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Back, by the skin of my teeth...
Aug. 11th, 2006 07:25 pmIf the campaign itself lacked adventure, the return home more than made up for it.
The driver showed up crack on time Thursday morning and despite heavy traffic on the Moscow Ring Highway, we covered the roughly 60 km fast enough for me to make it through customs at 9:15 am. As in previous passes outbound, my luggage was x-rayed as I entered the terminal.
Outbound customs was no problem, and my luggage was x-rayed a second time just before it was all subjected to a very thorough hand search immediately before I checked it when getting my ticket. With luggage checked and ticket and passport in hand, I went through the short passport control line and thought seriously about having a Guinness at the Irish pub, but the hour (early) and the cost (high) deterred me. My cash reserves were somewhat small and though I had recovered my wallet, the plastic inside was useless.
No news of the events occurring in the UK were made known to us as we winged across the Atlantic. For most of the trip, the ground was covered with a solid blanket of clouds; in spots, you could look down at the North Atlantic and see the shadow of our airplane and its contrail on the water. I took the following shot - which shows neither shadow nor contrail - as we approached the coast of Greenland.
I thought it'd be fairly easy to find this, um, "beach resort" on Google Earth, but without more pictures or a better idea of where our track lay, I found the task is not so easy (then again, the time spent looking is undoubtedly a factor; I gave up after about 10 minutes).
The first hint of something awry occurred while I was walking from the plane to US Passport Control. The public address system announced that the DHS alert level was orange, but until I specifically thought about where orange is with respect to yellow and red, I didn't think too much of it. The tone of voice used in the announcement communicated no particular urgency, and while I wouldn't care to hear panic in the voice, it might've been useful to let people know that the level had changed within the previous 12 hours or so. At any rate, when I then heard the announcement regarding no liquids going past the security checkpoint, and I realized something was going on.
First, however, I had to pick up my luggage and go through Customs, and that took a while because I had taken what I normally carry in the roll-on and divided it between the roll-on and a rucksack that I'd received as a souvenir of the campaign (thus distributing weight into 20.8-kg and 6.4-kg packages, respectively). The roll-on came off the plane; the rucksack didn't. That particularly disappointed me, as I had taken all the books (all four) and placed them in the rucksack. I gritted my teeth, went through Customs, and ran smack into an enormous line at the security checkpoint.
It was at this point that the news of events in the UK became known to me. Looking around, I saw people chugging wine from bottles and women sadly chucking cosmetics into the trash. It took a while to get through security, owing to the huge numbers of people involved and the slower rate of screening, but as I've had extensive experience getting ready for these searches, once my turn came, everything went smoothly.
Until I got to my gate.
My flight had been scheduled to leave at 7 pm. By the time I got to the gate, the departure time was 8:40 pm. I called Natalie with the news and suggested she keep abreast of events online. Going back to the gate area, I noticed there were lockers available for rent in the terminal, locked by one's fingerprint. However, when the alert level was orange or higher, the lockers were taken out of service (which made me wonder about what happened to the stuff inside once the level ticks up to orange, but I had other things to worry about).
The 8:40 pm time became 9:45 pm, and then 10:15 pm, and then 10:45 pm, at which point we were informed that maintenance had been called to check out a balky switch in the cockpit. At about 11:15 pm, the flight was declared cancelled. I called Natalie, who was already at the airport. She was disappointed, but did note - with some amusement - that according to the arrival schedule displayed at the airport, our flight was scheduled to arrive from Atlanta in about 20 minutes. So much for technology.
Back at the Hartsfield-Jackson airport, the mob of people that had assembled to board the plane now moved, like some kind of predatory entity, over to the Delta service desk, which exhibited about as much organization as those really decorative parts of the Mandelbrot set. There were 16 phones available to speak with agents, 4 flesh-and-blood agents behind a counter, a station that let you scan your boarding card to find out if you'd already been rebooked, and a good half dozen lines forming to try to get at all the goodies.
