GusMan's Blog

... and no. Im not talking about my personal size.

Yesterday I was waiting for my flight to Cleveland and I hear the following announcement over the intercom before boarding an American Eagle flight"
"To those in the terminal waiting for flight xxxx for Cleveland, we are currently in an overweight situation and we are looking for volunteers to give up their seat in return for.... blah blah blah."

An overweight situation? What the heck is that all about? I mean I have heard about this before but that was during bad weather and we are talking about small Regional Jets after all. But for some reason, I thought I would listen carefully. Glad I did.

As we were getting read to board I heard "And the following people should not board at this time and do not approach the counter...Smith, Jones, GusMan...."

Oh what the heck... give me a frickin break. I was about to be bumped. And the next flight was like 6 hours later.

So I waited then I was called back up to the counter. I handed her my boarding pass and she handed me another boarding pass for the same flight. I was happy but then I saw that it was for a different seat. I was wondering why. I kindly asked if I can have my seat back and she just said to get on the flight and take the seat anyway. Oh, no problem. At least I was going to be on time.

Now, I could joke around and say that I was being picked out of a crowd to be bumped because I was a big guy. But the thing is that they had no idea who I was. But the fact was that now the airline has another way to screw with your flights outside of saying "its the weather", "we are oversold" or "you are too fat, you must buy another seat" In this day and age of airlines going under and customer satisfaction ratings going southward, you would think that they would have some ability to figure things like this out before someone gets bumped. I know that some like to get bumped and reap the rewards, but truth be told, hanging out at the airport for 6 hrs or more is not my idea of fun.

They said that those who bought their tickets last are the ones that got singled out. Dont know if that is true, but it is what it is.

But here is the deal... I just checked my flight for my return trip and now it says I must check in to get my seat assignment. Great. Now what are they going to do with me. I guess I should get there early and see what the deal is. How come I have a feeling that come Friday, my next blog entry is not going to be a happy one.

Oh, and by the way to those who actually read my blog... thanks much. I hope you enjoy them. If you have something you would like for me to write about, feel free to let me know. Im not looking to start a career in journalism or anything like that but I do like to write about many subjects or questions.

Later!
-Gus