Sunday, March 29, 2009

Hurry up and wait already!

A very straightforward drive from Maryland to New Jersey. Took our time, got to the airport in plenty of time.

Airline check-ins. You either love the whole self-check-in process, or you hate it. Me, I hate it. I preferred the whole conversation, where are you going to, did you pack everything yourself, etc etc etc. By taking away the interaction, the airlines have maybe streamlined the process, but they've reduced it to an excercise in herding people.

Moo.

So I'm at the check in screen for incompetent-al airlines, and the show begins:

Enter your destination: Belfast

There is no itinerary for this destination associated with this name.

Bugger, it's beginning early.

OK, so since we are flying THROUGH London, maybe it wants me to put in Heathrow?

Yup, Heathrow is the right answer, the computer says yes, and all five of us are happily checked on to London.

But we aren't going to London. We are going to Belfast.

I then made my first faux-pas, I asked the "assistant" at the check in line (What a wonderfully ironic contradiction, calling the world's most unhelpful person an "assistant")

I explained to her that we are traveliing to Belfast, and that I wanted to know that my bags would be checked through.

Just enter your destination on the screen, she said.

I tried, but it wouldn't take Belfast. It accepted London, I said, so I put that in on the screen.

This triggered some sort of primeval response, maybe she couldn't help herself when she reponded with "That was completely the wrong thing to do".

I on the other hand was fully aware of my reponse of "And that was completely the wrong thing to say, perhaps if there was someone here to ASSIST....."

We got an assistant.

We cleared the security checkpoint (moo again) and grabbed an overpriced and overrated snack at the food court of Newark airport. It's a white. sterile looking location, lots of glass and white panelling.

The flight is not full. We have lots of spaces to spread out, which is really a good thing. The really bad thing is that we sat on the tarmac for three and a half hours prior to taking off. The Captain kept coming on the intercom to tell us it was something to do with the weather, but going by the party that the cabin crew were whooping up in the back galley, I was wondering if they were waiting for pizza delivery or something.

A three hour delay meant that even without taking off, I knew we missed the connecting flight, but since we were waiting for some really nasty weather to blow over, it couldn't be helped. Anyway, the airlines deal with missed connections all the time, right? After all, this is "incompetent-al" airlines! For now however, the kids are having a blast with the individual entertainment screens etc.