My fun, accidental, double ticket day.

I'm one of those people that gets to the airport well before it is necessary. This is because of the fact that I have been on the opposite end of the spectrum many times before when I had a traveling job in the States. Running for your gate and frantically trying to get ahead of people in line because of your own poor planning is a horrible experience. Since I have a relatively laid back life at present, I don’t mind sitting in a terminal and paying entirely too much for a cup of coffee in order to spare my own sanity.

However, I think arriving a full day early is a bit much, which is precisely what happened to me today. I didn’t plan this, I was here a mere 2 hours early in my own mind but in-fact I was here 26 hours early. I blame no one but myself for this. Ultimately it was me that pressed “accept” on the computer last night at 3am and I frequently don’t know what day it is because my life is devoid of weekends or weekdays because I work exclusively online – the date or day of the week is, for the most part, irrelevant to me.

The fun part of this story is how long it took for me (or anyone else) to realize that I was here on the wrong day and also a bit of an eye-opener as far as the multitude of checkpoints that exist inside of any airport. It kind of suggests to me that the staff at these places aren’t really checking anything properly.

I managed to get through all of the following without anyone saying anything to me (and i was completely oblivious to the mistake until the end)

• the staff member at the check in counter line that is insuring you are in the right line
• the check-in counter where they give you your boarding pass
• the obligatory checking of your passport /boarding pass before security
• having my boarding pass checked again at the x-ray machines
• the actual scanner at the gate by the flight staff who let me on the jetway
• the people at the door of the airplane that tell you your seat is to the right even though that is the only way you could possibly go unless you are driving the plane

It actually wasn't discovered that i was there on the wrong day until i went to get in my seat and someone was already in it. In retrospect, I wish I had just lingered around a bit and sat down somewhere else because I was only asked to leave the plane once the flight attendant got involved and even then, it took a while before she noticed that my flight was actually tomorrow.

I had a good time figuring out how to get out of the “in only” security portion of the airport and then just went and purchased another ticket for another hour later.

I’m not upset about this because it is kind of funny, it only cost me $25 for the missed flight, and everyone was really friendly about the entire ordeal. What I am a bit concerned about is why do we have all of these checkpoint Charlies if no one is going to notice something like me being there on the wrong day? Did they just assume that I was interested in sitting in the terminal for a full day or was too stingy to get a hotel?

do you enjoy looking at documents and pretending to interpret them? submit your CV today!

I really just think that those people who work at these various points simply have a dull job and tend to, over time, just glance at what you are showing them and pretend to be an authority figure. The only thing that really concerns me is that the computers actually let me on the plane for the wrong flight. If this is something that one can pull off I think I will start buying $30 tickets and have a go at getting on the plane for far more exotic locations. Maybe just linger at the back of the line so that when I do get on the plane, all the remaining seats are probably unsold and then just sit in whatever is available.

I want to state and let you guys know that I mean it when I say that this entire scenario was an accident that was put into place by my own incompetence. I am not blaming these people at all... the mistake was entirely my own. What I am trying to point out is that we have these really annoying layers of "security" at the airport, and I got on the wrong flight and would have stayed on that flight, if only seat 51A had not been booked.