So I misread my itinerary for today’s flight. At 3 pm I reread it and realized my flight was at 4 pm not 5:15. (In fact, it was supposed to land at 5:15 in Providence.) We got out the door quickly and headed to the airport. I snagged the iPhone and looked up my flight info and relaxed quite a bit when the Southwest web site told me that my flight was running half an hour late. My stress levels and the Fop’s went up again though because it was clearly Amateur Day on the highway. The star of the scariness was an elderly man in a yellow car with blue bumpers. He was straying from lane to lane, with and without signaling, and clearly sometimes it was not an intentional lane change. He was driving fast and was an accident waiting to happen. We lost him at some point as we got closer to the airport.

However, he was lost but not quite gone! By the time I got to the security checkpoint, elderly bad driver man was talking to the information person outside the checkpoint. One of the reasons he could have been driving poorly? He was wearing 2 pairs of glasses and had a third pair that appeared to be half-lens reading glasses hanging from his shirt. 2 pairs - one over the other. Do you think the DMV lets him take his eye test for his license renewal with both pairs on? I hope he gets one new pair of properly prescribed glasses soon!

So back to my little lateness. The security line was a little long but the only way to get moved up to the front is to have an airline representative accompany you. It turned out my flight was leaving from Terminal D and Southwest is based out of Terminal E (where I was dropped off) so I would have had to run back to Terminal E, probably wait in line, run back with someone in tow, etc… so I waited in line. It was 3:35 pm and the flight was still listed as delayed until 4:30 so I wasn’t too stressed but I hate travel stress. I like to get to the airport well in advance of my flight is to avoid this stress.

Luckily, it appears my travel karma had a positive balance today. I got through security with the usual hassle and juggling. I dinged the metal detector once but rescanned clean and then was free to reassemble my stuff on the far side of the checkpoint. I successfully got to the gate in time for the original departure time! Four minutes to spare! And then I waited an hour to board because the flight was still running late.

Turns out my flight actually DID depart at 5:15 pm. Coincidence? I think not!

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