For those of you city girls and guys who travel on a regular basis, I bet this sounds familiar …  your flight is cancelled last minute, new flight delayed for hours, sitting on runway waiting for takeoff for over an hour and have a sick person next to you.  Compound that with sitting in those uncomfortable seats with neck and back problems … no wonder I ended up in a battle with the mini bar at the hotel!

I was on my way to Chicago to attend a meeting.  I know -  as soon as you hear “airport in Chicago”, you assume trouble is coming!  My  door to door “journey” took 10 hours and ended up in a battle with the mini bar. Here are the highlights of my journey to Chicago:

The sceniero in NY:
1. At 1 pm, I received a voicemail from American Airline stating that my 6:30 pm flight to Chicago that night was cancelled. They rescheduled me on a flight at 9 am the next day. This wasn’t too helpful as it meant I would have missed all my morning meetings.
2. Luckily I was home to get the message and was able call the airline to get myself on a 4 pm flight out of JFK (yuk!) that night. I had to scramble to get my things together to get to the airport on time. Starting to stress…
3. Barely made it to the airport in time - only to find out the flight was delayed by a hour.
4. Each hour, the sign comes up that the flight will be delayed by another hour. There was bedlam at the gate as other people were missing their connections. In addition, since AA had cancelled several flights at Laguardia, those people were now at JFK trying to get on a flight.
5. Luckily a Starbucks was right next to the gate so I had a continual supply of my favorite coffee. In restrospect, that was probably not a great idea as coffee can make me edgy … probably not a good thing right now.
6. After a 4 hour delay, we finally boarded the plane.  Of course, I get the seat next to the sick crying child who had a horrible hacking cough (And yes, I did get sick 2 days later!)
7. Engines revving, we were told to put “our chairs into upright position and put tray tables down” and get ready for take-off.  Twenty minutes later, engines still revving, it didn’t appear we were taking off. So I looked out the window and saw at least 25 planes ahead of us! Nice.
8. My back and neck were starting to hurt from those uncomfortable chairs (ever notice how they are slightly bent forward?). So I sneakingly put my chair back a little to relieve the stress on my back. Immediately the flight attendant notices and comes over to me and tells me to put my chair back into “upright postition”. The child contines to cough my way. Starting to get highly annoyed. (pic - I was not allowed to recline my seat like this)
9. Finally, after over an hour of “getting ready for take-off”, we finally do. The rest of the flight was uneventful.

The sceniero in Chicago:
1. We arrive in Chicago. I now have really low blood sugar and look around for something to eat. Everything is closed! So I figure I’ll get something light in the hotel.
2. Upon checking into the hotel, I am asked if I want the key to the mini bar. I emphatically say No. The last thing I need right now is to be faced with array of chocolate products ( I have minimal control when it comes to chocolate).
3. I get to the room and immediately check out the late night menu. Not too many choices, but at this point, I will eat almost anything. I call room service and find that their “computers were down” so all I could get was a cheese panini (the kind I always tell my clients to avoid). This didn’t make much sense to me, but at this point, nothing makes much sense. I get the panini delivered to my room. It was the largest sandwich I’ve seen! Had to be over 1000 calories. I told myself I’d eat only 1/2 as it was now 12:30 am. Of course, that didn’t happen. Inhaled the whole thing.
4. Now a normal person would have just gone to sleep at that point. But for some strange reason, I decided to see what the mini bar looked like (although I was told it was locked) I opened the cabinet and pulled the door. It opened! It was not locked as had been told it would be. Yikes! So of course I have to see what kind of goodies it contained. Lot’s of chocolate type products. Let’s just say what happened next was not a pretty site. I lost my battle with the mini bar! (pic is of the mini bar goodies in my hotel room)

Tips to help you avoid losing your battle with the mini bar:
1. When traveling, plan ahead. Carry small snacks with you so you don’t get low blood sugar. Once you get low blood sugar, it is almost impossible to control what you eat. Ideas for small snacks include: mini bonbel cheese, small bags of nuts, 100 calorie packs, raisins, energy bars.
2. You don’t need to order room service at  midnight. Just get into bed. Chances are that you’ll fall asleep within 5 minutes. We all have enough fat stores to feed our body until breakfast the next day.
3. Tell them you don’t want the key to the minibar. Hopefully it will really be locked!
4. If you do have to order room service, order something healthy if possible. You could also tell them that you only want 1/2 the portion. Of course, you’ll pay for the whole portion. For example, knowing that the cheese panini was not a good choice, I could have said “send me only 1/2 the sandwich”. The same goes for telling them to omit the chips (which I did!) or french fries or extra bread.
5. If too much caffeine makes you edgy, drink decaf or better yet, just drink water. Being edgy can increase the chances you encounter emotional eating later on.

On a side note, the trip was really worthwhile. I went there on business. I am a consultant/spokesperson for a GREAT new product! I will be talking about it in the next few weeks. All I can say at this point is that it is really SWEET, has no calories and is all natural! More to come later. 

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