24 hour flight: NY to TN to GA to WA

Now that I've made it to Seattle without a glitch, I feel comfortable enough to share the fiasco of my last flight to Seattle (in '08) without the fear of jinxing myself.

To save a few dollars and for added convenience, I chose to fly out of McArthur airport, which is actually closer to my house. Because it is a smaller airport, it was such a breeze to get to the gate. Also, because it is a smaller airport, only small planes can fly to and from.

No big deal.

I don't love small planes, but I deal with them. Flight to Seattle with a brief layover in Atlanta.

Cool. More like cold. How about blizzard?

It's funny that I left decent weather in NY to fly into a blizzard in Atlanta. Go figure. While in the air, the pilot announced that we were being held in a holding pattern (pretty much flying in circles) because there was some back up because of the weather.

Still not worried because I had a good window of time between my two flights. Until...

The pilot announced that because of the size of the plane we were running out of gas and had to stop in Tennessee to refuel.

Really? Not ideal, but at least we're making some kind of progress.

Once we landed, they announced that because of the weather in Atlanta and Tennessee, we would not be able to fly out. Also, that there were no bus companies that would drive in that weather. And that pretty much everything was closed for the night.

Long story short, I was put in a cab from Tennessee to Atlanta and spent the night in Atlanta's airport (not the first time I spent such a long period of time there. We have a love/hate relationship).

All I can say is that it was a very interesting experience. The two best parts: I was upgraded to first class on my flight from ATL to SEA, and I got to satisfy my serious craving for a Chik-Fil A Chicken Biscuit in the Atlanta airport that morning before my flight.

By the time, I got to Seattle, it was exactly 24 hours after I took off from New York.

Do you have any fun travel stories to share?