Titania by John Simmons

How I spent my first day of Christmas Vacation By Barbara Jo Mattson

The day started at 5:30 AM EST.  I realize that I will get no sympathy from those of you who have jobs, which require you to normally rise at this hour; however, I am an astronomer, which means that to me midnight is an early night and anything done before 10:00 AM EST is generally a blur.

The day started at 5:30 AM EST.  The Super Shuttle was scheduled to pick me up for the airport at 7:00 AM EST, which I interpreted to mean it will be there somewhere between 7:45 AM EST and 8:30 AM EST.  Before the pick-up, I needed only to eat breakfast and walk 15 minutes (round trip) in the 20-degree weather to drop off my rent (again, I know I won’t get sympathy from those of you in points north because to you 20 degrees is a balmy summer day) - Both of which I accomplished prior to 6:45 AM EST.  Note:  I had a bagel with low-fat cream cheese BEFORE 6:45 AM EST; this will be important later.

The shuttle picked me up at 7:45 AM EST.  In the hour between my breakfast and the shuttle pick-up, I read Galileo’s Daughter.  For those of you who know me, reading is a rare treat, since I have been a full-time student for the past twelve million years, so I didn’t mind that the shuttle was late (although from past experience, by arriving only 45 minutes late, the shuttle was surprisingly early).

The ride to the airport was uneventful; although, I did chat a bit with the shuttle driver and the one other passenger.  I arrived at the airport, and was the only one in line at the Continental ticket counter.  This was exciting, since we all know that it’s not unusual to miss flights while standing in the ticketing line.  I would have been more pleased had I known how many other lines I would be standing in later that day, but I get ahead of myself.

While checking myself in, I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to check one of the bags I had originally packed as a carry-on.  I didn’t really need anything in the bag while I was on the plane; it only contained a few CDs my brother wanted me to bring, a few books I thought I might have a chance to read in MN, my toiletries bag and my scarf and mittens.  At least that was all I remembered that the bag contained.  After I had checked it, I remembered that it also contained my “life,” which has all of my phone numbers (like my Dad’s cell number - this will be important later), my extra breakfast bagel and my ibuprofen.  These things may not sound important just yet, but read on.

My trip was to consist of two flights on Continental Airlines:  one from Baltimore to Cleveland and one from Cleveland to Minneapolis.  I was to arrive in Minneapolis at 1:30 PM CST.  The first leg of the flight was uneventful, even unmemorable.  I had an hour at the airport before the plane boarded, so I continued reading Galileo’s Daughter and also read on the plane.  The only memorable thing that occurred was the beverage service.  Normally this is not an occasion to note; however, I was given a tiny bag of peanuts!  Yes, I know that this occurs on many flights, but this meant that in addition to my bagel (at 6:45 AM EST), I had a bag of peanuts (at about 11:00 AM EST).

When I arrived in Cleveland, I went directly to the nice gate attendant to see where I was to meet my connecting flight.  I was told Gate D10, so I proceeded through the C concourse into D and on to Gate D10.  There I found that there was no trace of my flight.  It was not listed on the helpful little display at the gate; nor was any flight listed there, for that matter.  I went to the Departures TV display and found my flight listed as “ON-TIME,” but with no gate information.  This seemed a bit fishy, but with nothing else to go on, I went back to Gate D10 and decided to wait for a few minutes.  The flight was supposed to leave at 12:15 PM EST.  At 11:55 AM EST, I began to worry, because there was still no sign of my flight at Gate D10, and no announcement of a gate change.  I went back to the Departure display, and saw that the words “ON-TIME” which had been there not 10 minutes earlier had been replaced by the word (in red!) “CANCELED.”  Ack!  The only thing for me to do was to hop into the Continental customer service line that was conveniently located next to Gate D10.

