Text 20765, 83 rader
Skriven 2012-02-03 11:30:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: on to Calif 175
=======================
The Shipps got me to the airport about 80 minutes before
takeoff; as security was surprisingly slow, I didn't have
a whole lot of time to kill.

UA 501 BWI LAX 1753 2037 320 3A Empower:td: Ch9^:td:

The oldish Airbus looked a little frayed around the edges, but
the seats were comfy enough. We were served by an incredibly
cute but pokerfaced blonde flight attendant, and the old song,
paraphrased, came to mind: ... and all the stars who never
were are parking cars and serving booze to jaded 1Ks ... .

Courvoisier came as a double; I was somewhat surprised to
note that the guy in 2B had a glass full of brown booze -
maybe it was cut with water, but it looked like an
astonishing serving.

After that, warm nuts, mostly almonds, which I like, but
no hot towel to wipe my hands with afterward.

My supper was was Tuscan chicken - brined and thus tender
though overdone white meat with spinach, olives, and sundry
sundried tomatoes, in a rather acrid red sauce; two kinds of
squash, butternut and something I couldn't identify; and
couscous with red onion and olive bits. A quite filling
meal, would have been more so if I had eaten all of it, but
the salt did me in. The other choice was cheese lasagne,
which smelled okay.

Dessert: oatmeal raisin cookie in a paper bag; this called
for another double Courvoisier.

The other cute FA working coach was much more my style, in
her 30s at least, girl-next-door looks, and, most important,
a smiley face on legs.

Channel 9 provided a fair amount of entertainment and then
comfort as I dozed. Sadly, when the video was turned off,
the audio was turned off as well; so the most interesting
part of the ATC communications was missing. We got in of
couse a bit early and of course had to wait for the ground
crew to be ready for us.

At the T7 club, the wireless was glacially slow, so I hiked
over to the T6 club, where the food is even more scanty, but
the Internet is much better, to get my e-mail.

Apparently, no matter what the hour, the hotel shuttles
come every 15 minutes or less. My Hilton LAX shuttle came
within seconds of my stepping out on the curb, a record.
Entered the rather grand vestibule and was suitably
impressed. The person at the desk gave me a very nice room
on the floor below the executive lounge; I dumped my stuff
and went up to find that this one actually had a concierge
and a kitchen staff. I saw a family who had apparently
special ordered snacks, as the kids were chowing on stuff
that wasn't out (or perhaps was out). All I could find were
cookies and candy.

Watched part of a dull football game and munched on a
cookie that was so unmemorable that I don't remember if the
black dots in it were raisins or chocolate chips.

Back to the room, where the bed turned out to be welcoming
but only until 3 am, when it kicked me out with a backache.
Fine - I'd planned on getting up at 5 anyway; just surf for
a couple hours, easy peasy. Wrong - the connection was down.
Shower and a futile effort to salvage another hour of sleep.
So I was grateful for the 24-hour every 15 minute shuttle,
which, when I got it at 5 something, was fuller than full,
with people deposited at the Embassy Suites, Air Canada,
and American, so by the time we got to Terminal 6, there
were only two of us left. We were both going to the elite
checkin, where it turned out that checkin took seconds. On
the machine my seat assignment came up 1F; a rat was duly
smelled. I tried to change, but no such luck. Maybe later
at the club. Security was pretty quick, though there was a
bunch of extra and unnecessary rigmarole, and I was happy
to be out of there.

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