So I made it home in one piece tonight. Oddly enough a lot of stuff didn’t work out in my favor but it didn’t really phase me. The first sign of badness came as I was in the car riding to the airport and realized that I had forgotten my cell charger in my room. I even remember thinking how bad it would to be to leave it behind. But there wasn’t much I could do so I went with it. (If you try to call me and don’t hear back it’s because I am conserving whatever battery I have left.)
As I was trying to get my bag out of the car at the airport, I managed to break one of the plastic pieces that holds the strap on the bag. It wasn’t too bad and with my amazing Eagle Scout skills I was able to re-attach the strap temporarily. I then preceded to the Independence Air desk only to find it empty. This left me slightly annoyed but shortly after that I discovered a sign that said that they would be back at 3pm since the next flight was at 4:45pm. I guess that their chapter 11 status has them cutting corners. Not to be brought down by a wait, I searched for a power outlet and then sat on the floor to watch the rest of Cruel Intentions. Good ending.
When the attendants returned I went back to the desk and checked my bag. I then preceded to the security gate and walked through the metal detector. It went off. I hadn’t set a metal detector off in several years which startled me a bit. I slowly went to empty my pockets and realized that I still had my leatherman in my right pocket. I quickly told the inspector and re-entered the detector. He pointed me to one of 15 idle bodies (yes I actually counted 15 idle TSA agents) who then preceded to point me to a kiosk where I could mail my leatherman back to myself. I was thinking that this would be great, maybe pay $3 and be done with it. Then I got to the kiosk and realized that the fine people at CheckPointMailers want $8. Now I know its only a difference of $5 but I felt like I had been take advantage of as I had no other choice (I really enjoy that they portray themselves to be the good guy with quotes like “I was afraid I would never see my dad’s pocket again” on their site.)
However the bad taste in my mouth faded quickly as I began to watch the Lost Episode from this week. Short tangent about Lost: the Lost writers are incredible. However, they always seem to find the most frustrating spots to stop at. I guess they still want me to watch next week. Sadly this time I won’t be able to obtain a copy of the episode (no cable or Internet access on Wednesday) I guess I will have to wait till I get back to school to see it.
I eventually boarded the plane and read through Building Scalable Database Applications: Object-Oriented Design, Architectures, and Implementations which has to the worst technical book I have ever purchased. Now I know why I got it for only $8 instead of $40. So yea, if you were looking at buying a book about databases don’t buy that one.
The flight itself was pretty boring but I did enjoy the nice fat emergency exit row sitting even if it was in the middle of the crying baby section (nothing a pair of headphones couldn’t silence). We landed and I got to walk in the new underground tunnel at Dulles (see the picture below). This was pretty exciting as I didn’t have to wait for one of the silly mobile lounges. It’s the only airport in the Nation who has them.
Short rant about baggage claim with a funny picture below. Why do the obnoxious Americans (you know, the ones that you don’t want the rest of the world to see cause they do all the things that the rest of the world hates) always feel the need to push up right next to the baggage carousel? I have a news flash for the people standing next to the carousel. The speed at which your baggage enters the carousel is in no way dependent on the distance you stand from the carousel. But what standing next to the carrousel does do is prevent the people who actually have luggage on the carousel from actually claiming it. For some reason it always seems to be the macho guys that feel a need to do this. Go figure.
After successfully grabbing my baggage off the carousel, my Dad picked me up at the curb and we went (along with my brother) to Uno’s and got some really great pizza. So now I am home, full of pizza and relaxing. Not a bad day at all.
