Something rotten in the state of . . . Glasgow?

You have to stink pretty bad to be able to smell yourself. I know exactly what it takes for me to get to that point: traveling overseas for thirty-six hours, including eight spent sleeping on the floor with a bunch of stranded Estonians.

A few years ago when Kenny and I had been dating for about two months, his band went on a three-week-tour through the UK. Being in that stage of "I-can't-live-without-you-for-two-days-much-less-two-weeks" in our love, he flew me over to join them for the last week. It just so happened that the week before, a major terrorist plot to blow up planes flying between the UK and the US had been foiled and the airport security was insane. That's where the limit on liquids in your carry-ons came from. Remember that?

Anyway, it made my flight out of LAX late, which made me miss my connectinon in London Heathrow which made me miss my connection to Dublin. I cried until they put me on a plane and just when I thought I would land in Dublin to make my last connection to my final destination of Glasgow, the plane pulled back in for another hour for some other security related stuff. I landed in Dublin to discover there was no way I was getting into Glasgow until the next day. I was exhausted, having already traveled nearly twenty four hours with very little sleep. I was hysterical when I finally got in touch with Kenny, literally barely able to speak through my sobs. I didn't want to try to take a cab to find a hotel and mess with them accepting his credit card over the phone and not having any cash of my own or being able to make it back to the airport in time for my flight, etc. . .um, I was frazzled.

It was one of those things where paralysis set in and I just stayed in the airport. I tried to sleep but a recorded security announcement interrupted me every fifteen minutes. I had managed to secure an uncomfortable bench but it was better than the floor the Estonians occupied, smoking and conversing boredly. But they kept eyeing my bench and I didn't dare get up for a potty break because I knew I'd be out one bench when I came back.

So it was a long night. I was delirious by the time my Aer Lingus ticket counter opened. After explaining that in NO WAY was missing ANY of the flights MY fault and I would not be waiting until the evening to take the same flight as the day before, I got on the first flight of the morning.

Kenny was waiting for me in the Glasgow airport with a poster he had made by borrowing tape, crayons and blank paper from a little girl. He whisked me away to my hotel and while I collapsed in exhaustion, I wasn't so delirious that I didn't realize I smelled . . . pungent.

Embarrassed, I pulled back and said, "I'm sorry. I stink, don't I?"

He smiled and pulled me back into his hug. He said, "Nah. You smell like you, only . . .more."

That night he told me he loved me.

Four months later we were married. How do you not marry a guy who smells you at your worst and tells you he loves you, anyway?