3 PM: Cruising Altitude...

My right leg spend the night in a raised position. Piled a couple of big pillows and an ice-pack in my bed and rested the leg on it most of the night, a double load of Benadryl and by the morning it felt much better. The alarm went of at 6 and I had the rest of packing to do. The breakfast and lunch sandwiches, some chocolate, lots of vitamins, all the warm cloth I have, computer, cameras and all the cables and chargers to keep things going, writing and reading materials and the chinese lessons were the important things.
Stuart slept here too, That way he can give me a ride to the airport, he was planing to party the night before in Berkeley, so it worked out just fine. Off we go, a quick stop at Eva's house to pick-up the lipstick she left me out on the porch and then the video store to return the flick we watched the other night. There was no traffic to get the the Oakland airport, no lines at the check-in nor security and next the thing I'm at the gate waiting for departure of US Airway's flight to Phoenix.
The weather changed, last night a few clouds appeared on the evening sky and got denser during the night, now looking out the terminal the sky is covered , the sun just barely is breaking through and it looks like by the end of the day there will be some rain... well, it's time for me to leave this place. All year we're having blue sky days with record temperatures and zilch rain. This has to change soon otherwise a serious drought will be plaguing the Bay Area and northern Californian.
The first leg of the journey is to Phoenix, AZ, a short pit-stop, just enough to eat my lunch-sandwich and call Bonnie to tell her that all is on schedule. Then the second flight to Minnesota is leaving at 1pm. The flight was full and I was pretty uncomfortable the hole time. Now here it gets tricky, I'm traveling in 36'000 feet cruising altitude from Mountain to Central Time Zone, and now what time is it really while I'm up there. but through both 3 o'clock's I was in the air. After a nap, not knowing how long, I look out the window and the landscape was real barren, ripples of hills in a flat landscape, didn't even see a road or any sign of life for quite some time, kind of wished I could take a picture of it, it was really beautiful, could be somewhere in Kansas or Nebraska. Further north snow started to mix into the dry scenery until the whole world was covered in this white stuff. The pilot did not even mention the temperatures in Minneapolis... probably too embarrassed to mention it after leaving Phoenix at 88°F.