Travel adventures
Jul. 12th, 2011 08:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
muck_a_luckAG33 returned from CT on Friday . I think the last time I was at the airport could have been over a decade ago. I mean, inside the airport. I think in the last five years I have picked someone up from the airport, and I have been to the Udvar-Hazy branch of the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, which is part of the airport, but in the actual part where passengers go - ages and ages.
So AG33 flew back from CT as an unaccompanied minor, so I figured I wanted to be driving into airport parking 1.5 hours before his flight was to arrive because I had no idea how to do anything. Where to park, paperwork for picking up an unaccompanied minor, security, finding the gate, were all mysteries to me and I preferred to have plenty of time, considering I expected a lot of line waiting to be involved as well as general confusion.
Dulles is big-assed place, let me tell you. Apologies to Cellmate, who used to say how she preferred to fly out of National becuase Dulles was just too big. I was like, yes, airports are big. Well, now I understand. I am sure I walked MILES on Friday, though that is partially related to optional things I did, but anyway.
I found my way to the ticket counter and was helpfully directed by a customer service greeter type lady to the correct line for special passenger servicse to get my gate pass. The line wasn't too long, but I had to raise my eyebrows at two guys who appeared to be low-level front-line management types who were having a loud, barely civil argument right in front of all the customers. It took me about 20 minutes from the tiem I parked to the time I had my gate pass in hand.
So then I wandered over to the security area.
TSA. You really can't hire better staff than these people? Rude, rude, with extra rude on top. I know they spend their whole day having negative interactions with stressed out people, but somebody needs to send them to teh Chic-fil-a school of customer serivce. I'm sure they could do a MUCH BETTER job than that, srsly. They were rude and they weren't even having any confrontations with anyone.
There were no instructions about what to do, but I saw the people ahead of me getting out their IDs to present at the ID checkpoint, so I caught on. But when I presented my gate pass and my ID, the guy checking it was so inert and failing to make any eye contact with me that I sincerely thought I had gotten confused and I asked him, "Do you need this?" indicating my ID. He said, "Yeah, but I figured it was you." Ha! A joke! Well, then, at least they have a mild sense of humor if nothing else.
I had my wallet adn was carrying nothing else - I did this deliberately to make my life easier. I was in line behind a couple who needed 5 buckets to load all their crap on the conveyor belt. I was in no real hurry, but I could definitely see how frequent travellers might grind their teeth in this situation. There definitely should be express lanes for people with little or no personal property to be reviewed. In the good news category, I did not need to either go through the radiation scanner or the pat down process. This surprised me, btu I think it was my ignorance. Apparently, you only have to do those things if the metal detector rejects you?
Just as I was putting my shoes back on, FIL calls to let me know that AG33's plane has returned to the gate without taking off because of an engine problem.
I found my way to the "mobile lounges" that carry you from the terminal out to the C/D Concourse. After my trip on the mobile lounge, I walked up the concourse to D3. As I walked, the arrival time for AG33's plane never changed. I held out hope that was a good sign, but I suspected it just meant there was a lag in posting the delay. I got to D3 45 minutes before AG33's plane was supposed to arrive.
I decided to continue my walk along the concourse. The C/D concourse has 47 gates. I do not know how long this is, but it is really, really long. I walked up and back, lookign at the shops and eateries, watching the passengers, wishing there was a nook where I could yoga, but deciding it was better not to make a spectacle of myself and also maybe not to get all sweaty. I headed back to AG33's gate about 15 minutes before he was due to arrive initially to see if they had any news. By this time the boards were showing delay for aircraft servicing. Five minutes before they should have arrived, the airline staff announced that the plane was in the air, due to arrive in Dulles 1.5 hours later than originally planned. The folks waiting to take the plane to Orlando were very sad.
So I spent the next 1.5 hours or so wandering around teh concourse. Good exercise. Though after a while I did regret not bringing a book.
I went back to the gate and the Orlando passengers were getting restless. The staff made an announcement to them to come and get seat assignments, and a few people actually took this as an invitation to head for teh door to board the plane, which I am not even sure had arrived at this point. They were told that it would be a mere 15 minutes after all teh passengers disembarked before they could board.
