Category: Travels

United Airlines Lottery

United Airlines put me on a roller coaster this week. First, they announced plans to stop giving employees bonuses. They would instead use a lottery to reward them.

I thought it was a great idea. I always feel like it’s a lottery flying with United. Yes, I have a ticket for the flight, but do I have a seat? Will I get on a plane? And will it be on the day that I’m scheduled to be flying? Let’s start a betting pool!

The betting pools always made those of us waiting in the gate area feel better. Even though there was a chance we wouldn’t make the flight (or the flight wouldn’t go today), at least there was a small chance that we might win. It was a little rain of sunshine on a bitter day traveling on United Airlines.

I thought having employees rewarded by lottery would help employees and passengers bond. Now employees would feel how we passengers feel when we wait to see if we’re going to fly on the flight that we bought a ticket for.

I don’t think the executives were going to participate in the lottery. I felt sorry for them. It seemed mean of United to exclude them. I accuse United of being executivists, treating executives differently just because they’re executives. It seems like companies will discriminate about anything these days.

But then, United announced they were not going to do the lottery. Say whaaat? Apparently, the employees weren’t as excited about the bonus lottery as I was.

That surprised the president of United Airlines, Scott Kirby (which admittedly sounds like a movie star’s name in the 1940s). Kirby said, “Our intention was to introduce a better, more exciting program, but we misjudged how these changes would be received by many of you.”

I admit, I paused when I read that. The company president was surprised that people weren’t happy that they weren’t going to receive the bonus money that they were probably counting upon. I think that gives us a little more insight into why United sucks more each year (hell, each month) as an airline. It explains why they’re surprised when passengers are pissed about paying extra for the blankets, food, and a seat that isn’t out on the wing.

Is it surprising that United will start selling priority boarding for coach passengers? I believe they’ll next be selling priority exiting, too. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they’re going to start charging for the seats in the crowded waiting areas around the gate. “I’m sorry, sir, can I see your ticket for that seat? You can’t sit there if you don’t have a ticket. Would you like to buy a ticket? Just five dollars per hour. What’s your flight number? Oh, you’ll need about six hours, then.”

Then, like all of United’s twisted, greedy thinking, they’ll oversell the tickets for the seats in the waiting area. “Sorry, just because you have a ticket, it doesn’t mean that you have a seat.”

I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that United Airlines employees must buy desk time at work.

United Airlines: “Fly with us. It’s a lottery.”

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Just Made It

You ever go to a restaurant, and find it quiet and with few customers, and then sit and order, and witness a sudden influx of people entering the restaurant and filling up the chairs, the noise level rising with their conversation and laughter?

Or maybe you reach the cashier in a store to make your purchases, and have no line, and then long lines form at all the registers?

These situations cause us to say, “Wow, we timed that right. We beat the rush.”

Traveling, we made it back home on Sunday. The weather served plunging temperatures and several inches of snow that night. “We made it home just in time.”

That thought, that somehow, you beat the crowds, the odds, the norms, the system, by just a little, fires a warm glow of satisfaction. It’s a little less satisfying when you fly home and see someone, and then they die the next day. Sure, there’s still some solace as we tell ourselves, “At least we saw them one more time before they died,” but the glow isn’t as warm nor satisfying.

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The Kiss Good-bye

Have you ever been sitting in your seat on an aircraft and drop something on the floor between your seat and the one in front of you? Man, the moves to pick it up would try a contortionist’s skills. If they ever tell me that we’re going down and I’d better bend over and kiss my ass good-bye, I’d need to decline. No way that I can bend over and kiss my ass in one of their seats. Nope, not going to happen. Somebody else will need to kiss it good-bye.

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The Ticket Dream

This was an ironic, humorous dream for me.

I was in a huge airport terminal. It was day. I’d been traveling all over, mostly alone, as was my case during my careers. Now I was going home. But where was home? How was I getting there? I didn’t know either of these answers.

As others left, I searched through my baggage to figure out where I was supposed to be going. While I was doing this, a female airline employee walked up and talked to different people. I prepared to approach her to ask for help. But as I did, she turned and pointed to me. “You’re going on the eleven nineteen,” she said.

