Goodbye, Mom. Goodbye, Dad. Goodbye, house, Herman, and little brother. Goodbye, car--I'll miss having that all-American independence waiting for me in the driveway every day. I'm off to Spain! I'm in the car (one last ride!), I'm making a few last-minute calls to banks and credit card companies and rejoicing that I'll be 8 months away from annoying automaton menu-option voices, I'm listening to my voicemails, and yet another annoying automaton voice comes on to inform me that my flight from Atlanta to Madrid has been cancelled.
Hello, house! Hello, bagel company, home-style coffee, and movie theater! I'm here for one more day.
I've got a new flight leaving tomorrow, Bozeman-Salt Lake-Charles de Gaulle-Madrid. Ryanair, that wonderful cheapo airline, had kindly informed me days and days ago that the Spanish baggage handlers were going on strike on September 29th (the day I was due to stop over in Madrid and arrive in Palma) and the baggage handlers had very politely informed the public that this strike would be occurring, so Ryanair offered one free rebooking for the next day. No problem, right? I would just spend the day in Madrid (not an unhappy prospect) and leave for Palma the next morning. Just to be safe, I called Delta and asked if their baggage handlers, too, would be out for the day, and the lady very snootily informed me that no, Delta baggage handlers would not go on strike, and if they were, then Delta would certainly contract out with somebody else, and she didn't know what these low-fare airlines were up to, and no, she had never heard of Ryanair, and was that spelled with a y?
Reassured, I re-booked my Ryanair flight and prepared for a day of exploring Madrid. Fast-forward five days later, when Delta cancels every flight to Spain without warning (guess they didn't "contract out with somebody else") and I'm now booked on a flight leaving tomorrow, arriving in Madrid after my Ryanair flight is supposed to depart Madrid, and I can't change the Ryanair flight, because cheapo airlines are cheap because they have no customer service.
Damn.
Well, at least I'm at home, drinking good coffee, have plans to go see "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" with my mom, and life will go on. I'm just delaying my Spanish adventure by one more day. Soon (I hope) I'll be saying ¡qué comience la aventura! except I'm going to a part of Spain where they speak Catalan (actually mallorquí, a dialect of català) and it'll be something like què començ s'aventura!
You're really just a master of every language, aren't you?!?! I'm sorry this strike had negative consequences for you. Today Pedro told me that "today is a holiday in a Spain, but it's uh...not a bery good one..."
ReplyDeleteI assumed that meant a strike, but you've confirmed that!
Hopefully you can get there soon enough!!!! And hopefully it will be UH-MAZE-ING! :]
So it's Herman...... and THEN me.
ReplyDeletenice