Wine Traveler’s Travels Vol. 18 (From the Archives)

Originally posted 12/11/01

It has been a while since I have had the time to write about my travels, I apologize to those who have missed them and to those who wish I had not started again.  I had a bout with the flu last week after returning from a trip late Wednesday night.  I woke at 4 am with the runs; by 6:30 that morning I had the chills to go with the frequent trips to the pot.  My temp was up to 102.5 so I called in to work, Gail and the boys went off to work and school, leaving me home alone with a pitcher of water and a bowl if things should start moving in the other direction.  I was aching all over and by 11 am was afraid to close my eyes incase it would be the last time.  I called Gail at work and had her come home to help get me dressed and to the doctor.  After fluids and lots of Aspirin my temp was still 102.5 when we got to the walk-in clinic.  I was seen rather quickly and given the usual directions lots of fluids and rest.  Well I did recover by Monday morning, and went into work only to get sent out on Tuesday on this trip.

After booking the trip I called the Aviators (TWA’s frequent flyer program) number to see about getting my usual upgrade to first class.  It seems that Mr. Carty (President of American Airlines) has chosen to give us all a Christmas present and diverted my call to the American Airlines program where I was asked if I had any stickers for an upgrade.  My response was, “what kind of stickers do you want?”  It seems that they do not treat their frequent flyers with the same respect and dignity that TWA did.  It was explained that for every 10,000 qualifying miles I fly, I would receive four complimentary stickers.  Each sticker can be used to upgrade 500 miles of my trip, and if my flight is 501 miles it will take two stickers.  And even though I had over 70,000 miles in my account I had no stickers yet.  He told me I could purchase stickers and I responded, “No thanks this is far to complicated and not worth the trouble.”  I guess I’ll have to shop around for a new airline to frequent. 

Tuesday morning I got up at 2 AM so I could get to the airport by 4 AM for my 6 AM flight.  I’ve been flying since the September 11^th event and since just before Thanksgiving the lines at SeaTac have been atrocious.  I forgot that I usually fly on Mondays like every other business traveler and that this being Tuesday there might not be such a line, well there wasn’t.  I was through all the high security and even a random search and got to my gate before 4:30 AM.  The Admirals Club didn’t open till 5 AM and even then, because the Latte machine is behind the bar, which obviously wouldn’t be open this early, I couldn’t get a Latte.  It’s obvious that Mr. Carty still hasn’t learned anything yet about customer service from the good people of TWA.  I also noticed that none of the TWA staff was present anymore.  I had heard that they were not given any credit for their years of service, so people who had given a lifetime of service to their job now had to start over as a new employee, I find this not only unethical but also inhumane and goes a long way to explain the arrogant and condescending attitude that American employees exhibited even before this merger.  There should be a law to protect employees in mergers from such abuses.  I think this calls for a letter to my congressperson and representatives, I won’t bother any republicans since they only support things that effect the immediate bottom line and not the long-term health or reputation of a company.  But here I go getting on my soapbox again; I can just see my dad shaking his head, wondering where he went wrong. 

Back to the trip, the boarding process went well American now boards in groups, which I am sure is based on seat assignment and frequent flyer status but sure reminds me of Southwest airlines the only difference it seems now between AA and Southwest is assigned seats.  The breakfast “meal” in coach was a cold (we’re talking near frozen) banana muffin, half the size of a standard muffin, a four-ounce cup of applesauce and a four-ounce carton of orange juice, which wasn’t as cold as the muffin.  There was a half of a napkin and a plastic spoon in the bag that the “meal” was served in.  The dilemma, do I use the half napkin to eat on or to place in my lap?  I chose to place the napkin in my lap and use the bag to eat on. The movie was “The Grinch.” now that I’m riding in the back of the bus it would cost me $5.00 to access the entertainment system.  I just can’t bring myself to spend that on a movie that I can rent for $3.00 and not have to watch a cut up version of it.  When this was TWA the movies were unreleased, which made them a bit more worth it.  The one redeeming factor of this flight was that it was on a 757, the flight itself was very comfortable and while I did not recognize any of the flight crew I was sure most of them must have been former TWA employees because they were smiling and courteous something that is rare in a long term American employee, there was one with the perma-frown that made me wonder if she was Dallas based.  This is the first leg of my trip to Indiana; I will be visiting a hospital in Franklin, which is not far from Indianapolis where my brother Jody and his family live.  I hope to get time to visit as I really miss having them out in Washington.  