I was impressed that she knew that, and thankful. After she said it, I discovered a ticket in my baggage. The ticket was one of those antiquated styles, with a card back and several tissue-thin layers separated with carbon paper. Pleased and relieved, I had my ticket. I just had to wait for my flight.

It was apparently going to be a long wait. Flights were called; people departed, and I remained. I kept losing my ticket in my paperwork. Back in paper days, I would create a folder for my travel. It would have my boarding passes, tickets, baggage claims, agendas, orders (when I was military), et cetera. As others left, I became anxious. To relieve my anxiety, I’d check my ticket. Each time I pulled out my folder to consult my ticket, the ticket was gone. Then I’d go through a mad hunt, emptying my bags and searching for my ticket. Each time, though, I wouldn’t find it, until – surprise! – I found it in my paperwork.

I moved closer to the customer service desk where the woman worked. At one point, she saw me, pointed, and said, “You’re going on the eleven nineteen. Your flight is soon.”

My wife arrived, surprising me. “How did you get here?” I said.

She was smiling. “My boyfriend drove me.” Her expression told me she was joking.

Tired, I wasn’t in a joking mood. “Well, did you boyfriend give you a way to get home? I’m on the eleven nineteen. My flight is soon.”

She held up a ticket. “I know. I’m on it.”

“How’d you do that? The flight was full.”

She didn’t say. At this point, I slipped into enough consciousness that I knew this was a dream. It reminded me a lot of some of my travels, but the part that struck me as ironic and humorous was that my ticket kept getting lost in my paperwork. I thought, that’s pretty funny for a writer.

2

The Overlooked Opportunity

There are types and tricks to sleeping in an airport. My wife and I know this, having spent many nights stuck in an airport.

Airlines usually do offer hotel vouchers when your flight is cancelled. But the song and dance is a familiar show: it’s midnight to two or three in the morning. They tell you that they have you on the first flight out, which will be six or seven in the morning. By the time you leave for the hotel, get checked in, and arrive in your room, your chance for sleeping is limited to a few hours before you need to get up and come back to the airport, because you need to process through security and get to the gate an hour before the boarding time.

So, when sleeping in an airport, don’t just settle for a chair. Walk around and look around. Many airports have conversation lounges or pits. You want to be able to stretch out.

Which leads me to the overlooked opportunity. Airports should be building sleeping lounges. These need not be fancy, just spaces where you can rent a daybed or cot and sack out for a few hours. You’ll rent it, of course. It’s not practical for airports to give things away for free. They get nothing for free. Taxpayers, businesses, airlines, and customers must tote the bill for everything in an airport. Why should you get anything for free?

Yes, there would be some administrative, bureaucratic, security, and cleaning maintenance overhead. Yes, no doubt, but we’d be willing to accept quite a bit, we exhausted, worn out, stranded travelers. Look what we’re already enduring, how we curl up in corners on the floor, or hunker like twisted metal hangers in chairs. Don’t you think we’d pony up a little money to stretch our backs, close our eyes and sigh into sleep?

By having these temporary beds available, airlines could look like heroes. They’d be off the hook for offering hotel vouchers. Instead, they could give you a bed voucher, so you should shuffle off for a sweet nappy nap before trudging back over and resuming your place in the queues.

You know the opportunity is here. We need them now. Walk through airports at night and count the sleeping denizens. Don’t tell me the need doesn’t exist. That need will only get worse in the coming years. The prices for tickets will climb. The airlines aren’t going to suddenly awaken to their ways and stop overbooking. No, they’re addicted to that profit model, and profit must be had. And aircraft break. We need a space to shovel these people so they stretch out when they’re left without the chance to leave.

Come on, some airport out there must step up and make it happen. The people are counting on you.

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Another Fine United Airlines Experience

Okay, yes, I know we swore we would never fly United again.

It’s rare that something goes correctly when traveling with United during the past several years. It’s usually a shuffle of planes, gates, and information that prompts us to wistfully comment, “Remember when flying used to be fun?”

But the prices and flight option mirages seduce us as it always does. United claims to have wonderful flights and prices. Their prices are several hundred dollars below the other airlines. So, wincing, we think…should we trust them?

It’s like being in a bad relationship. The other swears to change. You want to believe. You take them back, and they go out and do the same damn heart-breaking things as before.

You learn, again, you can’t trust them.

