First off, I'm an idiot. I've flown out of Hartsfield-Jackson many times at this point, so I know the airport pretty well, but I still managed to start off my trip by missing my flight. In my defense, there was a fire in the terminal.
Like always, I got to the airport approximately ten and a half hours before my flight (one of my many crazy tendencies is to be waaay to early for travel), found my gate and was standing in line for coffee when the lights went out. We all stood around like jerks for about five minutes until the cashiers told us to get lost; no power no registers means no sale. So I roll on down to the gate and realize that I only checked the gate number against what was on my boarding pass, printed the day before, so I approach the desk and ask the THREE Delta employees if that was the correct gate for Flight # XYZ to Austin. They said YES. It turns out that that was not the correct gate for Flight # XYZ, but for Flight # ABC. So I missed my flight.
By the time I figured out what had happened and stopped crying (when you're the kind of girl that gets to the airport at 6 am for a 10 am flight, you cry when you miss it),I went to the Delta service desk where the very nice, but very frazzled employees explained that they could not get me on another flight, because no power means no computers means no flight changes. I used the courtesy phone and got another, later flight. It had to be from another terminal though because, although there were other, earlier flights leaving for Austin from the terminal I was in, no power means no computers means no boarding pass.
It was a good thing though, as the other Delta terminal was the big, clean, nice one, with a coffee place next to the gate and happy employees who had computers. I did learn two interesting things about an airport fire, one, even though the lights are off and the back-up power comes on, the Muzak NEVER goes away, and, two, the manual check-in of passengers is a skill still taught to airline employees but it really freaks people out. Old-fashioned stewardessing is pretty impressive.
I made it to Austin at about noon, which was cutting it close for the 1 pm lunch my Mom had planned for Kristy, her sister, their Mom and Rob's Mom. It was very nice, as it meant that my drinking started no more than two hours after my plane touched the ground. Other than the airport fiasco and some minor drama with Mooky (I always end up crying at some point during my visits home), it was a good weekend and Kristy seemed really pleased with the ceremony and reception. You can (I think) check out the very lovely pictures online. Kristy and Erin, her sister and maid of honor, both looked beautiful, and I managed not to break any cameras. See:
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