AIRPORT

AIRPORT

I seem to need to travel way more than I really want to lately. I have a rule, if the trip can be made by car in 5 hours or less, I’m driving, that’s all there is to it. That way, I’m the pilot, and I can leave when the heck I want. However, If the trip requires 5 hours or more, I’m usually booking a flight.

I think by now my car knows its way to the airport on auto pilot, and I hate airport travel days. They usually start off with me having to get up at o’dark thirty to get ready. Then I have a one hour drive to the airport, but of course I need to be there 2 hours early so that I can get go thru “security”. So the night before I always find my self doing that special airport reverse math. Let’s see…If my plane leaves at 7A.M. then I have to be there 2 hours early. Now allowing for a one hour drive to the airport and an hour to get ready, then I have to set my alarm for 3 A.M….hold on a minute here...wait…Let me do that math again…I was going to pack in the morning…

As you approach the airport traffic slows down to a crawl as you merge in with all the other idiots that had to get up a 3:30am so they could “make it on time”. Now your putting along at a good 5 mph, with all the excitement of a slow speed O.J. Chase, behind all the old farts deciding which lane they really want to be in. It usually takes a few minutes to find a spot in long term parking. Long term parking is an anachronism for “the next town over”, but don’t forget to bring a separate bank roll to pay the man in the booth that has your car hostage. Just be ready to re-mortgage the house, when you try to leave the parking area after your trip. Then you have to take a mini-trip on some type of bus, train, tram, or circus animal to get to the “main terminal”.

Ok, so now you’ve finally reached the main terminal after several hours of your trip or vacation and you have to go thru the cattle pens at the ticket counter. I don’t really get this part of the ritual, you are forced to stand in line again to get your boarding pass and drop off your luggage. Any, they give you a ticket and send you back packing halfway to the long term parking area to get to your “gate” .. which usually requires another train, or tram trip, a series of elevators, a team of pack mules, and several of those “motorized walkways”, were you are all but guaranteed to catch a communicable disease if you touch the handrail.

But before you can get to your gate you must go thru the security and delousing station. Here you are subjected to showing your ticket and I.D. another dozen times, while you halfway disrobe, and place all that is near and dear to you in disgusting plastic trays, while you walk barefoot on the Dr, Shoals haz-mat and athlete’s foot transmission carpet.

If you are really lucky you will be pulled aside to be “wanded” and striped search or sent thru that special modern day equivalent of a blood hound, the “scratch and sniff machine”. Once inside the machine blows a powerful jet of air on you in the hope of dislodging some forbidden scent. At the same time they are swabbing your carry-ons while busting the latched on your designer luggage.

Wow, what an ordeal, but now you can proceed to your gate where you can wait the remainder of the one hour and 47 minutes till your flight allegedly is to depart. As you stroll past the newsstands the smell of fresh Cinnabons fills your nostrils, you know, you have finally arrived Gate #3. Just as you sit down with your $12.95 Starbucks coffee, you hear an announcement that there has been a gate change and your flight will now be departing from Gate #297, on the other side of the airport. Well you have some time so you stop at the local watering hole for a quick drink or two. Maybe its your lucky day because you sit next to a couple of great looking women and a obviously inebriated guy in uniform and you buy them all a few drinks and really get drunk together…party…party.. only at the airport.

Wow, what kind of sicko starts drinking before breakfast? Anyway, at this point, I’m re-thinking my decision to fly vs. drive. Heck I’ve already walked half the distance to where I was going by now anyway. The only advantage of all this pre-flight activity is the fact that you get to people watch. You get to see, all kinds of people going to all kinds of places, for a wide variety of purposes. There is the business man heading to a meeting with a far off client, the family.. ready for their vacation experience, and the crying baby that you hope doesn’t sit next to you for the 6 hour flight.

Anyway, you now arrive at your new gate, with only minutes to spare before the flight, and as you look out the window, it becomes evident that the most important part of you air travel experience is missing. That’s right, you guessed it.. no airplane…your flight has been delayed because it was raining in Minnesota.

Sure your disappointed, but if you really think about it, it’s just like loosing in Las Vegas, its all part of the game. Besides, no one seems more unhappy about the whole thing than the guy over there sobbing in the corner. As he looks up at you and sheds a small tear, you recognize him from back at the bar, little did you know then, he was your pilot for the trip… Well it’s all part of travel and your fun day at the airport, so sit back, rest a spell, and go ahead and have that Cinnabon you’ve been trying to avoid all morning, your flight has been overbooked anyway.

P.I.B.