Hello Vienna: I Hope You Like My Outfit

Thursday, April 9, 2009 at 4:41pm

I arrived in the Vienna airport with the sun still high in the sky and shiny. Unfortunately, my brain was stuck somewhere between four and seven A.M. and my eyelids were stuck together.
Waiting outside baggage claim, I saw them-- the familiar travellers who probably shouldn't leave home at all. Laden with travel trunks reminiscent of transatlantic voyagers of the late 1800s in the process of emigration, they are weighted down like pack mules in the Grand Canyon. And of course, they are looking for a porter. As if anyone knows how to say THAT in German. And, also, as if that even exists here. They'll probably just end up with a dark beer.
With my small backpack combo computer/camera case on my back, I think to myself, " I am so glad I am not THAT woman." Admittedly, I am not the clothes horse and try, in fact, to be equine in proximity of garments worn daily...minus the saddle--although as life goes on, I seem to have the "bags." I wait patiently at the carousel musing at the various and sundry types of luggage available planet-wide. Finally, everyone walks off and I begin to admire the suitcases of travellers from numerous other flights.
Hmmmm.
Yep, you are correct. United Airlines has seemingly disunited me from my luggage. Sure, who really needs a bunch of surgical gloves and suture material to spend the night in Vienna. But what about my panties? It's not like they make panties that big just anywhere--ask my brother, the international panty producer! I can tell everyone that I will GO WITHOUT before I appear in an Austrian clothing outlet and in broken German ask for panties for size DICK. There's no tellling what I would get.
So here I am in the NH Airport Hotel considering my options. I have a few hours before I embark to Iraq. I'm thinking UNITED is unlikely to produce a reunion between me and my "foundation garments." Will I go to Iraq COMMANDO and confirm all the suspicions about the women of the infidels? Will I wash the same panty hose out about 20 times over the next 3 weeks. They are L'EGGS and great for Easter candy, but I know the toes won't hold out, especially on my American Indian size 11 pirogues.
What's an infidel to do?
I guess I'll just step off the plane in Khurdistan with plenty of deodorant on, smile, and say, "I hope you like my outfit. It's the only one I've got,"