He's off you know, to a distant land

After an insanely early race to the airport and a full day of madness at work, I stayed up most of Monday night anxiously monitoring BlueBook's flight until it landed in Narita.

Paint dries faster than watching a 12 ½ hour flight

I wasn't watching because I was worried about the flight itself. He managed it two years ago, although he really doesn't like to fly. The issue was with him actually being allowed into the country.

Last Wednesday, we spent hours working with the Ministry of Health and Welfare getting the paperwork complete for his diabetes supplies. Because he was taking backup pens in the event his pump failed, and a vial of insulin to the fill the pump's cartridges, the amounts exceeded what the Ministry considered a month's supply. They also seemed unfamiliar, and concerned, with all the ephemera required for the pump.

That led us to the quest for the Yakkan-Shoumei. Each item he carried had to be documented on a separate sheet: one type for drugs and another for devices. Quantities, manufacturers, specifications, and the therapeutic application had to be documented. We scrambled with his physicians and pharmacy to get duplicate prescriptions and letters confirming his need for everything, although the ministry said it wasn't required, but would be "helpful" at customs.

Twenty-two pages later, which they accepted as an emailed PDF rather than a physical copy like all the instructions said, they emailed him a scan of the validated certificate on Saturday morning. There was rejoicing.

The worries about TSA were nothing compared to this. After all, they should be used to diabetes supplies. 'Merica.

On Monday night I caught up with my backlog of Bob's Burgers episodes while monitoring his flight on the second monitor. They landed seven minutes ahead of schedule, but I stayed up for another hour, anxiously awaiting a call from the US Embassy or somebody, that he'd been denied entry or arrested for some bureaucratic infraction. Yes, I am that mental.

I heard nothing, which I took as good news, or at least not bad. Last night Google alerted me that he'd logged in from Kyoto, probably at the hostel there, moments before I got a brief email, typed on a computer, he said, with the labels worn off the keys. He wrote that he was okay and off to breakfast soon.

When last in Japan, he'd not yet been diagnosed, and in hindsight, was in great danger. There'd been a heat wave in Tokyo so he was dehydrated, he'd picked up a bug like everybody else on the tour, and he was eating way too many carbs. Confused, he even got lost once and had trouble reuniting with the group. We were so lucky that his pancreas sputtered all the way to the fall before ruining his first week of the new school year.

This will be his last university-sponsored trip, and since he doesn't actually have to do a report this time, he can be a tourist. One of the professors accompanying them is Godzilla obsessed, and the two of them are going to be picking up anything they can find that is related to the new movie, for both themselves as well as one of my coworkers.

I will repeat my anxiety fueled performance in another two weeks, monitoring both flights. This time we'll leave for the airport the minute we see his plane start crossing over the lake. When we see him he'll probably look like hell, his clothes a mess, his hair unwashed, but no matter how much he drives me crazy when he's here, I'll be glad to have him back.