There's a first time for everything: your first words, your first steps, your first birthday, your first Christmas, your first bikeride without training wheels, your first day of school, your first time driving a car, your first time legally driving a car, your first (and last) taste of cognac, your first time voting, your first college party, your first illegal download, your first REAL job, and....your first missed flight.
I spent three years as a consultant travelling around the country every week (and hating every minute of it, but that's besides the point). I've flown about 250,000 miles in the last two years on American Airlines alone, but I've never missed a flight. Today, on arguably the busiest flight day of the year, I did it. Normally I fly on the JFK to San Jose / San Francisco flight at around 6:00 or 6:30. So I was chilling...I mean working...at home today mentally preparing for my 2 hour commute to the airport on the subway - and nursing a mean hangover, but that's besides the point. At 2:00, I decided I should probably start packing (I have to leave at 3:00) and get dressed for the day. But first, I figured I'd check on my flight status to make sure that the rain and wind wasn't going to delay my flight. I found my flight reservation and my jaw dropped to the floor - my flight was at 3:45. I couldn't believe it, what was I thinking booking a flight that early??? I threw some clothes on, packed my luggage, and was out the door in about 5 minutes. I caught a cab and $50 later (ouch) arrived at the airport at 3:10. The flight check-in lady said that I was too late and wouldn't be able to catch my flight because I was checking luggage. My luggage being practically empty, I almost considered ditching my luggage, but that wouldn't be the best idea. I told her I didn't care when my baggage arrived, but she said the FAA required that the person be on the same flight as their luggage. She said all I could do is go stand-by on the 6:00 flight. I asked what would happen to my luggage if I didn't get on that flight and she said that it would go to San Francisco on the flight - with or without me. Wait, didn't she just say that that wasn't allowed???
To piss me off even more (as if not having an aisle emergency-row seat wasn't enough), when I got through security my original flight was still boarding but they wouldn't let me fly on it because I was already on stand-by on the 6:00 flight = ANNOYING.
For good measure, the heavens opened up and brought thunder and lightning to the airport right before the 6:00pm flight. So we'll add an hour delay for that. And then, despite already being delayed an additional hour, they couldn't get all the luggage into the plane in time, so we'll go ahead and add another hour for that. Then we get to wait in line to depart for another half hour for a grand total of.....2.5 hour delay! That's fun! The real kicker came on the flight when they couldn't get the VCR to work, so they couldn't show the first decent movie to play on an airplane - Shark Tales. And of course that caused me to miss out on catching up in my sleep....
I'm ready to go to sleep and wake up tomorrow...
Merry Christmas!
J. Riley