After a brief stop in the Ambassador’s, now switching over to Admiral’s, club I returned to the same gate I got off at and the same plane just a different seat.  I did notice that they had changed all the signage at St. Louis International Airport to American and the airport looks really drab because everything is silver and gray now.  The old TWA red and gold signage was much more appealing.  They have also started scraping the paint off the planes so they too are very unappealing to look at.  The flight to Indianapolis was uneventful and a short 36 minutes.  We were served beverages and pretzels; I asked for club soda with lime and got lemon, not at all the same thing.  My guess is this is another one of Mr. Carty’s, money saving at the expense of good customer service items.

Upon landing I called Misti and made arrangements to meet for dinner.  I drove down to Franklin and checked into the hotel, they did not have a non smoking room at the regular rate, the only nonsmoking room was a suite with an in room Jacuzzi, they gave me a special rate of $85 for my inconvenience so I took it.  The room was great I had a king size bed in the bedroom then the living area had two areas one with the Jacuzzi and a fridge, microwave, coffee maker and sink.  The other area had a couch, TV and Desk.  Then I drove about 40 minutes north to Misti’s house for homemade spaghetti.  I really enjoyed seeing the kids Jessica is turning into a little lady and Jacob has really grown.  The twins were just as cute as buttons and so smart.  I left as Misti was putting them to bed, hoping to meet up again later in the week.  As it was our schedules did not coincide, I stayed busy with work and she had other commitments. 

My return through Indianapolis was quick and the security was so much more efficient than at Seattle.  The flight I was on would stop at St. Louis then continue on to Seattle so I didn’t have to get off.  Both legs were completely full, so those reports about people not flying are all hype by the airlines trying to sell tickets or something.  I spoke with some of the flight attendants about the merger and it seems that even though they were originally promised they would get to keep their seniority; Mr. Carty is trying to use recent events to take advantage of them.  I will be writing to my congressperson to see what can be done as I work for a company that is ripe for takeover or merger and I would not want to lose the seniority I have earned so far. 

Speaking of my company, I just received an email that the president of our company has announced his retirement.  There has been much discussion over the last year that this would be a positive move for our company as he has been cited as stifling the creativity and productivity of the employees.  I have yet to check our stock price but I would guess it would have risen on this announcement.  We recently sold our corporate buildings and property to Microsoft who surrounds our property, realizing a considerable profit; with this and the increase in sales we’ve been having this should be a good year.  

Christmas is coming fast and last weekend Gail and I went shopping and found three new bicycles for the boys, the sales were great on some really awesome bikes.  And we got new helmets to go with them.  Tyler’s birthday was this week and I called him on Thursday to wish him a happy Birthday but we had already arranged to celebrate it on Sunday.  We are waiting for a cockatiel to arrive that we are getting him, he has wanted a bird for quite some time and has even gone so far as to read books and search the internet for information about them and got a great looking cage, he only lacks the bird.  Tommy turned 16 on Thanksgiving and we celebrated his birthday on Sunday also so he did not have to share the limelight with the holiday.  He got a neat PDA (like a palm pilot), and phone cards for his cell phone that he got last Christmas, it’s one of those pre-paid ones that way he is responsible for the bill, the first time he did so well the card expired before he had used all the minutes (it’s the AT&T free to go plan).  Trevor has gotten a weekend job at a friend of mine where he cleans out stalls and does yard work; so far he has saved over $300.  He wants to buy an XBOX, the new game machine from Microsoft. 

Gail has started an online college course to get her Master’s degree in Nursing.  She has a Master’s in Healthcare Administration, but this other degree will let her go into teaching if she wishes.  She got interested in it when her company started a tuition reimbursement program, which would have paid for part of the tuition.  While signing up for the course she filled out paper work for financial aid and she got a grant that should cover all of the tuition plus some for a new computer.  She has had to learn more about the computer and hates it when Tyler can show her what to do.  But she is losing her fear of them.  You can email her at QueenGail@hotmail.com she would love to get something beside Spam. 

Wine Traveler’s Travels Vol. 7 (From the Archives)

Sunday, October 22, 2000

            After two weeks in the office I was ready for a trip, when they told me I had to travel on Sunday I was no longer so excited.  One good thing that occurred during these last two weeks was my luggage showed up.  It seems it was delivered to the office shortly after my trip.  It was being held in security and no one bothered to tell me it was here.  American Airlines still thinks it’s lost.  The tag on it infers that United Airlines carried it from Chicago and delivered it to the address on my tag.  In my letter to the CEO of American Airlines I informed him that it had been found and that if I were a less than honest person I could have filed a claim and collected on the lost bag.  I also sent him excerpts from my stories outlining the current level of customer service at AA. 