The passengers started coming off. First, two Asian guys *rocketed* off, yelling, "Where's gate C1?!?!" and running flat out in that direction. I knew from the boarding calls that a plane had left for Beijing from gate C1, probably 40 minutes previously. Poor kids. They were followed by pale, frazzled people, older folks walking creakily, harried looking people. The unaccompanied minors came toward the end. AG33 *bounded* off the plane, practically yelling "That was GREAT!!!!" I'm sure the entire gate heard him. :D
Then Saturday, I took The Barbarian and AG33 down to Roanoke to meet my folks and send them of to NC for a couple of weeks. We got off to a perfect launch on Saturday, hitting the road exactly on time to coordinate with meeting my folks at the agreed point at about 12:30. Aaaand before we had even gotten out of Prince William County, we had a flat.
I pulled over at a good spot, noting that there was another, disabled vehicle at the location. I assumed it was empty, but as I was calling USAA for my roadside assistance, I saw a guy walking down the road toward us (I had stopped about .25 miles down from the other car). This guy also had a flat and he had no jack or spare. I had a doughnut and a jack, but the jack was missing a part. We had the idea that if we could get hte jack to work, he could put the doughnut on his car, zoom up to the next exit to get a tire, and then bring the doughnut back to me.
This was all well and good as a plan - and I was more than happy to help this guy out - except we couldn't find anything in my toolbox that could substitute for the missing piece of the jack.
Eventually, I did make the call to USAA. Meanwhile, the wife and daughter walk down to visit with us, and the kids are having a great time, standing around by the side of the interstate. The family was Hispanic. The dad had decent English, the mom a little less, I think, and teh girl, between AG33 and The Barbarian in age, was fluent. She expressed concern that her mom was going to lose her job because of the flat tire. She also was worried taht because we were in Prince William County still, her parents were going to get arrested. There has been a lot of news about Prince William's Arizona-style anti-immigration laws and how afraid the Hispanic community is. Well, that was a pretty in-my-face example of what had been an abstract news story.
Well, I did notice that when the first cop arrived, they stood back and let me do the talking. I told him we both had flats. He wanted to know if we were travelling together. I said no, it was coincidental, and that I had called USAA and we were working on a plan to get us both fixed up. He said, OK, but it would be better if we all waited in our cars. The kids were well back from the road, but I suspect we *were* pretty distracting to oncoming traffic, so I herded the kids back into my car, where they were playing and enjoying themselves, and the cop went on his way.
A third car stopped to try to help out. He also couldn't get the jack to work.
Finally, the tow truck came. He put the doughnut on my car, and towed the other guy home. Meanwhile, a state trooper stopped, concerned, and worried that maybe something had been dropped in the road, disabling both cars. I suppose it is possible, but my tires were old and if truth be told, the one that blew had made a weird sound earlier in the week, but I didnt' remember to check on it. I'm sure it was the tire and nothing in the road. The trooper stayed with his lights flashing to slow traffic down while the tow truck guy did his thing.
Then, of course, I was one hour into a four hour trip on a doughnut in the middle of nowhere. Since Max had been so sure there was help at the next exit we drove up there adn found Cortez Tires. The Barbarian was very miffed with us. We initially drove past it, and she yelled, "That's it!" But AG33 and I didn't see it. Turned out we were looking for a big sign, but they only had a tiny sign. There WAS a sign over a convenience store that had two big piles of tires on it. THat was what The Barbarian saw. When we drove back, that turned out to be the place.
He was working on a car when we got htere, but he got to us in about 20 minutes, and we were on the road again 15 minutes after that with some off brand tire that cost $108 bucks installed. Whoo hoo!
There was some frowny facing in Costco on Sunday when I only wanted to buy three new tires, but I didn't cave.
And so the kids are now down in NC with my folks. It is peaceful and relaxing having no kids in the house, but also kind of creepy.
