It Almost Happened

Today's XKCD is a fun coincidence with the trip that JennB and I just returned from. Spending 4 days in Newfoundland with Jer was incredible and I promise that stories and pictures will follow.

Quick story now, connected to the comic: The flight on Wednesday night from Ottawa to Toronto was delayed. Once we saw this on the board Jenn quickly went to the gate to ask about catching our connection in Toronto for our flight to Deer Lake. They told her, "Yes, there are 5 of you with that connection. Since it is the last flight to Deer Lake for the night, we will hold the plane for you." I thought this was very strange since my experience with connections before (see my trip posts from Spain) were so bad.

Sure enough, we land in Toronto and as soon as Jenn turns on her iPhone there is a text from Air Canada saying that we have been cancelled off our Deer Lake flight. There is a man at the gate asking for passengers with connections, we rush over to him and give our names. He informs us that he have been taken of our original flight because our bags won't have time to switch over, we frantically tell him that we have no checked luggage and he tells us to run to the next gate over, where the plane will be leaving from, and see what they can do. We book it over there, I believe Jenn's pants nearly fell down while we were running. Once there, one flight attendant said boarding was closed and there was no way, the other said that the plane was still at the gate and she would take us through all the doors, which needed pass codes at this point.

We get to the plane, whose first class is mostly full and economy class appears to be completely full. Hundreds of eyes stare back at us, predominately belonging to large burly Newfie men on their way home from what I can only assume was Fort McMurray, Alberta. The flight attendant on board asks rudely, "Where did you come from?" I point out the window to the plane beside us and tell her that we just got in from Ottawa on a flight that had been delayed. She looks at our boarding passes and while glaring at us, says, "Your seats have been given away." I look at the first class section, where there are a couple of pairs of unoccupied seats, point to one and ask, "Well, could we sit there?" She fires back a curt, "No!" and tells us that she will go find something, storming down the aisle to the back of the plane. The pilot laughs and says through the open door, "You girls can sit in here." Both of us excitedly jump at the chance and agree, they call us into the cockpit, and Jenn heads in to start chatting them up. Somewhere in the shuffle of it all, getting off the Ottawa plane, I am carrying all of our luggage, so can't follow her in. While I don't personally know this part of the story, except to say that I was still standing at the front of the plane while people glared and grumbled, trying to catch people's eye and smile, Jenn got to hang out for a few minutes with the pilots. They chatted her up, asking about our trip and as true Newfies do, asked who we were staying with, 'cause they might know 'em. She was given two 'pilot's wings' stickers, one of which they put on her jacket for her. The younger of the pilots, who was behind the door and not visible to me at the time, was exceptionally cute (this I can vouch for since we saw him later while getting off the plane.)

Finally the rude flight attendant returns and tells me that there are two seats at the back. I struggle to drag all the luggage to the back, hitting many of the burly men on my way, of course I said "Sorry" and "Excuse me" a lot. When I finally got to the back, the seats were not really together. A very nice lady beside one said that she would move so that Jenn and I could sit beside each other. I dumped all the luggage in the aisle and negotiated moving seat positions with the lady and flight attendants. Jenn came quickly trotting up the aisle and negotiated our luggage into the overhead compartments, a real challenge in a full plane when you're the last passengers to do so.

We got settled in what were definitely the worst seats in the aircraft. Right by the bathrooms, no foot room, unable to recline, behind people who could and did, beside a man who shut the window for the entire trip only to open it occasionally, peer out, then close it again, and I had to type up an article for work on my laptop. Which I did, Jenn helped edit it, and we got to Deer Lake as planned and on schedule. The End!!

I see now that it didn't end up being a very quick story. Which doesn't bode well seeing that there are many many many others, which are more exciting and super hilarious. I guess I will just have to post highlights from the trip and you will have to contact/ask me for the full details.