            Well back to today’s trip, I am on TWA, on my way to Camden, NJ.  I fly into Philadelphia via St. Louis.  There was a direct flight on US airways but it would have been $500 more and coach.  Of course I am in First class again, though it is a MD-80.  This flight left at 12:05 PM.  It just wasn’t worth it on a Sunday to get up early enough for the 757 flight.  The service was wonderful, as always; lunch was a nice ham and Swiss cheese sandwich in a hard roll, Bowtie pasta salad and a dark chocolate covered scoop of Ice Cream.  The ham was generous and lean, real sliced ham not the boiled pressed type you might expect.  I had Vodka and Cranberry with a twist of lime instead of my usual Bailey’s and Kahlua.  We passed a few areas of bumpy air but over all, the trip from Seattle to St. Louis was uneventful despite the obnoxious noise you always get in an MD-80.

            The trip from St. Louis to Philly was also on an MD-80.  The dinner consisted of a grilled chicken breast filet on a bed of rigatoni pasta with vegetables, a warm roll, a salad of wild greens and tomatoes with some small pea sized things that tasted like olives, and a very scrumptious slice of cheese cake with caramel topping.   

            Hertz surprised me with a Lincoln Town Car; I did not send this one back for my usual two door sports.  The Directions though were a nightmare there had apparently been some construction since they were last updated because they got me terribly lost just getting out of the airport. Finally I found my way back to the highway I needed. Then near the end of my route they listed some street names, which were actually all local names for the same Highway, which of course none of the signs indicated.  So I spent an hour in a very scary part of New Jersey, afraid to stop for directions till I finally found the Hotel.  Now it’s after Midnight local time and I go to check in at the Hilton.  The only room available, even though I have a reservation is what they call a Parlor Room.  This Is like a meeting room that has a huge dinning room table (probably seats 14 people) and a sofa bed, no coffee maker or dresser.  They promise a better room tomorrow if this is not satisfactory

            This trip is to support a brand new product from Spacelabs Medical, called the “Ultraview Clinical Messenger.”  It is basically a paging system that notifies a caregiver when a monitor has alarmed and sends the patient’s name, room number, classification of the alarm as well as a 12-second cardiac reading for the patient in question.  Giving the caregiver approximately 6 seconds before and 6 seconds after the start of the event.  This is a supplemental system to their central monitoring stations.  It allows the caregiver to evaluate the condition of one patient while caring for another.  I spent this last week learning the system and how to support the caregivers that are using it.  It will be a nice change from the Labor and delivery product I have been doing.

The next morning I get up and arrive at the hospital at 8AM local time (5AM to my body) and about 10AM I am told that I will be doing the Night Shift.  The first thought to go through my head is “Why didn’t they tell me this before I got here?”  Later I’m thinking why did I have to leave on Sunday?  So at noon they let me go back to my hotel room to get a nap before starting my 12-hour night shift.  The desk clerk is very accommodating in finding me a room with a real bed, and putting me down for first cleaning the next morning so I can get to sleep early.  I woke up at 4PM and thought “Maybe I’ll just go down to the pool and sit in the hot tub.”  Well they only have an outdoor pool that closed on Labor day and no hot tub or sauna, just a small room with a couple of exercise machines.  And to think they think $99/night is a cheap rate, the usual rate is $149. 

So after a 12-hour night shift I return to my room and wait for the housekeeper who is supposed to be here right after 8AM.  She finally shows up about 8:30, works quickly then off to bed for me.  Then it is up at 5:30PM and dressed and showered for my next 12-hour shift. 

The next morning after a call to the desk the housekeeper finally shows up at 8:45.  Then I sleep from 9:30AM to 5:30PM. 

Thursday morning I wait till 9AM and finally call down and tell them I can wait no longer I call the desk and tell them to have my room cleaned after 6PM when I leave for work. 

Friday morning I ask for a late checkout as I may get to go home today, and I get to my room only to find it has not been serviced.  I call down and complain, as I am on the phone the housekeeper knocks on the door; when she sees I am still here, she leaves.  I head down the hall after her and ask her to clean my room.  She says they were supposed to do it last night and I am scheduled to check out today.  I explain that it did not get done and I need clean towels and such for when I wake up at 1pm for a late check out.  She did clean the room and restock the Coffee, which is what I needed most.  I ate at the Hospital each night and won’t scare you with the details.

I wrote a long letter to the management regarding the lack of service and amenities at this hotel. 