While in line I finished Galileo’s Daughter and started on Mike Nelson’s Movie Megacheese (definitely a change in tone from the first book).  I also had the pleasure of watching the young couple in front of me.  The boy could hardly stand waiting in line, so was restlessly fondling the girl.  The girl, on the other hand, was trying desperately to ignore her boyfriend while reading a Stephen King novel.  For about twenty minutes, the boy started playing with a yo-yo, several times, getting the yo-yo very close to hitting me while walking the dog and going around the world.  I was ready to hurt him, but was soothed by the Mike Nelson’s sense of humor.

An hour and a half after hopping in line, I reached the head of the line, and the Continental ticketing agent booked me on two TWA flights:  one from Cleveland to St. Louis and a second from St. Louis to Minneapolis.  I was to arrive in Minneapolis at 5:15 PM CST ? a mere four hours from when I was originally to arrive.  The nice lady who scheduled my TWA flights also assured me that they were transferring my luggage to TWA, and even gave me a little piece of paper to prove it.  I believed her ? perhaps because all I had eaten so far was a bagel with low-fat cream cheese at 6:30 AM EST and a tiny bag of peanuts at 11:00 AM EST and now it was nearing 1:45 PM EST.

The nice continental ticketing agent gave me a food voucher good at any of the restaurants in the St. Louis airport.  However, my TWA flight to St. Louis was to start boarding within ten minutes, and the TWA gate was across the entire airport and would take me at least twenty minutes to power walk there, so I wouldn’t be able to use it.  Not to worry, the agent also said it would be good at the St. Louis airport, so maybe I could get some food there.

On my way to the TWA gate, I stopped briefly to call my Dad, who would be coming directly from work to pick me up.  Now, remember that carry-on bag I decided to check?  His cell phone number was in there, so I couldn’t actually talk to him.  Instead I called my parent’s home to leave a message.  I knew full well that Dad wouldn’t actually get the message, but it made me feel that I’d done something.  When I reached the TWA gate, I found that I had to wait in another line to check in, which took another twenty minutes.  By the time the flight took off we were fifteen minutes behind schedule.

This second flight was more memorable than the first.  As I was putting my coat into the overhead luggage compartment, I caught a whiff of alcohol coming from somewhere near my row.  As I sat down in the middle seat, the smell got stronger.  I discovered that the man in the window seat next to me had taken a bath in some kind of high-proof alcohol.  Fortunately he was a quiet drunk and slept for most of the flight; however, my stomach was empty (current time 2:45 PM EST; bagel at 6:30 AM EST and bag of peanuts at 11:00 AM EST), so the fumes were making me dizzy.

Before we took off, the woman next to me had the gall to argue with the flight attendant about whether or not her bag would fit under her seat.  The flight attendant was right (of course), but the woman had to try to stuff the bag under the seat unsuccessfully before walking the bag up to the front of the plane with her tail between her legs.

During the beverage service, the flight attendant gave me my Coke and two (yes TWO!) tiny bags of pretzels (current time, 3:30 PM EST).  Then she turned to the drunk man and asked, “Do you want anything to drink?”  He was sleeping, so did not respond, but the flight attendant caught a whiff of him and answered herself with, “No, he’s already had enough to drink.”  The only other notable event on that flight was when the drunk man flopping over onto my shoulder (I nudged him none-too-politely back).  Other than that I continued reading for the duration of the flight.

As the plane landed in St. Louis, I asked the lady next to me for the time.  It was 3:15 PM CST.  This is noteworthy because my connection to Minneapolis was supposed to be taking off at 3:38 PM CST.  Our plane didn’t pull into its gate (Gate C33) until 3:30 PM CST.  I deplaned as quickly as I could (since I was a mere three rows from the back of the plane, I did not exactly make record-breaking time).  Once off the plane, I checked the gate of my connection (Gate D12) and jogged/power walked though a concourse and a half to get there.  When I arrived, I pressed my face against the window as I watched the jet way start pulling away from the plane.

Fortunately for me there was a TWA customer service station located conveniently 100 feet from Gate D12, and once again I found myself in a ticketing line.  Yay!  In front of me was a young lady who was trying to get home from college for the holidays.  She told me that last year, again on TWA, she had gotten stuck in San Francisco overnight while trying to get to Australia because of delays getting out of Washington D.C.  Today she was getting re-ticketed because she missed the connection to San Francisco.  I began to wonder if she should make her travel plans through a different airline next year; although, I couldn’t recommend Continental.

