Thursday, December 29, 2005
Since I've Been Gone, pt. I
(author's note: This blog entry will be a multi-part entry, from airport layover to airport layover.)
Part I
Right now, I'm sitting in the Bruce Sundlun Terminal of T.F. Green Airport in God's Country (Providence, RI for those of you great unwashed).
It's Thursday, Dec. 29. I've been home since last Thursday. For those of you mathematically challenged folks, that's a wee bit more than a week.
Since September, I've been as far away from the Naughty Northeast (hey, if the South can be Dirrrty, then the Northeast can be Naughty. Or nimble. Or nonsensical. Whatever.) And needless to say, it was a nice trip home. Nice to see the family. Good to see friends. And considering I got to O'Hare Airport literally 14 minutes before they closed the door to my flight, the harrowing beginnings certainly led to some relaxing downtime.
So how did this mess come about - the running late thing, I mean - ? Easy.
For one, I chose to save a few bucks to fly out of O'Hare (as in Chicago, the busiest g-d airport West of Heathrow, a P-I-T-A to get to, and whatever) rather than leaving from Milwaukee. Fine. Good idea on paper.
Rather than pay the roughly $46,000 to park at O'Hare for roughly more than a week (ok, I'm exaggering - it's only $37,000), I spent 42 quid on the Wisconsin Bus Lines airport service. Another good idea on paper.
The website said that the bus left from the 13th Street Terminal. Good! I live on the corner of 12th! And I always see buses rolling through campus, down Wisconsin. The 7:50 bus would get me to O'Hare at 9:15 or so. Short walk to the long bus. Slight wait for the plane. Right? Wrong.
It's 7:55. No bus. It's 8:00. No bus. In a panic, I call the bus company.
They confirm my fears. No bus. Not there, at least. I live on the North Side of 13th. The terminal was on the South Side of 13th. Not good. In a panic, I hail a cab, get to the train station - the closest bus stop to where I was standing at that point, and caught the 8:20. Which really was the 8:50, if you use the 1st bus as a frame of reference. And using that "add an hour to it" reference point, I'd be getting into O'Hare, on paper, at 10:15.
My flight's at 11. It's Christmas time. It's the busiest airport in the country.
Nothing happens on paper. Things go wrong.
For me, in this case, "slow" = "wrong." Like making a stop in every town from Milwaukee, to Kenosha, Racine, Bumbleshampoo, Aardvark (author's note: there isn't an Aardvark, Wisconsin. Well, maybe there is. But we didn't stop there.) And at each and every stop, annoyingly hyper kids and one-foot-in-the-grave old people got on. Not the picture of efficiency.
You know you're getting close to an airport when all the billboards are airline related. "Southwest Vacations." "United Airlines." "Visit Tampa." "Turn right for Airport."
Another way you know that you're approaching an airport is traffic. And we hit some. Not bumper-to-bumper, but enough to slow the rate of acceleration of the Coach USA bus to an accelerated crawl. Time check: 10:15. Not at the airport yet.
Around 10:25, we pull into O'Hare's Terminal One. A woman so old that I think I heard her saying she sat next to Dolly Madison (wife of our fourth President, James Madison) in homeroom at Orange County H.S. in colonial Virginia in 1767.
(historical note: yes, everyone, the original O.C. was in colonial Virginia, not the one with Seth Cohen and Summer...who both happen to be considering colleges in Rhode Island. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, EVERYTHING IN THIS UNIVERSE REVOLVES AROUND RHODE ISLAND. It's best if you just accept it and move on, really.)
So this woman was getting off the bus at about the same rate a sea urchin moves from rock to rock on the ocean floor. Ever see "March of the Penguins?" That was about as fast as she moved on the sidewalk, which would be no big whoops if the bus driver wasn't personally walking her to the gate.
It's now 10:35.
Nervous.
Swearing.
Calling my Dad to tell him that I probably was not going to make the flight home. Cursing myself for trying to save 150 bucks by going to O'Hare, now confronted with the possibility of buying a walk-up ticket for a same-day flight...and those things cost, well, about as much as pahking your cah at O'Hare for a week.
Timeline, 10:37. The bus pulls up to Continental Terminal two. It's me. I triple-jump down the aisle, grab into the compartment under the bus, and make a mad dash to the ticket line. I wasn't sure if I had my own bags, but I have tags and so did these. If there were wrong, I could just ship them to the respective person. I was late. Like the prophet Ludacris says, "Move, Bitch. Get out the way."