I called my travel agent and got an earlier flight but I lost my first class seating, I called the Aviators desk and requested an upgrade, which she told me, was not a problem.  When I got to the Philadelphia airport I was informed that she had gotten me first class seats all right but they were on November 27^th instead of October 27^th.  The flight was full and I would be on standby.  I got on the plane in coach, well as my luck goes we pulled out from the gate and then didn’t go anywhere.  It seems one of the engines wouldn’t start on this MD-80.  So we pulled back up to the gate while they replaced the starter on the engine they let us off the plane and I tried to rent a movie for the flight.  There is a service that will rent a portable DVD player and a movie for $10 if you are traveling between Seattle and certain other cities, Philadelphia happens to be one of them.  Well I must have my planets in the wrong house this month as I approach the booth she is closing it up because she has to leave to get more batteries.  Before she returns they call for us to board.  So it’s another trip on an MD-80 with no movie.  Things did get better the cabin crew were a couple of gals that put on such a comedy act they had us all laughing.  And they passed out free booze because of the delay.  No food on this 2 hour flight, but the flight attendants made the time fly by.  When I got to St. Louis I was pleased to find that I was in time for my connection and had a first class seat on a 757.  Now this is the way to fly the movie is Shanghai Noon.  This was a very needed comic relief to this week.  I highly recommend this as a rental.  The meal was a choice of Chicken and Penne pasta or Taco Salad.  I chose the Taco Salad; it was a nice portion of romaine lettuce, sliced fajita style beef, guacamole, sour cream, salsa and beans, with a bag of Doritos to crush over the top.  And the desert was a dark chocolate covered scoop of chocolate ice cream.  I arrived home on time and highly recommend TWA to anyone.

Wine Traveler’s Travels 5 (From the archives)

Sunday 23-Sep-2000

Well this was a very short weekend as I spent most of Saturday doing my laundry and everyone else’s too. Gail works extra shifts on the weekends so I do the housework, with some help from my boys.  The hardest part is getting them to hang up the clean clothes, so often I find folded clothes and clothes on hangers in their laundry baskets.  But they try real hard.  This week’s trip is out to Madison Wisconsin to one of our subsidiaries Burdick to take a weeklong class on their products and software.  I arrived at the airport in plenty of time with all the items I should have (Gail was home when I left so she runs me through a checklist).  This week it is on American Airlines and as I approach the gate at the time it was to start boarding I notice that it doesn’t look like they are ready.  Only a few minutes later though they start announcing the boarding process and this very unfriendly sounding lady announces that due to a short turnover there will not be the customary advanced boarding for frequent flyer’s (here goes another letter to American).  I should have known that it was a portent of things to come as I finally get my seat 10F, we sit, and we sit, and we sit.  Finally the pilot comes on the speaker saying that they found a dent the size of a dime on the outside of the aircraft and there is paper work that must be filled out.  Well after about 45 minutes he comes back on to say that the mechanics are arguing with the home office on how to repair the hole, yes the dent has now become a hole.  And that they are trying to measure how sharp the point is on the hole.  Well we end up getting delayed about 2 hours they announce that anyone with connecting flights will miss them and American will put us up in a hotel and get us to our destinations on the first flight in the AM. 

They refused to take anyone’s baggage off the plane so we couldn’t even try to get another airline to our destinations.  If you recall from my earlier travel that I have not been much impressed with the level of customer service on American well this isn’t helping much.  The Flight attendants were all in good moods despite the level of frustrations that could be felt among the passengers.  I tried using the airphone to cancel my hotel reservation but it would not work.  So off we went to Chicago, the meal was a very small portion of Chicken Strips (picture one regular chicken strip sliced into three pieces) two tablespoons of macaroni and Cheese and about ten pieces of green beans.  While they were well prepared and actually tasty, the portions would have had my youngest son begging for more.  The best part though was a cinnamon Oat bar from Love and Quiches deserts.  They also gave us a complimentary glass of wine.  They next round though they had no wine on the cart so it was just a small cup (4-oz) of club soda. 

The nightmare was only beginning, as we deplaned at Chicago it was obvious that we were late there was no one else in the terminal and only two agents to handle the arrangements for the whole plane full of passengers. The fellow ahead of me received his paper for the room at a Clarion Hotel he asked why aren’t we at the Hilton here on the airport property?  The response was “they don’t give us a discount.”  As I was given my paper for the room I asked about meal vouchers, “This is all they gave us” was the response I received.  I complained about the lack of food on the plane but it fell on deaf ears.  Then we were directed to the Baggage Claim area.  After waiting quite some time and the belt finished only about half of us had our luggage.  So off we went to another line.  It seems our luggage was taken to the area for our connecting flights, They seemed surprised that we would want our luggage.  One passenger had noticed his bag was in the American Eagle area and had asked the lady there for it she replied to him that “Can’t you see we are closed?”  Another lady from the American Airlines section, after hearing out plight, got our claim tickets and descriptions of all our bags and went in the back and brought out our bags. 

