Douglas Sherman
Staff
My wife and I ae finally home. It was quite the Odessey. We flew Southwest from Phoenix, AZ to John Wayne Airport in Orange Couty in CA to be with our daughter's family for Christmas. The fun began when we tried to come home on Monday the 26th of December. We woke up and looked at our flight details and everything was in order for our flight back home. Shortly before leaving for the airport, we got a message that our flight was delayed 30 minutes. OK, no big deal. One the way to the airport we got another update that our flight was delayed other 30 minutes. Again, no big deal.
But when we arrived at the airport and tried to check our bags in at the curb, the skycap came back and told us our flight was canceled. That's a big deal.
We called our daughter to come back and pick us up while Terryl was searching for other possible flights. There were none available. When our daughter arrived, we decided to go have lunch and search for rental cars. Dawn found one with Enterprise at the airport. I was a bit suspicious, but we decided to make a reservation. After lunch, we headed back to the airport and stood in line for about forty minutes to find out that we didn't have a reservation. Some guy came out and announced that if you had made a reservation today you didn't really have a reservation because the system had crashed because of the overload.
So, we found another Enterprise site away from the airport and booked a reservation. This time it worked, and we were off to Arizona at about 3:30 PM. (Our original flight time was 10:15). But we were about to have another turn for the worse. As we were headed to Palm Springs on Route 60, we encountered a monumental backup (probably caused by all of the people who rented cars to get back home to Phoenix). We traveled the section from the base of the hill to Banning in about two- and one-half hours (a distance of about 20 miles). Our daughter convinced us to cancel our reservation in Scottsdale and stop in Palm Desert for the night. To make this long story shorter we got up at 4:30 AM, and finally got to Scottsdale about 1:30 PM were we met out son and granddaughter for lunch where we were supposed to meet them the previous afternoon. We finally made it home in Cottonwood at about 5:30 PM.
Our daughter worked in the travel industry for many years and has some well-connected friends. A pilot for Delta told her that the CEO from Southwest sent out a memo to all employees that if they didn't show up for work on December 25th - 27th they had better have a doctor's excuse or they would be terminated. That prompted the ground crews across the nation for Southwest to walk out. A pilot friend from Southwest actually sent hm a copy of the memo.
Any good-looking cloud landscape images are fair game today. I am still tired.
Capitol Reef National Park, UT
Cumulonimbus over the college at which I taught in Illinois.
L
Lenticular cloud, Mt. Rainier National Park, WA
But when we arrived at the airport and tried to check our bags in at the curb, the skycap came back and told us our flight was canceled. That's a big deal.
We called our daughter to come back and pick us up while Terryl was searching for other possible flights. There were none available. When our daughter arrived, we decided to go have lunch and search for rental cars. Dawn found one with Enterprise at the airport. I was a bit suspicious, but we decided to make a reservation. After lunch, we headed back to the airport and stood in line for about forty minutes to find out that we didn't have a reservation. Some guy came out and announced that if you had made a reservation today you didn't really have a reservation because the system had crashed because of the overload.
So, we found another Enterprise site away from the airport and booked a reservation. This time it worked, and we were off to Arizona at about 3:30 PM. (Our original flight time was 10:15). But we were about to have another turn for the worse. As we were headed to Palm Springs on Route 60, we encountered a monumental backup (probably caused by all of the people who rented cars to get back home to Phoenix). We traveled the section from the base of the hill to Banning in about two- and one-half hours (a distance of about 20 miles). Our daughter convinced us to cancel our reservation in Scottsdale and stop in Palm Desert for the night. To make this long story shorter we got up at 4:30 AM, and finally got to Scottsdale about 1:30 PM were we met out son and granddaughter for lunch where we were supposed to meet them the previous afternoon. We finally made it home in Cottonwood at about 5:30 PM.
Our daughter worked in the travel industry for many years and has some well-connected friends. A pilot for Delta told her that the CEO from Southwest sent out a memo to all employees that if they didn't show up for work on December 25th - 27th they had better have a doctor's excuse or they would be terminated. That prompted the ground crews across the nation for Southwest to walk out. A pilot friend from Southwest actually sent hm a copy of the memo.
Any good-looking cloud landscape images are fair game today. I am still tired.
Capitol Reef National Park, UT
Cumulonimbus over the college at which I taught in Illinois.
L
Lenticular cloud, Mt. Rainier National Park, WA
