Up at 5:00 am today, making sure we get off to the airport in plenty of time.  Brad & Courtney are both busy today, so we’re using Uber for transport.  I-30 is closed in Arlington today for construction, so I’m anticipating lots of extra traffic on Hwy. 183 to DFW Airport.  There is also a Veterans Day Parade in downtown Fort Worth, so there may be some added traffic congestion going through town.  Judy reserved an Uber last night for a 7:30am pick-up.  At 7:10, she gets a text saying the Uber has been cancelled because her credit card needs to be updated.  Naturally there are issues trying to get it updated in the app on her phone, so I had to schedule the ride on my phone (thinking we’ll have a few minutes).  A note pops up that he’ll be arriving in three minutes.  Our relaxed final 15 minutes of prep turned into a hurried rush to the lobby for our ride.  He spots me, we load up, and we’re off to the airport.  Hope we grabbed everything.

Sure enough, on 121-North, there are two police cars blocking all the lanes driving very slowly? Not sure what that’s all about. We didn’t see any construction or anything else that would create a problem, but it got really slow for several miles?  Arrived at DFW before 8:00am, checked in, and worked our way through security (no lines). Once inside, we found a “Love Shack” eatery (Tim Love) and had a really good breakfast taco.  We’re ready for our flight.

While we sit, I started working on this blog entry, and Judy went for a walk.  When she gets back, she’s talking about our delay of almost an hour that just posted.  Ugh! We have a long layover in Atlanta before our Rome flight, so it shouldn’t be a problem unless we have more delays.

Oh yeah, I just got an article from someone on the “Cruise Critic” website talking about flooding in Petra.  No one was injured, but lots of tourists were scrambling for higher ground.  There’s a long narrow canyon everyone walks through to get to the historic site.  Apparently it turned into a river for a while.  We don’t get to Petra until Saturday, Nov. 17, so maybe it’ll be cleaned up and ready for tourists again.  Petra was one of the main reasons I scheduled this cruise.

Made it to Atlanta with time to spare (about 3 hrs.).  Had lunch/dinner at a Fridays, and now we’re waiting to board our Rome flight.  Our seats on the flight to Atlanta were comfortable.  Here’s hoping the Rome seats are as good or better.  It’s a 9 ½ hours flight, arriving in Rome at 9:40am.