United we fly, divided I feel less stressed

I flew out this evening in the hopes of dodging a storm about to hit Rhode Island and the impending snow disaster in Denver.

My flight from TF Green to Dulles was turbulent the whole way. Not just a little turbulent. Like the plane is shaking apart at its seams and we're losing altitude in a troubling way turbulent. Screaming baby for 2 hours. Mom laughing and trying to play games with the screaming imp. Apparently she didn't bring any milk for the strong lunged 3 year old and there was no service on the plane because of the turbulence (seat belt sign was never turned off).

Then I had to make a mad run for my connection at Dulles because the fuck wits at United decided, for reasons unknown, that all the luggage had to clear the wing before we were allowed out of the plane. That took 20 minutes because they only have, apparently, 3 slap dicks unloading planes. Why this happened I can't say. Stewardess told me it was a security caution to "keep passengers from grabbing their luggage on the tarmac" (we landed at a gate where we had stairs instead of that scary suction cup to the plane thing).

The crack head stewardess on my connecting flight to Denver kept saying "welcome to flight (whatever) with service to Dulles". Dude, we are AT Dulles. I bring this up only because I and everyone who flies is flying in extreme discomfort so a stewardess who's worked for an airline for 15 years can make $100k a year plus benefits and we wonder why the airlines are losing money with planes packed. DO NOT EVEN GO THERE WITH ME. I had a friend in Colorado who was a stewardess making that much money (she quit her job because it was "too hard"). And Virginia. And Maryland.

I should be a stewardess.

The pilot warned us the landing in Denver was going to be bad before we even took off. Not a good sign. The luck of the day was that the flight left more or less on time and, when it came time for drinks service and I asked for a glass of wine even though it costs $7 and was a merlot (I'd rather lick adhesive off of an envelope than drink merlot - but believe me, after the last two days I've had, I needed a drink) the Japanese steward, who may have noticed I was reading a Murakami (Wind-Up Bird Chronicles - read it - paperback is 607 pages and I read it in a week on top of my magazines - was getting up at 530 in the morning so I would have an hour to read it before work), took my credit card after giving me a plastic bottle of wine, and said "your name is Franki?" I started to pull out my boarding pass since I had no hope of getting to my backpack which was shoved under the seat in front of me and the Polo cologne stinking fuck nut in front of me had his seat reclined. But the guy said "since your name is Franki this is free". Mazel tov.

After the plane landed (after three approaches where the pilot backed off) I had to make a mad dash 3 rows back to get my other bag. I did that successfully but was unable to return to my row because of the fuckwit family in front of me. The daughter (in her teens) was asking the dad to pull her bag out of the overhead (along with the bag of her 7 year old sister). The dad said "no, you get it out". I was like "dude, the trains run A LOT less frequently in DIA after midnight, so the sooner we get our bags and deplane the more likely we will not have to wait for a long time for a train". He was like "but, they're never happy, no matter what I do". Needless to say I pulled their bags down for them. Moron dad. I feel bad for those kids.

I got to my car, finally, after waiting FOREVER for the train back to the main terminal. It was 12:40am. Poor Jakey was covered in snow. The roads were a shit show. I saw a ton of accidents. I was driving like "it's actually 3 am for me because I'm on east coast time - no one has plowed - tourists are driving like idiots and spinning their cars - I might die". Even sure pawed Jake had some issues on the road. Finally made it home at 330 am (EST, which I'm on, or 130 am MST).

That's when I took out my laptop and turned it on because I have an early morning conference call and want to do the least amount of work possible before the call. BTW, I am supposed to be on vacation tomorrow.

And I realized I left my laptop power supply at my customer site.

Fuck me. Or, not. I have a back up. No single point of failure. And I think the customer will bring me back soon so I'll just grab it then. The customer I was working for was so great. The group was a great way to end my sordid year because they actually like my company. Even the VP came to all of my training sessions and when he was able to do a heat map he was so excited he was like "you have to come back!"

I have to take the little victories.

I should go to sleep. But I'm kind of wired after the drive I just did to get home from the airport. Hm. Only 6 hours before my conference call. Maybe I'll just stay up.