I’m very excited to report that Sunday evening, halfway through the Oscars, my sister gave birth to her second child, Ava Elizabeth.
Ava was 18″ 6 lbs, 7 ounces (45.7 cm / 2.92 kg) at birth and both mother and niece are doing well. This morning niece #1 is going to go visit Mom and kid sister in the hospital. Jenn’s done a lot of work trying to prepare Emily for her new sibling, so we’ll see how Emily reacts.
On other news, I arrived in San Francisco on Saturday morning after a relatively painless 20-hour journey from Bangkok. I was fortunate that on both the BKK-NRT and NRT-SFO legs of the trip I had friends from UA working the flight.
Actually, BKK-NRT was someone I had only heard about from Tawn, but had never met: a former regional flight attendant who moved to the Narita base many years ago. He had heard my name, and recognized me on the passenger manifest.
On the NRT-SFO leg, I was very fortunate that another friend swapped his schedule to work the trip, since I was seated in Economy class. Using classy discretion, he made sure that my wine was from First Class, warm nuts appeared with that wine, and my breakfast before arrival was a nice fruit place that had come from a galley further forward in the plane! Thanks!
Of course, my preference would have been to have Tawn on my flight – but since that wasn’t possible, I’ll settle for other friends instead.
The weather is wet and rainy here in SF, and while I’m glad to be visiting I sure wish I was back in warm Bangkok!
christao408 
Did the people sitting next to you in economy noticed the first class treatment and get jealous?
The extra treatment was done subtley. The First Class wine arrived in the same plastic cups used in Economy. The warm nuts, too, were in a cup and I was readinga magazine and lights were somewhat dimmed, so it wasn’t 100% obvious. The meal I ate was the standard Economy issue. And the breakfast, which I think was from either First or Business, was eaten while most people were still waking up. So, all in all, it wasn’t something that would raise too much suspicion.And the slippers and amenity kit? Well, I could easily say that I had received those on a previous flight and just brought them along.