Old Man Morgan

Talk about a sucky day …. very long day of work. Then traffic was absolutely horrible. It took me 90 minutes to go 1.25 miles (as the crow flies). Thankfully traffic finally cleared up and I was able to go the last 4.75 miles in about 30 minutes. I HATE long commutes like that. It was also adding insult to injury in that the only thing I had eaten all day was a bowl of cereal for breakfast … and the only thing in the car on the way home was a diet coke. Finally made it home around 730pm. Ate dinner. Then started working on airline reservations.

Thank God I ALWAYS do my homework on reservations before using an agent. Initially the United Airlines agent tried booking me on a China Air flight. Then they tried booking me on a flight that costs $4,700 a person. Finally, I was able to redirect them to the cheaper, more appropriate flights. And, unfortunately, I was unable to use my frequent flyer miles (not an acceptable flight) nor our two $250 vouchers (because one leg of the trip is on Singapore Airlines). ARGH. Once all that was done – I received the confirmation and Decy’s name was missing – although I was charged for her. I went into the reservation record, found her, printed the e-ticket and noticed the spelling on her name was wrong. This was after 70 minutes on the phone.

Decy’s name being correct has always been critically important as the local airline counter (at check-in time) is always wanting a “fee” (aka “bribe”) for handling her ticket if the name is not precise. Thus, I am currently (again) on the phone with United Airlines to correct the name. Unfortunately, this type of fix is not as easy as it sounds. The original ticket has to be cancelled and a new ticket has to be issued. Of course, because there are 3 tickets on one reservation …. all three have to be cancelled and reissued … which means my credit card gets hit twice for the charge and then credited for one. Given that it is already the 22nd of the month and billing is around the 26th, it will be interesting to see if my billing statement includes one or two sets of charges.

After all the “excitement” last night, it then took me about an hour to relax before being able to go to sleep. Bottomline … it was well past 11pm when I went to sleep … and then up at 315am. URGH.

As mentioned in my last blog – please keep George W. in your prayers. Today is a key day for him … being as they will let him eat again and be doing another x-ray to see if everything is moving along ok. If his intestines are still blocked then they will need to seriously consider surgery which is not a good thing due to his age (less than a week old) and the fact that this is Indonesia.

Need to close this email and work on some things before going to work.

ciao ciao. GBU.