You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy™
Sleeping in the Denver airport.
After missing my connecting flight to Nashville, and being told there are no hotels in the Denver due to the 500 year flood, I am sitting in a row of black chairs weighing my options.
I am frazzled and tired.
I hate Southwest. I hate the Denver airport. I hate the stupid intercom voice that keeps welcoming me to Denver.
Screw you intercom voice. I almost flip off the ceiling, but I’m too tired to raise my arm.
I have been up traveling since 6am. It’s now almost 10pm in a 2nd time zone.
My watch doesn’t even reflect the correct time.
My brain is like re-fried beans in a cast iron skillet over an open flame.
SIZZLE.
I’ve been to Carmel, San Jose, Salt Lake City, and now Denver. And that is just today.
My head is throbbing from constant pressurization.
I doubt Southwest is even giving us the correct amount of oxygen we paid for.
South West Bastards.
As I sit in this lousy, 1970’s style chair, in an airport that looks like a series of White T-Pee’s from the air, I weigh my options.
A huge part of me wants to roll over and scratch my belly, just give up and hit the bar. A big part of me is done, toast, out to lunch.
This part of me has decided to sleep in the airport. I eye ball the bar. I see people eating hamburgers and drinking beer. There is a college football game on.
I am drawn to this image like a kitten to a ball of yarn dipped in cat nip.
I haven’t eaten all day. I haven’t seen one football game all day. I really wanted to see Alabama beat Texas A&M. Instead I had to hear about it on the plane.
Man that beer looks good.
I start to get up, but I reflect on my situation. I’m a Cordan. As I tell my kids, Cordans never quit.
I all ready booked a flight for Sunday. Maybe, just maybe I can find a hotel room, even though everyone said it can’t be done.
I call the number given to me by the idiots at Southwest.
We are all booked up the hotel liaison tells me.
“The floods?” I ask.
“The floods,” they reply.
I try a second and a third hotel and hear the same thing.
Each call I make, I get an automated recording.
The airport is so loud and my connection is so bad. It makes communicating almost impossible.
Dial 1 if you have a reservation. Dial 2 if you want to make a reservation. Dial 3 if you just threw up in your mouth and hate Denver International Airport.
F*** It!
I’ll get buzzed and pretend I’m back in college. Who cares. I slept on the dirt at Andrews Air Force base waiting for the sun to rise to see the space shuttle land. I slept on the front lawn at city hall in Palm Springs. I was rudely awakened by a steel toed cop’s boot.
The airport carpet? That’s a piece of cake.
I go in the bar and order a beer and a sandwich.
I am somehow relaxed, finally. I am resigned to my destiny.
I see a bunch of Southwest refugees like myself.
One lady near me is trying to get back to Philly. The double thunder-storm that grounded my plane also grounded hers. She says they landed at some remote airfield in the middle of a cornfield.
Area 51 I joke.
She has a bowl of soup and a beer in front of her.
“I was so mad,” she says. “My husband bought me first class tickets for my connection home. Now I leave in the morning and they won’t honor that.”
The woman in her late 50’s or 60’s has decided like me to sleep in the airport.
“They have some big comfy chairs,” I tell her.
“Try going upstairs,” the bartender interjects. He is wiping a glass and has bushy white eye brows.
“Nobody goes up there,” he says, looking around like it’s a bad drug deal. “It’s not as dusty. You can lay out on the carpet, or there may be a row of seats without arm rests.”
“I call first dibs on that,” the woman says.
I laugh. Is it really so bad that we are fighting for a row of less dusty chairs without arm rests.
“They’re yours,” I laugh.
Just then my phone rings.
“I found you a room,” my friend says.
“You did? Where?”
“Embassy Suites. I have it booked. All you have to do is grab the shuttle bus.”
“Wow. You’re the best. Thanks.”
I am excited. I’m also bummed. My plan to get drunk and fall down on the carpet is now scrapped in favor of more moving and walking and catching busses.
“I got a room,” I tell the woman beside me.
She laughs. “I guess that row is all mine.”
I pay my bill and head to the shuttle bus area.
I am excited about the hotel, but I also dread having to come back to this stupid airport and getting frisked by TSA all over again.