Then the long trek to the place where you get to catch the Hotel shuttles I’m talking a good half to three quarters of a mile through tunnels.  When I arrived there some of the passengers were trying to get the shuttle for another hotel to take them to the one we were to stay at.  It seems that when they called our hotel they were told there were no shuttles were available this time of the night it was 1 am now.  Just then another man came up and said that after explaining that there were quite a few of us they agreed to send a shuttle.  We got to the hotel to find they did not have the usual continental breakfast and that the shuttle would start running at 5 am to take us back to the airport.  So I got about two hours sleep before I had to get up and get dressed for the class I would now be late for. 

The flight was only 30 minutes airtime but took over an hour from gate to gate with no food or drinks served.  So now it has been since early last night since I have had anything to eat, good for the diet I guess.  I arrived at my destination ready to drop from lack of sleep, the rest of the group was well rested and we stayed working with the computers till 7pm that night.  The group members in this class were Tom Taylor who is one of the technical trainers from Redmond, Dave Crossly and Adrian who are CSR’s (customer service Reps) from the UK, and Erik Lam a CSR Manager from Hong Kong.  For lunch they brought in was great it was from a local sandwich shop made great subs.

Checking into the Hotel in Madison that night they removed the no show charges from the night before after I recounted my experience.  I went straight to bed without dinner.  The next morning this hotel, a Comfort Inn, had a great breakfast and I was much more attentive in class.  Lunch on Tuesday was Chinese take-out and left a lot to be desired. 

Madison is the state capitol for Wisconsin and has a beautiful domed capitol building at the center of town, and also boasts some wonderful Frank Lloyd Wright buildings namely the Manona Terrace, which is a civic center that is on the shore of Lake Manona.  It is also the home office for Oscar Mayer Corp.  The wiener mobile is seen quite regularly here. 

Tuesday night I found a wonderful Italian restaurant named Bellini’s it was inside what had once been a church with the cathedral ceilings and stained glass windows intact.  I had the Brochette as an appetizer and the special, which was a tomato-basil fettuccini with a clam and garlic cream sauce.  The food and the atmosphere were really satisfying. 

Wednesday, was another long day at class starting at 8 am and ending at 6 p.m.  We had been invited to the house of one of the staff from tech support, Melissa Owens.  Melissa used to work in the Redmond office but had relocated to Spacelabs/Burdick after becoming pregnant to move closer to her family.  She and her husband had just built a new house so four of us that were in the class came over for barbecued chicken and salad.  She had also made a wonderful apple salad that had whipped topping and caramel in it.  Chris, Melissa’s husband, used to work for Spacelabs Medical in technical training with Tom Taylor, but now does web designing for another company.  Chris had wired their house for the future he had cable in every room and at least two Ethernet outlets in each room.  Chris had also just built a table for their kitchen, which was quite unique, it was like an island work area with a breakfast bar attached to one side and wrapping around the far end.  The Bar section was built up about four inches above the work area. The top was laminated with a marble like Formica to complement the kitchen counters.  The food and the company were great. 

Thursday was another long day of class in which I learned much and found very enriching, we ordered from the sandwich shop again. 

This was our last night in town so the instructor took us all out to dinner at a Japanese Steak House I had Chicken and Shrimp.  This was one of those places where you are seated around a large grill and they prepare the food in front of you.   The Shrimp was prepared with Kogane sauce this is a combination of egg yolk, lemon juice and spices then it is place on top of the butterflied shrimp and covered on the grill till done.  It was really a taste sensation I want to experience again.  The Chicken was grilled with teriyaki sauce and the veggies were onion, Zucchini, and bean sprouts.  While preparing the veggies the chef took a thick slice of onion separating the rings and stacking them atop each other to make a cone. He then placed some form of alcohol inside and lit it moving this to a hot area of the grill it shot a flame way up and he announced “Japanese Volcano.”  After the flame went out it continued to spew steam and really was impressive.  Of course the usual fancy knife work and the juggling of the large salt and peppershakers were all part of the show.  It was a real dining experience.  

Our last day of class everyone was in overload but the presentations were so well done we continued to learn more.  I’m real excited about taking on these new products. 

