Art Flies on an Air-o-Plane

In June of 2001, I had a 3:50 PM flight from Philadelphia to California with a change of planes in Pittsburgh.  Not having been to the Philadelphia area in five years, I wanted to leave the suburbs, where I was staying, in plenty of time to get to the airport without worry.  As luck would have it, the trolley - bus connections were quick and the long bus trip uneventful, so by 2 PM I had been checked in and was sitting at the gate, listening to morons constantly gabbing on their cellular telephones.

Very oddly for me - I never eat when I travel - I decided to get a hoagie at a concessionaire directly across from my gate.  It turned out to be fortuitous...

At 3:50, they still hadn't boarded anyone, although the plane had been there for close to an hour. Finally they announced that the intended crew had just arrived on a flight from Fort Lauderdale, and they were walking to this gate right now.  This same announcement was made several times over the next few minutes, leading me to worry that the crew was either handicapped or lost.  Finally the crew ambled through the departure lounge and down the ramp a half hour late, and eventually we started boarding.  We pulled away from the gate 50 minutes late, and I had 1 hour - now down to ten minutes - between flights.  I had hopes of making the connection if the gates were not too far apart, although I doubted the luggage would make it.

We were towed about a hundred feet back.  The plane was turned around to taxi forward, and then stopped.  The pilot made an announcement: a passenger had a seat with bubble gum on it, and they would have to send out for a new cushion!  I knew then that I was doomed.  About 20 minutes later they wheeled a portable stairwell up to the plane and up came some clown holding a seat cushion.  He disappeared behind me and soon returned forward and exited the plane.  They sealed the door and rolled back the stairwell, whereupon we were able to taxi toward a rather healthy lineup of planes.

As we were waiting our turn, the pilot suddenly pulled off onto a smaller taxiway and shut down the engines.  He told us that bad weather in Pittsburgh had shut down the airport, but he hoped this wouldn't be for long. By now it was about 1¼ hours after the scheduled departure time.  He lowered all the TV sets from the ceiling and started some god-awful situation comedy at high volume, with utterly obnoxious canned laughter after every sentence. Out came the earplugs that I carry at all times.

At about 2 hours, he informed us that the FAA had experienced a failure of the air traffic control computers in Pittsburgh, and that the airport was therefore being controlled from Cleveland, on top of the normal duties at Cleveland.  Thus the flow of flights in and out of Pittsburgh was severely restricted, but at least the airport was now open.  He realized that this was an extreme inconvenience to everyone, so to partially make up he directed the stewardesses to serve everyone - you expect me to say "drinks" - ice water!  Sure enough, they started wheeling the beverage carts down the aisle and giving everyone small, half filled tumblers of water.  Never again will I accuse big corporations of being greedy, unscrupulous bastards. Meanwhile, every buffoon with a cellular phone was gabbing away.

We finally took off just shy of 3 hours late.  At times the turbulence was so severe that they had to stop serving beverages.  We were told that because so many flights were delayed, there was a good chance that all our connecting flights would still be there with correspondingly late departures.  This was irrelevant to me, as John Wayne (my destination airport) has a 10 PM noise curfew and it would have taken the Concorde to get there in time, if not the space shuttle.  We were instructed to talk to the waiting US Airways agent at our lounge, but that we couldn't check the video screens for arrivals and departures because, true to form, the US Air computers had malfunctioned.

We eventually landed, and I asked the agent what I should do.  "Check the monitors", which apparently were back up.  And if the flight was gone already?  "See the Special Services Desk down the hallway".

Well, there was no sign of my flight; obviously it was long gone.  Trudging down the concourse, I finally arrived at the Special Services Desk, easy to recognize because of the several hundred people snaking their way therefrom in a huge queue down the hallway.

Across the way was an empty departure lounge from a flight that had obviously just left, as the agent there was cleaning up and finishing his duties.  I walked over to simply ask him the question, "when I finally reach the front of that line 6 or 7 hours from now, just what might I realistically expect from US Airways?  This isn't a familiar situation to me."  To my utter astonishment, he said "I'll help you right now." Several other people came up immediately thereafter, and he directed them to the Special Services Desk!

