Brutality At Its Best

The title says it all, but I will begin to describe the problems I have had with American Airlines during my travel home for the holidays.

I was flying home for Christmas, it was Friday, it was 6:30 am.  I get on the plane and find out we are delayed for two hours due to bad weather in Chicago.  That’s no problem, not AAs fault the weather sucks in Chicago in the middle of winter.  We finally take off, and I land about 15-20 minutes after my plane takes off for Kalamazoo.  I call for rebooking and find out that they cannot rebook my flight for that day to Kalamazoo because all flights are full.  While on this call for rebooking I ask if I can get a refund on my ticket if I never take the flight, the guy on the other end of the line says yes, but I cannot put in the claim until I have completed my round-trip and that I could put in my claim online at http://www.refunds.aa.com/ I also ask him about my baggage since I wont be going on to Kalamazoo.  He tells me he will put in a note to remove my baggage and make sure it ends up at the baggage claim in Chicago.

I then go down to baggage claim, wait about an hour for my baggage to never come out.  I then get in line at the baggage service counter for American Airlines.  I tell them that my baggage never came out and the lady, very impolitely informed me, that they do not remove baggage from flights and it would end up in my destination city whether I was actually connecting there or not.  So, apparently, the guy on the phone was lying when I was told that my baggage would be removed in Chicago and I could pick it up at baggage claim.

Five hours later I arrive in Kalamazoo to pick up my baggage, because I was told it would be there.  I walk up to the American Airlines counter, give the woman my baggage number, and she goes in the back to look for it.  Not too long later she comes back with no bag, telling me that they did not forward my baggage to my connecting city, and that it’s probably still in Chicago, but they still don’t know where it is.  I give her my phone number and address, and they are supposed to contact me when they find it.  At this time they still don’t know where my baggage is (this is roughly 8 hours after I have landed in Chicago, and have traveled back to Kalamazoo).

Alright, whatever, I’m sure it will appear the next day, too bad I left my cellphone charger in my bag.  The next day comes around, and I really need to charge my cellphone, I don’t have an extra charger and no one I know in Michigan has the same kind of phone as me.  I call American Airlines baggage service to see if they know anything about my baggage, they still have not found it.  I then asked the guy on the phone since I dont have my luggage and my cellphone charger is in my bag, if I purchase a cellphone charger, would I be reimbursed by American Airlines, he says yes.  I ask him what the steps are for that and am told that if my baggage is not located and reunited with me in 24 hours, I just need to save the receipt of it and when I turn in my claim for reimbursement.  So I save my receipt.

I travel back from Kalamazoo to Chicago.  My flight is delayed due to some mechanical problem in coming in, and we are delayed even longer flying into Chicago.  I get into Chicago about 20 minutes after my connecting flight to San Francisco takes off.  I call for rebooking,  and am told its the last flight out for the night.  The guy I talked to on the phone tells me I am tentatively scheduled (if I never check in) to leave on the flight at 7:30 AM the next morning (about 11 hours after I have landed).  I go to the ticketing desk for American Airlines and try to check into the flight.  I am then accused of not trying to make my flight (even though I landed 20 minutes after it took off) and am also told I was never booked for the flight in the morning.  After some more waiting he gets me scheduled on the next flight.

7:30 rolls around when the plain is supposed to take off and the flight is delayed again (yes this is flight 3 / 3 that I’ve taken with AA that was delayed, although this time the delay wasn’t due to weather) .  We couldn’t board our plane because one of our flight attendants overslept and missed the bus to the airport.  Excellent.  30 minutes later we were finally able to board and got to take off.  I finally got home, with my baggage (this was on Thursday).

Today I try to refund my ticket at the website I was given before and was told my ticket was non-refundable.  It gave me a number to call, so I called it.  I was then told that they don’t do ticket refunds at the number I was just given from the website that told me they did, and was given a non-toll free number to call.  Ok, whatever, so I have to call this non-toll free number to see if I can possibly get a refund on this ticket that the guy on my first trip to Chicago told me I could get when I completed my round trip.

Since I had American Airlines on the phone, I decided to do what I needed to to get reimbursed for my phone charger I had to buy. I talked to the woman and she told me that I could not put in a claim because my lost baggage complaint had been closed (since I received my luggage).  She gave me the location in which I could talk to American Airlines customer relations to attempt to get reimbursed for the phone charger I should have never had to purchase.

I get off the phone, since they can obviously do nothing for me, and go to send in a note of my experiences to American Airlines.  Contacting their customer relations I was able to write a 1,500 character limit to explain the situation to them.  Except, that wasn’t even true, I was only able to type a 1,499 character limit, I tried to send one with 1,500  characters and it told me that my message was too long.  Excellent, so I have put in my complaint and am waiting their response.

I am far from impressed with my American Airlines trip.  Sure it was Christmas, and I actually wasn’t upset about any of my trip, except every time I found out that the previous AA employee I had spoken with was apparently misinformed of AA’s actual policies and in turn I was misinformed.  At the moment it looks like I wont be reimbursed for my phone charger or the flight I never took, but we will see how that goes.  Updates to come, assuming that I ever hear back from AA.  If only AA’s employees knew what their companies procedures REALLY were.