On this episode of United Horror, my wife was traveling alone. The travel east, from Medford, Oregon, to Charleston, WV, went almost perfectly. Everyone was so nice, she said. This was, of course, because United had encountered another P.R. moment when a woman was forced to hold her baby for the entire flight after she’d bought a ticket for the child.

Service and pleasantness declined a little in Chicago. “Maybe they didn’t get the memo,” she said, but it was nothing major.

Now we’re set up for the return. Her first leg on her way home, to Chicago, went fine. It fell to pieces in Chicago. In line to board, the passengers were told there was a delay. Mechanical problem. The delay was for several hours; it meant my wife would miss her next leg.

She headed to customer service. Nothing can be done, she was told.

What about flights on other airlines?

Nothing.

What about going to Portland instead, and then catching a flight to Medford?

They would get her to Portland, but she was on her own after that, and good luck.

Well, that would leave her almost three hundred miles from her destination.

Yep, true. Good luck with that.

Well, mechanic issues happen. Food vouchers were given. She bought a vegetarian sandwich in the airport. How was the sandwich? “Well, there were vegetables.”

She was scheduled to arrive in Medford by quarter to one in the morning. Instead, she arrived in San Francisco at two in the morning. “You’re booked on the same flight as before, but delayed twenty-four hours,” the customer service supervisor told her. Instead of arriving at Medford at a quarter to one Friday morning, she’d be arriving at quarter to one on Saturday morning. “We also have put you on stand-by for an earlier flight, but the flights are full. We’re going to put you up for two nights in a hotel. Wait right here, and we’ll take care of you.”

Then they left.

Almost an hour later, my wife wandered through the SFO terminal in search of United help. Customer service was full of sleeping passengers, but no workers. Have you ever been in these terminals at three in the morning? Cleaning crews circulate while stranded passengers sprawl out or desperately occupy themselves.

Finding a customer service hotline, she called for assistance. “Just go to customer service,” she was told.

“That’s where I was. There’s no one there except sleeping passengers.”

“Well then, I don’t know what you can do,” the helpful agent replied.

Bravely continuing on her quest, my wife circulated around the United gates and customer service areas until she spied United employee. Flagging her down, she explained what had happened. To her credit, this woman took care of her.

My wife arrived at her Comfort Suites room at four in the morning.

While my wife was enduring her flying fun, another woman was furious with United for keeping her baby in an overheated aircraft for two hours.

I offered to drive down to San Francisco and pick my wife up. It’s only a four and a half hour drive, in theory. Weekend traffic and construction would probably extend that travel time. She declined. She’ll be patient and wait, not because she trusts United, but because it’s all set in motion.

An eclipse is happening on August twenty-first. Oregon is considered prime viewing territory, so we’re bracing ourselves. Hotel prices have climbed. People are renting out houses, rooms, and their yards, with bathroom privileges. These sort of total eclipses don’t happen that often. People want to be part of the scene.

Hertz has already confirmed that they’ve overbooked, and have a problem, and have begun canceling reservations. United, of course, will overbook. That’s their motto: “We overbook.” There’s a damn good chance in my mind that if you’re flying via United, you’ll end up arriving a few hours after the eclipse.

Oh, the stories people will tell.

 

 

5

Whetting Desire

There was no warning of what was about to happen.

The other and I jumped into the car. Directing it onto the Interstate, we sped to another town for two days and a night of dining elsewhere, shopping, reading and relaxing. Our mini-vacation choice puzzled friends, but that’s life. Being out there, though, staying in a hotel, reading and eating at restaurants without any damn cares whet my desire for more of that life.

My wife felt it, too. “Wouldn’t it be great to just keep driving and go to another town, stay another night?”

Yep, it sure would.

Meanwhile —

I was writing yesterday, working on the novel in progress. It was a fabulous writing day. I jumped right into that writing and editing phase after some deep thinking and writing in my head that took place while driving and shopping the day before. Terribly rewarding, it whet my appetite to spend my hours doing nothing but writing and drinking coffee.

Suddenly — 

I read about Bertha, the TBM. Some quick pedantic explanation: a TBM is a tunnel boring machine. Bertha was the one used in Seattle in the tunnel construction to replace the Alaska Way Viaduct. The A.W.V. had been damaged in the six point eight magnitude earthquake in two thousand one. Bertha had just completed its part, breaking out of the earth and into its disassembly area.

