November in Chicago

Remember how last week I said that as you were reading this I’d be in the sky somewhere between Los Angeles and Chicago. Not exactly how it turned out. I was supposed to fly on Friday afternoon. That was the day that a guy with a rifle managed to shut down the LAX.

I figured out when I first saw that all the roads in and out of LAX were closed that there was going to be a problem flying. It took two calls to American Airlines, but I got my flight changed until Saturday.

I wasn’t sure how the airport would be on Saturday. Would it be jam packed with all the people who couldn’t get out on Friday? Not even close. It was more like deadly quiet. There were two cops in the terminal where there usually aren’t cops, but there was no line to drop off bags and almost no line for security. There were whole rows of empty seats on my plane.

And then when I got to Chicago there was an alligator on the loose in the terminal. In all honesty, I didn’t see it and only heard of it after the fact on the news. It was only about a foot long and a apparently not in the best of shape. I never thought I’d say an alligator was cute, but this little guy was - as long as you didn’t think too long that it was going to turn into a giant man eating monster. It was taken to some reptile center where they were doing their best to save it.

The big question is how did it get there. Did somebody pack it in their suitcase and then when they arrived in Chicago change their mind and drop it off under a stairwell? It couldn’t have been in their carry on. I’m sure it would have shown up in the bag screening. Imagine if some poor nervous TSA person thought there was something suspicious in the bag and reached in to feel around. The alligator was small, but definitely had teeth.

Anyway, my late arrival pushed my book signing at the Vogue Live Knitting Show until Sunday afternoon - just when things were winding down for the weekend and people were getting ready to pack up and head home. You get the drift - not a big crowd. Still, I met a lot of nice people, bought a little yarn - I was really proud of how what a careful shopper I was - and moved some books.

I left sunny warm Southern California and was surprised to find myself in the cold. The news people seem to be on the same page. They keep making a big deal about the 40 something degree temperature as if it was an oddity. I mean, this is Chicago and it is November.

For Better or Worsted went out into the world on Tuesday, along with the paperback edition of If Hooks Could Kill. Tomorrow I’m going to head downtown to a Book A Million to sign stock. It’s always exciting to see my books on the shelves for the first time. I posted stuff on Facebook on Tuesday and it was fun to read that people already had gotten the books and were already reading them. Fingers crossed that they like what they read.

And now it is back to concentrating on Knot Guilty which is due next month. Here’s hoping my fingers fly over the keyboard as the story unfolds in my head.