TSA: Making The Skies Safe From Breastpumps
As I am captive on this plane for the next few hours, suffering those nosy people around me who insist on looking at my screen, I thought it would be a good use of my time for me to finally tell you about this week of travel. All I can say is, “I’m tired.”
The beginning of my mishap occured last Thursday when I flew from Philadelphia to Greenville, NC. I should have known there would be trouble when my admin informed me that I wouldn’t be able to rent a car when I arrived because the rental car agencies close at 6 PM. Clearly I was flying into a small airport.
As is typical when flying Useless Airlines out of Philadelphia, the plane to Charlotte left late. The connection in Charlotte would have been tight but for the fact that the storm had delayed the connecting flight to Greenville. Unfortunately there was no place to sit at the gate or at any of the nearby gates. I unhappily camped out on the floor against the wall by the bathrooms.
I arrived in Greenville at midnight. Now this was the tiniest airport that I’ve ever seen. It had one gate, one baggage carousel (actually 1/4 carousel would be more accurate), and as predicted, all the car rental windows were closed…save one: Avis. My company has no contract with Avis, so I didn’t think to try to rent with them. I’ll just go outside, I thought, and catch a cab. The hotel isn’t far.
I wheeled my little suitcase out the building trying to find the taxi queue. Taxi queue? What was I thinking? This little Podunk airport barely had a parking lot, much less a taxi queue. I headed back inside and approached the Avis guy about how one would go about finding a cab. He motioned to the pay phone behind me. “There are numbers on the phone,” he advised.
OKaaay…I went to the germ-ridden pay phone. For some stupid reason that I have yet to ascertain, I didn’t think to call the cab from my cell. Liana’s mental breakdown dictated that if the numbers were taped to the pay phone, then Liana must use the pay phone to make her calls. I scrounged for quarters. The first company I called punted me to voice mail. They’d call me back. Yeah, I don’t think so. The second company told me that they would be there in 20 minutes. I’m thinking to myself that this little town is not big enough to have a cab take 20 minutes to arrive after midnight. What the hell?
I found a bench in front of the airport to wait. One after another, all my fellow passengers were picked up. Fifteen minutes into my wait a gentleman from the airport came out and asked if I was OK. I let him know that I had called a cab that should be arriving in a few minutes. With that assurance, he then proceeded to close up the airport. Yes, my friends. The airport closed for the night. The doors were locked and the lights turned off. And there I sat in front waiting for my cab…alone.
Another 15 minutes later, I was really starting to get spooked. No cab had arrived and 30 minutes had passed. The problem was that since I hadn’t used my cell phone to make the call, I didn’t know the number of the company. I also had forgotten its name.
At this point, I did what any good wife would do. I called my husband. AdoringHusband answered the phone sleepily, but immediately became alert when I explained my predicament. He was not happy. He told me that I should have rented with Avis and to hell with company contracts. Unfortunately with the closing of the airport, that was no longer an option. So we set about trying to find the cab company I had originally called.
Glory to Google, he found the company and phone number in a few minutes: Comfort Cab. I called on my Blackberry while keeping AdoringHusband on my cell phone.
“Hello, I called you guys about 40 minutes ago for a cab at the airport and was told you’d be here in 20 minutes.”
“Well, we’re busy.”
“But I’m all alone in front of the closed airport.”
“We’re busy. We’ll get to you when we can.”
We’ll get to you when we can? What the fuck? Is the one cab tied up at Bernie’s Rib Shack or something? I was more than pissed. I was also something else…I was scared. There was no one else around. I looked across the street (yes, this airport was so small that there was an “across the street”) trying to see if there were any open businesses where I could go to wait. Nothing.
AdoringHusband helped me keep it together. “Let’s call some more companies,” he suggested sensibly. The next two companies were busy also. (What the hell was going on at 1 AM in Greenville, NC that required all the cabs?) The next company, Aladdin Cabs, was my salvation. “The cab will be there in 5 to 10 minutes” the dispatcher told me. Five minutes later I called back to make sure that the cab was truly on the way. “Five minutes,” the disptcher said trying to calm me. Three minutes later the cab made its way to me. AdoringHusband wouldn’t get off the phone until I was safely ensconced in the cab. And to the hotel I went.