The article whet my appetite for big endeavors like digging a tunnel. I wished I’d pursued an engineering degree. Then I might have been part of amazing projects like this.

I must admit, too, the child residing just under my skin said, “Bertha. Bertha Butt. One of the Butt Sisters.” Recognize it? It’s just how my infantile mind makes connections.

But then, without warning — 

I watched the first episode of American Gods again. Suddenly, I wanted to watch the next one, right now. Then I watched the Handmaid’s Tale. It whet my appetite for more, as did Red Rock when I watched its episodes.

It just seems to be one of those periods. I’m restless, excited and energetic. Life and its demands feels like a straitjacket. Time plods along, and impatience snaps a whip. Everything whets my appetite for more, now.

But, alas —

I know this period will shift. Maybe I just slept more, so I feel more rested and have more energy. My Fitbit claims I slept seven and a half hours, an hour more than my usual. Perhaps this energy and mood is the product of my dreams when I slept. They all seemed empowering…from what I remember….

Regardless —

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

I know exactly where to begin today.

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Experience

He was seventy-five, and she, the younger, was just seventy-three. They met on a cruise to Alaska, an adventure to eat food and see things like glaciers. They knew they didn’t agree on politics but there was e l e c t r i c i t y between them, not sparks or embers, but record one hundred mile long billion volt lightning strokes. So they said, what the hell, let’s try this and see.

Adventurous people they were, they went ‘camping’ together, renting a small cabin to share (there were separate beds), fishing and hiking in the day, campfires and singing at night.

Ten days in, they knew it would not work. He was an ardent Trump supporter and she was advocating RESIST. She gave him three choices: “Take me to an airport and I’ll fly home. Drive me home. Drive me to somewhere where I can rent a car and I’ll drive myself home.”

He replied, “Number three sounds good.”

So that’s what they did, swearing never to see one another again, and unfriending one another on Facebook.

It was a thirty-day life experience.

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Spiteful Stuff

Okay, everyone harmonize. This will be a self-pitying blues ballad. Sing along if you want.

Some days I feel like the universe hates me. It’s not really mean, just spiteful. Exhibit number one.

The week before leaving to take care of family business on the East Coast, we were shopping. The wind wrenched the door out of my hand, slamming it into the car beside me.

There weren’t witnesses. I could have driven away.

I could see a small ding on the crease line. The Hyundai Elantra wasn’t a new car but a recent year. From the tags, someone had recently purchased it.

My deductible is a grand. I knew this would be less than a grand. I wrote a note, apologizing and providing my contact information. As it happened, I came out as the other drive was leaving. She hadn’t noticed the ding or my note, so she drove off, saw the note, parked and got out to look. I hurried up to her and talked about it.

Now, back home, I’ve received the bill: seven hundred forty dollars for a parking lot ding. Ouch.

Exhibit number two.

I had four flights scheduled for my trip, covering the travel there and back. There were all with United Airlines. I took two of those four; the rest were canceled or missed because the flight before it was late. I ended up on six flights, total. I was re-booked on four flights that were cancelled.  None of the flights took off on schedule. None arrived to their destination on schedule. One hundred percent failure in both of those areas.

I spent one night in the SFO airport going, and a day there coming back. I was supposed to be in that airport for about two hours, instead of eighteen.

One flight that I took was a re-booked flight to cover one of the cancellations. Going through Chicago, they couldn’t provide me a seat number for the next flight. “See them at the gate when you get there.”

We did that. The first agent told us we didn’t need another boarding pass or seats. We would use the same ones, and the same seats.

He was wrong.

The next agent got us seats but we weren’t together. We couldn’t get seats together. That was another recurring theme in this flying fiasco. Originally booked side-by-side, it took a lot of cajoling, talking and visits to agents at the gates to make it happen, and it failed sixty percent of the time.

So, the universe and I aren’t getting along well right now. I don’t think it’s me, personally, that’s making the universe spiteful. I think it’s weary of the world’s bullshit as much as I am. It’s tired of trying to be reasonable in the face of insanity. I understand, in a way, but I don’t like it.

To the universe, please let me know what I need to make it up to you. I’d really like to return to being on better terms with you.

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