This year's National Association of Government Webmasters (NAGW) Conference is being held in Galveston TX. I used Expedia to book my flight and I received a 6-digit confirmation code, but chose to panic at the last minute thinking I needed to print a ticket.My brother-in-law (a frequent flyer) calmed me down and all I had to do was worry about getting to the airport Monday morning.
Working for an MPO, I wanted to take public transit, but the local bus (which never keeps an actual schedule since this morning three Route 48 buses came one after each other). The connection to the airport (on the R1 Airport train) also added another variable to the equation, so I opted for the taxi, which is a $28.50 flat fee from Center City. Since I technically live about three blocks north of the area as defined by the Philadelphia ??? Authority, I decided I would walk to the nearest intersection on the northern limit (Fairmount Av). The first place I called would not pick me up without an actual house number, so I hung up, found the address of the local real estate agency on the corner, then called another service that specializes in service to the airport.
My taxi was exactly on time and my driver (Raj) couldn't have been any nicer, engaging in small talk, but not too invasive. We got to terminal C (rescheduled from the night before) in 20 minutes flat, taking 21st Street down to Market, then jumping on I-76. I gave him a $5 tip and he gave me his cell phone number in case I needed a ride back Friday night.
With only 1 person in front of me at 8:35 am, I was quickly directed to a self check-in terminal, paid for my checked bag, then it was off to find a cup of coffee and wait for my boarding at terminal C17 (US Airways Express - Republic Airlines flight 3121). Expedia did a nice job of showing me where I would sit (row 5 seat F) which ended up being zone 4 seating, or the last ones on the plane, so I got a few extra minutes to streach my legs before the almost 4 hour flight. It was a small E75 plane which only had 2 seats per side (4 per row) and only 22 rows. A much more comfortable ride than most, where the odd man out is stuck in the middle. In fact, I don't think I even came close to brushing up on the dude sitting next to me, working on his large brick of a Dell laptop.I got nervous the two times beverage service came by, and handed me a filled-to-the-rim beverage just inches above his keyboard. I read through an entire issued of Maximum PC and took their 50 question geek quiz, only to find out that I just barely pass as an enthusiest, scoring 27 out of 50 answers correct (can YOU identify the socket for the latest intel chip?).
Got to Houston Intercontinental Airport (IAH) without incident. Nervous about the next leg of the trip (shuttle to the hotel), I was glad the NAGW people got all their information straight and directed me (in an email) to go to the Limo area outside terminal C. Since I landed in Terminal A, a friendly information booth guy pointed me down the escalator, where I boarded a waiting tram, or automated people mover. It was over 3,200 feet to Terminal C, so they squeezed in this mini rail system that makes turns on a dime like a go-kart, and had passenger's luggage jostling about which each hairpin turn. Unlike PHL food concessions, they don't appear to be regulated here in Houston, as a half grilled chicken ceasar wrap and bottle of water was $10.02! OK, so it did come with a complementary bag of chips, but that was outrageous for such a lackluster meal (bad, bad chili's to-go franchise).
Messed up with the time difference, I kept calling Colleen thinking she was on lunch break, when her lunch was actually 1.5 hours ago. For the 2nd time today, I found a plethora of wi-fi signals, but none of them worked, and the one that did was not free. So much for cloud computing!
It's 1:50 pm local time, and my shuttle leaves at 3 pm. So now I sit and wait.
Working for an MPO, I wanted to take public transit, but the local bus (which never keeps an actual schedule since this morning three Route 48 buses came one after each other). The connection to the airport (on the R1 Airport train) also added another variable to the equation, so I opted for the taxi, which is a $28.50 flat fee from Center City. Since I technically live about three blocks north of the area as defined by the Philadelphia ??? Authority, I decided I would walk to the nearest intersection on the northern limit (Fairmount Av). The first place I called would not pick me up without an actual house number, so I hung up, found the address of the local real estate agency on the corner, then called another service that specializes in service to the airport.
My taxi was exactly on time and my driver (Raj) couldn't have been any nicer, engaging in small talk, but not too invasive. We got to terminal C (rescheduled from the night before) in 20 minutes flat, taking 21st Street down to Market, then jumping on I-76. I gave him a $5 tip and he gave me his cell phone number in case I needed a ride back Friday night.
With only 1 person in front of me at 8:35 am, I was quickly directed to a self check-in terminal, paid for my checked bag, then it was off to find a cup of coffee and wait for my boarding at terminal C17 (US Airways Express - Republic Airlines flight 3121). Expedia did a nice job of showing me where I would sit (row 5 seat F) which ended up being zone 4 seating, or the last ones on the plane, so I got a few extra minutes to streach my legs before the almost 4 hour flight. It was a small E75 plane which only had 2 seats per side (4 per row) and only 22 rows. A much more comfortable ride than most, where the odd man out is stuck in the middle. In fact, I don't think I even came close to brushing up on the dude sitting next to me, working on his large brick of a Dell laptop.I got nervous the two times beverage service came by, and handed me a filled-to-the-rim beverage just inches above his keyboard. I read through an entire issued of Maximum PC and took their 50 question geek quiz, only to find out that I just barely pass as an enthusiest, scoring 27 out of 50 answers correct (can YOU identify the socket for the latest intel chip?).
Got to Houston Intercontinental Airport (IAH) without incident. Nervous about the next leg of the trip (shuttle to the hotel), I was glad the NAGW people got all their information straight and directed me (in an email) to go to the Limo area outside terminal C. Since I landed in Terminal A, a friendly information booth guy pointed me down the escalator, where I boarded a waiting tram, or automated people mover. It was over 3,200 feet to Terminal C, so they squeezed in this mini rail system that makes turns on a dime like a go-kart, and had passenger's luggage jostling about which each hairpin turn. Unlike PHL food concessions, they don't appear to be regulated here in Houston, as a half grilled chicken ceasar wrap and bottle of water was $10.02! OK, so it did come with a complementary bag of chips, but that was outrageous for such a lackluster meal (bad, bad chili's to-go franchise).
Messed up with the time difference, I kept calling Colleen thinking she was on lunch break, when her lunch was actually 1.5 hours ago. For the 2nd time today, I found a plethora of wi-fi signals, but none of them worked, and the one that did was not free. So much for cloud computing!
It's 1:50 pm local time, and my shuttle leaves at 3 pm. So now I sit and wait.
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