Saturday, January 30, 2010

Outbound Plane

Hurray for sleeping in my own bed! How do prostitutes do it? Well, I know how they do it, I just meant, don't they want the comfort of their own bed once in a while?

I made it out of Nashville, by the hair of my chinny chin chin.

You see, Nashville, like most of the south cannot handle snow, let alone ice. They were slated for both. I was doing my risk-benefit analysis all during the last two days of my stay on whether to change my flight or trying to make my 20:00 one scheduled for yesterday.

My rationale for keeping the original flight was "they'll have time to clear the streets and runways". As I got up that last morning, I thought differently. They think differently. They closed all the schools a day before the first flake even fell. This was not a town that was going to clear anything.

During sessions I should have been participating in, I went on-line and changed my flight. I moved it to 14:00, though there was a 15:30 as well. I almost went for the latter and just said, "oh fuck it" and did the former. ....and thank fucking g-d I did.

The normal travel time from the Nashville office to the airport is 20 minutes. Reports yesterday were that it was over an hour, so I gave my presentation and boogied on out of there with two others. I'm sure some were not happy that I left before sessions ended, but I can deal with that. And they'll have to.

Taking back roads (thanks iPhone/Gooooooogle Maps), we stayed off the parking lot of a freeway and got to the airport in 45 minutes. Plenty of time....considering. Instead of a direct flight, I had to connect in Chicago which I was good with. We pushed off from the gate almost on time.....and then that's about it.

We sat. And sat. And sat. And then sat some more. The 15 minute wait for the de-icer (yes, THE ONE...and only one), turned into 45, then 90 then 120. Mind you, the flight to Chicago is 65 minutes.

I can deal with the sitting and waiting (well, to a degree) if anyone was giving any kind of updates. But they did not. Well, that's not true. They flight attendants kept coming on to tell people to turn off their cellphones. "Fuck you honey! It's the only way we were getting any kind of info!" ...is what I said.....at least the voices in my head said that.

Of course, we were watching out the window watching it get worse outside. But it's all relative. It was Nashville bad - not Cleveland, Chicago, Philly bad.

And even though Southwest clearly changed my flight, I was still getting updates for the 20:00 flight being emailed to me. At 15:00, they delayed that original flight by an hour. Really? They are doing that five hours in advance? I says to myself, I says.......that really means cancellation.

Lo and behold, when we landed in Chicago (oh yes, we did eventually take off), the entire Nashville airport had been shut down. Bullet dodged.

I can't say it was really fun trying to make my connecting flight in 10 minutes, but I did - and made it home.

....and slept in my own bed for the first time in almost a week.


Song by: Suzy Bogguss

3 comments:

Birdie said...

My boss is in Nashville, driving back from a conference today. We'll see. Good to see you made it back okay.

Larry Ohio said...

I hope your week-long travels don't keep up like this. Will they?

A Lewis said...

Welcome to my precious world.

You wouldn't REALLY use the "F word" on me, would you???