PHX – LAS
Well my flight adventures (or lack there of) started off around 6 p.m. tonight. As I was hanging around the house, I realized that I had forgotten to watch a movie I rented the day before at Redbox. I was supposed to be leaving my house around 7:20 p.m. to catch my flight – so I figured I’d just have to cut my losses and return the unwatched movie. It was then I decided to check the status of my flight – delayed… and not just delayed a couple minutes, but 50 minutes!
Those 50 minutes gave me ample time to watch my unwatched movie, return it and get to the airport with plenty of time to spare. Of course, I was slightly nervous as whenever a flight is delayed, there is no scheduled “departure time”. If the plane shows up 30 minutes early and boards everyone except you, they’re leaving without you. Not that I would’ve minded staying an extra night in Phoenix but it really would’ve been a burden to wake up at 5 a.m. to catch the earliest flight out.
When I got to the airport, the two people ahead of me in line at security apparently had “weird” identification. Makes ya feel REAL safe right? Then TSA agent had to ask some of his colleagues if the identification was allowed. Makes ya feel REAL confident in our TSA agents, right?
So I get to the ticket counter and guess who’s there?! My favorite customer service agent! She joked around that she was worried I wasn’t going to make the flight because I showed up so late. I told her I was checking the website to make sure I wouldn’t miss my flight.
When I boarded the flight, I couldn’t help but recognize one of the flight attendants – she was a flight attendant I had hung out with a couple months ago in Vegas while we were hoping to get out on some full flights.
So my flight… My goodness. Never in my life have I felt a plane drop like that. It was wild. I quickly downed my water in fear of it spilling on my laptop. Luckily it only lasted a couple minutes.
Everything after that was pretty much routine. Landed, unloaded and got picked up by my ride.
It was two months ago today that “Plane & Simple” was just an idea being brainstormed and discussed over dinner with a group of friends. Two months, 150+ posts and 1,000+ followers later - Plane & Simple has been cleared for takeoff!
I’m very much appreciative of the people that read my blog. You all are amazing. If I could I’d fly out and meet each and everyone of you, I would! And of course, I’d blog about my adventure along the way. :)
I’m always looking for new ideas - so if you have anything you’d like to ask, say, recommend, see more of (or less of) or something entirely different, feel free to shoot me a message on Tumblr, Twitter or on formspring and let me know. I love hearing from you guys.
So right now I just want to say thank you for taking time out of your day to catch up on what’s been posted on Plane & Simple. Thankyouthankyouthankyou!
Do you prefer salted or honey roasted peanuts?
I’ve been in three states in 13 hours. California, Nevada & Arizona. I realize that this is not normal, but this is the life of someone who has to find open seats on flights. And quite honestly, I wouldn’t change it even if I could. I meet some great people, see some great things and have some crazy adventures in all my flying around.
SJC – RNO
The weirdest thing happened at TSA today. The lady checking IDs didn’t think I was old enough to need an ID. How old do you have to be to have an ID? 15? She really thought I was 15? REALLY!? If anything, people think I look older than I am. I wasn’t sure whether to be flattered or insulted.
My flight was pretty boring. I was super exhausted but couldn’t fall asleep because the flight was so short. My mom was on the flight with me so it was nice to be able to catch up with her.
RNO – LAX
This flight was much more entertaining. The flight was full so I ended up sitting in a middle seat between two super friendly people. The guy was a nonrev going to Denver and the girl was flying to LAX to see her boyfriend. She and I ended up talking the entire flight about the most random things. She said she’s a huge blog fan so let’s see if she actually checks out mine. :)
LAX – PHX
When I first landed in LAX, I went to the gate (waited a super long time… which I’ll talk about in a second) and got my boarding pass – they then announced that the flight would be delayed a half-hour because our pilots from another flight hadn’t landed. I figured this would be a great time for me to see if one of my friends on Twitter was working – and he was! So that was very cool to meet up with him. I think more tweetups should happen more often!
So I check the flight status board and it says that my flight is now boarding. What? I thought it said it was a half hour delayed! It’s only been 10 minutes! So I rush back up to my gate – only to be stopped by TSA… it was one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen. There were around 15 TSA agents blocking the entire aisleway, telling everyone to, “STOP!”… Then some head hancho announced, “ALL CLEAR!” and they went on their marry way. No, “thank you for your cooperation”, no heads up on what was going on, nothing. Weirdos. So now I’m even more rushed. I haul my tiny feet as fast as I could to my gate, only to find out that everything is still delayed. So so so annoying. I could’ve stayed and chatted a little longer.
On a side note, I think my biggest pet peeve about LAX is the lack of gate agents. This has now happened to me twice in the last three times I’ve been to LAX: I get to the gate all ready to check in for my flight, and there’s no one working the gate. I ask around, and no one has been at the gate for a while! There’s no sign to say, “Talk to a gate agent at __” – so I don’t know whether I should just wait or go talk to someone else. Both times this has happened I’ve been at the two secluded gates (1 & 2). Also, my second biggest pet peeve is that the “Free Public WiFi” doesn’t work! And also, that their flight status boards update manually! Sorry, I only planned on ranting about one thing but it ended up being three. So back to my flight.
Both my flight to and out of LAX were fairly full. I hadn’t been on a full flight in a while. Luckily on the flight to PHX I was able to get a window seat with no one sitting next to me. I like my love handles to have some breathing room.
So the flight attendant comes around taking everyone’s drink orders. I ask if she has a lime. Now, perhaps this isn’t a common question asked because she looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language. I didn’t know all SWA flights had fruit on board – No scurvy onboard these flights!
Anywho. My flight landed just fine in Phoenix, despite it being late.
I guess for every early arrival there’s going to be a couple late ones.
