Why I Hate Flying

For anyone that knows me, it’s no secret that I absolutely hate to fly. It’s not so much the flying part that bothers me; it’s the coming down part. What makes it even worse is the fact that this last time flying the airline decided to send my bag to San Juan, Puerto Rico instead of St. Louis, MO. How it ended up in San Juan is a mystery to me, however I did finally get my bag, the day before I left to go back to Augusta, and it arrived at 1:30 in the morning.

My flight plan this Thanksgiving was to go from Augusta to Charlotte to Washington DC to St. Louis. For someone that doesn’t like flying, that is a lot of up and down. The day started out bad to begin with because while sitting on the runway in Augusta in my twin propeller plane, the captain comes on the intercom and says, “Sorry for the delay folks, but we will get underway shortly. We are currently delayed because of some birds.”

What? Birds can delay a flight? I never heard of anything.

After a 35 minute delay because of birds we finally took off in this flying Volkswagen and by the time we landed in Charlotte, my plane to DC was scheduled to take off in 10 minutes. Charlotte is a huge airport too, so I had to hike it from one end to the other to make my DC flight.

Little side note here, I CAN NOT STAND IT when people use the moving walkways as rides. They get on those things and just stand there so they don’t have to walk. I was taking full advantage of those walkways to double time my pace and I kept having to slow down for people just standing on the moving walkways.

Anyway, once maneuvering around people I arrive at my gate to learn that my flight to DC was cancelled. I asked why and the lady told me “the plane is broken.”

So I am put on a direct flight from Charlotte to St. Louis. Awesome! I ask about my checked back and I was told they are changing the routing system to have it placed on the appropriate plane. I immediately have my doubts about this whole thing.

Sure enough, when I get to St. Louis, my bag is no where to be found. The guy at the baggage claim tells me, “Look man, I don’t want to come off rude, but there is not enough people to track where bags are suppose to go. Guys just take a bag and throw it on a plane. There is not enough man power and people don’t get paid enough money to scan each bag.”

Thanks for being honest I guess. The guy didn’t know where my bag was and could not answer what happens to a bag when the plane it’s suppose to go on gets cancelled.

Around 7:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving I learn of my bag going to San Juan. Finally on Saturday at 1:30 a.m. I get my bag from the airline, a little over 24 hours before I leave to go back to Augusta. The guy that delivered my bag couldn’t find my parents house either. I was on the phone with him every half hour trying to tell him how to get there. He told me, “The GPS can not find it.” That’s funny, because I typed it into map quest and it came up fine. Also, my friends who have GPS had no problem locating it.

So I checked my back for $15 dollars and didn’t even get my bag until I was basically leaving. Why do I have to pay $15 dollars anyways to check my bag? When I take a cab, the cab company does not charge me extra for carrying a bag? What a complete rip-off. If I could avoid flying for the rest of my life, I would be ok with that.

The airlines are getting worse, they are very inconvenient, they are over priced and it’s uncomfortable. They charge for checked bags, they charge for drinks on a plane ($2 for a can of soda, $7 for a can of beer!!).

John Madden has it figured out, just bus it everywhere.