Delayed

If there is a hell … and I am in fact bound there … the perfect torture would be sitting in an airport, waiting for a flight that is delayed.   Originally, say, it was scheduled for 11:42, boarding at 11:02.  It is now10:30 and I have been sitting at the gate for almost an hour trying to ignore the guy in the next row talking loudly into his phone, closing the deal of the century.  Seriously, don’t you wonder if there’s no one on the line and these guys just want to sound important. There is a gaggle of business folks returning from a convention, bursting with comradery and yucking it up about something that happened as they finished the day in the hotel bar.   There’s a family with three adorable kids who just got off a connecting flight and are so full of energy spontaneous combustion is not out of the question.  They squeal and laugh and run.  I love kids but I hate airports which cancels out the love of kids.   As I am fetching my Bose noise cancelling headphones from my carry-on, I look up just in time to see the departure time click from 11:42 to Delayed 12:05 on the flight status board.  Shit!   And over the next two hours, the flight delay will advance maddeningly in 20 minute increments until either the flight is cancelled or, finally, blessedly, the loudspeaker announce We will begin boarding in 20 minutes.   But wait.   This is hell!   The flight delays go on for eternity and the businessman never stops talking and the conference goers laugh louder and louder and more adorable kids show up and my headphone batteries are dead.  I would be pulling out may hair if I had any.

I bring this up because at 9:30 am we were just getting ready to leave for the airport to send Christmas with our grandkids in Texas.   For three lovely years they live only ten minutes away, so enjoying Christmas morning with them didn’t require trips to the airport.  But now they live in Texas and we have to fly to see them.   Fortunately, my daughter texted us that our flight had been delayed just before we were ready to leave for the airport, so I was spared.   After three delays, it looks like we will be leaving two and a half hours late (since the incoming flight is finally on it’s way).  So, here I sit, passing the time by writing this post and grateful it’s just another day at the airport.  But of course, our outgoing flight could still be delayed due to weather in Dallas (believe it or not, it’s colder there than it is here in Utah).  But I know we’ll get there eventually because my wife is entirely too good to be sentenced to airport hell.

(Almost) Headed Home

Our Christmas stay with our grandkids is over (sigh) and we are (Almost) Headed Home. Almost because our flight from Salt Lake City is delayed over two hours. It has been snowing here on and off for two days and, on the way to the airport the car next to us went into a 720-spin on the slick road and almost hit us. But the snow here isn’t the reason for our delay. Lightning storms in Texas delayed the plane’s departure from Austin to Salt Lake. You should know that in spite of the fact that I am a Million Mile flyer … and that I find the window seat at 30,000 feet a great place to work or write … I hate airports, especially on busy flight days.   OK. If I had an airport to myself … and maybe a few hand-selected friends … it might be tolerable.  I’m just not fond of being crammed into uncomfortable seating at the gates with hundreds of travelers. Businessmen talking (loudly so we’ll all know how important they are), closing deals on their cell phones. Noisy kids and noisy parents trying in vain to keep them under control. Lonely souls telling their life stories to anyone who will listen.  The inevitable babbler with the annoying voice who can’t seem to stop talking even though she ran out of things to say ten years ago.

