What is Blue, Red and Grey, weighs 55 tons, has 262 eyes, can fly 504 miles per hour, but takes 28 hours to go 700 miles? A Delta Airlines MD-88 full of people!!! If you dare, read the incredible (but true) saga of one Intrepid frequent flyer's attempt to reach a land called NEW-ARK, which in the ancient tongue means "the far away land of smog and tolls.". TITLE: The never ending story of the never-beginning flight Fade in: July 10, 2007 Our story starts with our Intrepid Traveler parking at Atlanta Airport-Park and Ride. Jauntily he pulls his mid-size SUV into a space mid-way down a row of 50 mega SUVs. "That'll be easy to find in the middle of the night" he thinks. He expertly pops the hatch and proceeds to un-trunkify his rolling bag and laptop case. "Drats!" he exclaims. Something's amiss with the rolling bag. He quickly surveys the supple grain of the ballistic nylon, the luscious curve of the wheels, and the sexy handle peeking from its hiding place. "Why won't this handle come up?" he asks the bag. "Rise handle...I command thee!" Still not working. He examines the bag and sees it was made in China. " 上升把柄 !!!!" he says in fluent Mandarin. Still nothing. Stupid bag. Resorting to actually lifting his bag like some sort of leisure traveler, our hero trots off to the shuttle bus thinking, "If I'd known I would have to carry this bag, I wouldn't have filled it full of gold bricks". But on with our story… Finally arriving at the Terminal, our Intrepid Traveler "de-metals" himself by putting watch, belt, Blackberry, as well as various platinum and gold teeth (gotta keep' it real…Hommie) into his laptop bag, while retrieving his previously printed boarding pass. Stealthily and fox-like, our Intrepid travel casually saunters up to the First Class/Gold - Platinum Medallion line even though he's only a Silver Medallion!! The stress of this elaborate ruse is beginning to show on our Intrepid Traveler. He's been out of the spy and espionage game a long time. The line gets shorter and shorter. Our Intrepid Traveler begins to pull at a non-existent neck-tie, the sweat begins to puddle in his arm pits, crotch and shoes. His eyes dart back and forth. "Must...remain...calm", he thinks, forestalling the impending myocardial infarction (Heart attack to those that didn't attend Harvard Medical) . "Boarding pass and I.D. Sir", the steely-eyed Government (TSA) agent says. Our hero produces the paperwork, while summoning the guts to look her straight in the eye and say "Here ya go". "Have a nice day Sir", she says and hands him the boarding pass and Id back. "Ha!" thinks our Intrepid Traveler, "stuck it to the Man once again". Gradually, our Intrepid Traveler makes his way onboard the plane, surprised that he's been upgraded to First Class. He sits in his incredible comfortable Naugahyde covered lounger and watches the pleading faces of the "Zone 3 and below" folks stalk to the back. He laughs silently. "What a retched bunch, can you make them stop looking at me?" he says to the Flight Attendant as she hands him a Magnum bottle of Dom Perignon, Beluga Caviar and a napkin taken from the Forbidden City in China. Gradually the plane fills to capacity, people and luggage shifting in a swirling cesspool of human activity. The plane door is shut....then opened...then shut. "Faulks, from the cauck-pit", the P.A. says, 'weer goin' ta be dee-layed here just a biit". Apparently there are weather patterns in D.C. "Doesn't D.C. always have weather?" Our Intrepid Traveler thinks. Finally the plane pulls back, taxis to the runway and stops.... For 3 hours. It's summer and there isn't any air conditioning on the plane. There's even a fly walking because there isn't enough air to support flight inside the metal cigar case of death. Finally, as the passengers plot to decapitate the lead flight attendant and drink her blood in place of those cute bottles of water, the Captain announces that they are going back to the Gate to get more supplies. Which they do. More water, more Sun chips, more yummy Biscoff cookies. Now, back out, taxi to runway...wait....another 1.5 hours. The Captain announces "weer goin' bak to da gait", without explanation. Everyone looks to the flight attendants for information like baby vultures look to their mother for carrion, the plane door pops open and in walks a SENIOR Delta Customer Service agent. It said so right on his name tag. "Thith flight ith cancthelled", he lisped with an air of command. Great, thinks our Intrepid Traveler. But he'll be able to get on one of the next three flights into Newark. The Senior Customer (No) Service agent continues, "The next two flights are also cancelled and the last flight of the evening is oversold by 15". "Everyone hath been re-booked on flight-th leaving tomorrow". "Great!" thinks our Hero. The Intrepid Traveler attempts to make a quick call to Delta on his Blackberry. OK, turn it on…. Wait for it to power up… It's finding a signal… Now click on the Phone icon… Text in the word "Delta"… It finds "Dever". NO…DELTA. It finally finds it. After several attempts he gets through to Delta customer service. After a lengthy wait, he's informed he's been put on the 10:00am to Newark. Still enough time to make his afternoon meeting at least. "Not a bad way to spend 8 hours doing nothing", thinks our Intrepid Traveler as he heads for the parking lot. Day 2. July 11th Fade In. Same scene. "The 10:00am flight has been delayed until 10:45am. "OK, cutting it close, but still time to make it to the afternoon meeting", thinks our Intrepid Traveler... Finally, at 10:50am, our Intrepid Traveler boards the flight, this time relegated to lowly coach. As the plane fills to elbow-jostling full capacity, the flight attendant announces, "folks, we are going to be delayed a bit longer...Our pilots aren't here". "What!" thinks the Intrepid Traveler. "They are kind of important". At 11:45, the pilots board from another delayed flight. At 12:15, they find a problem in their pre-flight check. One of the battery back-ups isn't working. The Captain radios to the mechanical crew that they need a replacement. Mechanical apparently tells him they don't have that part. The Captain announces " Faulks, they are lookin' for the part now, I'll update you IF they find a replacement". At 1:15pm, they find a replacement and install it. At 1:55pm, we take off toward Newark. Forward to Secaucus, NJ Apologizing profusely to the new Reed Connect users of "Customer A" who have agreed to stay from 5-7pm, our Intrepid Traveler aches for the breakfast or lunch he hasn't eaten. Thursday, July 12th. After training the new users of "Customer B", our Intrepid Traveler starts making his way to Newark airport while apparently every car in New Jersey is attempting to block his way. A 20 mile trip turns into a 2 hour ordeal. Getting to the terminal just in time, he prints his boarding pass from an automated kiosk and picks up his (non) rolling bag and computer case. He runs through the terminal toward security, looking like some elegant Gazelle...with luggage…that doesn't roll. Finally making it to his gate with minutes to spare, he sees it. Flight DELAYED 1 Hour. At this point, our Intrepid Traveler SNAPS! Using his remaining business cards, he disembowels a random Delta employee with paper cuts. It couldn't be helped; his defense will stand up in any court of law. The other waiting passengers declare him their new King. After allowing others to kiss his ring and accepting tribute, our Intrepid Traveler boards and sits in his MIDDLE seat. Not very King-like. As expected by now, our Intrepid Traveler hears the now expected news over the plane's P.A. system. "Foulks, this is yur Cap'n speakin' it seems we've been dee-layed another hour". The 5:55pm flight finally did take off just after 9pm. And they all lived happily ever after... Except for that lady that threw up in the bathroom before the plane even took off. I threw her out over Cincinnati … or maybe I didn't.