Have I lost all dignity? I pride myself in always being on-time. It's the German in me, and it has caused me to never miss a flight. That's right, even though most of my flights leave early in the morning, I've never ever missed a flight, other than misconnecting, of course. Well, that changed overnight.…
Continue reading: How could I?!?
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Yikes! There must be something in the water, though ... check on this FT thread from a couple of weeks ago:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travelbuzz/942317-first-ever-missed-flight.html
Happened to me a year or two ago, for the first time that I can remember. Woke up about half an hour before the flight was supposed to take off, which was unfortunate given that I live about 1.5 h from the airport... 😉
Crazy stuff happens. 🙂
While I don't like missing flights, I DO relish the opportunity to exercise some of the FF know-how I have accumulated over the years (thanks to Lucky and FlyerTalk, among others!) It certainly gives on an adrenalin rush. It certainly seems to be happening more frequently to me (perhaps 2 times in as many years), usually due to alarm clock related issues, although once I forgot a suitcase at home and didn't realize it until I opened the trunk in the airport lot. .
The real question is, why rebook yourself onto a flight that requires you to get up at 3:40am???
Unless it's TRULY life threatening, a more civilized departure is clearly the order of the day.
Can't comment on the JFK *people* (other than saying I find them pleasant relative to IAD). But I'm much less than pleased with UA's JFK *baggage handling*. I don't know the stats, perhaps I'm just unlucky...
I agree with JFK's baggage handling being horrible. I just read this article ( http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30442451/) about piano virtuoso Krystian Zimerman who refuses to come back to the US, partly because "security workers at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport destroyed one piano in recent years and ripped the keyboard out of another." Nice...
Glad it all worked out all right!
So you're becoming a regular at the JFK Holiday Inn, eh?
Were your front desk friends there to meet you this time.your last adventure at the JFK Holiday Inn?
Better yet, did you get a night credit towards the free room promo?
Guess I'll check to make sure my alarm is loud enough as I have a 6AM flight out of JFK in a couple days.
@ Gary -- Well, the flight was sold out, that's why. I wanted a bump. I actually thought I could get up later, but when I got to the hotel I realized I hadn't checked in yet. When I called the front desk I realized that the airport shuttly only runs every hour until 5AM, and the 5AM shuttle was cutting it a bit tight for a 6AM departure when I hadn't checked in yet. Oh well, for me it's bumps over sleep (at least in theory).
@ bk3day -- Hah, yes I am becoming a regular! Unfortunately my buddies weren't there, so I got crap treatment from the awful agent. She even refused to enter my Priority Club number, so I might just be out of luck here. Boooo!
Steh auf und sei aufmerksam.:) Mit freundlichen Grüssen aus Singapur, Chitown.