Day 1: San Diego to Pensacola Part 3
By JoeBruin88. Filed in Career and Travels |Tags: airport, Career, Dallas, Navy, Pensacola, Travels, work
2:21 AM PST San Marcos, CA
It’s late. And I’m just wrapping up packing my luggage. I’m off to Pensacola, Florida again for the third time in two years. This time it’s with a great company and for the Navy. I’m headed over there to train some Navy Instructors on the new virtual learning product our company helped design.
More to write later.
6:50 AM PST San Diego Airport, CA
So I’m finally at the San Diego airport terminal. The flight through Dallas is going to be full. Fortunately, last night I “checked in” electronically and chose an aisle seat on one of the last remaining available seats. Checking in my bags was interesting. We totally missed the American Airlines gate so I had to walk all the way back to the other end of the terminal. Instead of doing curbside check in, I decided to go upstairs where the line was really long. Fortunately, the self check-in line was very short; I guess a lot of people did not have electronic ticket or something. One guy in the self check-in line did not know what to do with the “computer”. I guess he couldn’t follow instructions on the monitor, so an agent had to check him in even though it was a self check-in line. Going through the security check was even better so to speak. This lame foreigner (I can only guess of Arabic descent given the accent, body odor, and the Koran in his briefcase) did not understand the security agent when she asked him to remove his coat and shoes. When he attempted to go through the metal detector, the other security agent sent him back to the line that was being held up, and he finally removed his coat and shoes. I pray he and his fellow “Arabians” are not on my flight.
At this particular gate there is no wireless access point, so I have no Internet access. I’m hoping there is a wireless access point when I get to Dallas because I need to check my email for some files that I’m expecting via email. I’m actually waiting for two screen shots of the product in order to finish one slide on my presentation. The screen shots I needed were not available on the product web site.
11:05 PM CST Pensacola, FL
Well, I’m finally getting a chance to blog tonight. I just finished going over my first presentation and notes for tomorrow morning. I’m looking forward to it. I’m less nervous now than I was last week about training these Navy Instructors on our product, which is good. I know this product very well and I feel confident in my abilities to explain it to them.
The flight from San Diego to Dallas/Fort Worth was pretty uneventful, about two and one-half hours. It was a crowded flight and the seats were not comfortable. There was not much space and my arm was constantly touching the arm of the person next to me, so I kinda felt my personal space was violated for two hours straight.
On the flight I spoke briefly with a teacher, Celeste, that taught biology at Rancho Bernardo High School in 1993 when I was a student teacher there. How strange that she happened to be on the same flight. It was only a day or two ago that Josephine was telling me about how Celeste returned to the Poway Unified School District to assume a principal position at one of the elementary schools. When I was talking with Josephine right before I boarded, I thought I recognized Celeste’s heavy southern drawl and her face. So when Celeste passed by my seat on the way to the lavatory on the plane, I asked her if her name was Celeste and it was! She was travelling to North Carolina to see her parents and she had her two young children with her.
The Dallas airport was huge. It was the first time that I had been in it; I like it. I decided to eat lunch at the airport instead of waiting until the late afternoon in P’cola. So I found a Chili’s restaurant and had a BBQ Burger, fries, and a raspberry iced tea. It was very filling and good.
After lunch I only had about 20 minutes before boarding the next plane to P’cola, so I decided not to pay for a T-Mobile Internet access point since I figured I would be boarding the plane soon. Well, turn out the plane was a little late and there seemed to be a clog in the runway flow, so we ended up taking off at about 3:30 PM CST instead of 2:51 PM CST. I slept for most of the trip. I didn’t even want a beverage to drink because I felt so tired.
Towards the end of the flight, this annoying infant seated behind me with his mother woke up and started crying. Then the rude, stupid mother allowed this baby to play with the seat tray behind my chair and the baby pounded and jumped on the tray, as well as opened and closed it. I did not say anything because I figured it was just a baby, but I wanted to slap the mother silly for being rude and inconsiderate. That boy is probably going to grow up with poor manners and a sense of entitlement like the rest of teenagers of this country. But anyways, I digress. The baby also had poop smell coming out from his diapers and every once in a while, I would be treated to a whiff of that raunchy soiled diaper smell.
I was finally glad to arrive in Pensacola at around 5:00 PM CST. After picking up my cool rental car, I used my Google map directions to find my way to my hotel room. I think the mileage estimates on the Google directions were inaccurate because the hotel was much further than two miles away from the airport. Nevertheless, I did not get lost and I arrived safely.
When I arrived at the hotel room, I was surprised to see what a dive this place is. My hotel sucks compared to the last two business trips I had here where I stayed at the Holiday Inn Express. And I thought that place sucked. This one is funny. I just hope I don’t run into any cockroaches. There are at least three good things about my room: free wireless Internet access, the motif is blue and yellow (gold), the two best colors in the world, and the shower has hot water.
Time for bed. I have to get up early and check out the “Complimentary Deluxe Continental Breakfast Buffet.” I think I’ll wake up at 6:00 AM, head to breakfast at 7:00 AM or so, then head over to Corry Station, where I am expected at 7:30 AM. My briefing starts at 0830 hrs. Wish me luck!