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Fort Wayne, no Chicago, no Kansas City here I come

I was so looking forward to attending The Mouse Project fundraiser, but alas, mother nature conspired against me and last night I actually slept in my own bed.

My flight out of Kansas City was delayed because of severe weather. We sat in the plane for an hour before takeoff. By the time we arrived in Chicago I had seven minutes to make the flight connection.

Knowing it would be tight, I asked the flight attendant if there was anyone else on the flight making the same connection and if so, if he’d mind asking them if I could follow them to the next flight. Sure enough, there were several of us headed for Fort Wayne. We ran through the Chicago airport and made it to the gate (in another terminal) two minutes after the door was closed. What irritated me was that the plane to Fort Wayne had 20 seats maybe, and six of us were coming from this Kansas City flight. You would think that knowing we were on the ground and coming, United would have held the flight.

So, my newfound friends and I went to customer service where, despite severe weather and so many delayed flights, they had one customer service representative.

I tried to get on another flight on another carrier, but it was overbooked and the standby list was long. I even tried to see if I could get a bus the rest of the way. Nothing.

So, rather than get the next flight that would have had me to the fundraiser for a half hour, I decided to save the hotel and taxi bills on the other end and fly back to Kansas City.

Thanks to all the weather, however, we sat on the tarmac in Chicago, in a little plane none the less, for four hours. I didn’t get home until late. I’m glad I did it though because the flight I was supposed to be on out of Fort Wayne today was cancelled.

I am greatly disappointed that I didn’t get to attend the event. Becky Molter sent me the program and it looked like it was going to be amazing. They had a long list of silent auction items. Two ideas that I loved (saving them to steal in the future) were the live painting and hope toast. There was to be an artist at the event that would paint a painting during the course of the evening. The guests could watch, and it was sold at the end of the event.

The other idea was the hope toast. Guests could buy glasses of champagne for $20 for this special toast.

Mostly, however, I’m disappointed that I didn’t get to express my appreciation to all the people that make this event possible in person. I wonder if they truly understand what a big difference they’ve made in all our lives.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Unbelievable!!!! I am so sorry you didn't make it to Fort Wayne. Dumb weather storms. Anyway, you made it back home safely. -Julie

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