How I Nearly Didn't Get To San Francisco!

Picking up where my last blog left off… I woke up the day after Christmas to wind, gray skies, and snow. I planned on leaving “eventually” on that day but with the weather bad I gathered my crap and left as quickly as possible. Turns out the weather was just fine and my drive home was uneventful, which was good. I got home and needed to do laundry but my land lady (who lives upstairs and is gracious enough to share her laundry room with me) put a load of laundry in literally 3 minutes after I walked in the door and then dominated the washer and drier the rest of the day in spite of the fact that I had been gone for several days and she knew I was flying to San Francisco the next morning. I managed to get enough laundry clean early the next morning so I could pack and then leave for the airport. I should mention that this was a trip to spend time with my Canadian in San Francisco while he was there for a job interview. More on him later. I knew my flight left the airport at about 6ish, that it took two hours to get to the airport, and that you should get to the airport about two hours early. I knew all of these things. I have flown before and I have done simple math before. So… 6 – 2 – 2 = 2. Simple. Yeah, somehow I didn’t do that math and left my house at 3:30 for the airport, thinking I was actually leaving myself an additional 30 minutes. About an hour into the drive I looked at my clock and thought… hmm… it’s 4:45, how is that possible? Don’t I fly out at 6? I found my flight info (while driving) and confirmed that my flight did in fact go out at 5:59. Which meant my flight would start boarding in about 45 minutes and I was about that far from the airport still! HOW COULD I SCREW THIS UP SO BADLY! In my own brain I was leaving 3 ½ hours early but somehow I failed to account for the fact that it would take about 3 ½ hours to get there, check in, and get through security! ARG! To complicate things further, the wind was INSANE and there were at least 4 overturned semi’s in the interstate so that slowed me down. I called United and they told me there was no way I would be able to board my flight but they could put me on standby for future flights once I got there. I didn’t like the sound of that but didn’t have much of a choice so I hauled ass to the airport. I found the one and only flesh and blood United ticket agent and I poured on every ounce of charm I had at my disposal. Unfortunately, she had a horrible cold and I think my charm got caught in her mucus. Her best offer was to send me to Fresno and then I could get put on standby for a 5 AM flight to San Francisco the next morning. Being stranded in Fresno was not my idea of a good time so I opted to be put on the standby list for the 9:50 direct flight to SF. She told me there were about 16 people ahead of me on that list and that the flight was full so I shouldn’t get my hopes up. Bitch… So, I texted my Canadian to tell him the bad news. At that point I was reasonably certain I wasn’t going to make it since it sounded less than likely that I would get on the 9:50 flight and the next one wasn’t until 8:00 the next night. But I had to at least try, so I went through security and found my gate. I decided to check the monitors and found out there were 2 flights before the 9:50 flight that Flight Agent Mucus failed to mention. One was supposed to have left hours before but they were having mechanical problems and the other left at 7:50. I asked about the delayed flight and she told me there was no way I would get on that standby list since it was way over booked. Sad. So, I decided to see what flights were going to the west coast, and had someone at the ticket counter to talk to. I found a flight to Seattle and cranked up the charm level to DEFCON 1. I explained what had happened, emphasizing the fact that I drove all the way from Wyoming and that there were four overturned trucks and horrible wind that delayed me (which was partially true) and asked if there were seats on the fight to Seattle and if there were any connecting flights to SF that night. Then she offered to put me on the standby list for the 7:50 direct flight to SF. She told me there was a very good chance that I could get on it and that even if I didn’t I would probably be able to get on the 9:50 flight. I don’t recall but I might have confessed my deep and undying love for her at that point. I went to the gate she told me to go to and attentively waited to hear my name called. Boarding started, the gate cleared out save for about 5 people including myself, they started calling the names of missing passengers, none of them showed, they started calling the names of other standby passengers, a few of them showed… I was getting nervous and trying to do the mental math in my head (ok, they called 7 names… 2 showed… that leaves 5… there are 5 people here…). Then they closed the door to the gate. CRAP! The ticket agent asked all of our names and asked if we were on standby… then they started calling our names! They told us to stand by the door so they could check seating. *fingers crossed* Then they took all of our standby tickets away. What did that mean? They told us to wait there at the door… again, what does this mean? The ticket agent disappeared for a minute behind the door and came back. She told us to just take anything available. Wait, what? Any what available? Oh, seats! YAY! I practically ran through the gate, found a seat and had about 30 seconds to fire off a text message saying “got on a direct flight.” I was going to San Francisco!