The flight home was another adventure in American Airlines, we were first greeted with a slight delay but they would do their best to catch up the ten minutes it was behind. Well when the plane arrived they couldn’t get the Jetway to work so they brought up the portable stairs and announce that we would be boarding the plane from down stairs so we all went downstairs.  As we watched them off load the Regional Jet we were to fly back to Chicago we stood in disbelief as they moved the stairs away and attempted again to get the Jetway to connect.  They then announced that we would now be boarding upstairs so we all moved upstairs again.  As we watched out the window they continued to struggle with the Jetway, we were sure we would be told to go back downstairs again.  Then finally they started boarding from the Jetway.  As we were taxiing out to the runway we stopped and you could hear the engines slowdown…The Pilot announced ”I’m sorry there are problems at the Chicago Airport and we are to wait twenty minutes.”    We finally took off and had an uneventful short flight, as I got off the plane at G-19 (the very end of the G concourse) and was checking the monitors for gate information. I heard my name over the intercom stating that this was the final boarding call.  Off I ran two concourses over; they were actually holding the plane for me.  This is more like the customer service I would expect; I thanked the crew extensively and heard one of the flight attendants say to another “let the captain know, he is the one who was waiting for this passenger.”  I stuck my head in the cockpit and thanked him personally.  Well the short wait for me (only five minutes) was nothing compared to the wait in the taxi line as it seems that we were about fifteenth in line to take off.  It was another MD-80 and I won’t bore you with my dislike of this very inadequate plane.  The meal again was good but so small one of those $.79 frozen dinners would be a feast in comparison.  This time it was barbecued chicken, green beans, seasoned potatoes and a salad.  The highlight was the triple chocolate brownie for desert again made by love and quiches.  I noticed a web site on their package, which I will be checking out http://www.loveandquiches.com/.  Again they only gave the small cup of soda, not the whole can like TWA and Delta do.  But the fact that they waited till I could run from the end of one concourse over to the middle of another really goes a long way in making up for these other complaints.  I don’t want to sound unreasonable it’s just that when other airlines have had similar occurrences I have been given meal vouchers and phone cards to alleviate my inconvenience.  You get used to a certain level of customer service and expect it from others.   As we approached Seattle the Pilot announced that we were entering a holding pattern as the traffic at SeaTac was backed up.  As I am heading home this does not bother me, but I feel for those who have connections. 

I won’t make it in time to see Gail before she goes to work so I’ll have to wait till tomorrow.  I don’t know how she puts up with me when I’m home or when I’m away. 

I should have known better than to think this nightmare was over.  As I watched the bags move along the carousel I thought “ya know I bet my bag didn’t make the tight connection in Chicago” and sure enough it didn’t show up.  So I walked over to the baggage department for American Airlines and explained my predicament, they gave me a print out with all the pertinent information and the 1 800 number to call to check on my baggage.  I left with a sure feeling that my Bag would be on the next flight from Chicago and that I would get a call in the morning that my bag was to be delivered.   Well all day I stayed home (cleaning house and doing laundry, Oh yeah!) and the phone never rang.  The paper I was given said I would be called once every 24 hours with an update, so I waited.  Ten PM and no call, I called and spoke with a very nice young man who checked all my information and verified that my bag has not yet been found.  

On Sunday at 10 AM I called again with no luck so off I went to buy a new bag.  I found one at Target it is a rolling duffel with a small backpack on one end, which can be detached.  The best part was the price; it regularly sold for $29.00 but had a sale tag for $19.99.  When I got to the counter it scanned $9.94, finally something was going my way. 

Wine Traveler’s Travels part 4 (From the archives)

Tuesday 19-SEP-2000

This morning I am winging off to Oakdale, California, via San Jose on Alaska Airlines.  I specifically booked this flight due to the listed equipment was a Boeing 737-400.  I arrived in plenty of time with my wallet and new pager.  I parked my van at the MasterPark lot where you get to drop your vehicle at the door they cart your bags to the waiting bus then whisk you off to the entrance of the airport.  They know me so well here they will tell me how fresh the coffee is as soon as they see me.  Well the first change this morning was the gate, not much of a change, from D-1 to D-3.  They started boarding the plane after about 2 minutes they stopped and made an announcement that the type of plane had been changed and that the following people had to come to the desk for new seat assignments.  “Uh oh” I thought Here goes my luck and sure enough it was an MD-80 and all those people who were in the D seats now had seats in the rear of the plane.  The MD-80 is narrower and longer than the 737 instead of two sets of three seats in a row they have one set of three and one set of two and the rows are much closer together.  Using my laptop is next to impossible without getting cramps.  The one saving grace of this flight was that Alaska always serves Seattle’s Best Coffee, which is so much better than Starbucks.  We were also served our choice of a raspberry coffeecake or an orange and currant scone.  I chose the scone that was very flavorful but a little too moist to be called a scone. 

