When the Rain Comes

I got to the airport two hours early, as requested by the fine print on my e-ticket.
Good thing I got there early, because I was just in time to watch the flights screen change- my flight , 4188 to Chicago, went from "on time" to "cancelled." Since my flight was the first one listed, I halfway expected the rest of the listto follow suit- perhaps some sort of incident had occured and there were to be no flights that day...

Nope. It was just my flight- not to worry , I am told.
.
"We have one leaving in an hour to St. Louis , and from there you can connect to Chicago ".

"Excellent. What's the ETA in Chicago?"

" 6:50 PM"

"!!!%@(&8&%"!!!???" ( It is 9 am- my first flight was to leave at 11 am and arrive in Chi-Town at noon (one hour time diff)

"There's a four hour layover in STL"

"Whatever gets me there. I'll take it."

The Airline Guy types a lot. He smiles, then winces. He continues typing and his facial expression seems to change with every keystroke.

Finally.

" Sorry. The connection is full. "

Good news, actually, because if I'd learned about this cancellation while stranded in St. Louis, I would have been really pissed- not to mention stranded in St. Louis.

" We have a non-stop at 3pm- would you like that?"

Sure- why not? I spend the first six hours of my vacation in the Richmond airport terminal. I read my entire travelling book during this wait and am forced to buy another -Nickel and Dimed by Barabara Ehrenreich (sp?) - excellent book, but it depresses the hell out of me because what she describes is familar territory to me- and it's so short I finish it before the plane reaches Chicago...in the spirit of her book, I do the math:
It cost me $13 and took two hours to read- that's $6.50 an hour to read. At that price, a $10 movie seems almost reasonable.

Highly recommended book nonetheless- use your library!

I finally get to Chicago right as the Twin is leaving work, so that works out OK.

He shows me to a coffeeshop w/ internet, where I sit at this very moment, waiting for the rain to let up, which looks to be happening now-the weather here is notoriously unpredictable.

In a few minutes I will catch a train to Lincoln Park and tour the Zoo- and the Twin has scored tickets to the Cubs game tonight (if the rain stops), so today looks pretty good- as long as it stops raining.

If it doesn't stop raining, I am screwed.

My brother doesn't have TV or a computer. He doesn't even have a working CD player, though this is due to a recent malfunction, not his obsessive Luddite ways. If it keeps raining, I will be stuck in his apartment with a cat and a book.

That's what I do pretty much every night at home - not what I came here for.

Please make it stop raining!