-----
My plane is boarding. More later when I land in Detroit Rock City.
One.
Part I
Right now, I'm sitting in the Bruce Sundlun Terminal of T.F. Green Airport in God's Country (Providence, RI for those of you great unwashed).
It's Thursday, Dec. 29. I've been home since last Thursday. For those of you mathematically challenged folks, that's a wee bit more than a week.
Since September, I've been as far away from the Naughty Northeast (hey, if the South can be Dirrrty, then the Northeast can be Naughty. Or nimble. Or nonsensical. Whatever.) And needless to say, it was a nice trip home. Nice to see the family. Good to see friends. And considering I got to O'Hare Airport literally 14 minutes before they closed the door to my flight, the harrowing beginnings certainly led to some relaxing downtime.
So how did this mess come about - the running late thing, I mean - ? Easy.
For one, I chose to save a few bucks to fly out of O'Hare (as in Chicago, the busiest g-d airport West of Heathrow, a P-I-T-A to get to, and whatever) rather than leaving from Milwaukee. Fine. Good idea on paper.
Rather than pay the roughly $46,000 to park at O'Hare for roughly more than a week (ok, I'm exaggering - it's only $37,000), I spent 42 quid on the Wisconsin Bus Lines airport service. Another good idea on paper.
The website said that the bus left from the 13th Street Terminal. Good! I live on the corner of 12th! And I always see buses rolling through campus, down Wisconsin. The 7:50 bus would get me to O'Hare at 9:15 or so. Short walk to the long bus. Slight wait for the plane. Right? Wrong.
It's 7:55. No bus. It's 8:00. No bus. In a panic, I call the bus company.
They confirm my fears. No bus. Not there, at least. I live on the North Side of 13th. The terminal was on the South Side of 13th. Not good. In a panic, I hail a cab, get to the train station - the closest bus stop to where I was standing at that point, and caught the 8:20. Which really was the 8:50, if you use the 1st bus as a frame of reference. And using that "add an hour to it" reference point, I'd be getting into O'Hare, on paper, at 10:15.
My flight's at 11. It's Christmas time. It's the busiest airport in the country.
Nothing happens on paper. Things go wrong.
For me, in this case, "slow" = "wrong." Like making a stop in every town from Milwaukee, to Kenosha, Racine, Bumbleshampoo, Aardvark (author's note: there isn't an Aardvark, Wisconsin. Well, maybe there is. But we didn't stop there.) And at each and every stop, annoyingly hyper kids and one-foot-in-the-grave old people got on. Not the picture of efficiency.
You know you're getting close to an airport when all the billboards are airline related. "Southwest Vacations." "United Airlines." "Visit Tampa." "Turn right for Airport."
Another way you know that you're approaching an airport is traffic. And we hit some. Not bumper-to-bumper, but enough to slow the rate of acceleration of the Coach USA bus to an accelerated crawl. Time check: 10:15. Not at the airport yet.
Around 10:25, we pull into O'Hare's Terminal One. A woman so old that I think I heard her saying she sat next to Dolly Madison (wife of our fourth President, James Madison) in homeroom at Orange County H.S. in colonial Virginia in 1767.
(historical note: yes, everyone, the original O.C. was in colonial Virginia, not the one with Seth Cohen and Summer...who both happen to be considering colleges in Rhode Island. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, EVERYTHING IN THIS UNIVERSE REVOLVES AROUND RHODE ISLAND. It's best if you just accept it and move on, really.)
So this woman was getting off the bus at about the same rate a sea urchin moves from rock to rock on the ocean floor. Ever see "March of the Penguins?" That was about as fast as she moved on the sidewalk, which would be no big whoops if the bus driver wasn't personally walking her to the gate.
It's now 10:35.
Nervous.
Swearing.
Calling my Dad to tell him that I probably was not going to make the flight home. Cursing myself for trying to save 150 bucks by going to O'Hare, now confronted with the possibility of buying a walk-up ticket for a same-day flight...and those things cost, well, about as much as pahking your cah at O'Hare for a week.
Timeline, 10:37. The bus pulls up to Continental Terminal two. It's me. I triple-jump down the aisle, grab into the compartment under the bus, and make a mad dash to the ticket line. I wasn't sure if I had my own bags, but I have tags and so did these. If there were wrong, I could just ship them to the respective person. I was late. Like the prophet Ludacris says, "Move, Bitch. Get out the way."
-----
My plane is boarding. More later when I land in Detroit Rock City.
One.
