Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Epic Tales of a Drooling Freakshow in Fluffy Pink Slippers

Approximately once a week, I convince myself that I am on candid camera. Some of the situations that I have found myself soaking in just seem too perfectly outrageous for them to happen in “ real life” and the only logical explanation I can formulate is that someone is secretly filming my life for a reality TVshow that is undoubtedly widely popular in Canada. I surely did not disappoint my Canadian fan base this weekend.

I flew out of Connecticut at 6am Friday morning and other than a small incident of being trapped with my luggage in the revolving door at the airport, everything was going fairly smoothly. That is, until my first layover in Pittsburgh.

When I awoke from my traditional airplane nap, my tongue had a dry leathery feel. I am not an expert in tongue saliva analysis but the way my dry tongue stuck to my lips lead me to believe that it had been dangling outside of my mouth for the last 2-60 minutes. The plane had just landed, so I checked my blouse for noticeable drool spots and collected my belongings from the overhead compartment.

As I was leaving the plane, the unthinkable happened. The man behind me stepped on the back of my sandal, and the strap that holds my foot in place snapped. I immediately found a seat at a nearby terminal and shuffled through my bag to see if I had anything that may save my shoe. I was hoping to open my purse and see a magical roll of duct tape that had materialized out of thin air, a Genie that would grant me 3 wishes, or at the very least, a stick of gum. No luck.
I decided that I was not going to let my bad luck ruin my spirits and instead take it as an opportunity to buy a new pair of shoes without the fear of buyer’s remorse taking over my conscience. The only problem was that I was of course still in the airport and my choices for shopping were limited.

I shuffled through the airport, failing with my attempt to walk normally with a broken shoe. I checked several stores hoping for a pair of loafer-like shoes and still holding out hope on finding a wish granting genie.

If I had found a Gene in the airport, I’m not sure exactly what I would have asked for. A pair of solid shoes, for sure since that was the only reason I was looking for said genie in the first place but I don’t know what I would use the other 2 wishes on. I think that I may ask for my household chores to take care of themselves and for my legs to always be smooth without my need to shave them. I also would consider wishing that endless amounts of chocolate chip cookies would fall from the sky- in which case I would also have to wish that I could eat endless amounts of said cookies without my waistline suffering the consequences.

Although genie hunting in the airport was not successful, I was able to find a solution to my shoe dilemma. I eventually found a store full of socks. If there was any hope of ending my awkward shuffle parade, I knew that it would be found in the Socks shop.

As I limped and wobbled my way into the store, and heaven’s lights shined down on me as I spotted a huge wall display of slippers. Naturally, I squealed with delight.

Now though, I had a whole new problem on my hands. They had black loafer slippers like I was originally hoping to find, but they looked so dull and boring next to the plethora of colorful slippers that filled the wall.

Although I have to admit that the decision was a difficult one, I ultimately decided that a pair of furry, pink/yellow/blue/green slippers best suited my needs.
I figured that this was the best choice because

a.) I generally like my airport slippers to make a statement. I would hate for anyone to see my new slippers and think to themselves that I have boring taste in bedroom footwear.
b.) Multicolored slippers would surely make for a more entertaining blog entry later.
c.) I would fulfill my childhood dream of becoming a Sesame Street puppet.

I proudly put my slippers on and pranced throughout the airport. I felt that I was experiencing everything for the very first time. The thin bottoms of the slippers allowed me to feel the different textures of the tiles and carpeting. I had made a few laps around the airport, before making the worst decision of my day.

As you know if you have read this blog from the beginning, I typically try to avoid the moving sidewalks at the airport. They rarely end well for me. With my new slippers however, I let my curiosity get the better of me and transformed into a sidewalk riding-daredevel. I decided that I could not leave the airport without experiencing the sensation of the escalator grids on my slippered feet. If you only take away one thing from this blog, please remember to never, under any circumstance, walk on the moving escalator with pink fluffy slippers.

As soon as I placed my full body weight onto the sidewalk, I knew that I had made a mistake. I could feel the grids pressing against my feet and instead of the massaging effect that I was hoping for, I thought that my feet were going to be sliced like slivers of cheese by the end of the trip. OUUUCH.

I had to get off the moving escalator as soon as possible and had to minimize the time each of my precious fluffy feet spent touching the moving grid of torture and hell. I ran to the end of the side walk , lifting my feet as high as I could with each step. I imagine it looked similar to burt or ernie walking on coals, or cutting through a field full of snakes. Naturally, by the end of my coal walk, I had formed an audience. I thought about taking a bow and wait for the round of applause, but opted to find my seat outside my terminal let my tongue hang out of my mouth and resume my traditional airport nap

1 comment:

Nate said...

this is hilarious!! i wish you would have taken a bow though, that would have been the cherry on top of the chocolate cake of a show you performed on the escalator sidewalk.