Charlotte, Costa Rica

Hello faithful readers - I trust you’re ready for an update? After what seemed like an endless marathon of packing up every worldly belonging, far too many trips to our storage space (which ended up being just barely large enough), a last Chicago meal of Pequod’s deep-dish and a 7-11 fountain diet coke, we departed for the beautiful O’Hare Garden Inn for what would be our last night in Chicago. After an early wake-up call, a five-a.m. shuttle to O’Hare, an 11 minute delay (yes, 11 minutes - US Airways is extremely precise), two yippy dogs whining and barking fairly regularly, I managed to fall asleep for some much needed rest, with dreams of Costa Rican beaches and warmer climes. Surprisingly, Costa Rica is strangely reminiscent of Charlotte, North Carolina. A strange comparison, for sure, except that, unfortunately, I type this missive from a Days Inn in the Tar Heel State. How did this happen? Apparently the gentleman wearing the old-school Bulls Starter-brand jacket and reading Mike Ditka’s autobiography should have laid off the 45 years of double-dip Portillo’s combos that undoubtedly lead to his in-flight heart attack. I only mock because he was smiling and offering up apologies as the medics took him off the plane after our emergency landing in Columbus, Ohio. After finally getting off the ground again, we spent another hour or so in the air, to eventually land at our scheduled stop-over in Charlotte. Having missed our connection to San Jose, CR, we were herded into a line of about 150 other frustrated flyers, all looking to re-book their international flights to exotic locales. Lines at airports are nothing new, especially to those ever having graced the superb time-wasting vacuum known as O’Hare International Airport, but this was something to behold. The time was 12:15, and after having waited in line for about 40 minutes and covering about two thirds of the first of 6 legs of the snake, I joked with Elizabeth that we would be in line for at least another hour and a half (I think my guess was “at the counter at exactly 2:02pm,” giving myself a bit of a buffer, and hoping against hope that I was wrong). I was wrong, as it turns out, because 2 o’clock came and went at about the half-way point in the line. Now would be a great time to mention that this was a “special” line for people that had missed international connections (essentially, our flight from Chicago) with four ticket agents trying their best to wade through dozens of connecting flights for people traveling to various Caribbean locales. This “special” line was completely separate from the “general” US Airways line that was amply staffed and had no line. Ever diligent and growing increasingly more impatient with the passing hours, Elizabeth attempted to speak with someone in the “general” line, and to our surprise, they were fully trained and capable of helping us, but were apparently being told not to by their management. (Elizabeth overheard one manager say to the ticket agent finishing up our revised itinerary that she wasn’t supposed to help any other customers from the “special” line, because that’s what the “special” line was for) No joke. They had our money already, and apparently weren’t into helping us in a timely manner at this point. Elizabeth hit the jackpot, however, and got us booked on the same flight the following day, in first class, no less, along with some food and hotel vouchers. So that’s where we are now: the Charlotte Airport Days Inn with some leftover Papa John’s pizza on the table and the last US broadcast television for a while on the TV. Hopefully tomorrow goes a bit more according to plan, and the travel only gets smoother from this point forward. Goodbye, Charlotte, we’ll see you when we see you. Next stop, Tamarindo, Costa Rica via San Jose. Please.