Behind me in line was an older lady (my grandmother’s age) who had no sense of personal space.  Her large coat continually buffeted me as I waited.  After a measly forty minutes in line, I reached a ticketing agent.  She booked me on a flight leaving for Minneapolis at 5:05 PM CST (just about the time I should have been in Minneapolis) and arriving 6:40 PM CST (a short five hours later than my original plans).

I called my Dad again, at home.  I might just as well have scrawled my plans on the St. Louis airport’s bathroom walls ? Dad would have been just as likely to get that message.  Meanwhile, I had twenty minutes before the plane should have been boarding, so decided to see if I could get some food (bagel at 6:30 AM EST, tiny bag of peanuts at 11:00 AM EST, two (!) tiny bags of pretzels at 3:30 PM EST).  My only choices seemed to be Burger King and Cinnabon.  Burger King is not exactly a paradise for vegetarians; in fact, I can’t think of the last time I was able to eat there.  On the other hand, I had eaten next to nothing so far that day, and a Cinnabon would make me jittery.  I was thinking that my extra breakfast bagel would have been perfect right about then (actually three hours earlier it would have been good, too), but of course I checked it.  I continued on to the gate sans food.

Recall that the plane was to leave at 5:05 PM CST.  I arrived at the gate (Gate D5) at about 4:30 PM CST.  At 4:55 PM CST, the gate attendant announced that our plane needed to be repaired before we could take off.  In fact, they needed locate a replacement part first, and then fix the plane.  We were told not to go wandering off, though, because they didn’t know how long the process would take.  I futilely left another message for Dad to let him know that we were going to be delayed even further.  At 5:30 PM CST, the gate attendant announced that rather than fixing the one plane, they had located a different plane for us to take.  We were to proceed to Gate C1 and not wander off because they didn’t know when we would be boarding.  I attempted to call my Dad again, but this time I was cut off twice by their answering machine.  Not that it mattered much anyway, because he certainly hadn’t heard any of my messages up until now.

I was giddy as we boarded the plane to Minneapolis at 6:05 PM CST.  I could hardly believe that I was actually going to make it to my parents’ house for Christmas.  I mentally started laying odds on whether or not my Dad would be at the gate in Minneapolis to meet me (these were about 3 to 1 against) and whether or not my luggage would make it (these were about 100,000 to 1 against).  The flight itself was not noteworthy because the beverage service did not include either nuts or pretzels.

The plane finally let us off at the gate in Minneapolis at 8:30 PM CST (only eight hours late).  And both my Dad and Mom were there at the gate!  We proceeded hopefully to the baggage claim - I’ve always been an optimist.  After waiting through the luggage from my flight with no sight of my luggage, we approached the woman in the TWA luggage office (Mom nicknamed this woman Ms. Crankypants).  She informed us, with all the pleasantness of a sharp tack up the ass, that there was another flight from St. Louis that had landed at the same time as my flight, and that my luggage would surely be with that flight’s luggage.

We waited around for another forty minutes waiting for the luggage from this other flight.  Once again there was no sight of my luggage.  So I filled out the “luggage irregularity” paperwork and left the airport with assurances from Ms. Crankypants that my luggage would be on the flight arriving at 10:30 PM CST from St. Louis.

After a lovely dinner at Denny’s at 10:30 PM CST (recall bagel at 6:30 AM EST, tiny bag of peanuts at 11:00 AM EST, and two (!) tiny bags of pretzels at 3:30 PM EST), Dad and I went off to Wal-Mart to pick out some jammies, underwear and toiletries.

That is how I spent my first day of Christmas vacation.

Note:  My luggage did arrive in Minneapolis at some point; however, instead of taking the Baltimore-Cleveland-St. Louis-Minneapolis route on Continental and TWA that I took, it took the Baltimore-Cleveland-Detroit-Minneapolis route on Continental and Northwest.