THE AIRPORT — We got to Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport before 7 a.m., because My Beloved Wife and I are experienced post-9/11 travelers. Northwest Airlines, however, no longer behaves like an experienced carrier. Elaborating will just make me mad all over again. But we arrived at the airport in New Hampshire after 11, got the rental car and arrived at our motor court in Ogunquit, Maine, a bit after midnight, not the planned 7 p.m., entirely because of flub-ups by NWA (that’s Northwest Airlines abbreviation for itself, while our home airport is XNA).
OK, a snippet: The NWA agents at XNA were two amiable and patient young men in polo shirts and cargo shorts; they were luggage handlers substituting for the two agents on break at the same time and for well over an hour. We had been rerouted, and NWA sent the e-mail to an incorrect address. The first flight left at 6:15.
The twenty-something couple behind us learned from the guys they were rerouted and would have several unexpected hours waiting in the Memphis airport. Then a woman got in line, a one-time Wal-Mart exec just hired by another company, who told us her flight number was right but it had left a half-hour earlier than she had been told. MBW or I should have phoned the airlines a week earlier and obviously also a day earlier to reconfirm but: It wasn’t just us.
Handler One: “Dude, what’s the abbreviation for Manchester?â€
Handler Two: “Let me look it up. Dude, it’s ‘MHT.’†-30-