My first scan at the rebooking notification station yielded nothing. About 40 minutes later, after my part of my line had moved about 10 inches, I tried another scan and found out I had been rebooked for a 7 am flight this morning. By now, it was closing in on midnight.
The lone Delta representative was not very communicative regarding housing vouchers. In fact, he said there were no vouchers left (!) and that our best bet was to go find a place to stay and then send the bill to Delta for partial reimbursement. Between not having active plastic, missing half my luggage, and having to be back at the airport at, say, 4 am to deal with security, etc., I decided to ask for a blanket and figured I'd find a corner somewhere and get some sleep. I had slept perhaps one hour during the transatlantic portion of my day, and figured fatigue would do the rest.
I managed to drowse for perhaps two more hours. At around 3:30 am, I took several shots of the gate area, as I was far from the only person to choose the "stay at the airport and avoid the crowd" alternative. One is shown below.
At 5 am, I got in line to check in for the 7 am flight, only to find that the Delta agent would be there to check people in at 6. Eventually, I got my new boarding pass. At 6:45, the agent announced that the flight would be delayed a few minutes, pending arrival of a complete crew. Some time later, this flight was cancelled owing to an inability to muster a suitable crew.
We all went back to the Delta customer service center, where a repeat of the previous night's fun was already in progress. A scan of my new boarding pass instructed me to speak to an agent. I picked up a phone, which buzzed quietly and informed me to wait for the next available agent.
Forty minutes later, the next agent came online and informed me that I had been rebooked on a 9:30 am flight. I hung up the phone and made my way to my new gate. All this time, the TSA announcement regarding liquids kept playing in the background, causing me to fondly recall the mind-numbing, highly repetitive Beeline telephone video spot that violated my eyeballs about a million times while waiting to board the plane in Moscow.
The third time must've been the charm, because the 9:30 flight made it okay, and somehow, my missing rucksack caught up with me at the baggage claim office in Houston. Right now, Natalie is waiting for me to get off my computer so we can go out to eat. A good idea, after which I am sure I will fall asleep with great speed.
Cheers...
The driver showed up crack on time Thursday morning and despite heavy traffic on the Moscow Ring Highway, we covered the roughly 60 km fast enough for me to make it through customs at 9:15 am. As in previous passes outbound, my luggage was x-rayed as I entered the terminal.
Outbound customs was no problem, and my luggage was x-rayed a second time just before it was all subjected to a very thorough hand search immediately before I checked it when getting my ticket. With luggage checked and ticket and passport in hand, I went through the short passport control line and thought seriously about having a Guinness at the Irish pub, but the hour (early) and the cost (high) deterred me. My cash reserves were somewhat small and though I had recovered my wallet, the plastic inside was useless.
No news of the events occurring in the UK were made known to us as we winged across the Atlantic. For most of the trip, the ground was covered with a solid blanket of clouds; in spots, you could look down at the North Atlantic and see the shadow of our airplane and its contrail on the water. I took the following shot - which shows neither shadow nor contrail - as we approached the coast of Greenland.
I thought it'd be fairly easy to find this, um, "beach resort" on Google Earth, but without more pictures or a better idea of where our track lay, I found the task is not so easy (then again, the time spent looking is undoubtedly a factor; I gave up after about 10 minutes).The first hint of something awry occurred while I was walking from the plane to US Passport Control. The public address system announced that the DHS alert level was orange, but until I specifically thought about where orange is with respect to yellow and red, I didn't think too much of it. The tone of voice used in the announcement communicated no particular urgency, and while I wouldn't care to hear panic in the voice, it might've been useful to let people know that the level had changed within the previous 12 hours or so. At any rate, when I then heard the announcement regarding no liquids going past the security checkpoint, and I realized something was going on.
