Kansas City... ah, yes. The name of it brings tears to my eyes.
In the past several weeks, I've eaten some great barbecue stuff (random cow and pig pieces). I've driven nice SUV's. I've used a lot of pillows. I've even thrown down Dr.Pepper at every opportunity (both figuratively and literally...but we'll get to that). Good times.
You know what? I gotta go back to this whole pillow thing... I keep getting these down pillows, right? Yeah, yeah, "I'm so sorry to hear that, Joe." Well they have pointy things at the end of the feathers and they all point OUT of the pillow. You'd think the feathers would have been
trained to have the fluffy side out, but noooooo. Someone needs to go back to feather school.
Okay, so now for part of the real part of the story. Last Friday I was in a hurry to leave the jobsite in "KC" so I could catch my plane back to Champaign, Illinois. I left the job REEEEALY late and arrived at the airport in a remarkably short period of time. (I'll blame my punctuated trip on the traffic...sure it was rush hour, but cars seemed to be moving out of my way quickly when they saw me approach....*ahem!*). I blasted my way to the airport just in time to find the world's slowest rental car check-out kids. I waited patiently, and even impatiently. Some guy finally came up and saw I was in an obvious rush, so he helped me out. I ran over to the buttle shuss and proceeded to WAIT. We all loaded on like pigs in a trailer, but then SOME GUY needed to run inside the main building like 200 feet away to grab "something." Fortunately the driver didn't wait too long, but I was already missing my flight, yo. The buttle shuss screamed over to the airport, something like a 5 minute drive, at about 10 miles an hour, (which made it longer), and then I had to endure the single most RIDICULOUS airport layout I have yet come across.
The bus turns into the lane running in front of the terminal. The Kansas City airport is horseshoe-shaped, for those unfamiliar (which hopefully is all of you). There is a road and parking area inside of the horseshoe and the outside part is used for the airplanes. Get it? Okay, well picture driving all the way around this really long building, slowly dropping a couple passengers off here or there...picking up one....driving to the next airline part, picking up, dropping off...(and you're extremely late, remember?). Then you get ALL the way to the far end of the horseshoe... and your airline isn't there! You get really nervous. You look around the shuttle bus at the people inside with a horrified look on your face. You're trying futilely to express to these helpless innocent regular people wearing the obligatory tropical tourist getup how late you are and how much they should care about your awful situation. Evidently I have not perfected this look, as I'm sure they thought I was having some serious gastrointestinal issues instead.
I buried my head in the backpack on my lap. I knew what lay ahead... kind of. It had to be another building. We slowly pulled away from the building and drove another couple minutes to an identical large horseshoe building. Then began the process, once again, of dropping people off and picking people up. Over. And over. And over. Guess what? My airline wasn't in that building either!!! Kansas City has THREE completely separate large horseshoe-shaped buildings and MY airline was in the LAST ONE! AND I WAS LATE TO BEGIN WITH! Once at my stop I ran off the buttle shuss and the other passengers were likely praying I would find a good specialist for my digestive disorder at my final destination. I ran to the counter and the guy gave me my ticket. They were already giving away seats to standby passengers so my original seat was gone. They stuck me in the back. Now for the security gauntlet. On my first approach, I put everything right through the x-ray, but I forgot the phone and change in my pocket. Next trip through the upright, I passed, but proceeded to dump all the loose contents of my laptop bag all over the floor in the security area. Always handy for a late passenger. I pick it up, walk 20 feet to the gate, walk on, and crawl all the way lback to a window seat right next to the engine of the plane (side-mounted on the back end). My favorite seats because its acceptable to yell at the passenger next to you just to express a simple idea like: "I must urinate!!!!!" The first words out of the guy-next-to-me's mouth reminded me of all those prison movies you see. The "whacha in for?" line. "Flying standby, huh," he asked me. I looked around and sensed that everyone around me at the butt-end of the plane was of the reject-standby flavor. Its like another class of human being...treated like you're somewhere between monkey and dog on the animal spectrum. I then, for some reason, tried to explain to my row-mate that I did have a nice juicy seat up near the front but they gave it away because I was late. Thats always a good way of making the person next to you feel first class. There was silence. Moments later over the intercom the flight attendant asked if someone had left a cell phone at the security checkpoint. I felt up my pockets and smashed in the attendant call button. I was that guy. Strangely, all my pocket articles were returned to me except for about 70 cents in change I placed in the dish.
Caution. New story. This week in the buttle shuss I was more than on-time and prepared mentally and emotionally for the ridiculous airport layout, but the other folks in the bus weren't quite ready for me. You see...on my way to the airport I picked up a juicy Wendy's cheeseburger, and nice big-old Dr. Pepper. Man it was good. Both sips.
I carry a backpack with my books, notebooks, pens, keys, and a bunch of weird things that I can't even remember. I also carry a laptop bag containing most of my work utensils and paperwork. Well I'm on this packed bus, so I set my laptop between my feet and my backpack on my lap. I wanna start digging into the burger, so I do the most logical thing I can think of. I set the drink down and wedge it between my right foot and my laptop bag. Makes sense, right? Putting a really large top-heavy beverage on an wildly moving surface and "holding it still" with the side of your ankle is always sensible. Seemed to work for me for like 2 minutes, then I quickly became "That Guy." One of my favorite phrases in the world. I heard it from a friend at college and proceeded to use it incessantly. I always joke in public situations about someone being "That Guy" and people always laugh. 'Cause there's always that guy who holds up the plane. Always that guy who drives the wrong way down the one-way street. Always that guy who does something incredibly obnoxious and against the rules no matter how many signs and warnings are posted, or how many times he's told otherwise. Yeah...I spilled my drink. It lurched forward, and landed with the lid toward the front of the bus. We were also going downhill at the time :) I yelled at all 6 people in front of me and they simultaneously picked up their stillettoed heels as a headwall of Dr. Pepper flooded the floor of the bus and collected near the driver's seat. (The lady immediately in front of me didn't fare so well as the others). Every time the bus would speed up or slow down the surge would change direction and flow toward the back where I was sitting. I was that guy. I felt so stupid, but in all that I still had the presence of mind to wait for a few moments, 'till it was silent, and utter my special phrase. "Dangit. I'm that guy." Everyone laughed. The bus driver did not. All I got from him was a simple "...its not the first time." I quickly exited at my stop and continued my day.
And that, ladies and gentlemen....is my story.
