Hell in Los Angeles

Dear Wilson,

Well, we had our first day of travel. Let's just say it did NOT go as planned. The day started at 3:00 am to catch an early flight out of New Orleans. So far so good. A one-hour plane delay but that didn't bother us. Then we landed in Los Angeles for our 14-hour layover. Let's just say we should have just stayed at the airport and waited patiently for 5 chair ornaments. Instead we got the genius idea to "go explore the city".

Since we originally were not planning on exploring, we didn't reserve a rental car. Mistake #1 engaged… Los Angeles and an extremely large airport, so the rental car lots are about a 15-minute bus ride away. No big deal right? We hop on a shuttle that says "Avis". I'm thinking these shuttles just bring us to the "land of the rental car companies". You know, like in most places where the rental agencies are lined up like sardines one right next to the other. That way if one company doesn't have a car, we just sidestep to the next line and try again. Well, no… Not in Los Angeles. Avis shuttles bring you to "Avis land". This is where you are dropped off at a 1 hour + line with the high hopes of getting a rental car. I say "hopes" because the app wouldn't let us rent a car for same-day pickup and drop-off. Yes, that's our fault which makes the scenario just that much more frustrating for not planning ahead. We are in a parking lot with seemingly at least 500+ rental cars in the parking lot gave us confidence. That's good because if Avis didn't work out, the other rental agencies are so far away that you can't even see them. Finally to the front of the line. The 128-year-old lady (let's just call her Agatha because that's fitting), said she had cars available. Sweet! Agatha even has a Tesla! I said I'll take the Tesla. In my mind, I'm thinking it's my lucky day… Then Agatha says "Oh I'm sorry, the Tesla isn't actually available". That's ok, just any car will do, I reply. "Oh wait, I made another mistake, instead of the $160 per day price I quoted you, it's actually about $270 for today. At this point I don't care, I just wanted a rental car so I agreed to pay whatever. Agatha walks away for a moment, then comes back with a sad look on her face. "I'm afraid I have made another mistake, we have no cars available at all". Yes, this actually happened. 3 strikes and we're out. At this point, I'm silently pissed and want to slap Agatha. (Spoiler alert, I don't maul the 145-year-old lady) I just clench my jaw and walk away.

So we got a one-way shuttle to a parking lot with endless cars that were apparently completely booked. Unbelievable… So, we caught an Uber to a nearby luggage locker to drop off our bags, then walked to a pizza restaurant to regroup. Mistake #2 engaged… The pizza was good. Except for the "minor" food poisoning part that came next. First Brandt. Then Erica followed. Chloe went next. Cali wasn't feeling great either but wasn't as bad. I somehow dodged the sickness. Erica and Chloe proceeded to attempt to fill each trash can they passed with the pizza from earlier if you catch my drift. If it were a competition, Erica gets the gold with the most points. Approximately 15 "points" in about 10 different trash cans to be exact. At this point, we are basically stranded in very close proximity to our luggage lockers because, with the "frequency of "eruptions" from our family, we can't possibly get into an Uber to go back to the airport. (Only 1.5 miles away) A 1.5-mile Uber ride would yield at least 2 slices of pizza in reverse order to the way they went in. Even the hotels were completely booked that were within walking distance. So we walked back and forth between trash cans and the Target store. Utilizing trash cans and repetitively shopping to buy things like baby wipes, Pepto, water, etc. On one of our trips inside Target, Chloe started to feel nauseous. The bathroom had a line, so she had to run outside. I made Cali follow her so she wasn't alone. While they were outside, a homeless lady started frantically yelling at them aggressively saying gibberish, which proceeded to make Cali cry when she came back in to find us. I can't make this shit up honestly. Like WTF… At this point, the only option left was to walk to the airport with our luggage. That's luggage for a 6-month trip with NO checked bags by the way. Not ideal but we had to do something. At this point, I start to feel self-conscious. I see the looks of people looking at us like we are crazy. In my mind, they were definitely thinking "Damn, that guy is a cheap ass making his family haul luggage and walk to the airport" or "Wow, you couldn't spend $20 to Uber bro"? I must have looked like the worst dad on the planet. To make up for at least some embarrassment, I carried as much luggage as I could. #Mule mode… So yeah, there we were marching along all the way to the airport like idiots. 

We made it! We got to the airport and by that time, no more puking. We had to laugh so we didn't cry today. Well, Chloe cried. She tried her best to fight the puke demon inside her with tears but tears don't seem to be a remedy. Oh, and Cali cried from the psycho bitch outside lol. So other than all of that, it was a pretty amazing day… Ok, actually it was the fucking worst but it only gets better from here. 

As I write this, I'm sitting at my gate, waiting to board the plane from Los Angeles to Taipei, Taiwan for the next leg of the trip. 36 hours in total from New Orleans to Bangkok, Thailand. Still a long way to go and I am on hour 20 without sleep. Looks like we sleep hard tonight on China Air. The real adventure has not even started.