Yes, this is exactly how I felt yesterday morning at work; my second call of the day was from a client flying on Continental Airlines, who had let a ticketing deadline expire. I had to call the airline to get a waiver code, and although I was confident I’d be given the okay to issue at Thursday’s rate, I groaned as I dialled their number. Why? Because due to Hurricane Ike’s merry romp towards Houston, CO had announced that they were closing down operations for a couple of days. Which meant that their reservations lines would be jammed with calls…
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It’s a little weird at work today. Morale may be a bit shaky for a while as there have been changes in my area. Transitions is tricky. I’m okay, just concerned for teammates. “I hate it when things don’t go smooth. “
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This morning when I got to work, I had a notice that one of the hotels where I’ve got a group booked was going to be in the office with treats. After dealing with some morning stuff (why can’t people plan in advance?) I wandered in to the board room where they were set up. MMmmm! Breakfast pizza! That’s nice and fattening and full of calories and sodium! (and it was delicious too). This evening, after futzing around meal-wise, David and I decided to forage in the cupboards and fridge. I had a vague idea I’d heat up some soup. “Oh,…
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It’s the most underwhelming office holiday of the year: it started out being a feminist holiday to encourage daughters to dream of careers. Now it’s devolved into an excuse to bring your kid to work instead of dropping him/her off at school or daycare. Most years, the kids are kept busy with activities. Some years, the designated wranglers drop the ball and the l’il dollinks wander around on their own or in packs. This year seems to be in the latter vein – a couple of boys have been mooching around on the work floor looking bored and have had…
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I’m already having a bad day, and it’s not even noon yet. All seemed normal until I went to leave: the garage door was stuck halfway open. I didn’t notice it until I checked the rearview mirror and couldn’t see the street. There was enough light to see by when I went out, so my blinkers were on and I thought “David left the garage door open.” Well, not quite. I couldn’t open it or close it, and last time it got stuck, the red release handle caused the whole thing to drop down and bust the springs, which were…
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7online.com: Praying passenger is removed from plane 4/17/08 I don’t want to be too dismissive and need to know more specifics, but on the face of it this smacks of the kind of prayer that’s less private piety and more public propriety. I don’t know if it could have been started earlier or not to be considered right and proper, but it sure sounds like an attention-getting device.
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American: Normal schedule days away — chicagotribune.com The number of canceled American flights stands at more than 3,000 since late Tuesday, wreaking havoc at the airline’s hubs in Chicago and Dallas and eroding its profits at a time the industry is hurting because of high oil prices and economic worries. Chief Executive Gerard Arpey said the costs to the airline will run into the “tens of millions of dollars” from the disruption of service, but he said American can withstand the loss. The American terminal at O’Hare International Airport was calmer Thursday, despite 124 cancellations, as passengers had more notice…
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A couple of years ago, blog posts like this: Gov Now Wants More Air Flyer Data, Redux | Threat Level from Wired.com and this: Practical Nomad: January 2004 archive on passenger name records and US/Canadian security surveillance went by my eye, more or less under the radar. So noted, but not really impacting my daily working life. But today I somehow got my reservation computer (SABRE) to cough up the following in response to a normal request for “direct connect” availability for a specific light out on United (UA) that somebody was trying to change. This was while there was…
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Passengers and employees showed up at Midway Airport today to find that ATA Airlines, code TZ, has filed for Chapter 11 and is ceasing operations. Earlier this week, Aloha Airlines (code AQ) shut down in Hawaii. We only had a few passengers affected by the AQ shutdown, but may have quite a few more on TZ, although they’d announced they were pulling out of Midway Airport a while back. I flew on ATA to Maui with a group of friends once. And once was all it took, as that was the first time I encountered a surly flight attendant who…
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There are a number of my co-workers that need to be reminded how to properly take a phone message: Send an email.  Send an email. Don’t get up, scribble an illegible message with no date or time, walk all the way over here and drop it on my desk where I won’t see it and it gets covered up.  Put that little pink pad/tiny little sticky note/random torn-off scrap of paper away; send an email. It really irks when someone calls repeatedly – if I don’t answer, either I’m on a call or away from my desk. And then they…