He pulled out a list of hotels, pondered, and picked one for me called the Hawthorn Suite, describing it as very nice, writing out and handing me a voucher for that hotel.   He handed me so many prepaid phone cards I pushed most of them back.  He wrote out several meal vouchers for dinner and breakfast, and booked me on the next day's 9:50am flight to John Wayne, arriving at noon.  I was simply flabbergasted.  He told me to go to the baggage area and look for white courtesy phones to various hotels, but that this one might not have one - it would simply be a local phone call.  I was sincerely impressed, shook his hand, and trotted toward the baggage area.  I might not have a toothbrush or any clothes, but at least I'd have a bed.

Checking the phone bank at the baggage area, I found he was correct regarding no courtesy phone, and asked an adjacent Travelers' Aid lady if she could dig up the phone number of the Hawthorn so I could request a shuttle.  She kindly offered to make the phone call for me - very nice.  After hanging up, she said that the Hawthorn was close to a half hour away, but that the shuttle driver was here right now.  I sprinted out the door, and five seconds later I waved down the driver of the Hawthorn van!  Total time outside of the airport: less than fifteen seconds.

The Hawthorn turned out to be 14-15 miles away, and was a lovely extended stay residence hotel.  It was fully equipped with kitchen, including microwave, toaster, utensils, plates, glasses, etc, etc., which of course were of no use to me.  It was a huge, gorgeous hotel room with the best looking television I'd ever encountered.  (It was a Magnovox, believe it or not.)  Unfortunately, the clerk informed me that the nearest restaurant was a considerable distance away, rather unpleasantly far for a pedestrian.  He warned me that the roads were dark, hilly, and congested, and that there were no sidewalks, but the route wasn't especially complicated.  Although I had a meal voucher for dinner, being so bummed out over the entire situation, and having downed the big hoagie in the airport, I decided I didn't need any food, and simply watched a basketball playoff game on the beautiful television.  All the while, I was futilely using the calling cards to unsuccessfully get hold of my wife, who was to pick me up at 8:30pm.  I called a friend, explained the situation, and asked him to do likewise.  We couldn't get hold of her.  Thinking she might have gone to the airport extremely early, I finally started calling John Wayne's paging number, which the US Air reservations number managed to dig up for me, as did my friend.  We had her paged numerous times - no dice. I called my office and left a brief description of my predicament on the boss' voice mail, explaining that I was stuck in Pittsburgh and there was zero probability of my being at work in the morning.

I also had to worry about getting back to the airport.  It turned out that there were only two morning shuttles to the airport: 6 AM and 9 AM.  9 would have been risky, and having fasted I wanted to splurge on a lavish breakfast anyway, meaning a 6 AM shuttle and arriving 3½ hours early.

Finally, at 1 AM, my wife called.  She had started a new medicine that had wiped her out; she had been at home sound asleep and thus wouldn't have been there to pick me up anyway.   I explained the situation and she agreed to pick me up a half hour or so after the noon arrival to give me time to (hopefully) get my baggage, which I had been assured would magically appear on that flight, without the nuisance and expense of her parking at the airport.

I was so keyed up that I got about 2 hours of sleep.  I checked out at 5:50 AM and asked where to catch the shuttle.  I was asked "Do you have reservations?"!!! I replied that nobody had told me anything about reservations, and was informed that the 6 AM van was full.   Could anything else go wrong:?! My only choice would be an expensive (15 miles!) taxi ride, or to wait for the later shuttle.

Fortunately, one person didn't show up and they put me on the shuttle.  From there on, everything went well, including the breakfast.  The lounge didn't start to fill up with the inevitable yuppie cellular phone users for a couple hours.  And the flight left on time and was smooth, aside from a bunch of obnoxious birth control failures, naturally occupying the seats directly in front of me.  Thank goodness for earplugs.

And due to favorable winds, we actually got in a half hour early, at 11:30.  I managed to get home, soothe one of my cats who is utterly traumatized and terrified when I'm gone for more than a few hours - this was two weeks - and get to work by 1:15.

So that's my story.  And people don't understand why I don't like to travel.