Adventures in Tay-sitting

We were expecting Tay Tay to arrive bright an early Thursday morning. (See post below) She made it here bright and early Friday morning instead....... Here’s the sitch. (that’s short for situation...keep up people!)

Thrusday Morning: 7:05am Oxford time- Sam and Pete awake, birds are singing, the sun is shining, and they are excitedly anitcipating the call fromTay to say she is here.*
*content may be exagerated

9 am Oxford time- Still haven’t heard anything, but Heathrow can be notoriously slow. Sam heads off to work. Pete heads off to work......oh wait, Pete “works” from home. Nevermind.

11am- 4 ½ hours after scheduled arrival. Sam starts to wonder why Tay hasn’t shown up yet. They did ask her to bring a whole lot of stuff over. We’re hoping she hasn’t gotten stopped by customs asking her why she would possibly need 3 pounds of Starbucks coffee AND 19 boxes of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese? We’re also hoping the answer to this query is totally obvious.

1pm- 6 ½ hours after scheduled arrival. Sam keeps calling Peter wondering if he’s heard anything. Sam calls the airline to make sure the flight made it and finds out it landed a little early. This doesn’t help. Peter calls the bus station to see if there has been traffic or any delays. None. We’re starting to believe there really is a customs issue, and mom has been locked in a back room at Heathrow with a chimpanzee named Ike.

2pm- 7 ½ hours after scheduled arrival. Sam is worried. Peter is worried too, but does not tell Sam this, as she’s on the verge of flipping out.

3:15 pm- 9 HOURS AFTER SCHEDULED ARRIVAL. Sam feels she has retained her cool long enough. Colleagues at work are starting to walk her through the process of calling various authorities. She uses valuable work time to call the airline for the flight manifest. Next step, call the police.

3:20pm- Sam calls American Airlines to confirm that her mother was actually on the flight. Working in Customer Service has given her a firm understanding of how to deal with people. At first discussion, she is told that this is a security breach and will not be given the names on the manifest. Sam realizes abusive language is totally inappropriate and never works in situations like this. However, panic has taken a firm hold and she can no longer control the pitch of her voice as she explains the situation. Reaching new levels of human communication, Sam convinces the woman to check the manifest.......she is put on hold for a very long time......

Meanwhile back at the ranch......
3:15pm- Peter decides to give Adam a call and gently mention that his beloved mother has not actually arrived in England, and is in fact rather late. Adam tells Pete that he just dropped off said beloved mother at the airport, just one hour ago. Even with the vast time difference, this doesn’t add up.

At this same moment, Sam is hearing from the very patient and kind American Airlines representative that Taylor Conrad was not on this morning’s flight, but is in fact scheduled to arrive tomorrow morning on the same flight.

If you’ve never witnessed someone going from complete panic to blinding rage, I’m here to tell you that it is a site to see. To be only slightly fair to my mother, the ticket did not clarify in bold letters that she arrived Friday, even though she left Thursday. It was implied…………. But not to us, who were told very clearly that she arrives at 6:30am Thursday morning.

Needless to say, all is resolved now, and everyone is happy. We have booked Tay into a youth hostel in town, and asked her to kindly slip the goods she brought us through our mail slot. We’ve decided to reassess the situation after the weekend. We’ll keep you all updated.