very, very early thursday i flew to san diego. this was the first time i actually had accrued enough miles to use for a flight, so i used some for the first part of this trip. which meant i had to fly thru LAX. i am not the first person to say this, and will no doubt not be the last, but - LAX is perhaps the most fucked place on earth. we all have had the annoying experience of it taking "forever" after landing to actually being able to deplane, but at this nightmare airport, it literally took over 45 minutes to finally get to the gate after we landed. if we had arrived on time, i only had 50 minutes to get to my next plane (in another terminal) -- the landing to gate delay seemed to guarantee i would miss my flight.
as i was leaving the plane, i realized i had lost my ring. this is the only piece of jewelry i ever wear or care about. i got it at a trippy hippie festival in barcelona on 2004 and so it has huge sentimental value -- it was my first trip abroad to see some of my favorite people in the world. the ring was gorgeous - a cutout vine curled around it, why didn't i ever take a picture of it? on the flight, i had taken it off to wash my hands, put it in my pocket, and it must have fallen out. so, there i stand, pissed about the ring, freaking about missing my flight, and annoying the flight crew because i wouldn't leave the plane. i didn't find it, which i think has to mean someone found it and kept it. grrrrrrr
i finally leave the plane fuming. my ticket said my next flight left from terminal 4, i had no idea which terminal we landed at (the flight attendant said, "i think it's A-1..?"). as i walked into the airport and could just feel the shitbags falling on me. with no idea where to go, and no clear signs about how to get to another terminal, i just turned in circles. finally i saw a sign at the very next gate that said "shuttle to american eagle" (which is what i needed). the guy working there asked where i was going, i said "terminal 4" which is what my ticket said. he basically shooed me away saying something about "go outside and go left" puzzled i wandered for a bit, but not trusting that idiot, i asked someone else. they told me that the guy was wrong and that was where i needed to be.
at this point, amazingly, it was actually still possible for me to make my flight. can you guess what happened when i got back to the dumbass who sent me away? the shuttle was just leaving as i got there, so i thanked him for making me miss my flight and he actually tried to tell me again to go outside. fortunately someone with a brain who worked there, overheard my frustration and asked me. turns out there is a terminal 4 you can walk to, but the "terminal 4" american eagle departs from is actually a separate building in the middle of nowhere that you HAVE to take a shuttle to. in the end i had to wait 20 minutes for the next shuttle bus (i had 15 minutes until my plane left).
i arrive at this mystical barn in the middle of the runway and ask when i can get on another flight. i was put on standby for the flight one hour later...not bad, until i see the list of 9 other people trying to get on this little plane that only holds about 35 people. somehow i was moved up on the standby list, and so was called to get on the plane. i literally was sitting in my cramped seat on the plane, when the ticket bitch came running and told me to get off the plane because there was a "problem with my ticket." so i followed her, watched her type retardedly and scowl at her monitor, assuming she was fixing my problem. she wasn't.
she sent the plane with my seat empty. needless to say the other people on standby were pissed that they didn't get my seat if i wasn't going to get it. within a few minutes, the "problem" that she couldn't explain had disappeared and i had a ticket for the 12:30 flight. after almost getting bumped from that plane because of it being overweight, i got sat and the door closed. i expected to see the ticket b come running after the plane. because enough shit hadn't gone wrong yet, we sat on the runway until 1:30 then finally took off. it took me 4 hours to complete a 23 minute flight.
never NEVER again.
the happy end to the story is that i made it here and have a direct flight home.
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