I get to the passenger loading area. There’s a raw anger simmering all around. Many planes were diverted. Many planes missed connecting flights. People are angry. Children are crying. People have that crazy look in their eyes. It feels like Y2K all over again.
I’m relieved to be leaving the airport, but a part of me dreads the entire experience. It’s past 10pm at night. By the time I get to the hotel, it will be time to wake up and do it all over again.
I am exhausted. Like everyone around me, I hate South West.
“They should be doing more to put us up or buy us a meal” one man grumbles.
Misery loves company.
The shuttle bus area is chaos. Dozens of tired and frantic travelers are 3 deep on the curb. A bus pulls up. It is not well illuminated. People swarm the door. The driver says he is not going to our hotel.
Anger swirls across the loading zone. It is thick and palpable. I get a strange sensation. In some ways, this is what it felt like on 9 1 1. I was at a gas station where people in my home town were panicked and filling their cars with fuel they thought would never be available again.
Then the shuttle for Embassy Suites arrives.
People step off the curb, almost throwing themselves under the large van.
The driver senses the frenzy.
“Bags in the back,” he says.
I cut through the crowd and toss my two bags in the cargo hold.
I move to the door and jump aboard.
Almost every seat is taken. I sit in the front row with a guy from Philly. He is clutching his carry on bag. He was supposed to go to Salt Lake City. He is pissed at Southwest. Everyone on the shuttle hates Southwest. What’s not to hate. They didn’t connect us. they didn’t give us vouchers for food or lodgings. Southwest can kiss all our asses.
I tell him that I was diverted to his home town. He laughs.
He tells me that South West will hold jets forever if there is a mechanical malfunction because they have to pay to put everyone in hotels. But an act of God?
“Southwest doesn’t give a crap,” he says.
Others agree.
We begin driving away from the curb.
Suddenly loud thumping is heard on the bus windows. A woman seated by the window is frightened.
“it’s a man,” she screams.
The man rushes along side the bus banging on the windows and doors.
The driver stops and opens the door.
The man is enraged.
“I’ve been waiting 45 minutes,” he screams.
“Sir. You can’t bang on the doors. Another bus will be coming by soon.”
The man is seething. I can see the crazy in his eyes. He is poised to enter the bus but steps back. The driver closes the door and we take off.
The man sitting next to me asks me what that was about.
“He’s a father,” I say. “I saw him with his little kids. He’s frustrated. I’ve been that guy. They’re probably crying and whining asking why they can’t go home. He’s losing it.”
The shuttle bus pulls into the hotel.
I get a room and meet the guy in the front seat in the bar for a beer.
Need to chillax.
I order a Budweiser on tap. After the day I’ve had, this foul concoction masquerading as beer tastes like nectar.
The other guy is from Philly originally. He tells a lot of funny stories in a discernible East coast accent.
We laugh and talk sports and decompress.
I say good night and jump in bed.
It’s a king size bed. I think how this is better than the floor at DIA.
Sadly I wake up after only a few hours.
The air conditioner in this room is louder than a WWII tank with a blown head gasket. It comes on and goes off like Tommy Lee banging the skins.
My head is swimming with concerns about security lines and waking up on time and what will the weather be. I can’t help but think I would be home right now in my own bed sleeping soundly. I had big plans for Sunday. I wanted to work out and cut the lawn and watch the Red Zone Channel and I have a million bills to write.
Sadly, Sunday will be a frenetic crap shoot like Saturday. Hurry up and wait and be inconvenienced.
Sunday comes and I get to the airport 3 hours early. I am bored and I don’t want to miss any more flights.
Surprisingly, the lines are short and the day long, but relatively easy.
I get home at 5pm. My ride from the airport is an hour late.
“That’s par for this trip,” I laugh to myself.
So at the end of the day, my itinerary for this trip looks a little something like this.
NASHVILLE to LAS VEGAS to SAN DIEGO to LOS ANGELES to CARMEL to SAN JOSE to COLORADO AIRSPACE to SALT LAKE CITY to DENVER to NEW ORLEANS back to NASHVILLE.
I wonder how many frequent flyer miles I get for this mess?
Knowing South Worst, they probably charged me.
Life’s Crazy™