Cancellation, Rebook, Good Karma, Green Bay.

Sorry Jade. I was ultimately lazy for three days at home. I didn't even look at my own blog to see if the counter has been going up. Here's a post just for you, seeing as I haven't got much to report.

I flew home on Sunday and Nicole picked me up and took me straight to her office. For those who don't know, Jam (the company she works for) decided to close the physical office in Westwood, and keep Nicole employed but working from home. So it's mostly a win win for us. Nicole keeps her job and no longer has to commute the hard way through L.A. (West to East and vise versa). Now she sits in the office at home and telecommutes. We went to her office and got the last of her stuff moved out. She's keeping the phone number and mailing address, so every now and again, she'll have to go to Westwood to pick up the mail. We then returned home where I spent the next two days on the couch facing the often on television.

And that's about it for the next two days. I moved occasionally to go the the loo and to sleep on the bed, but otherwise I was immobile. Oh, we did go to REI to get me new socks, and I did have really bad allergy attacks, but for the most part, immobile.

I guess I was just saving all the fun for yesterday. I had a flight to Green Bay to start this leg of the tour on American Airlines. As I'm sure most of you heard, American grounded most of their MD-80 fleet yesterday to inspect a possible wiring flaw. 200 flights were canceled. But not to worry, most of the flights that were canceled were originating out of their two hubs Chicago and Dallas, said the morning news. Only two flights were canceled in L.A. One of them was of course, mine.

Once we found out, I got on the phone to our Tour Manager to see what was, if anything, being done. She tells me that the travel agent was aware of the cancellations, but didn't think it affected any of our flights. The TM would call me back.

They sorted it out. Got me a flight on United that left around the same time. We tried to check in on line, but for some reason, could not. So we just left for the airport. We got to United and again attempted to check in. The "Easy Check-in" kiosk was not being easy, "Please pick up the phone" it kept telling me, so I did. The agent on the other end tells me the ticket has not been paid for so it won't issue, but she'll work it out. So after holding for about 5 minutes she asked me to try it again, and this time it went through.

The next screen offered me to "upgrade to Economy Plus for $44", I chose yes, what the heck right? A little more leg room. But alas, all that was left was middle seats, so I canceled the upgrade request and attempted to check in to standard economy. But they wouldn't assign me a seat in economy. So I canceled that and went back to Economy Plus, because at least I was going to get a seat. I would have had a middle seat either way I assumed, may as well have some leg room.

SSSS. The four letters of death you could see at the bottom of your boarding pass. It means, you aren't sashaying through TSA security. I got to security walked through the metal detector and handed the TSA agent my boarding pass. "You know what the 4 S's on your boading pass mean?" He asked me sternly. I replied, "Super Special Secondary Screening." He remained unimpressed and sent me to the addtional screening line. Why did I get the SSSS? Simple. My ticket was booked only moments before the flight. Let that be a lesson to you terrorists! Book your ticket well in advance!

10E was my seat. With the new fangled way they board planes, I was in Group 4. By the time Group 4 was called, there was no over head room. This was shaping up to be a bad flight. Middle seat, with my bag stuffed at my feet. At least I had leg room. I got to row 10 and pointed at the middle seat between to skinny German boys. "Would you like to seeet on ze aizle? I will seeet in ze middle," Said the nice German boy. Good Karma for Dan! I got an aisle seat in Economy Plus.

But that was about it for the really good karma. In Chicago where I had to change planes, I had a choice, go out to the curb and catch the tram from terminal 1 to terminal 3, or walk from terminal 1 to terminal 3. I chose walk. Why? Because I wouldn't have to go through security again. I didn't need the secondary screening again.

Needless to say, I got to Green Bay, one puddle jumper from Chicago to here and we're already back in the grind. Wayne's back so the shooting quartet is complete. Next day of shooting, Monday in Peoria. Stay tuned.

...