Mr. Wong goes to Chicago – 2050hrs

Well, I flew out of Portland last night into Philly without a hitch…then caught the second leg of my journey to Omaha into Chicago where my luggage was kind enough to greet me!  That was around 2200hrs last night… decided that since my next flight wasn’t until 0930 this morning, and as I’m getting older and don’t like to sleep in terminals too much these days…and I had ALL my luggage (couldn’t check it into the next flight that early)…I figured I’d bite the bullet and pay for a hotel room at the Hilton O’Hare.  VERY nice…VERY swanky (had a 53″ LCD in the room which was nice…as was the leather recliner!)…of course the room rate reflected that niceness…but I digress.

So I get up and outta the Hilton and into the airport through security and all without a hitch…hang out at the gate…got there an hour and a half early.  Per United instructions, you just sit and wait for them to call your name to assign your seat TO you…so I wait…and I wait…and they start calling for boarding… and still I wait.  The get DONE with boarding… and I wait… (yes, I DID check with the gate person on the status of my seat…both times was told she would call me).  So I wait some more… “Final boarding call to Omaha”

WTF!?!?!?

Finally the gate agent says, “We’re sorry sir, we’ve over-booked the aircraft and need to bump you.  For you compensation, we’re going to put you up in a hotel for tonight, and give you a free round-trip ticket good to anywhere in the US good for one full year.  The next Omaha flight isn’t until tomorrow morning at 5:40am”

Um..okay?

So… I’m holed up at the Wyndam hotel in Rosemont Village… bored, Mr. Wong appeared about Noon and decided to grab a subway train ride into down-town Chicago!  Visited the Sears Tower and went up to the Skytower on the 103rd floor, then proceeded to walk around downtown Chicago for the next four hours!

So… wake-up call at 0300 for tomorrow to get over the airport for the 0540 boarding (BTW…I’m pre-booked with a seat assignment for that flight!).  Here’s what Mr. Wong saw today!  (Click the image to jump to the photo album and see the rest of them)