We’ll see if I decide to fly them again when I travel back to Michigan.  I guess it depends on how this one ends up.  Surely glad I am done flying for a long time now though.

So I have been in California (San Francisco specifically) for just under a month (4 days shy at the moment).  I am enjoying my place quite a bit and having a really great time out here, the weather is pretty nice, but gets pretty cold at night.  Everyone that lives in the building with me (~5 other guys) seem really nice as well.

I’ve been in my apartment for roughly 2 weeks.  I had exactly 0 cell phone coverage in my apartment.  I have received a new cellphone now, and have ported over all my numbers to my new phone.  I will be contacting people in the next few weeks, and for the next few days I will have both phones on me.  If you need to get a hold of me and are unable to via my old phone number (that 269 area code) please shoot me an email and I’ll be sure to give you a call.

Other than that, guess that’s about all I have for an update, been pretty busy with work, but the baseball season starts in two days.  So being next to the Giant’s park should be pretty exciting.  Until next time (and it might actually be a useful post then).

I have officially moved into my new place. It is pretty large for places out here, it’s in Downtown Castro. Its located roughly around Market at Castro.

So far I am liking it, I just got a new bed, which I am about to fall asleep in for the first time, so that should be pretty nice. I still have lots of stuff I need to do to make it liveable (like clean). But that comes tomorrow, as well as buying a lot of house goods!

And for now…That’s all I have.

Let’s try this one again.  I just returned back from San Francisco yesterday, it was nothing like I had planned.  I did not include the purpose of my last trip to San Francisco, but as you may know some of my friends work for a company called imeem.  If you haven’t heard of it, you may want to check it out.

Well long story short, I am moving out to San Francisco before too long (my flight leaves March 3rd, 2007.  So if you want to hang out with me, you better get a hold of me before Thursday, March 1st.  Otherwise, you’re going to have to fly your ass out to San Francisco to hang out with me…And that’s a long way, but I am totally worth it!

Maybe some interesting stuff will come up shortly that I can post about once I move out and this time remember my camera.

Well, I’ve just finished packing and am soon out the door. I am making a day trip to SF, but, I forgot my camera, so just imagine me taking pictures such as:

(I had to jump really high for this picture, it took me like 3 or 4 attempts to get it right, as a building kept getting in my way, But I think it turned out pretty well)

This was just some plaque I walked by, it’s kind of a weird plaque, I mean, it just floats surrounded by white as you can kind of see here. But I laughed when i saw it, I touched the white even. White means hot, I burnt my hand:

As you can also see from this picture of my burnt hand, I received quite the tan while I am out in San Francisco tomorrow. I am pretty excited for my new look, but not my burnt hand .

I rode one of these around for a while, but got sick and jumped off. Stupid motion sickness!

But after a long day of traveling it was time to enjoy nightlife!

I mean, I was right behind these people in Karaoke…they sucked, and I tore the place up… people cheered, a lot

You may wonder why it’s all boys, well, it is San Francisco after all.

After I was done Karaoke’ing, I met some nice ladies to sit down and have a drink with

They were all real fun (read: drunk). but the girl on the left scared me. She looked like that all the time, even when she wasn’t smiling.

Anyway, I got the girls three numbers in case I ever return to San Francisco.

My plane leaves tomorrow for there and I am very excited for the previous trip to happen. That’s about all for now, so until next time (read: about a year), that’s all I got for now.
Craig

So, it was just that time of the year.  I am officially graduated from Western Michigan University, and am now unemployed.  Those things coincide because of my student job, damn.  I have begun applying for jobs in the area, but I don’t really care where I end up, I don’t have anything tying me to any certain location, which is nice.  And between job hunting next week and preparing for that one holiday, I am sure I will be extremely busy the next week, awesome.  Thought I was supposed to get a break from all of that “real world” stuff.

I got to hang out with Laura for the first time in a while, it’s nice to be able to go out with her, we have a pretty good time together, and she is one of the more entertaining friends I have.  Mike, Laura and I went out to Shakespear’s for some beer and food, shortly after going to B-Dubs to meet my sister and her boyfriend for wings and beer.  It was a pretty good day overall, plus, I paid for Mike’s meal, so that means he owes me…or something (Or I still owe him, either way).

I am now zero for four.  Well I am not zero for four, but she is.  Something always comes up, so, I don’t even care anymore, maybe one day she will make it up, and if not, oh well, I am sure we will all live.  I’ve got more important things to worry about anyway, now I need to go find myself a career, and get a place to live, then I will start worrying about girls again.

That’s about it for now until I come up with something else equally as worthless to post about, or something totally awesome happens.  (Expect the former before the latter.)  Off to celebrate graduation with _MY_ friends.

I have joined the facebook AND myspace.

My friends consist of these people.
Sorry, you people will not be allowed to friend me, because you are not as HOT and COOL as these people are.

The end.

Yes, it is true, I am still alive.  I just got done with a not-so-eventful Holiday.  Katie came to visit on Tuesday, and we got to hang out for a bit, although she was gone by the time I woke up.  I was sad we didn’t get to make cookies, I could really use some!

