Flying Back

Today is a return travel day.

On the one hand, it's a bit odd how driving 850 miles and flying 850 miles can both become the dominant part of one's day. Driving is significantly more draining, and leaves less margin for comfortably starting and ending one's day. In returning to the Washington, D.C., area, I'm thankful to avoid driving for 12 hours, and then hitting another 1.5 hours of stop-and-go traffic.

While I looked at the savings on air fares by delaying my return by a few days, in the rush to book the flight four weeks out while rates were still good, I forgot to run that calculation by the opportunity cost of what I could be making these days by returning earlier. I've set reminders for next year to check earlier, and to take more of these things into consideration.

This was a good trip. It actually turned out to be two Thanksgiving celebrations, one on Thursday and one on Saturday, full dinner and all. It was good to see family, see nieces and nephews who have gotten bigger, meet new members of the family, learn more about my parents that I didn't know before, and enjoy some games along the way. Thanksgiving is a blessed time of year.