing if we stood still for long.
I was very fortunate and found that my seat was in Premium Economy and so I had heaps more leg room and width. I had two very nice youg Canadian gentlemen siting next to me so the journey to LA was very pleasant and I got plenty of sleep. The bad thing was that United Airlines make everyone (even international passengers )pay for food on internal flights, so I had to spend my last $6 US to keep body and soul together.