Due to a plane bedeviled by mechanical troubles, I was stuck late this afternoon at the Toledo Express Airport for two hours and 25 minutes. At one point, I was literally the only person in the main gate area, which leant an otherworldly, 28 Days Later atmosphere. As I eventually did, I learned the other three people on my flight back to Cleveland had retreated through security to the check-in area to await further updates. Realizing I’d miss my connecting flight in Cleveland, I phoned Continental, but they weren’t much help in booking another flight tonight, instead temporarily signing me up for a crack-of-dawn flight in to Newark tomorrow. I was fully prepared to stay overnight at my parents’ house in Cleveland.
By remarkable coincidence, as I deplaned in Cleveland, I overheard that the flight right next door was nearly finished boarding for LaGuardia. Without comment, I handed my now-invalid boarding pass to the check-in woman there, just to see what would happen.
“This isn’t for this flight,” she said after glancing at it.
“Can it be?” I replied, exuding all the charm I could muster through my weariness.
After a flurry of typing at a computer, she printed me a boarding pass and rushed me on board to take one of two remaining seats. I got to be that jerk who boards late and inevitably has a seat at the rear so the other passengers can form a gauntlet of annoyed glances and frowns. I don’t know what sort of strange magic that gate lady cast to get me on board so quickly, but I later noticed the stub of my boarding pass listed my first name as Abraham.