A 10 hour layover leads to this.

I wasn't planning on taking my first step into the blogging world until I had something (at least mildly) exciting to write about, but I've tired of all my other kill-times while I spend waste ten hours of my life in Miami International airport en route to Quito. It doesn't help that this is an American airport in which I can't reap the benefits of duty free alcohol.. (Hopefully they'll be a bit more generous on the way to Ecuador, especially since flying blows if you ask me.)

I was expecting to be hit by bouts of every extreme emotion today as I embark on this journey -excitement, sadness, nervousness, anxiety, what have you, but my entirely irrational fear of flying has sucked most of the available emotional energy out of me, and the line between excitement and anxiety has become blurred. 

I don't know whether it's the fact that no matter how much saliva I force out of my glands just to swallow it back down again, it still feels like someone is stuffing marshmallows in my ears for hours on end, or whether it's those periodic tail-dips that momentarily convince me that the concept of aerodynamics is a complete crock and gravity will reign in my sudden descend back to solid ground, the idea of being airborne is extremely unsettling, to say the least. Just because we have the power and capability to do something doesn't mean we should, people. I know I wouldn't get to Ecuador without it, but I can't help but to loath air travel, and I can only hope that this fear will dissipate with age or something.

So now I'm here at gate D47, anxiously awaiting part two of my quest to Quito as I study everyone in the terminal, wondering if any of my temporary neighbors have any drugs strapped to them, and moreover whether or not I can take any of them before I take off again to ease some of this angst. Somebody get this girl some Xanax. (Just kidding, Mom.)

Nos vemos en Quito.

Cheers.