There and Back Again!!

We arrived in New York this morning, Monday January 15th, only to find the entire airport deserted. There had apparently been a terrible ice storm in the midwest, and most all flights from there were delayed or cancelled. We slept most of the way to the U.S. from Moscow. It is definitely easier traveling East to West, versus the other direction!! Nevertheless, we were very tired. We hurried to our next gate which actually was not departing for about 6 more hours, but we were anxious to get home! Of course, due to planes arriving late due to the bad weather, our plane to St. Louis was yet again delayed. Finally it was almost boarding time.......and they announced to the crowd that the flight was overbooked and would be asking for volunteers to give up their seats and fly out later, and if they did not have volunteers, they would just randomly bump some of the passengers. I looked at Wayne and said I was way too tired to volunteer for anything like that. I missed our kids, and I just wanted to get home. Then......I heard my name paged overhead.......NEVER a good sign!! We were told that our bags were too heavy, and we would have to stay overnight in New York, and get a flight out in the morning. What is it with the bags again?? We gave a lot of gifts to the caregivers at the orphanage......and still had to pay additional weight to get back to Moscow. That is because you are allowed 30 kilograms from Moscow to Magadan, but only 25 kilograms on the return flight. We had unloaded a lot of stuff we brought for the kids.....but it must have been the boots I bought that weighed so much .........OK....FOUR pairs of boots I bought. I am sorry, but Mother of Russian boys most (must) have Russian (said with a "rolling R") buts (boots) to wear!! HA!!So after explaining to us we would have a hotel voucher tonight (sounds familiar, doesn't it?) and get a new flight in the morning......they will call our name when it is all ready. A few minutes later, I am overhead paged again......expected to get the hotel voucher and new flight info.....they unexpectedly give us boarding passes and tell us to get one the plane!! Hooray!! One unexpected treat for us and our delay was being able to see Wayne's oldest daughter, who leaves in Nebraska, and was also re-routed unexpectedly to St. Louis due to weather problems. So when we arrived in St. Louis, we had a brief, pleasant rendezvous with her. Now.....only a 3 hour drive to the town in which we live.......and we will be sleeping in our own beds tonight!!