Whew, not much sleep last night, maybe 4 hours if that. But that's ok. Got up around 5:15 to get ready to drive to Mom's where Kathy was going to meet us at 6:15 to take us to the airport. Carlos joined us on the trek to the airport. Really easy at the airport, not too much of a line waiting to check in, then had coffee with Kathy and Carlos at Starbucks, then we pretty much sailed right through security. They didn't seem to be checking all that much this time.
We didn't have long to wait to board our plane and we had a really good flight to Denver. When we got off the plane we felt like it was almost miraculous to be able to get off at Gate 55, and our connecting gate turned out to be Gate 54!!!! So, really easy, we just walked across the aisle! So, we had an over 2 hour wait for our next plane but it seemed to go fast.
We were somewhat taken aback upon boarding our next plane when they told us we'll have to check our biggest carry-ons and to leave them right there at the door of the cabin. Lots of other people had to also, but the thing is, I had stuffed my purse into my carry-on (thinking I'd take it back out once I was in the plane) because they kept announcing that anyone carrying on more than two items would have one taken away from them. But even so, they took my carry-on away and it all happened so fast that I had no time to get what I wanted out of my purse. So, the whole flight, I wonder how the chocolate bar was faring in the purse, if my glasses were getting crushed and if my cell phone would be in once piece after this. But no, everything turned out ok.
At the airport in Albuquerque, we found that to get to the rental car place we'd have to take a shuttle ride for 10 mins. and there'd be no guarantee there'd be any available cars. So we just decided to take a taxi to the hotel. This hotel is far from the airport, it's not in a "touristy" section, but two things: one - it's close to where Jackie's apartment is, and two - it's the same hotel Guillermo and I stayed at a few years ago. It's not the biggest and the best hotel, but it's convenient to where we want to be, it's quiet here, the room is well supplied and the breakfasts are good.
In the late afternoon, since all we had for lunch were some sandwiches at the airport in Denver, we decided to have an early dinner. We asked the hotel to call us a taxi and we had the driver take us to Cracker Barrel. We had a great dinner there and we called our taxi driver back when we were done and asked him to take us to Jackie's apartment. This taxi driver's name is Idaan (he's from Israel) and we really liked him. We told him why we were wanting to go to Jackie's apartment complex and we got into a nice discussion with him about families and how difficult things can be sometimes. Once we arrived at the complex, we were pleasantly surprised to see that there was no gate so he was able to drive right up to the leasing office. He agreed to wait for us, as long as it took, so that we could talk with the office manager and ask her to get a note to Jackie.
Well, when we got there, the manager was just finishing up with some new renters so we had to wait a little while. When we were finally able to talk with her, we explained to her the situation and she was very sympathetic. She said of course she'd get a note to Jackie, and if we wanted, she'd call her right now and see if she could come down. We thought maybe it'd be better if she got the note first. The lady did let us know, though, and this was a big one, that Jackie does indeed still live there. So, we felt hopeful. We left the note with the lady and she kept telling me, "You sound just like Jackie!!" In a way, it felt kind of weird, yet good, to talk with someone who knows and has talked to Jackie lately.
The taxi driver then drove us back to our hotel. Later that evening, Mom and I decided to walk over to a very near Furr's Cafeteria and of course, right as we're getting ready to walk, it got extremely windy, with dust blowing all over the place. We walked through that anyway, and we both had a piece of pie with water.
So, all in all, we felt it was a good day!
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