First, however, I had to pick up my luggage and go through Customs, and that took a while because I had taken what I normally carry in the roll-on and divided it between the roll-on and a rucksack that I'd received as a souvenir of the campaign (thus distributing weight into 20.8-kg and 6.4-kg packages, respectively). The roll-on came off the plane; the rucksack didn't. That particularly disappointed me, as I had taken all the books (all four) and placed them in the rucksack. I gritted my teeth, went through Customs, and ran smack into an enormous line at the security checkpoint.
It was at this point that the news of events in the UK became known to me. Looking around, I saw people chugging wine from bottles and women sadly chucking cosmetics into the trash. It took a while to get through security, owing to the huge numbers of people involved and the slower rate of screening, but as I've had extensive experience getting ready for these searches, once my turn came, everything went smoothly.
Until I got to my gate.
My flight had been scheduled to leave at 7 pm. By the time I got to the gate, the departure time was 8:40 pm. I called Natalie with the news and suggested she keep abreast of events online. Going back to the gate area, I noticed there were lockers available for rent in the terminal, locked by one's fingerprint. However, when the alert level was orange or higher, the lockers were taken out of service (which made me wonder about what happened to the stuff inside once the level ticks up to orange, but I had other things to worry about).
The 8:40 pm time became 9:45 pm, and then 10:15 pm, and then 10:45 pm, at which point we were informed that maintenance had been called to check out a balky switch in the cockpit. At about 11:15 pm, the flight was declared cancelled. I called Natalie, who was already at the airport. She was disappointed, but did note - with some amusement - that according to the arrival schedule displayed at the airport, our flight was scheduled to arrive from Atlanta in about 20 minutes. So much for technology.
Back at the Hartsfield-Jackson airport, the mob of people that had assembled to board the plane now moved, like some kind of predatory entity, over to the Delta service desk, which exhibited about as much organization as those really decorative parts of the Mandelbrot set. There were 16 phones available to speak with agents, 4 flesh-and-blood agents behind a counter, a station that let you scan your boarding card to find out if you'd already been rebooked, and a good half dozen lines forming to try to get at all the goodies.
My first scan at the rebooking notification station yielded nothing. About 40 minutes later, after my part of my line had moved about 10 inches, I tried another scan and found out I had been rebooked for a 7 am flight this morning. By now, it was closing in on midnight.
The lone Delta representative was not very communicative regarding housing vouchers. In fact, he said there were no vouchers left (!) and that our best bet was to go find a place to stay and then send the bill to Delta for partial reimbursement. Between not having active plastic, missing half my luggage, and having to be back at the airport at, say, 4 am to deal with security, etc., I decided to ask for a blanket and figured I'd find a corner somewhere and get some sleep. I had slept perhaps one hour during the transatlantic portion of my day, and figured fatigue would do the rest.
I managed to drowse for perhaps two more hours. At around 3:30 am, I took several shots of the gate area, as I was far from the only person to choose the "stay at the airport and avoid the crowd" alternative. One is shown below.
At 5 am, I got in line to check in for the 7 am flight, only to find that the Delta agent would be there to check people in at 6. Eventually, I got my new boarding pass. At 6:45, the agent announced that the flight would be delayed a few minutes, pending arrival of a complete crew. Some time later, this flight was cancelled owing to an inability to muster a suitable crew.We all went back to the Delta customer service center, where a repeat of the previous night's fun was already in progress. A scan of my new boarding pass instructed me to speak to an agent. I picked up a phone, which buzzed quietly and informed me to wait for the next available agent.
Forty minutes later, the next agent came online and informed me that I had been rebooked on a 9:30 am flight. I hung up the phone and made my way to my new gate. All this time, the TSA announcement regarding liquids kept playing in the background, causing me to fondly recall the mind-numbing, highly repetitive Beeline telephone video spot that violated my eyeballs about a million times while waiting to board the plane in Moscow.
The third time must've been the charm, because the 9:30 flight made it okay, and somehow, my missing rucksack caught up with me at the baggage claim office in Houston. Right now, Natalie is waiting for me to get off my computer so we can go out to eat. A good idea, after which I am sure I will fall asleep with great speed.
Cheers...
