Shoe by Gary Brookins and Susie MacNelly for May 31, 2022

Murphy’s Law…..airport style.

It’s one of the few places you see retirees running like teenagers.

So true.

I missed a connecting flight because I had to go (run) from one side of O’Hare to the other.

absolutely!

Please add as a corollary: And your luggage will be transferred to a different Aircraft, then the one you will be on.

If you want to read them, all of these rules are on your trip ticket.

I remember once in Miami they changed the gate twice! Had to run AND take the train twice! I’m getting way too old for this!

My ex and I were lucky on our way to Savannah. We got off our one flight and our connection gate was right there in the same area. We walked off one flight and got right in line for the other.

Ha, that is because you bought cheap tickets on the internet. Same story with my daughter, but she was at Charles De Gaulle in Paris. She went to Morocco for a year and bought her return flight, a year early, from Rabat to Paris and expected to leave on Air Iceland in 15 minutes, one end of the air port to the other, ticket was $200, LOL.

This was the time of cutting edge internet and Google, so we were able to search for exactly what we wanted from Ontario; we needed 1 ticket to Toronto from Paris, a few searches and sending a scan of our visa to her for the ticket counter, she was on Air India the next morning, we booked her into a nice hotel, She was going to go cheap again and find some “couch” (She did this a few times, “rent a couch,” you stay in a persons living room, must be the generation). She loves Indian food. We flew to Morocco during her stay, there was boy friend talk so that was an adventure in itself.

Truth.

Didn’t miss it but……..barely got on board before they closed the doors in Dallas/Ft. Worth ! ! ! ! !

Not so – I was trying to make a connection at LAX – going from gate 57 to 55 (or something; I don’t remember the exact gates). It would seem like they’re right next to one another.

Nope. These two gates are separated by a huge food and shopping court. Missed the connection and had to stay overnight.

So true, that.

It’s doubly bad when you have to clear security again, because the incoming flight doesn’t share the same terminal as the outgoing flight, and there isn’t a secure way to get from one to the other. Logan has some of that.

Almost missed flights twice last month because this rule was in effect. Even stumbled and fell while speed walking thru the terminal.

In all the years I have flown, in all the airports in the world, this is (unfortunately) an absolute truth!

There’s also the Parking Lot Rule: If two unrelated groups of people are getting into their vehicles to leave at the same time, they will be parked next to each other.

One of the Rules of the Perverse Universe, like the shorter the time you have to get to an appointment, the greater the number of red lights you’ll encounter

This is true with many things.

I had to make a connecting flight in Charlotte, SC. That airport is huge, also. I was walking so fast that I had to stop and lean up against the wall and huff and puff for a while. I told the lady I was walking with to go on ahead, ‘cause I didn’t want her to miss her flight. I asked her to tell them that I was coming but, it was taking a while. When I finally got to the gate, others were still coming, also. Huffing and puffing, too. I was told next time on the way back to request a cart ride. LOL

And sometime we do it to ourselves…. I had a longish layover between flights one day so I parked my happy ass in a bar, bought a beer and started digging thru some FORTRAN code I was carrying between sites. I never heard the boarding announcement and when I finished the beer and looked up everyone was gone except me. Oops!

I got lucky, there was another flight a hour or so later that I was able to get on so I grabbed another beer and went back to my source code, while I kept a much closer eye on the time… 8^)

Many years ago we had to get to the right gate at Dallas/Fort Worth. Told the wrong gate for our flight. We ran on the moving ramp. Managed to snag a Nathan’s hot dog with all the trimmings just before boarding a no dinner flight. Cabin reeks of Nathan’s best as I took a long time to savor each bite!

Truth!

That’s really just a logical extension of Murphy’s Law.

When I was in college there were 10 minutes from the end of one class to the beginning of the next. At the time all the buildings with classes were close together. Now it takes close to 30 minutes to get across campus.

There was a guy who went to LAX and told the ticket taker that he wanted to go to Chicago but he wanted his luggage to go to Seattle and Phoenix.

“We can’t do that” was the response.

He replied “why not?, you did it last week!”

Oh for the old days when the gate agents had a lot more authority and security wasn’t an issue. A co-worker and I were flying from Austin to LAX on business but our corporate travel agency put us on a plane to Houston with a connection to LAX. We arrived at the airport early and the gate agent told us this flight was seriously overbooked and we would probably miss our connection in Houston. He said there was a flight leaving from the gate right across the terminal that left about an hour later that was a direct flight to LAX with one stop. Would we mind taking it. We said sure. It was a short trip so I had all my stuff in a small carry-on bag while my co-worker had checked his luggage.

The flight we took was not packed and we got to LAX in good order. Meanwhile, the flight from Austin to Houston had arrived late and in addition to our potential missing the connection, my co-workers luggage definitely missed the connection. His luggage arrived at the hotel about 3:00 am which is about when we would have arrived had we taken our original flight. Thank goodness for thinking gate agents (who could do stuff like that back in 1980.

Rule 42 is highly improbable. Perhaps it needs to be considered with a slice of lemon.

We had a connecting flight from San Francisco to Hawaii and the same thing! Nothing like running in the airport with thousands of people in getting in the way.