Nothing To Do But Write

It’s 1:45 in the afternoon and here I sit, in the Dallas Fort Worth Airport, American Airlines Terminal B, to be specific.   Back in the days when I was a regular business traveler, I was a member of the Admirals Club, a private lounge for American Airlines travelers willing to pay a hefty fee … in dollars or miles.  The Club has comfortable seating, private working areas, and snacks … plus sandwiches and drinks for a price.  If I was stuck with a three hour layover … like I have today … it was better than sitting at the gate.   Quieter, for one, at least until business travelers starting bringing their kids along.  Today, I am sitting at a counter with USB ports in the Gate B5 waiting area.   I have no special attachment to gate B5 but there are no flight scheduled for the next several hours so it is relatively quiet.   For about ten minutes, the alarm on an employees-only door kept going off, a high pitched squeal that leaves my teeth vibrating.   Desperate for power for my laptop, I waited it out.  A speaker on the ceiling over my head is prattling on about the madhouse that has become our national government.  It is only slightly less annoying than the alarm.   Terminal B mostly serves American Airlines secondary routes … like those to Huntsville, where I’m headed, so in front of me passengers trickle by in ones and twos, hunting for their departure gates or talking quietly.  Even with occasional gate change announcements, it’s not a bad place to write, especially when there’s nothing else to do.  It’s not the Admirals Club, for sure, but it’s better than the madhouse in terminal A, where I arrived from Socal.

Information Content

It’s Friday and I’m flying again.  There was a time that meant business, very likely in Washington, D.C.  At this stage of my life, flying usually means vacation or visiting family.  Today, the destination is Salt Lake City to see our grandkids (and their parents … it’s a package deal).  If you’ve been a reader for a while,  you know air travel is a challenge for my Inner Curmudgeon.   It has three of the things he hates: waiting (especially in lines) and confined spaces packed with people and their cell phones.  And the worst thing, small cadres of business folks traveling together, compelled to have loud business meetings in the airport lounges … or worse, in the row behind me on the aircraft.

Throwback Thursday – Following Instructions

I discovered this old post, originally posted in 2010, by accident as I was reviewing the similar posts WordPress inserted at the bottom of yesterday’s post, Yakkers.   It is the perfect combination of common sense and curmudgeon for a Throwback Thursday.

This morning, waiting in the aisle of Southwest Flight 931 to choose my seat, I was talking with a man from San Antonio I’d met in the boarding area.   We were both experienced business travelers exchanging … as experienced business travelers do … stories of cities visited and flights endured.  The flight attendant, who appeared to be almost as old as I am … remember when they were all young and glamorous? …  probably not … was giving her full flight speech.   Ladies and gentlemen, this is a very full flight.  There is limited overhead space for carry-on luggage, so please place any  items such as computer bags, cameras, coats or hats under the seat in front of you. As she was finishing, the man in front of me stuffed his computer bag into a partially full bin and farther down the aisle, a woman was doing the same with her coat and purse.   My temporary traveling companion and I just looked at each other and laughed.

Monday Smiles – Airborne Edition

I am flyng again.  At the moment, the interactive map on the video screen at my seat tells me I am over Juarez, New Mexico.  I am bound to the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, hoping to catch a tight connection to Huntville AL for a two day business meeting.   It looks like I land in one terminal and depart from another, so I may have some running through the airport to do.  Truth:  at my age, it will be fast walking, especially with my computer bag over my shoulder.   I’m on the aisle in the 13th row, not First Class but not the worst seat on the plane either.  Most of the passengers are reading or playing whatever on their assorted electronic devices, which is good … no loud talkers.   The only annoyance is the very large guy in front of me who keeps shifting  in his seat and pushing against the backrest so hard that he almost spills my Diet Coke.  Me?  I’m writing and listening to my jazz playlist in shuffle mode … Keiko Matsui Walls of Akendora, at the moment.   The Captain just said, We are beginning our descent into Dallas/Fort Worth Airport.  Please return to your seats and be sure your seatbelts are fastened, which means 40 more minutes in the air.   He says there are storms in the area so the descent could be bumpy.

I used to travel once or twice a month and I liked being in touch with my professional community.  I enjoyed working on teams addressing real technical problems and I enjoyed giving presentations on our work. These days, the work is still interesting but I don’t need to be a shaker and a mover anymore.  It makes my bones rattle and my joints hurt.  But here I am at 34,000 feet, listening to the music I love, posting on my blog.  I’ll text Muri when I land and hook up with my colleagues for the flight to Huntsville.   We’ll finally get to see what our customer thinks of our work.  If I had my druthers, I would be at home.   As my wife Muri and I have grown older, we like to be in shouting distance of each other, not that we do much shouting.  We do occasionally text each other from or respective enclaves, hers the love seat in our bedroom and me in my recliner downstairs.  Yes, I’d rather be doing that.  But for a couple days I can pretend to move and shake like I used to.  I can even smile about it.  It is, after all, Monday.