So AG33 flew back from CT as an unaccompanied minor, so I figured I wanted to be driving into airport parking 1.5 hours before his flight was to arrive because I had no idea how to do anything. Where to park, paperwork for picking up an unaccompanied minor, security, finding the gate, were all mysteries to me and I preferred to have plenty of time, considering I expected a lot of line waiting to be involved as well as general confusion.
Dulles is big-assed place, let me tell you. Apologies to Cellmate, who used to say how she preferred to fly out of National becuase Dulles was just too big. I was like, yes, airports are big. Well, now I understand. I am sure I walked MILES on Friday, though that is partially related to optional things I did, but anyway.
I found my way to the ticket counter and was helpfully directed by a customer service greeter type lady to the correct line for special passenger servicse to get my gate pass. The line wasn't too long, but I had to raise my eyebrows at two guys who appeared to be low-level front-line management types who were having a loud, barely civil argument right in front of all the customers. It took me about 20 minutes from the tiem I parked to the time I had my gate pass in hand.
So then I wandered over to the security area.
TSA. You really can't hire better staff than these people? Rude, rude, with extra rude on top. I know they spend their whole day having negative interactions with stressed out people, but somebody needs to send them to teh Chic-fil-a school of customer serivce. I'm sure they could do a MUCH BETTER job than that, srsly. They were rude and they weren't even having any confrontations with anyone.
There were no instructions about what to do, but I saw the people ahead of me getting out their IDs to present at the ID checkpoint, so I caught on. But when I presented my gate pass and my ID, the guy checking it was so inert and failing to make any eye contact with me that I sincerely thought I had gotten confused and I asked him, "Do you need this?" indicating my ID. He said, "Yeah, but I figured it was you." Ha! A joke! Well, then, at least they have a mild sense of humor if nothing else.
I had my wallet adn was carrying nothing else - I did this deliberately to make my life easier. I was in line behind a couple who needed 5 buckets to load all their crap on the conveyor belt. I was in no real hurry, but I could definitely see how frequent travellers might grind their teeth in this situation. There definitely should be express lanes for people with little or no personal property to be reviewed. In the good news category, I did not need to either go through the radiation scanner or the pat down process. This surprised me, btu I think it was my ignorance. Apparently, you only have to do those things if the metal detector rejects you?
Just as I was putting my shoes back on, FIL calls to let me know that AG33's plane has returned to the gate without taking off because of an engine problem.
I found my way to the "mobile lounges" that carry you from the terminal out to the C/D Concourse. After my trip on the mobile lounge, I walked up the concourse to D3. As I walked, the arrival time for AG33's plane never changed. I held out hope that was a good sign, but I suspected it just meant there was a lag in posting the delay. I got to D3 45 minutes before AG33's plane was supposed to arrive.
I decided to continue my walk along the concourse. The C/D concourse has 47 gates. I do not know how long this is, but it is really, really long. I walked up and back, lookign at the shops and eateries, watching the passengers, wishing there was a nook where I could yoga, but deciding it was better not to make a spectacle of myself and also maybe not to get all sweaty. I headed back to AG33's gate about 15 minutes before he was due to arrive initially to see if they had any news. By this time the boards were showing delay for aircraft servicing. Five minutes before they should have arrived, the airline staff announced that the plane was in the air, due to arrive in Dulles 1.5 hours later than originally planned. The folks waiting to take the plane to Orlando were very sad.
So I spent the next 1.5 hours or so wandering around teh concourse. Good exercise. Though after a while I did regret not bringing a book.
I went back to the gate and the Orlando passengers were getting restless. The staff made an announcement to them to come and get seat assignments, and a few people actually took this as an invitation to head for teh door to board the plane, which I am not even sure had arrived at this point. They were told that it would be a mere 15 minutes after all teh passengers disembarked before they could board.
