Fun Times in the Hartsfield-Jackson…

Well, coming home from Chicago (see previous post about Chicago) Saturday was an adventure to say the least. The flight from Midway to Atlanta was fine, no big deal. I got in at 4:30p and my flight to the TRI was to leave at 5:30. (BTW, did anyone see the race yesterday?) When I got there I found out it was delayed to depart until 8:20p, then 9p, then 9:30…and so it goes. If you’ve never spent 4+ (it wound up being a little more than 6) hours in an airport terminal, you are missing out in life. One thing I noticed last night is that there is a gate change approximately every 10 minutes. It only happened 2x to me, but lots of other had flights delayed and it’s hilarious to watch herds of people move back and forth through the terminal. For example, a flight to Allentown, PA changed gates about 6x all in one area before boarding and every few minutes about 50 or so people would get up and move together in a group to whatever gate that was called over the speakers. What was really funny about this? The gates were side by side and they really didn’t need to move at all. It was at the end of “D”, and if you’ve been there (like A, B, C & T) the end of the terminal has about 4-5 gates in one space. This was where they were all moving around.

Now keep in mind I usually sit right at the gate (with the agent) because I like to eavesdrop on everything going on. Not only was watching all those people amusing, but listening to some of the things said were equally hilarious! There was one flight to Knoxville that boarded at 6:30p – then they had to deplane at 7:30p (yes, they could have been in Knoxville by then – especially seeing as how it is only 40 minutes to the TRI). This delay was due to the AC not working. Well, one guy started yelling at the counter girl when he got off. “We have been on that plane with no AC sweating and being miserable, and you now deplane us after an hour? If there was a baby in a car for that long outside the parents would be arrested and put in jail. I can’t believe this!!”
The agent looked up at him when she heard this. “Were there any babies on board?” she asked this in a very sincere and concerned voice.
“No,” said the man, “it’s the principal.”
“Sir, we’re doing everything we can to fix your plane. I’m sorry you’re sweating.” She said.
I heard this and laughed out loud and they both looked at me and I just shook my head and smiled. The guy looked at me and then the gate girl and walked off in a huff. The gate girl tuned and gave me a big smile. ;) Seems now, I am on the good side.
After that, not 10 minutes later, a woman comes up to the counter and asks, “Ma’am, can I get my bag? Since I gate checked it and we’re going to be out here a while, I need to get some stuff out of it to pass the time.”
Nice request, I thought to myself – much nicer than the last guy that was up here.
“Sure, not a problem”, said the gate girl. “what’s your tag number?”
This is where it gets amusing…this is the honest to goodness conversation…I wrote it down word for word when I heard where it was going.
The woman answered, “Well, when I gate checked my bag, they didn’t give me a tag. Is that a problem?”
“Really? Well, that is odd. OK. What’s it look like?”
“Ummmm, well…it’s black, has 2 zippers on it with a handle and is about this big.”, which her hand gestures played out about the size of a small microwave. I couldn’t make this stuff up...
The gate agent just looked at her and again I laughed out loud-hard. They looked at me and I think I gave the gate girl some extra courage because she realized that other people had heard this and were thinking what she was thinking.
“Are you serious?” the gate girl asked. “You’re kidding right?”
“Yes, I am serious. I know it looks like every other bag here, but I can go out there and get it. I know what it looks like.”
“No, you can’t go out there. We’re not going to go digging through all the bags to try to find yours and it doesn’t even have a ticket.”
“Yes, but that should make it easier to find. It’s probably the only one without a pink ticket on it.”
“Ma’am. Go sit down and wait for your reboarding. I don’t have time for this.”
I was laughing so hard. I know it was rude of me, but it was sooooo funny. Other people started laughing too, when I broke the ice with my laughter. I had to have a break from the clinically insane, so I walked up to BK and got some food. I returned at about 8:15 and all the Knoxville people are still standing at the gate. I mean, this is 45 minutes later! And, there are plenty of seats to sit in (one of which I take, next to the gate of course). And they finally did a last call for Allentown – those poor people would be able to sit in one place for a while…hahahaha. At this point, I’m ready to stay in Atlanta.

At 8:45, my flight was delayed to 9:52p. Whatever. But get this, gate D34 makes an announcement. “Ladies and Gentlemen in the D34 gate area. We are going to do something a little different tonight. We are going to board flight XXXX to Dayton Ohio and flight XXXX to Portland Maine at the same time. So, please pay attention to which plane you are getting on when you go through the gate.” That is what he said! Talk about mass confusion…

Then I go to Starbucks and get my trusty grande marble mocha macchiato and enjoyed it tremendously. Yummy! At this point, I’m hoping the go ahead and cancel the flight so I can get to bed. They make an announcement at 9:30 saying they have a plane on the way from Huntsville for us and we should be leaving soon. At 10:15 they tell us it’s time to board so we can go home. They make a few final adjustments and the place takes off at 10:30. When we arrive, I see what the hold up was. RACE Weekend! There were at least 50 planes on the tarmac and about 10 or so were big ones. It was the busiest I have ever seen.