Hurry up and wait
This week I found myself cooling my heels at the Eureka/Arcata Airport while air traffic problems in San Francisco delayed yet another flight. The choices were to fume, fuss, get into Zen mode and hope all worked out, or ... go into manager mode and correct the problem. I chose the latter.
My first act was to make a mental note not to get lazy and book flights with short layovers in San Francisco. I now try for around 2 hours instead of one hour of less between connections. My next act was to saunter up to the counter and make back-up plans in case I missed my connection to Newark NJ. Luckily, I'm fairly well known here and the staff is terrific. They booked me a back-up route through Denver and even kept my upgrades in tact. Sweet.
So why use a technology blog to rant about my air travel woes? Simple ... it's tech that usually saves my sorry butt when things go awry.
I sign up to United auto notices that send messages to my cell phone whenever there are flight changes. Sometimes the news is good (you've been upgraded) and sometimes bad (your upcoming flight is delayed). Increasingly, delayed connections send the United auto-bot into correction mode and it books me on alternative flights.
My return flight from Newark (which I am still in the midst of) had similar hiccups with similar automated re-bookings. I am now in the Chicago airport on a free WiFi connection awaiting my flight to Sacramento, and eventually to Eureka.
It certainly helps to be civil and enlist human assistance when things go wrong. But I am also grateful for the technical solutions and tools that help me stay on the right path to a project or home.
All aboard !!!
Chris Crawford
www.justiceserved.com
Photo credit = Microsoft clipart