Once again, I remain astonished that LAX (or United’s terminal here, not an insubstantial one) does not have WiFi. The result of which is that this particular post won’t go up until the morning.
Which reminds me that my flight won’t hit the ground in Denver until 11:45p, which means if I get into bed before 1:00a, I’ll be wildly lucky. And, alas, I have three critical phone calls and a deliverable to some VPs due tomorrow morning, too, so no sleeping in for the wicked.
*sigh* At least I’ll be back home.
UPDATE: Or …
We all get aboard, we’re all ready to go … and the dreaded “This is your pilot, the mechanics say they have to replace a part” message comes on. Next update in 20 minutes.
Which update is, they don’t have the part yet, so next update in 20 minutes …
At some point, I will say, “Screw it,” and plan on leaving a message for the Boss that I won’t be on that 7:30a phone call — which is an important call, but not that important.
UPDATE: Well, that was cool. They invited folks who wanted to come up to the cockpit (a few at a time). I casually wandered up, and me and a couple of other guys chatted with the pilot and co-pilot. It’s a 757, so it’s one of the first “glass cockpit” (video indicators) planes, so it has both the video and full analog instruments.
The pilot mentioned that he and the flight crew were all Denver-based, so they were definitely incented to get the plane off the ground ASAP. While I was up there, the ground crew guy came up and told them the part had arrived, but they needed to disconnect all the A/C — at which point I got my Surprise of the Evening, as the pilots did that, then cracked open the front-side windows of the cockpit. I never realized they opened …
Anyway, it was a very nice bennie of the unfortunate delay, and they were very nice and positive about it. Doesn’t make it any less late of a night (or early of a morning), but it was both entertaining and good PR.
UPDATE: Finally got home at 2:00a. Called the Boss, left a message on his office phone that I wasn’t sure I’d be on for the 8:30a phone call he had for me (and was going to call home about. At 8:30a, my cell phone went off. At 8:31a, the home phone went off.
Boss Man: Hey. Were you expecting our call.
Dave: Yeah. That’s why I left a voice mail for you last night saying I’d gotten in at 2 and wasn’t sure I’d be on the call.
Boss Man: Yow. Sorry, man. Hey, that must be what that blinking red light is for …
And so it goes …
Good to be home.