Houston, We Have A Problem

UPDATE: Here's a picture of my meat locker.



It's currently 7:55am and I'm sitting at a kiosk in O'Hare Airport in Chicago. My plane didn't leave Rochester until 8:30pm (4 hours late). Of course I missed my flight to Portland so AA put me up in a hotel for the night (the airlines, not Alcoholics Annonymous, but I can see where you'd think that).

So after riding the Mexican Chicken Bus Shuttle from the airport to the hotel- I got the wheel well and surrounded by a teenage dude flapjacking harder than I've ever seen to a couple of teenage...uh....bimbettes. I didn't know which I wanted more - for the kid to get shot down or for one of them to get syphilis. OK, just kidding. It's early and I'm cranky. So I got to my meat locker, I mean hotel room around 10:30pm (ct) and was up by 5:30 to get "selectively chosen" for a special security screening. Sorry, Z, the sunblock didn't make it because I didn't have a ziplock bag for it. I also lost my $3 travel size tube of toothpaste. What the hell is a ziplock back going to do if I'm blowing up a plane with sunblock? Or maybe they're worried that I'll take the sunblock and threaten to keep the pilot pasty white or his breath minty fresh. Anyway, I'll need to buy more sunblock. It's not like I haven't budgeted for it already.

So AA put me on a United Airlines flight today. They were sure that my duffle bags, each with it's own zip code, will be transferred to my UA flight. So far, no one has any idea and no way to find out. This should be fun.

Oh, and about the duffle bags. Getting bags that you could fit a dead cow in seemed like a good idea at the time, but I didn't think about having to carry the damn things. I know have, literally, bruises on my delicate shoulders from dragging them 10 feet.

I'm not complaining. I'm just describing in a way for comic effect. I'll deal with whatever because in the end, I'm ending up in Maui. I don't know how long that thought is going to keep me calm, but it's working for now.

I'll have pictures of my trip to Niagara Falls with Brad & Co, of my meat locker and will have of Portland by tomorrow.

Aloha.