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My Life as a Hotfessional

Karma.

(Karma karma karma karma karma chameleon,
you come and go, you come and go.
Loving would be easy if your colors were like my dreams,
red gold and green, red gold and green.)

I’ve seen the mention of Karma in a couple of different blogs today. Do I believe in Karma? You bet your sweet little butt I do. Karma is when the car that blasted past me in the right lane doing 15 miles over the speed limit is pulled over by a state trooper a few miles up the road. Karma is when the person behind me in the grocery lane zips into a newly opened lane (even though the cashier asks for “the next person in line”) just to get stuck waiting for a price check. Hee! That’s always fun.

Last night, I finally got my own Karma for years and years of O’Horror flight delays.

Tuesday and yesterday, the suck ass snow hit Chicago. It started Tuesday evening, and by 8 pm, it was really coming down. (I know, I was freakin’ walking back from a mexican restaurant in it.)

When I woke up yesterday morning, the ground was covered, but the streets had melted (well, not the streets, themselves, but…shut.up.). There was snow on the rooftops (which you can see when you’re on the 28th floor!), but traffic seemed to be moving okay, and most importantly? There were taxis that were willing to stop for me. (Scoff if you must, but this isn’t always the case when you’re dragging a suitcase in bad weather - even though I was only going to the office.)

I checked the American Airlines website as soon as I got logged on. According to it, we were still scheduled to leave at 6:30 p.m. (I’m such a sucker. I actually checked 10 hours before scheduled departure time to see if we were delayed. Snirk. Like they’re going to fuckin’ post that.) The Federal Aviation Administration site showed incoming delays of 3 hours and increasing for O’Horror. But! Only 45 minute delays for outgoing flights.

(Now, I’m by no means a rocket scientist or air traffic controller, but I’m guessing that eventually? If incoming flights are delayed by 3 hours? They’re going to run out of planes. Y’know? To go out? Because last time I checked, there’s not an overabundance of extra planes laying around Chicago. But, who am I to say? Maybe there are and someone is just hiding them. In the Air & Space Museum? In the basement of the Sears Tower? Under Lake Michigan?)

Aaaaaanyway, I went to my morning meetings, and then met my friend the Logistics Goddess for lunch. As we were sitting there, (her stuffing her skinny little 27-year-old-face with a ginormous piece of chocolate cake with mint frosting, and me sipping my green tea feeling my hips grow just looking at her damn cake), the skies once again let loose with that wet, white crap. Damnity, damn, damn, damn. Another check of the American site tells me, “Yep! Still on time. What are you worried about?!” (sucker)

(I know, I have “sucker” tattooed on my forehead. Must cut bangs so tattoo stays hidden.)

At 2:00, the snow stops and the sky turns that brilliant shade of blue that says, in Midwesternese, “It’s about 12 below out here. But you need sun, so come stand outside for 2.3 seconds and try to soak it up because it’s going to be cloudy, for, oh, about the next 17 weeks.”

At this point, I decide to make my getaway. It’s 2:30. Four hours ’til departure. (So says the American site). I say goodbye and Happy Holidays to everyone. I get a cab and make excellent time to O’Horror. Like, 35 minutes! Door to door.

Except, at the 25 minute mark? I get a Crackberry message from American. “Flight 510 ORD to DTW NOW 8:15 p.m.”

Sucker. First notification of a 105 minute delay.

You’re waiting for the Karma part, right? Well, I’m getting there.

As I get through security, I take a look at the departure board to see which gate I’m scheduled to leave from (yea, like they won’t change it 12 times in the next 5 hours) and I pray that there’s a bar near it.

Wait, what’s that? Right above that big “Delayed - Now 8:15″ lettering next to Flight 510 - Detroit? A 5:05 pm flight? to Detroit? That’s listed as being “On Time”? And leaving from the gate I’m standing in front of?

Well, well, well. You just know that I dragged me and my Staypuft-marshmallow-coat-covered hotness over to the desk and asked about getting on standby. The nice gate attendant gave me a standby card told me to make sure I checked for gate changes before boarding time.

Boarding time? 4:35. Current time? 3:09. Across from the gate? Macaroni Grill. Wine!

To spare you any additional boredom, er, hitting yourself in the head with your keyboard, er, angst, I will tell you that yes! I did get my standby seat (on an 17 1/2 row, 70 seat plane). We landed at 6:25 pm Central time. Which was 5 minutes before my original flight was even scheduled to take off.

The original flight? Left O’Horror at 8:50 pm. Which would have put my in my front door around 11 pm Eastern. Instead, at 11 pm, I was snuggled in my nice warm flannel sheets. Fast, fast, asleep.

—- That, my friends, is Karma. I hope you get your dose of good Karma today. —-

My darlin’ friends,

‘Tis the Season to be credit aware.

Love,
Hotfessional