Birthday Awesomeness

I will rarely plug any business or product on this blog because I just don't think you need that junk in your life, but I do have to give a GREAT BIG shout out to my flying friends at Southwest for this little bit of awesome greatness we experienced on our trip out to CA:

On our flight out, it was one little guy's eighth birthday day. We were basically spending the entire day in airports, rental car lines, and driving to hotels, so there wasn't much time for actual celebrating.

As a neurotic Mom who thrives on celebration of events, none of this was sitting right with me. We should have been throwing a party or blowing out candles or stuffing ourselves full of cakey deliciousness, not salivating over bags of peanuts that wouldn't fill up a small gnat.

So I took action. Starting with the lovely woman who gave us our boarding passes, I started telling everyone who was wearing Southwest garb or who LOOKED like they could have possibly worked for the airline at anytime in their life that it was my son's eighth birthday.

I struck gold while waiting for the ticket agent to come up that thingy that attaches the building to the plane* because the pilot decided to check the passenger load.** He was very kind when I asked if he would announce son's birthday over the speakers mid-flight. He said he be delighted to do this but that I should let the flight attendant know so his pilot brain wouldn't forget.***

The gold rush continued when we boarded the plane and the flight attendant already knew about the birthday boy and immediately whisked all three Nowell kids into the cockpit! The two younger guys were lifted into pilot's seats and the oldest took over as king of "Don't touch that". The pictures I managed to get show the crazy amount of excitement in the boy's eyes. And touchy-feely-OOPSY-hands.

About 3/4 of the way through the flight, we heard birthday wishes over the speaker system and the flight attendant presented our boy with a gift. No, not plastic pilot wings or a deck of cards. PEANUTS!!! And not just a few packages, but the big plastic bag they hoist on board to feed about half the passengers. A BIG HUGE bunch of peanuts.****

In a couple of days we are going to have a proper eighth birthday party here at the house. On New Year's Eve. With eleven boys.***** No matter how much energy I put into that celebration, I don't think I'll be able to top the "party" Southwest threw last weekend.

Southwest? You had me at "Hello".



*Technical definition eludes me here. You get my point, I hope.

**Completely full plane plus one dog. Yes, a dog. Southwest has found a way to bilk $75/one-way out of over-attached dog and cat owners who feel bad about leaving kitty/fido in the kennel WHERE THEY BELONG WHEN HUMANS GO ON VACATION.

***Apparently, multi-tasking isn't in this dude's DNA. But, if you saw the cockpit, you, like me, would get really worried about this. There are like ten-thousand buttons and levers and cup holders in there. What if he accidentally hit the "eject" button trying to announce birthday wishes and ended up parachuting into Des Moines?

****Mike was channeling the entire family when he announced "If I never see another honey-roasted peanut in my life I'll be happy."

*****Please call 911 if there isn't a post on January second.