Drama. When Molly gets on an airplane, there will be drama. Count on it. It is always something. Lost luggage. Heart attacks in the back of the plane. More lost luggage. A not-so-subtle proposition regarding the Mile-High Club. Rain delays. Mechanical delays. And my favorite, the metal clip in my jaw that always causes a scene at security.
And, of coarse, my trip from Seattle to Jackson this past weekend was as dramatic as ever...
Besides the usual flash light down my throat and the pat-down by a burly female, I got out of Seattle and arrived in Atlanta with ease and even ahead of schedule. But that is where it all went wrong. My flight was over an hour delayed and was WAY over-booked. I waited. And I waited.
The airline eventaully started making offers for people to give up their seats and fly to Jackson the next morning at 9:30. I waited until the price was right and jumped on it. Well, apparently I don't weigh enough to qualify for a $400 voucher. The guy looked at me and he LAUGHED! "Lady, you obviously didn't hear me. I said that the the plane was over the weight limit. It would do me no good to leave you here. I need a few"bigger"people to volunteer." He agreed to put me on the list as a "last resort". Now it you would, just please pause for a moment and imagine the extreme awkardness amoungst the passengers sitting at the gate contemplating the "weight" problem.
We finally board the plane (over an hour late) and then proceed to sit on the runway for over an hour waiting for our turn to take off. When we finally took off, I looked at my watch...ok, we should be on the ground in an hour. But, 1 hour and 1/2 later, we were still flying. And 2 hours later, we are still flying. 2 and 1/2 hours later, we are still flying. 3 hours later, we finally land. But, no, not in Jackson. We land IN FRICKIN ATLANTA at the same frickin gate that we took off from. Apparently, the fog was too thick to land in Jackson, so we went to Monroe. But the fog was too thick to land in Monroe, so we went to Little Rock. But the fog was too thick to land in Little Rock, so we went back to Jackson. But the fog was still too thick to land in Jackson, so we went to Montgomery. And you guessed it- the fog was too thick to land in Montgomery, so we went all the back to frickin Atlanta. (Now don't get me wrong, I am all about not trying to land a plane if we can't see the runway. But...was it really necessary to circle the entire southeast? Don't they have equipment for that sort of problem??)
And to top it off, we land at the far end of concourse T. Baggage claim is at the far end of concourse A (not that we were going to get our baggage, but baggage claim just happens to be the only way to get out of the airport). Have you ever been to the Atlanta airport? It's HUGE. The gate agent told us that it would be about 1 and 1/2 miles from our gate to baggage claim. And the tram was out of service. And there was "no one available" to drive the carts with the annoying little beep. So, at 3:00 am, we walk 1.5 miles to catch a shuttle (that never showed up) to take us to a hotel (that only had smoking rooms, smelled horrible and didn't have coffee in the lobby the next morning).
I got frisked again the next morning and got home at noon the next day. Without my $400 travel voucher.
