20th Wedding Anniversary, part two
We park the car at the airport and I open the trunk, and only then does Kathy realize that I’ve already packed for us both. She still doesn’t really know what’s going to happen or where we’re going, since I won’t tell her anything ahead of time. Whenever she asks anything, I just say “Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of everything.” She asks if she needs to call her boss to let him know she won’t be in.
“Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of everything.”
As we take the escalators to the ticket counter level, she asks if we need to stop at one of the ticket counters. I had already printed our boarding passes online the evening before, of course. “Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of everything.”
As we are about to go through security, I mention to the TSA guy that Kathy doesn’t know where we’re going yet, and ask if it is possible for him to verify that she is a ticketed traveler without letting her see the boarding pass. He obliges, and this part of the surprise is safe for a bit longer.
We arrive at the gate so early that the agents haven’t even updated the board for the flight yet. This works in my favor, since it is that much longer that Kathy is kept in the dark. We sit in a section of seating near the next gate over, so Kathy still won’t be able to see the board once the agents do update it. She still doesn’t know where we’re going until an hour or so later when they finally announce the boarding over the intercom. “We’re going to Las Vegas?!”
The flight left on-time at 6:00 AM sharp. It was a great flight; quiet, not crowded (we had the entire row to ourselves), and relaxing. Even though she had only slept about four hours and I had slept only three, we were too excited to snooze. It’s pretty rare that we get to take a plane anywhere, so it’s always a treat to look at the scenery go by 30,000 feet below. She wanted to know what we were going to do once we got into Las Vegas. “Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of everything.”
We land, and I tell her that we should probably see about renting some cheap wheels to get around town. We catch the shuttle to the off-airport rental car center, and I find the Dollar Rent A Car counter. I tell her to wait in the lobby, which is far enough away that she won’t be able to hear the transaction. She tilts her head to the side, squints her eyes a bit and asks if I’ve already reserved a car? And if so, what kind? “Don’t worry, I’ve taken care of everything.”
Ten minutes later I have the rental agreement in hand, and we make our way out to the garage to get the keys. As we’re waiting for the attendant to tell us which car is ours, we are standing right next to a new Corvette. I joke about how cool it would be to drive a nice car like that for the week-end. She groans, in a “Yeah, right” kind of way. I don’t think we’ve ever driven anything nicer than my Volkswagen or her Honda. “Sir, here are your keys. You car is right there, three spaces down.”
As we approach the CLK500, Kathy says “No way! You rented us a Mercedes?!”
Read part three
Read part four
Read part five
Add comment October 7th, 2008