On Airports and Plastic

I've been planning on starting the blog again since I departed the country on December 26th, but time has barely caught my coattails.  And this evening, as I've been stranded in airports all day, I've been trying to decide how to do it.  As I was sitting here at this airport restaurant in Istanbul eating my absurdly expensive piece of airport cheesecake, I was trying to think of all of the eloquent ways in which I could begin such a monologue to cover so large a span of time.  I chatted with friends, picked at my cheesecake, ordered a second water, and finally brought myself to my blog.  Of all things to ruin the moment, the page is translated into Turkish.  I finally bring myself to this page again, and I cannot even figure out how to login.  I'm a firm believer though, that life sometimes gives you lemons, but sometimes life gives you cheesecake too, but let me elaborate:  just as I am about to leave the moment and put off the blog until I arrive in Singapore, my beloved friend Dayna comes online and wants to chat.  I reach down to grab my ipod so I can plug the headphones into the computer when "boom," not only do I find my ipod, but my cell phone charger (thought I lost it), a pack of gum (good for popping the ears on long flights), and finally a plastic spoon.  Now to some of you, the plastic spoon may seem a little bit, well, unnecessary to note as it is A) used, B) about the width of one tooth, and C) probably going to break from the weight of my ipod, but, in the spirit of making lists, let me tell you what plastic spoons are good for:

1)  They stick better to your nose.  I've never been able to do that thing where you breath on the spoon and it sticks to your nose.  Whoever has that ability, I'd like you to be my mentor in life.

2)  Having a plastic spoon reminds me of two things:  first, the times when I needed a plastic spoon, and second, the times when I actually found one.  The times I found one, well, they are cool, and in the moment much more appreciated, but the memories come when you have pudding all over your face because it was all stuck inside and I turned it over and it was not coming out and I shook it all out on my face...those are the moments I live for.

3)  The truth is that my friend Thalia got me the spoon from a man who found it in his drawer at a Kibbutz when I missed breakfast and wanted some yogurt.  Now there is a clean spoon.

But I digress:  Let me come back to the moment.  It's 9:36pm in Istanbul Turkey.  I departed Tom's house this morning (A great friend in Tel Aviv whom I have had the pleasure of staying with for the last week), at 8:15am in the same time zone.  So, I had these great ambitions of arriving on time in Istanbul around 12:45, taking a cab, and spending the day in the city before my 11:55pm flight.  Somewhere along the way, something happened to our plane.  They didn't really give us details, which in my opinion is a good thing.  There are times in life where I really don't want the details.  If the wing of my Turkish Airways plane fell off and we are using that plane once it is "repaired," I don't really have a desire to get on.  Anywho, the plane was delayed for 6 hours with an estimated departure time of 4:00.  This cut my day in half, so I couldn't leave the Tel Aviv airport, and I currently must fend for myself against the Turks in the Istanbul airport.  I have spent far too many hours in this airport.