The passengers started coming off. First, two Asian guys *rocketed* off, yelling, "Where's gate C1?!?!" and running flat out in that direction. I knew from the boarding calls that a plane had left for Beijing from gate C1, probably 40 minutes previously. Poor kids. They were followed by pale, frazzled people, older folks walking creakily, harried looking people. The unaccompanied minors came toward the end. AG33 *bounded* off the plane, practically yelling "That was GREAT!!!!" I'm sure the entire gate heard him. :D
Then Saturday, I took The Barbarian and AG33 down to Roanoke to meet my folks and send them of to NC for a couple of weeks. We got off to a perfect launch on Saturday, hitting the road exactly on time to coordinate with meeting my folks at the agreed point at about 12:30. Aaaand before we had even gotten out of Prince William County, we had a flat.
I pulled over at a good spot, noting that there was another, disabled vehicle at the location. I assumed it was empty, but as I was calling USAA for my roadside assistance, I saw a guy walking down the road toward us (I had stopped about .25 miles down from the other car). This guy also had a flat and he had no jack or spare. I had a doughnut and a jack, but the jack was missing a part. We had the idea that if we could get hte jack to work, he could put the doughnut on his car, zoom up to the next exit to get a tire, and then bring the doughnut back to me.
This was all well and good as a plan - and I was more than happy to help this guy out - except we couldn't find anything in my toolbox that could substitute for the missing piece of the jack.
Eventually, I did make the call to USAA. Meanwhile, the wife and daughter walk down to visit with us, and the kids are having a great time, standing around by the side of the interstate. The family was Hispanic. The dad had decent English, the mom a little less, I think, and teh girl, between AG33 and The Barbarian in age, was fluent. She expressed concern that her mom was going to lose her job because of the flat tire. She also was worried taht because we were in Prince William County still, her parents were going to get arrested. There has been a lot of news about Prince William's Arizona-style anti-immigration laws and how afraid the Hispanic community is. Well, that was a pretty in-my-face example of what had been an abstract news story.
Well, I did notice that when the first cop arrived, they stood back and let me do the talking. I told him we both had flats. He wanted to know if we were travelling together. I said no, it was coincidental, and that I had called USAA and we were working on a plan to get us both fixed up. He said, OK, but it would be better if we all waited in our cars. The kids were well back from the road, but I suspect we *were* pretty distracting to oncoming traffic, so I herded the kids back into my car, where they were playing and enjoying themselves, and the cop went on his way.
A third car stopped to try to help out. He also couldn't get the jack to work.
Finally, the tow truck came. He put the doughnut on my car, and towed the other guy home. Meanwhile, a state trooper stopped, concerned, and worried that maybe something had been dropped in the road, disabling both cars. I suppose it is possible, but my tires were old and if truth be told, the one that blew had made a weird sound earlier in the week, but I didnt' remember to check on it. I'm sure it was the tire and nothing in the road. The trooper stayed with his lights flashing to slow traffic down while the tow truck guy did his thing.
Then, of course, I was one hour into a four hour trip on a doughnut in the middle of nowhere. Since Max had been so sure there was help at the next exit we drove up there adn found Cortez Tires. The Barbarian was very miffed with us. We initially drove past it, and she yelled, "That's it!" But AG33 and I didn't see it. Turned out we were looking for a big sign, but they only had a tiny sign. There WAS a sign over a convenience store that had two big piles of tires on it. THat was what The Barbarian saw. When we drove back, that turned out to be the place.
He was working on a car when we got htere, but he got to us in about 20 minutes, and we were on the road again 15 minutes after that with some off brand tire that cost $108 bucks installed. Whoo hoo!
There was some frowny facing in Costco on Sunday when I only wanted to buy three new tires, but I didn't cave.
And so the kids are now down in NC with my folks. It is peaceful and relaxing having no kids in the house, but also kind of creepy.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-12 02:18 pm (UTC)note about picking someone up at the airport...check online to verify their flight before you leave the house LOL. oddly, that gets updated pretty instantly
no subject
Date: 2011-07-12 02:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-12 04:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-12 05:02 pm (UTC)And teh Orlando people gave a collective AWWWWWW when the staff announced, as AG33 and I were walking off, that they would NOT be boarding in 15 minutes, but rather would get an update in another 1.5 hours, as they were trying to fix the engine problem, which had come back.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-13 03:47 am (UTC)And yes, a house with no children banging around IS creepy.