The return trip was less eventful, thank goodness. Yet I did discover that Southerners seem to have a different sense of time than than we Northeasterners. First everyone was walking so slowly. I spent much of my time in the hospital where I had to give the talk trying to get around people in the hall. Then there was the return cab. I asked for the cab to be there at 1:10 to take me back to the airport for my 2:05 flight (luckily the airport was only 10 minutes away). At 1:12 I called and asked where the cab was. The dispatcher informed me that it was not 1:10 yet. Um, yeah, it was after 1:10. Then she promised the cab would be there in 6 minutes. At 1:20 I called again. “Two more minutes,” she again promised. Finally at 1:25, the cab arrived.
Thanks to the horrifically tiny airport, I did make the plane. Yet the flight was late leaving Greenville (why, I have no idea), so we landed in Charlotte at 3:23 in Terminal E exactly 22 minutes before my flight to Philadelphia left from the back of Terminal B. Those of you old enough to remember O.J. Simpson’s Hertz commercial would have some idea what I looked like running through the Charlotte airport. But I made the plane.
The next day, Saturday, I had to fly again. Because I was leaving for a week, I had to pack a suitcase that would be checked. I always find this daunting because I worry that I’m going to need some specific article of clothing that I neglected to pack. And as it usually happens, I overpacked. I took so long packing that I left 30 minutes later than I had planned. And then AdoringHusband wanted a ride to the repair shop to pick up his car. This was a detour in the opposite direction.
Though I broke the land speed record and made the 40 mile drive to the airport in 35 minutes, I was 5 minutes too late for the cutoff to check my bag. I had thought it was 30 minutes, but it seems that it is 45. I was pissed. I begged, I cried, all to no avail. I asked about the 6:15 flight through Phoenix, but the Useless rep told me to wait until she had finished with other people. I exited in a huff.
Our travel agency managed to get me booked on another flight the following morning (but no first class upgrade this time). I made sure to leave with enough time for my 7:35 flight. But what did I see when I exited the garage, a veritable sea of people attempting to check in. What I hadn’t realized when my attempt to print my boarding pass at home had failed because the site was undergoing maintenance, was that all of Useless Airlines systems had failed when they went to merge computer systems with America West. No one could get a boarding pass without visiting the ticket counter. It was horrific. I reached the counter at 7:25. The only reason I made the plane was because a wonderful agent took pity on me. He created a manual slip for my bag and let me go on to the gate.
But first I had to get through security. And this brings me to the explanation of the title of this post. Getting through security was no easy task thanks to my Symphony Breast Pump. You see, as I have discovered in my travel this week, this Breast Pump does not scan well. In fact it seems to scan in a way that makes TSA agents think it’s a bomb. So first in Philly, then San Diego, then San Francisco, I have had to be pulled aside to have my breatpump tested to see if it contains explosive residue. This is getting old very fast.
I whined, pleaded and explained that this was just an innocent breastpump. They weren’t interested. The breastpump was suspicious. Hmmm…a suspicious breastpump.
The TSA agent at the airport in SF today had the nerve to tell me to be thankful that they were being so vigilant. It’s for my safety, I was admonished. Yes, so that I can be saved from breastpumps. How special. At least they didn’t make me use it in front of them, right?
Stay tuned for good news in the next post!
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You’ll be saved from breastpumps when all your hard work pays off and that little girl takes to nursing like a champ!
I am a road warrior…just a FYI…I have called Avis numerous times to say my plane is late. They will stay open for me….not sure if the other rental car agencies will do the same…our company policy is if no other car is available on company contract we can rent from who ever is available regardless of cost. But, yes, I have done some unsmart things on travel because I thought I was being a good employee and following policy…the last was a Motel 8 at DFW where the airline put us up for “free”…no, I did not have to stay in substandard conditions…this hotel was bad…if only men wore shirts in the lobby it may have been ok….lol.
That’s just flat out crazy! I’m glad the hubbie was able to find you a service out there. Is it wrong that I’m giggling over a breast pump as a WMD?
It is more than amusing, isn’t it?