Despite the Travel Agent’s assurances that San Jose was closer to my destination than Sacramento which I requested (67 miles verses 77), the neverlost system in my Ford Taurus from Hertz told me it was 98 miles.  But the Drive was very interesting I passed through the hills where all the power-generating windmills are, it was such a site.  This is one of those trips I really wish I had a digital camera to capture the sites with.  I have thought of bringing my 35-mm camera but I have about 45 rolls of film at home that need to be developed, so that wouldn’t be worth the space it would take up.  I keep watching the prices are getting better and so is the quality.  Then I passed through the farming area of the Central Valley of California.  Almond and Pistachio orchards, vineyards and strawberry fields forever. 

Oakdale is a quaint little town that claims to be the Cowboy Capitol, it seems the national rodeo circuit starts out here, though I saw no cowboys, Central Florida had more cowboys than this.  I had to go straight to the hospital to start work I was there until about 6pm.  I had booked my lodging at the Best Western Rama Inn, a nice hotel I have stayed at before.  As I walked in the lady at the counter smiled.  I said, “I’m here for one of your fine rooms.”  She said she had just the room for me, it was to be a suite which she said because I was a business traveler I could have at the same rate as a regular room $59.  Well this room had a King size bed a desk and full closet and a Jacuzzi right in the room.  After the flight on the MD-80 and the two-hour drive then having to work I was ready for the tub.  I filled it up with real hot water and soaked for about 20 minutes with the jets on full.  Feeling much refreshed I looked out my window and noticed a new Mexican restaurant next door.  I walked over and was very pleased with the generous portions and great service.  I had the Chicken Mexicana, which was strips of chicken tenderloin with onions, green peppers, and Jalepenos.  Served with refried beans, rice and tortillas.  I left very full.  Back in my room I fell asleep as soon as I hit the bed.  The next day was another full day at the hospital with return trips at 7:30 PM and 12:30 am to do some trouble shooting.  If it hadn’t been for the Pizza I bought for the staff at lunchtime I wouldn’t have eaten at all this day.  When I got back to the hotel at 9pm I was too tired to wait for the tub in my room to fill so I went to the indoor pool and hot tub there at the hotel and was pleasantly surprised to find it was hot.  It has been a common occurrence to find hotel hot tubs to be cooler than my pool was in Florida.  When I mention it to the staff they usually say that too many people complain that it is too hot when the set it at the mandatory 103-104 degrees that most Health Departments require for sanitary reasons.  This is also where it is most therapeutic.  The only disappointing thing about this stay was they charged me long distance for my local calls to my ISP, this will be credited after I showed the manager the phone book, which listed the exchange I called as a toll free local number.  This occurred when I checked out Thursday morning.  That day at the hospital with the help of Tech support we were able to get their system functioning better though it took all day.  I had to reschedule my flight for later that night.  Then we ran into a problem that required me to stay over another night.  The hotel I had just checked out of was now full so I had to drive about thirty minutes to the next town of Modesto.  The caveat here was there is a great restaurant here called St. Stan’s.  They have their own microbrewery and great food as well as live entertainment Weds-Sat.  I sat down and the barmaid came over promptly and asked what I would like to drink.  They had 9 of their own brews on tap.  I was undecided between the Amber and the Virgin Amber.  She explained that the Virgin Amber has less of the yeast filtered out so I tried that one it was very full bodied with good hops taste.  I ordered Wiener Schnitzel, you would think with a name like Schessler I would have had Wiener Schnitzel before, I had always assumed this was some sort of sausage.  Well this was some very lean pork finely breaded and sautéed in butter and lemon.  It was served with fries, which were lightly battered potato wedges, and a vegetable medley that had broccoli, carrots, beansprouts red peppers and snow peas.  The veggies are perfectly cooked, not too soft not too crisp.  I had a second beer while listening to the band which consisted of three guys two with guitars and one vocalist though all three sang. The Barmaid informed me that the band’s name was Chandler-Pratt.  Two of the guys are 16 and one is 22.  They did some classics from Jimmy Buffet to Leonard Skynard. 

