travel rant #2
Aug. 7th, 2008 12:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
faceless_wonderthe rant i posted earlier this evening was small potatoes compared to what happened after i logged off my computer.
when i was writing that rant, i had a boarding document telling me that i was confirmed for a seat on the flight, but that i would be assigned a seat at the gate. i was fine with that, as long as i was checked in for the flight. i assumed everything would be okay, since [despite the preceding insanity] i was checked in for my flight an hour and a half beforehand.
they started boarding people. there were still ten people on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list, and then another fourteen on standby. i was number nine on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list.
they kept boarding people.
they stopped boarding people.
they shut the door.
by this point, i was still number nine on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list, and starting to feel like i was in no better position to get a seat than the people on standby. i had moved from my seat in the gate area over to the ticket counter to see what was going on.
i had no truly concrete idea why i was so low on the list, and United's list of factors wasn't helping me much. they said that people's position on the seating list was based on "mileage plus status, and other factors such as flight intangibles." so, in other words, i reasoned that because i had a $300 flight off of travelocity instead of paying $600 to buy the ticket direct from United, i probably wasn't going to get a seat because they were ridiculous enough to oversell a 150 person flight by ten people.
completely ridiculous.
finally, they printed out four tickets and gave them to the first four people among those still left on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list. there had, at least, been a few people who checked in but did not show up for the plane. those four happily took their tickets, walked over to the plane, and were allowed on. there were six of us left; i was fifth on the list. i was pleased to see the line move a bit, but i knew in my heart of hearts that there were not five more seats open on that plane.
this meant that i was going to be left in chicago overnight, since the next flight they had space to put people on was scheduled to leave at 9:30 tomorrow morning. of course, i generally don't complain about extra nights in chicago...but really, i didn't want to spend a night stressing out about flight mishaps, and i didn't want to catch the inevitable large amounts of guff for not making it to idaho on time.
finally, they called out one more person who could have a ticket. however, that person was a mother travelling with her kid, and only one of them would be able to go. they weren't splitting up. they called the third person on the list. she was travelling with a friend--and she and her friend weren't splitting up. then, they called...me. SO MUCH RELIEF. i claimed the ticket: the last seat on the plane.
what made it even more awesome? there was one woman standing at the desk, continuously screaming at the ticket clerk. whenever she started printing out tickets, or even looking as though she might be printing out tickets, she started screaming, "gimme a ticket! gimme a ticket! i'm travelling alone!" it turns out that Loud Obnoxious Screaming Lady was the last person on the list, and even though she was travelling alone...there were no more seats, and she was stuck at o'hare an extra night. karma's a bitch.
when i was writing that rant, i had a boarding document telling me that i was confirmed for a seat on the flight, but that i would be assigned a seat at the gate. i was fine with that, as long as i was checked in for the flight. i assumed everything would be okay, since [despite the preceding insanity] i was checked in for my flight an hour and a half beforehand.
they started boarding people. there were still ten people on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list, and then another fourteen on standby. i was number nine on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list.
they kept boarding people.
they stopped boarding people.
they shut the door.
by this point, i was still number nine on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list, and starting to feel like i was in no better position to get a seat than the people on standby. i had moved from my seat in the gate area over to the ticket counter to see what was going on.
i had no truly concrete idea why i was so low on the list, and United's list of factors wasn't helping me much. they said that people's position on the seating list was based on "mileage plus status, and other factors such as flight intangibles." so, in other words, i reasoned that because i had a $300 flight off of travelocity instead of paying $600 to buy the ticket direct from United, i probably wasn't going to get a seat because they were ridiculous enough to oversell a 150 person flight by ten people.
completely ridiculous.
finally, they printed out four tickets and gave them to the first four people among those still left on the "confirmed awaiting seats" list. there had, at least, been a few people who checked in but did not show up for the plane. those four happily took their tickets, walked over to the plane, and were allowed on. there were six of us left; i was fifth on the list. i was pleased to see the line move a bit, but i knew in my heart of hearts that there were not five more seats open on that plane.
this meant that i was going to be left in chicago overnight, since the next flight they had space to put people on was scheduled to leave at 9:30 tomorrow morning. of course, i generally don't complain about extra nights in chicago...but really, i didn't want to spend a night stressing out about flight mishaps, and i didn't want to catch the inevitable large amounts of guff for not making it to idaho on time.
