Crushed - At the Bakery

Yesterday started off pretty well, and, I thought, went well.  Got up, had cereal for breakfast, fed my kits, cleaned their litter boxes, spent two hours on the computer checking e-mails and my schedules, plus looking at news and the few comic strips I read.  Then I put together a neighborhood wildlife watch bulletin about the recent incursions of prairie dogs in the Githens Acres neighborhood and sent it out to the 60 folks who receive it.  Set off for work and visited three homes, feeding and watering various pets, gathering news papers, watering flowers and plants.  Stopped by at Rosie's at our usual time, and took her out for a slow one hour stroll.  Got home just before noon, and washed and dried two loads of laundry, and swept and mopped the floor.
  About three in the afternoon, one of my usual clients called and asked if I would feed her critters that evening.  I told her she had set up feedings, and walks for the dog, for Friday through Monday due to her meditation retreat schedule.  She had forgotten setting up the work...  Then she asked if her daughter had called, or sent an e-mail, regarding her arrival at Denver International Airport on the red-eye flight from LaGuardia.  I told her, no - it was the first I'd heard of it; the last I knew her daughter was here in Boulder.  The Mom insisted that the daughter was flying back "on her usual 1 a.m. Frontier flight," and begged me to be there to pick her up, because she, the Mom, had the meditation retreat and needed her sleep, plus wasn't supposed to speak to anyone until the retreat was over.  I agreed to pick up the car a little after 9, once I left Rosie's, and drive to DIA.  Then it was time for my afternoon rounds, so I went to three houses and fed and walked critters; then I went to the Mom's house and fed her animals; then on to Rosie's for a visit until 9 p.m.  After that, I walked over to the Mom's house, let the dog out for a few minutes, and then took the daughter's car to my apartment. I tried to take a nap before leaving for DIA, but I couldn't sleep.
   My one thought through all of this was that I would treat myself to two doughnuts with chocolate icing for breakfast today, this morning, as I went over to the Jack Russells' house.  I got up, checked the DIA flight schedule and saw the flight from LGA to Denver was on time.  Due to road construction, I left the house with a 20 minute "cushion" in case of road blocks or traffic stoppages.  I arrived at the cell phone waiting lot 15 minutes before the plane was due to touch down, but I went inside to check the arrivals boards.  The flight was on-time.  I went back out to the car and began to read the book I taken along.  Twenty-six minutes after the plane was due to land, I went back inside and looked at the arrivals board again.  It stated that the plane had landed and where luggage could be picked up.  I went back to the car.  After another 15 minutes, I called the daughter's cell phone.  It went straight to voice mail.  I  left a message asking where she was, and telling her where I was.  I drove over to the Arrivals pick-up point, but there was no one in sight.  I went back to the cell phone lot, sat a few minutes, then call the Mom's cell phone.  It went straight to voice mail.  I explained where I was and there was no sign of her daughter.  I asked if the daughter's boyfriend might have picked her up?  I don't have his phone number...  I waited a bit more, and tried to call the daughter again.  No luck.
  So I drove to the economy parking lot, and went inside the terminal.  The flight the daughter should have arrived on had already continued it's flight on to California.  There was no one waiting near the airline's area; there was no sign of the daughter in the rest rooms; there were no unclaimed bags from her flight.  I walked back through the arrivals area, but saw no one who looked remotely like the daughter.  I went out to the car, called the Mom on her landline number - and it went straight to voice mail.  I told her everything I'd done, and that I was driving back home and would return the car before 9 a.m, when I was due at my first job of the day.
   Drove back to Boulder, arrived about 4 this morning - Beatrice was worried that I hadn't come home yet, and was still awake, since I didn't have the sense to call my room mate.  I got into bed at 4:10, and closed my eyes, promising myself chocolate iced doughnuts.  I got a recorded call from a telemarketer at 5:45  - and I'm on the National Do Not Call list.  I was not happy.  Then the Mom called me, in hysterics, asking where her daughter was, at 5:53...  I explained everything all over again, and she hung up while I was talking.  Apparently, she called the boyfriend, as she called me back at 6:20, saying that the boyfriend said she'd spent the night in NYC.  Mom was calmer, but still in a panic mode.  I was almost asleep again when the daughter called me from NYC, to tell me her side of things....  Her flight is tonight.  She will arrive at DIA Sunday morning at 1:04.  Kevin, the boyfriend, will pick her up.
   Mom called me back to be certain I'd feed the critters and walk the dog today.  I got up.  I stopped at the bakery on the way to feed the Mom's critters - they did not have any chocolate iced doughnuts, they did not have any regular glazed doughnuts, and they did not have any sugar-sprinkled doughnuts.  I bought a blueberry bagel and fed the Mom's critters....   *sigh*  ....