I felt like I was on The Amazing Race

Of all the days to be travelling, and of all the airports to catch a flight connection, I had to choose January 1st, and Denver International, respectively. January 1st, when everybody is flying to get home after the holidays. Denver, where a blizzard had halted the entire city just days before. Lesson learned: never try to make a flight connection where the arrival-departure gap is only 1 hour.

The customs lineup at YYZ was one of those that wrapped around multiple times, through multiple rooms. You think the line is moving, but then you just end up standing 2 feet away from where you just were 15 minutes ago, but facing the other direction. You’d think that with such an epic queue, they’d lighten up on the customs questioning, but I got the full interrogation.

“What is your profession?”

“What was your major?”

“Why would a Canadian ever travel to the States for work?”

“What school did you graduate from?” (I was asked this twice.)

But I made it. It took only a Mild Airport Sprint to get to the flight with time to spare. The Toronto-Denver flight was only slightly late in taking off, and we landed pretty much on time. I relaxed. I even enjoyed seeing the snow, my first sight of snow this winter. The plane actually taxied on top of snow. All was well, until the following:

“Uh… this is the pilot. Unfortunately, our gate is occupied. So, unfortunately, we will have to wait until they clear us to enter the gate, unfortunately. Uh, unfortunately, I apologize for the inconvenience.”

Yes, she actually used the word “unfortunately” four times.

There was still about a half hour before the departure time of my second leg. I talked to some of the guys seated around me. Apparently, several of us were making the same connection to San Jose. I told them, cocksure, “Well, since there are a few of us, they’ll see that this flight is late in arriving and hold it for us. We should be okay.” Sure enough, the plane started moving again. We had been assigned to another gate. Fortunately.

“This is the pilot. Our gate is open, but we need to wait for the marshal to guide us in.” The marshal? How about the sheriff, or the deputy? Do we have to wait for them to show up too?

Thirty minutes passed before we finally pulled in. I’ve never heard so many buckles being disengaged prior to “the captain has determined it safe to leave your seats, and has turned off the seat belt sign”. Now it was time for a Fierce Airport Sprint. One of my temporary airplane friends and I arrived at the departure gate, but it was too late. We would have to stay the night in Denver.

Let’s look at the bright side, shall we? I got a free hotel stay. I got nine dollars for dinner. I got four dollars for breakfast. More accurately, since this is a business trip, I earned my company a free hotel stay and thirteen dollars of food vouchers. Most importantly, when I arrived at my final destination in the afternoon the next day, it was too late to go to work, but not so late that I had to go right to bed. So I went and saw Apocalypto. Good movie.