Not *More* Bad Travel Karma…

I partway through my BOS-MSP-ORD-SFO-ORD-MSP-BOS trip, and it’s been an annoying trip already (wrote this on Tuesday; this is the first time I've gotten online since I landed).

I experienced an extreme failure getting to the airport via MBTA—it took 1 hour 10 minutes to get from Porter Square to the airport. The little frustrations along the way were what really bothered me. Sitting at South Station, and seeing four non-airport Silver Line buses drive by. <sarcasm>Shit—it’s not like anyone really goes to the airport, anyway, instead of, say, Silver Line Way.</sarcasm> Then stopping at Terminal A (already late), and doing the mental calculus—“If I bail here and hump my bags overland through Central Parking to Terminal E, will I get there faster than the bus circuit?” (I decided against it). And then standing in a checkin line of squalling children, with morons standing at the front of the line waiting for a human being—while there were open checkin kiosks.

I fully expected to miss my flight, but they managed to check me in (a plus, for a change, for airline delays). I got on the plane with minutes to spare.


My bags didn’t make it, as I expected—I planned for this contingency, and threw my chinos into my carry on bag. Unfortunately, because my missed bag was my fault (checking in late), the airline doesn’t deliver your bag—I had to take the train back to the airport to pick it up. Grr.

My colleague had it worse—getting stranded overnight at ORD with a $300/night hotel as the only option; he managed to get to the conference around noon--and he’s a co-chair of a session.

The Minneapolis end went fine—actually, major points for the Minneapolis Light Rail system--a convenient airport connection to the station, $1.50 for a ride pretty close to my hotel. Go mass transit!


Another annoyance was trying to get a network connection. The hotel charges for wireless (it’s the usual expensive-hotel-so-we-don’t-include-wireless-for-free scumbag model). Also, the convention center charges for wireless. Fuckers! You’re all fuckers! The City of Minneapolis claims to offer free wireless, but once connected, I couldn't seem to do anything.


Anyway, I’m looking forward to taking a few days off after this conference--hanging out with my buddy Psycho Security Guard tomorrow. My talk went very well (a few people complimented me on it and asked questions), and I managed to retrieve my luggage. I’m figuring I’ve gotten the suck-ass travel out of the way, so the rest has to be smooth sailing, right? (i.e., the French car theory of life—your Peugeot puts you through so much misery that the rest of your life has to be good to compensate).