It’s amazing how frequently our vacations begin in the thick of some crisis or great drama.  This year may have set a new record though.  On the eve of our departure Rachael accepted a new job at Saif and submitted her resignation from the Oregon Youth Authority at the end of the day.  

This major development unfolded with shocking speed - on Tuesday morning, only 3 days earlier, Bill Anderson announced his resignation, opening up a lead programmer analyst position at Saif.  Wednesday, after thinking over my suggestion to hire Rachael, my supervisor Marsha encouraged her to apply; and Thursday night, after another day’s reflection, she called Rachael at home with a job offer (Ed: this sounds like nepotism, but Marsha already knew Rachael well because she had previously been employed at Saif as a programmer analyst).  It is a wonderful, long hoped for development; and a blessing to have closure before leaving for vacation, freeing Rachael from anxiety over interviews and outcomes.

We were late getting out of town due to last minute hiking activities, so we decided to stay in Salem for dinner at La Marguerita and a movie (Bossa Nova) before driving up to our airport hotel for the night.  We stayed at the Howard Johnson’s, where we left our car for the month and caught their shuttle to the airport at about 4:30, in plenty of time for our 6:20 departure.

Our flight itinerary included a stopover in Seattle, where I phoned mom and dad to share the news about Rachael’s job; then a 3 hour layover at JFK, and 6 hours at De Gaulle - up from the scheduled 45 minute layover because we missed our connection and waited for the next and final departure to Clermont-Ferrand for the day.  We were actually relieved by this, because we had been expecting to miss our flight, anticipating that there would be no more flights today and that we would be spending the night in Paris.

We arrived in Clermont-Ferrand at about 5 PM, groggy and ready for bed - but were alarmed to find that our bikes had missed the plane.  We submitted our lost luggage claims and then resigned ourselves to a night of anxiety, not knowing when if ever they would catch up with us.  Fortunately there is a motel only 200 meters from the airport, so we had a very convenient base from which to await developments.