London, England Feb 1: Arriving at Houston-Intercontinental, Houston TX (IAH)

01FEB08 Houston-Intercontinental, Houston TX (IAH)

After what seemed much longer than an hour, during which I dozed off a few times as I was still tired from the Tel Aviv trip, I arrived at the airport at 7:12p, two minutes behind schedule. I cleared security after a little delay and then headed to gate C-23 for the 7:25p flight to San Antonio, TX (SAT). There were several passengers standing around so that meant they had not yet cleared standbys. I waited…

They were only able to clear one standby and the only reason why they were waiting was that one of the connecting flight had arrived in Terminal E which was a ways away. I did hear one customer complaining that it was ridiculous that the connecting flight was so far away from this flight. I am not sure what could have been done in that case though since customers connect to different flights. I assumed that his inbound flight was delayed; I think I heard him say he was coming from the New York area which was having bad weather.

The agent soon announced that the flight was full and that the next one would be at 9:15p; bummer, I was bumped.

After waiting to ensure that the flight had departed, I went to the Presidents Club closest to gate 44, our departure gate. There was also another flight from E10 at 10:55p, but I was hoping I would have to wait for that one. Luckily this was not the case.

I had a snack in the Presidents Club, checked e-mail and worked etc., until about 8:45p when I left for the gate. At the gate, I did get a seat, albeit a middle seat over the wing. I was extremely thankful though.