Leaving on a jet plane . . .

After celebrating Christmas with Janet and Nick on Friday night, I drove to Houston on Saturday and spent the night at my sister, Ardell's, in Kingwood.

Arc de Triumph in the fog!

Don't travel with me!  Monday, December 20th, three friends and I were scheduled to leave IAH for Dublin, Ireland through Paris.  This is my third plane trip of the year and, once again, there was a major delay.  Our plane left Houston three hours late - not so bad but it caused us to miss our connection to Dublin.  Charles deGaulle Airport has been closed off and on for most of the week.  The earliest flight we could get was Wednesday evening.  Air France gave us food and a room voucher which was great!  We took a taxi into Paris Tuesday evening and walked down the Avenue Champ Elysees and saw a few sights.

Most famous street in Paris.

  We walked by the Arc d'Triumph and saw the Eiffel Tower through the fog.  After roaming through the kiosks set up along the street for Christmas, we had onion soup before heading back to the hotel.  Wednesday morning we slept late and headed to the airport for our flight.  They had told us to be there at 3:00 pm for our 6:00 p.m. flight.  It finally took off at midnight!!!!  Nine hours sitting around the airport is exhausting.   Diana and I passed a few of those hours playing cards with a couple of young Irish children.  We arrived at our hotel in Dublin about 2:30 a.m Thursday morning.  Needless to say, we slept late Thursday morning.

French Onion Soup - the real deal:)

Too bad I had already bought
Doug's Christmas present.

The snow in Dublin is amazing - more than they have seen in almost sixty years!  They do not have the manpower or equipment to keep it cleared.  We just bundle up in our long underwear, etc., etc, etc. and head out:)