Text 11919, 117 rader
Skriven 2007-02-16 13:35:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
     Kommentar till en text av BURTON FORD
Ärende: Snow 73
===============
 -=> Burton Ford said to All <=-

 BF> We seem to be in the low end of the predicted snow.  We are getting
 BF> somewhere around 6-8 inches since last Evening.

In Boston (where I went to run some errands after my Arkansas
concerts) there was little snow, but little hailstones - the
captain of the plane I ended up getting on said that if we took
off before these abated, it would be like flying through BBs.
Two degrees warmer, we'd have had rain (manageable), two degrees
cooler, we'd have had snow (also manageable). But we were in the
zone of no travel for many hours.

 BF> But now the wind has come up and it's starting to drift.  Just a few
 BF> minutes ago I measured a drift, right in front of out garage doors, at
 BF> 32". The average height of the snow in our backyard is about 19".

Once back around when I started on the echo and I still had the
house in Salem, we had drifts of over 10' - I could have slid out
of my second-story office window and right down into the 3' to 4'
back yard. Life could be worse.

 BF> In an expanding circle around us the snow gets deeper and deeper.  The
 BF> sheriff has closed the roads in Wayne County, unless you are going
 BF> home.  And it gets worse farther away.   
 BF> I was surprised at the road closing, because it doesn't seem to be
 BF> that bad a storm here.   Although the wind can change the situation
 BF> here in a hurry.  

Probably the slipsliding more than the lowered visibility.

 BF> And on the computer the radar around Baltimore looks horrendous.... so
 BF> how are you doing Dale?

I guess the airlines saw the radar around Baltimore - I ended up
having to go to National.

0214 US 719 BOS PHL 1640 1757 319 3A
was    1929         1230 1358 319 2C
was     719         1330 1458 319 3A
was    1759         1430 1600 319 2F

I checked online and discovered that my original carefully
chosen flight was cancelled and so went early to the airport
to see what I could cadge myself onto. Chaos. Got into the
first-class line to find that the lone agent there was
helping a family in apparently extra dire need of help who
were in the midst of a complicated reroute. The line had
3 people in it, and they'd been waiting a long time before
my arrival. I decided to take a hike to the shuttle check-in
and discovered that it was chaos there, too, and my favorite
agent wasn't there (apparently he had gone on his break, as
he was there later). Came back to my same place in line,
cutting through the same place in the coach line, saying
excuse me to the same people, and waited for 20 or 25 more
while the window for getting on the 12:30 came and went.
The agent was pleased to get an easy one and put me on the
1:30 in a couple minutes. Off I went: the rebooking was
going so slowly that there was no line at security, and I
was through in a seconds. At the club I noticed that the
12:30 hadn't gone - Sonia said that the only flight that
had gone was the 5:30, and everything was cancelled up to
the 12:30, but she could put me on that. Got to the gate
around 12:45 to find that the flight had been delayed to
1:30, so back to the club for a beer, where I talked with
the idle bartenders (remember, most people were still in
the ticket line) about Valentine's day and how it's a
made-up holiday from the candy and card manufacturers.
At 1:30 they bumped the 12:30 and 1:30 flights to 2:30.
At 2:30 they cancelled the 12:30, so I went back to the
club to find that Sonia had kept my seat on the 1:30, just
in case. Hung around until 3, when they boarded us (as well
as the 3:30), and we pushed back at about 3:30. At 4:30 we
finally started getting deiced and were on our way on a
short, bumpy flight shortly after. I asked for my usual,
but they were out, so I asked for VO, which was also out,
so I asked for Beam, which was out, and I ended up amusing
myself with a double Jack Daniel's. We got to the gate
just before 6, and a glance at the monitor showed that the
Baltimore flight was delayed 3 hours: I debated chewing on
a cheesesteak for 2 hours or trying to get on the just
closing National flight - hoofed it there to find that it
hadn't boarded, as the power plug of the 737-400 was
incompatible with that at the gate, and so the plane could
not start (captain's explanation during the flight, I have
no idea about the accuracy of this), so they had to find an
APU to fit the aircraft, which took a good long time.

0214 US1762 PHL DCA 2100 2120 734 8C
was                 1735 1830
was     948 PHL BWI 1735 1827 733 2F

An efficient and calm agent took care of all sorts of
rebooking problems and found me a decent seat in coach (it
turned out that the plane left with at least one empty in
first, but that could easily have been due to a misconnect).
We boarded up at 7, off the gate at 7:30, and I fell asleep
only to wake an hour later and finding that we were just
getting deiced! So much for the 9:28 bus to Bowie. Called
Carol and arranged to have her pick me up at New Carrollton.

There were plenty of empties on this flight, owing probably
to misconnects, and with the shuffling of people wanting to
sit with each other, I ended up sitting in a middle seat (so
as to be able to recline relatively guilt-free) in a row of
my own. Snoozed fitfully through a quite bumpy 20-min flight
at 10000 feet; then an interminable wait (17 minutes!) while
they found a guide to guide us in.

It turns out that the Baltimore flight and both its
successors were cancelled, so I'd made a good choice.

The subway was running okay, so I got to the end of the line
around 10:45, with Carol picking me up shortly after.
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