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The great Dcon Adventure:
Sep. 11th, 2009 11:09 amI caught the megabus from TO to Buffalo Niagra International Airport, and we left on time. Settled in for a comfortable ride on their cool double decker.
Things started to go sideways, bad, when we arrived at the border and the driver promptly sat us on the tarmac outside the customs building in the bus, for a good 45 minutes before letting customs know we were there. He then compounds the issue by creating a convoluted customs procedure of 5 people at a time, and it was slow moving chaos. Even the customs agents were getting pissed at his ineffectual crowd management.
It should be noted that several people decided to not listen at all, a theme that would be recurring on the way back. It was one particular demographic that refused to listen to any direction given, irksomely.
We get to the airport an hour and a half late. Around ten minutes after my flight leaves. For the first time ever, I've missed my flight.
We'd made some frantic calls to expedia and air tran, and expected I'd have to pay to fix this, but happily, Airtran just plopped me on the next fastest flight, which....routed through orlando florida. Had I known what was to follow, I'd have possibly waited at BNIA, but it should be noted that airport possesses no amenities whatsoever.
So off to orlando, I have a 30 min connection, and....we spend most of that taxi ing to the gate! like, could we have landed further? At this point I'm about to gnaw off my arms.
I'm the only person in my row, so I'm ready to bolt as soon as we get the word go. And then a very very very obese woman hops into the aisle. And I'm thinking I'm FUCKED. I start pleading with her and everyone else, that I have a short connection to make and I pop off that plane, RUN UP THE GANGWAY INTO THE TERMINAL AND RIGHT ACROSS THE WAY IS MY NEXT FLIGHT. I had all of 4 minutes on the ground in orlando, surely a record.
And off we go.
At Atlanta, I suspect my luggage didn't make the short transfer, and lo, I'm right. I hie off to the Air Tran office to remedy this, and I'm stuck behind a fucking dumbass whose luggage didn't make it, and she "threw away her boarding pass and claim ticket". Nor can she really describe the bag. And she doesn't know where she's staying. And has no contact info. And she's getting shirty with the staff for her precious backpack has "magazines, water, a watch" in it. Hold the press folks, we have a national crisis!
It takes a good hour to sort her stupid ass out.
I have the hotel address, phone numbers for me, bec, skittle, a clear description of the bag and contents, my bag claim check and the clerk is most helpful and unlike dipshit before me, they expect they can find mine and drop it at the hotel. I suspect they told dipshit they couldn't because she was a pain in the arse. Lesson: when travel plans go hob wobbly, be calm, be polite, be assertive, but throw in a small hint of "if you do this for me, you'll be my favoritest person evah!"
The bag did arrive at the hotel the next day.
On the way home, megabus screwed the pooch again, showing up an hour late and over full to accommodate us reservation holders. One jackmunch is loudly claiming that his res for Coach Canada is valid for megabus, and a near riot breaks out as the nebbish driver can't handle this. He finally calls reservation numbers and I squeak on, one of the last 5.
Customs again, the same demographic of ladies can't fucking listen to a goddamn word anyone says. ( I wish to punch them in their useless gobs.) We get processed fast and we pull in to toronto an hour and ahalf late ( notice a trend? Yes, megabus, adjust your arrival times.)
Anyway. Airtran rocked it for me, Megabus? Never using again for a BNIA connection. Oh no. Not ever. And they'll be getting a crabbygram shortly.
Things started to go sideways, bad, when we arrived at the border and the driver promptly sat us on the tarmac outside the customs building in the bus, for a good 45 minutes before letting customs know we were there. He then compounds the issue by creating a convoluted customs procedure of 5 people at a time, and it was slow moving chaos. Even the customs agents were getting pissed at his ineffectual crowd management.
It should be noted that several people decided to not listen at all, a theme that would be recurring on the way back. It was one particular demographic that refused to listen to any direction given, irksomely.
We get to the airport an hour and a half late. Around ten minutes after my flight leaves. For the first time ever, I've missed my flight.
We'd made some frantic calls to expedia and air tran, and expected I'd have to pay to fix this, but happily, Airtran just plopped me on the next fastest flight, which....routed through orlando florida. Had I known what was to follow, I'd have possibly waited at BNIA, but it should be noted that airport possesses no amenities whatsoever.
So off to orlando, I have a 30 min connection, and....we spend most of that taxi ing to the gate! like, could we have landed further? At this point I'm about to gnaw off my arms.
I'm the only person in my row, so I'm ready to bolt as soon as we get the word go. And then a very very very obese woman hops into the aisle. And I'm thinking I'm FUCKED. I start pleading with her and everyone else, that I have a short connection to make and I pop off that plane, RUN UP THE GANGWAY INTO THE TERMINAL AND RIGHT ACROSS THE WAY IS MY NEXT FLIGHT. I had all of 4 minutes on the ground in orlando, surely a record.
And off we go.
At Atlanta, I suspect my luggage didn't make the short transfer, and lo, I'm right. I hie off to the Air Tran office to remedy this, and I'm stuck behind a fucking dumbass whose luggage didn't make it, and she "threw away her boarding pass and claim ticket". Nor can she really describe the bag. And she doesn't know where she's staying. And has no contact info. And she's getting shirty with the staff for her precious backpack has "magazines, water, a watch" in it. Hold the press folks, we have a national crisis!
It takes a good hour to sort her stupid ass out.
I have the hotel address, phone numbers for me, bec, skittle, a clear description of the bag and contents, my bag claim check and the clerk is most helpful and unlike dipshit before me, they expect they can find mine and drop it at the hotel. I suspect they told dipshit they couldn't because she was a pain in the arse. Lesson: when travel plans go hob wobbly, be calm, be polite, be assertive, but throw in a small hint of "if you do this for me, you'll be my favoritest person evah!"
The bag did arrive at the hotel the next day.
On the way home, megabus screwed the pooch again, showing up an hour late and over full to accommodate us reservation holders. One jackmunch is loudly claiming that his res for Coach Canada is valid for megabus, and a near riot breaks out as the nebbish driver can't handle this. He finally calls reservation numbers and I squeak on, one of the last 5.
Customs again, the same demographic of ladies can't fucking listen to a goddamn word anyone says. ( I wish to punch them in their useless gobs.) We get processed fast and we pull in to toronto an hour and ahalf late ( notice a trend? Yes, megabus, adjust your arrival times.)
Anyway. Airtran rocked it for me, Megabus? Never using again for a BNIA connection. Oh no. Not ever. And they'll be getting a crabbygram shortly.