finally, they called out one more person who could have a ticket. however, that person was a mother travelling with her kid, and only one of them would be able to go. they weren't splitting up. they called the third person on the list. she was travelling with a friend--and she and her friend weren't splitting up. then, they called...me. SO MUCH RELIEF. i claimed the ticket: the last seat on the plane.
what made it even more awesome? there was one woman standing at the desk, continuously screaming at the ticket clerk. whenever she started printing out tickets, or even looking as though she might be printing out tickets, she started screaming, "gimme a ticket! gimme a ticket! i'm travelling alone!" it turns out that Loud Obnoxious Screaming Lady was the last person on the list, and even though she was travelling alone...there were no more seats, and she was stuck at o'hare an extra night. karma's a bitch.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 09:56 am (UTC)Of course, it's Friday, so the planes are packed, and we go down to the counter to get our flights changed (three of us traveling together) to find that nothing's open. So we get put on confirmed-but-unseated for a (HA!) American flight from Philly to St. Louis. During this process the following conversation ensues:
Postdoc: Worry about these two (self and Fellow Male Grad Student) first; they have to give talks tomorrow.
USAir Lady: Honey, I couldn't get you on plane right now if you were giving birth tomorrow!
FMGS: Hey, I'm giving birth tomorrow!
USAir Lady: [unperturbed] Still can't get you on the plane.
Self and Postdoc: LOL.
We hang out at the gate, and lo, and behold, seats open up because other people didn't make their connections. So FMGS and I get on, but Postdoc doesn't. And neither does the poor woman who'd been waiting longer than us, but was somehow "lower priority". *sigh*
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 04:06 pm (UTC)just...wow.
did FMGS eventually get there?
[and, i don't know whether to be sad that the USAir lady didn't laugh at the joke, or impressed that she was completely unperturbed by it.]
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 01:28 pm (UTC)There was a fellow on Off the Hook with me last night who spent three days in Heathrow airport trying to get back to NY. Poor guy ended up flying to Edinburgh, and catching a flight from there to NY.
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 04:10 pm (UTC)three days in Heathrow? poor guy. :( that's terrible!
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 04:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 04:31 pm (UTC)i flew from St. Louis to South Carolina to visit my friend and her family this past December. my flight back was routed through O'Hare. the day i was supposed to fly back to St. Louis, there were terrible windstorms in Chicago. i checked in, and they said my flight was delayed. [it was originally supposed to leave around noon.]
by the time i got up to the gate, they announced that they cancelled it, and that we'd have to go back downstairs to get seats on the next flight out, around five thirty. so, i got a seat on that one. the five thirty one was also delayed like crazy, between the windstorm in Chicago and the storm that was going on in...whatever city the flight was coming into Greenville, SC from. it ended up leaving sometime between ten and eleven...making it ten or eleven hours delayed out of Greenville.
the problem was, there were no more seats on flights out of Chicago that day...or the next day. they could get me from Greenville to O'Hare, but it would be two days before i could get back to St. Louis. i booked a ticket, and kept calling
i finally got in touch with him around eight or nine, when i was still stuck in Greenville. he, being the awesome friend that he is, suggested i try and get a ticket out for five days later instead of two days, so i could stay for Christmas and spend it with him and his family. [his family is full of awesome, and his mom is the most adorable mom on earth.] i went up to the ticket counter, and the woman was absolutely bamboozled that i was willing to trade my ticket on the first available flight out for a flight that left several days later. she switched the flights for me and did not even charge me an itinerary-change fee to do so.
so...it was ten or eleven hours in Greenville...and then a two-day layover in Chicago that turned into an impromptu five-day vacation in Chicago. all in all, not so bad.
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 06:55 pm (UTC)I'm surprised I'm still willing to fly, probably only because I know that it could never ever be that bad again.
(Although there was one where the stewardess had a heart attack right after take off so we had to land and then re-take-off, but that's not god hating airplanes, that's just bad health!)
no subject
Date: 2008-08-07 07:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-08-08 07:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-08-09 06:01 pm (UTC)