Up in the Air

There was a time when I flew coast to coast almost every month, which made it a good thing that, for the most part, I enjoyed being Up in the Air.   Yes, it helped that with so many flights on Ameican Airlines came Aadvantage miles which allowed me to fly first class most of the time.  Some of the other airborne annoyances, like loud, inebriated businessmen or First Class chatterboxes were mitigated by my Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones and my favorite playlists in the mp3 player I always kept in my briefcase.  I’ve always liked the window seat because I find the world spread out beneath me, five miles or so down, awe inspiring.  I found I could get a lot of work … or reading … or writing done to the tune of my favorite music.  I’ve made some important decisions at 30,000 feet.  I’d look at people doing absolutely nothing for a six hour flight and wonder, How the heck can they do that?  The best in-flight song ever is, in my opinion, Derek and the Dominos’s Layla, by the way.  I’d love to know yours if you have one.  I suppose most people don’t have favorite in-air songs.

Infrequent Flyer

I used to be a Frequent Flyer.  At least once a month I’d board a plane in Orange County, CA, headed east, usually to Washington, D.C. or to Hartford, Connecticut … sometimes both.   I almost always flew American Airlines and accumulated over 2 million frequent flyer miles.  I’d accumulate miles so fast that I never flew coach, nor did Muri and I when we traveled for pleasure.  That is very easy to get used to, especially the free drinks and wine.  I’d sometimes find myself flying in more ways than one.   I became somewhat of an airport elitist, annoyed by those who held up airport lines because they didn’t know what they were supposed to do or because they were dragging along a gaggle of noisy kids.  I used my frequent flyer miles to join the Admiral’s Club where I could hide out with other airport elitists … and I complained loudly when some of them began to bring their noisy kids to the Club.  They even began to use their miles to bring the kids into first class.  The nerve.   But the truth is, once I was airborne, I enjoyed flying.  I never got tired of looking out the window, seeing this lovely country of ours from 30,000 feet and sights like a moon reflected on the great lakes or a lightning storm seen from above.   I found that I worked better, wrote better and thought better at altitude, and if some noisy kid or loud inebriated businessman bothered me, well, there was always my Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones and Layla played loud enough to drown them out.

Following Instructions

This morning, waiting in the aisle of Southwest Flight 931 to choose my seat, I was talking with a man from San Antonio I’d met in the boarding area.   We were both experienced business travelers exchanging … as experienced business travelers do … stories of cities visited and flights endured.  The flight attendant, who appeared to be almost as old as I am … remember when they were all young and glamorous?  probably not … was giving her full flight speech.   Ladies and gentlemen, this is a very full flight.  There is limited overhead space for carry-on luggage, so please place any  items such as computer bags, cameras, coats or hats under the seat in front of you. As she was finishing, the man in front of me stuffed his computer bag into a partially full bin and farther down the aisle, a woman was doing the same with her coat and purse.   My temporary traveling companion and I just looked at each other and laughed.

Peculiar Behavior

We made it back to Socal, arriving on the tail end of a record-breaking heat wave that brought temperatures up to 115 degrees, territory usual reserved for our Little House in the Desert in San Tan Valley (formerly Queen Creek) AZ.   Other than a few gate changes and a half hour flight delay in Dallas (truly nits among the possible difficulties to be encountered in flying these days), our return was uneventful.    Now, it’s Top Sites Tuesday #79, Two Thoughts on Tuesday, and I’d have expected that eleven hours in airports and airplanes would have provided a multitude of thoughts.  But looking back, I could only find one.