I stayed up late watching the storm, I would say conservatively that the lightning flashes were 2 or 3 per second sustained for 4 hours! Impressive display! My flight leaves at 1400 so I got a late check out and with the Rocket safely at the Triumph dealership I take cab to the Daytona Beach airport.

Having checked in online I go to the bag drop area and as I am waiting, Delta texts me that my flight is delayed. There are thunderstorms over Atlanta and it is throwing a spanner in the works for the entire NorthEast flight operations.

I get about 10 texts over the next hour as the departure time continuously fluctuates, eventually leaving just over an hour late. It will make my Atlanta connection very tight. I sit in my aisle seat, share only the most superficial of pleasantries with the cotton top lady in the middle seat, put in the noise cancelling earphones and let Pink Floyd take me away. At some point I fall asleep, until something is poking me in the ribs, sharply.

There is that poke again, the cotton top next to me is jabbing me in the ribs and talking to me! I pull out an ear bud and she asks "do you know what PeePee means?" WTF?! I stare blankly at her until she asks again, "Do you know what PeePee means?" She holds her iPhone up to me;



I shake my head, mostly in disbelief, put the earbud back in and try to go back to sleep incredulous at the nerve of this cotton top! A couple of minutes later the flight attendant comes and chastises here for trying to use her phone in flight. I smile smugly to myself!

As we reach the outer marker for Atlanta we start circling. The pilot announces, in that irritatingly phoney innocuous voice, that there is lightning within 10 miles of the airfield and that we need to delay our approach. 30 minutes later we resume our approach but at the 50 mile mark we start circling again. The pilot comes on the blower and announces 'the airfield' is now closed so we start circling again.

To me, an airfield is a grass covered strip that Billy Bishop lands his Sopwith Camel at, or perhaps Snoopy on his Red Dog House. Atlanta International Airport is the world's busiest handling over a quarter of a million passengers a day on 1 000 000+ flights annually. It covers over 4700 acres, hardly an air field!

Mr. Droll Voice comes back on the blower and tells us we are close to Bingo fuel (either have to land immediately or divert to another airport), the third option I guess is to fall out of the sky!

After giving us this particularly bad piece of news he never talks to us again, we land, somewhere, no one knows where and it isn't until the flight attendant makes his landing announcement that we know that we are in Atlanta.

Everyone on that flight is connecting somewhere else so there is a mad scramble to get off the plane, common courtesies are thrown out the window!

The terminal is so big (at this 'air field'!) that I have to take the subway to another terminal for my connection. Luckily that flight is also delayed by more than an 1 hour so I make it. As we taxi out to the runway Mr. Droll Voice's brother announces that due to the backlog of delayed flights, we are number 37 for take off! In go the NC buds, crank up the Pink Floyd and I don't snap out of my trance until we finally land in Philadelphia about 2.5 hrs late.

I look for the limo stand but it is empty (limo's are the way to go in big cities because the are flat rate and you will almost always get stuck in traffic). I end up in a cab and find the trip is only 15 minutes, a good thing because I am starving.

Arriving at the hotel, chosen for its location close to the surgery facility, the nice lady checks me into a very nice room where I will stay for 3 nights. For the second location in a row I am very impressed by the person who books my accommodations (me of course!).

I go in search of Philly Cheese Steak, but end up having mussels and a burger at the Perch Pub around the corner. A couple of Happy Pops finish the deal and I am back in my room and fast asleep by 2300h.