In other news I am graduating in a little less than 20 days, so most of my time lately has been devoted to being able to do that, you know the whole needing to pass classes and all.  It seems that this year I actually have work to do…maybe I just care more about it this semester than previous semesters.

I’m still living with Mike, and that’s going pretty well, even if our place is messy most of the time, I put the blame on him (and me), but our place is clean now for a not-coming visitor…That’s like the third time now, maybe one of these times it will stay clean.  I doubt it though.

After graduation I do not know what I am doing yet, I will probably get some kind of crap job in Kalamazoo until I find a job in my major somewhere in the area if possible, but I’m not really tied by anything, I have no reason to be or stay anywhere, so we will see where I end up.  I should get back to applying for jobs, but I’ve been so busy with school work and regular work I have passed on keeping up with a lot of it.  Amanda just turned 21, so that was fun to go out with her, as well as Jen Kay recently turned 21.  All these youngin’s, make me feel old =/.

Well I guess that about updates my life, at least I can’t think of anything that is less worthless than what I just updated with.

Alright, so probably not THAT exciting, but still, it’s pretty exciting.

So whats been going on?  Not too much, I just bought a new computer desk, it is sexy, huge and now I have room for everything on one desk without making a HUGE pile of papers and such on my desk.  I am very happy with the purchase and I think it looks pretty good in the room.  I’ve decided I *probably* should put up some posters, I won’t but I probably should.

Terry and Jason were up this last weekend to help with moving and to participate in drink the beer.  I have decided we need to hang out more often, because when all of us get together, it leads to some pretty damn entertaining times.  We also ended up watching the breakup, and managed to miss the whole breakup scene, it was awesome.

Yesterday, Jen K turned 21, so we (Mike and I) headed out to the bar for a bit, it was good to see Jen again, I haven’t seen her in a while (she has been super busy, and I am a bad friend).    Oh, and then the point of the title, I got beads for showing my boobies nothing (free beads are so much better than those I have to flash for).  We couldn’t stay out long unfortunately because of homework I had to accomplish before going to bed.  At least I was in bed by 1:00 AM, too bad I have gotten in a “bad” (and by bad I mean good?) habbit of making late night phone calls to a certain individual (Yes, I keep Star up way past her bed time).
Think that about covers it.  However I suggest you all check out these songs, because, sometimes I listen to good songs .

KRIM - Something Better (Acoustic)

Celldweller - Stay With Me 

Oh and before I forget.  KATIE!!!

So I have a mid-range story for you this morning.  (Also please note while noting the time, you are in fact noting that this took place today.)
Picture this, it’s 9:00AM in the morning, well really 8:40, and my alarm goes off.  Usual morning start with me saying “Oh my god, it’s so early, why did I stay on the phone so late last night?”  So I figure, well if I get up in about 30 minutes I will still have plenty of time, right?  Right.  So I reset my alarm for 9:50 (my alarm clock runs ~20 minutes ahead because thats how I roll, some other time I will discuss the benefits to setting your alarm clock ahead and knowing how far ahead it is).  This will still give me time to get a quick shower before I roll into class.  I am still in bed at 9:50 AM.
Well I just kinda lay in bed some more, waiting for the energy to get up, and the time rolls around where I decide, either I get up now or I waste the money I am paying for classes.  I chose to not waste my money and make something of myself today, so i rolled out of bed, brushed my hair down with my hand and brushed my teeth.  I got dressed and headed off to class.  I look at my alarm clock on the way out, I am about 10 minutes behind where I normally am to make it class 3 minutes early.  I get in my car, drive to class.

I walk to my classroom and another instructor is in the classroom teaching, “wtf, mate?” I think.  One of my fellow students was sitting outside so I go talk to him.  I was like, so is class cancelled this morning or something, and this guy gives me a crazy ass look.  Not like “boy you are weird” but like “man you are dumb, what the hell are you talking about.”

He responds to me, “Dude, class isn’t until 10:00 AM.” I was like yea, I know that, what time is it.  He’s like it is 10 minutes after 9:00.  Well shit, I am really early it turns out.  Earliar than I wanted to be.  But at least I wasn’t late.

So to explain how I am so naive to think that it was an hour later I must blame my alarm clock, and the fact that I got roughly 3 hours of sleep (instead of the 4 dammit!) and decided to ignore every other clock I have (phone & car) on the way to class.  With that long explanation, my alarm clock is dying.  Last week when i was just laying there my alarm clock makes this really annoying noise, I thought it was a smoke detector, apparently it was my alarm clock warning me it was dying.  It set itself ahead 4 (yes four) hours.  I reset it at the time, and it’s reset itself ahead one other time just an hour. I guess it’s time I change the battery.

Ironically, I go into work, since I do not have class for another 45 minutes.  And I check my e-mail and I receive this from my professor:

“I’ve got a bad sore throat and can’t talk today.
So I’ve cancelled my classes (8:30 & 10) for
today (Tuesday Sept 26th).  I’ve emailed my
students.”

It’s now 9:39, remember that.