The travel agent had gotten me a room at the Courtyard that was very nice but not as welcoming as the Best Western, not to mention the lack of the in room Jacuzzi.  The next day I ended up not finishing till after 4pm this just left me enough time to get back to San Jose.  Well it seems that due to construction it took over 45 minutes to get in the entrance of the airport and through the car rental return.  I missed my flight, fortunately they were able to get me on the next flight.  To my delight a 737 pulled up to the gate.  The flight home was uneventful though roomier than the fight down.  I got in about 11pm I had to stop by the office on the way home to drop off some papers and pick up some things for my next trip.  I left the office about 1AM.

Wine Traveler’s Travels part 3

Wine Traveler’s Travels part 3

(Sometime in 2000, didn’t date this one)

This week I am off to Helena Arkansas, a small town on the border of Arkansas and Mississippi.  My morning flight on American Airlines was missed due to my error of leaving the house without my wallet; I sat at the airport on standby till 1:48 PM which got me into Little Rock, AR at 10:30 PM with a two and a half hour drive to Helena.  This was the first time I had used American in quite a while I was pleased to see the attitudes of the employees has changed greatly.  They used to always seem angry.  The food on this flight was awful; it was described as a smoked turkey sandwich, which wasn’t much bigger than a small dinner roll, and a bag of chips that had more air than chips.  Needless to say I was starving.

At the recommendation of the Sales Rep I booked a room at the Isle of Capri Casino hotel across the river from Helena in Lula, MI.  Well at 1:00 am I was tired and grouchy my room was almost the last room from the one and only entrance.  I was on the second floor; there were about two hundred rooms per floor, with only one entrance (many alarmed fire exits) and a security guard at the door.  When I finally made it to my nonsmoking room I noticed a strong smell of smoke and two ashtrays in the room I called the desk and the girl said, “Well the computer says it’s a nonsmoking room.”  I won’t go into all the details of my conversation but I was less than pleasant.  She said, “I will bring up keys to another room” So I moved to the room that was furthest from the only entrance.  I then ventured down to the all night restaurant, for a rather pricey breakfast it was like an a la cart menu each item was $1, so two eggs, grits, sausage, a biscuit, and a glass of milk was $6.  The good thing though was it was well prepared and delicious.

Well I had to be up and dressed at 7 am the next morning and fortunately the Hospital was only 5 minutes from the casino.  After spending all day at the hospital with some very nice nurses, the sales rep, the Installer, the Monitor demonstrator and I went back to the casino for the Buffet dinner.  I was less than impressed with their treatment of vegetables the carrots were all mushy and so were the Brussels sprouts, (Is there a group for the ethical treatment of vegetables?)  Now the seafood part of this buffet was a whole other story.  The fried catfish was excellent very crispy on the outside and tender and flaky on the inside.  The boiled shrimp was very well seasoned and not over cooked.  Even the shrimp salad was very good, and the King Crab and Stone Crab were tasty as well.  The price of this buffet was a reasonable $13.95.  I also made a $5 donation at the one armed bandits.

            Then Wednesday before I returned to Little Rock to catch my plane home, we stopped in the casino again and I won back 3 of my $5.  Following the Sales rep back to Little Rock as he lived there, we stopped in a little town called Brinkley where they had a Stuckey’s, which unlike the ones I recall from my childhood was more like a convenience store than a restaurant but still with all the souvenirs.  What he stopped for was the Mexican blankets they sell here; you know those nice colorful woven blankets that are great to use to cuddle up in front of the TV with.  They were priced at $5.99 each; we paid more than that in Mexico about 8 years ago.  So I picked up one for each of my boys. 

            I got to the Airport in plenty of time for my scheduled flight but was met with bad news.  The flight was so delayed I would not be able to make my Seattle connection in Dallas.  So the very nice young man got me a flight on Delta which was leaving in the next 15 minutes.  This allowed me to return to Seattle at 10:45 PM instead of the 12:30am I would have on American.  My opinion of American Airlines is definitely better than it was prior to this trip, while the food sucks the employees have a much better attitude and go out of their way to help you out.  The flight home on Delta was lacking only in the food department, as it was a late flight, only pretzels were served in coach.  The flight from Dallas to Seattle was in a 757 and as I have said before I’d rather be in coach in a 757 than First Class on a MD 80.  The Movie was Frequency so I saved $5 since I had already seen this one and was less than impressed.  We were served pretzels and soft drinks on this 3 hour and 45 min flight.  But the comfort of being in a 757 made up for the lack of food.  Somewhere on the flight home my pager must have fallen out of my computer bag, as it was not there the next morning.  Arriving at a little after 11 it was about 12:30 when I made it home.  Fortunately I had a message from the office that I could come in a little late in the morning.