Dear Derek,

You're right. I should be grateful that Delta got me there alive. That's a good standard of service. Yep, when I ride the metro in D.C. every day, I always think, "Wow, I'm glad I didn't die."

And there were no incidentals outside my flight. I was delayed, sent to a different airport, and told I had to pay the difference, all by Delta. The place wasn't stressful or unfamiliar, dealing with Delta was.

Travel is not just difficult today, it sucks. But I've flown to Africa before, and it sucked less on other airlines, who also did not charge me extra for their ineffeciences.

Osama sucks too and you're right, it's fun to blame him or Bush for everything. But Osama didn't demand that Delta gouge me or yell at my friend. Let's have some personal responsibility, don't you think Derek?

all the best,

Michael

p.s. What rhymes with Sagar? Lager. Soccer (kind of). Mater, as in, alma.
That's it, you can call me Alma.

Michael,
Why do you bitch and complain about the flight being late because it was number 30th in line? Anyone who reads your article can quickly figure out that you are a spoiled child who always blame someone else for your own problem. Use your brain a little here, if you had enough money to rent your own private airplane, (for the same flight, probably costs you $200,000 round trip to Africa), do you think that little jet of yours will be able to cut in line and get to number one, just because you paid more?
Please keep your silly opinion to yourself, the next time you're trying to get a job at a real newspaper, someone will read this article and says "Oh dear, this guys bitches bitches and bitches, We don't want him here!"
You're not going to work for New York Times, anytime soon.

Michael,
Why do you bitch and complain about the flight being late because it was number 30th in line? Anyone who reads your article can quickly figure out that you are a spoiled child who always blame someone else for your own problem. Use your brain a little here, if you had enough money to rent your own private airplane, (for the same flight, probably costs you $200,000 round trip to Africa), do you think that little jet of yours will be able to cut in line and get to number one, just because you paid more?
Please keep your silly opinion to yourself, the next time you're trying to get a job at a real newspaper, someone will read this article and says "Oh dear, this guys bitches bitches and bitches, We don't want him here!"
You're not going to work for New York Times, anytime soon.

Michael,
Why do you bitch and complain about the flight being late because it was number 30th in line? Anyone who reads your article can quickly figure out that you are a spoiled child who always blame someone else for your own problem. Use your brain a little here, if you had enough money to rent your own private airplane, (for the same flight, probably costs you $200,000 round trip to Africa), do you think that little jet of yours will be able to cut in line and get to number one, just because you paid more?
Please keep your silly opinion to yourself, the next time you're trying to get a job at a real newspaper, someone will read this article and says "Oh dear, this guys bitches bitches and bitches, We don't want him here!"
You're not going to work for New York Times, anytime soon.

Dear Tom,

Thanks for reading! As my friends will tell you, I am a spoiled little child who does blame others for all my own problems. It's like you're psychic! But the other 200 people on each flight seemed to have a problem too, and they also seemed to blame Delta.

Unfortunately for your thesis, the flight that caused me to miss my connection was not late because it was 30th in line. That was the other flight. I may well not have a shimmering future NYT career, but I sure can tell time distinctions like: "Leaving Accra a few days later..."

I've always wanted someone to say, as you do, "Oh dear, this guys bitches bitches and bitches, We don't want him here!" There's nothing that makes me happy like being called "this guys." Hopefully it will happen again some day.

Wishing I had a plane,

Michael

There are many reasons why flights wait in 30-plane long lines. Most of them are not related specifically to Delta, nor ATC alone. And it was definitely not "JFK" airport. There is no such thing as a "scheduler". Whatever caused the delay was probably a confluence of issues. What day were you flying? I wonder if there was weather involved. And I don't mean only at the departure airport. I'm talking about at any airport enroute or destination airport. These systems affect traffic flows. ATC uses ground holds en masse when weather systems affect airspace. Safer to keep you all on the ground complaining than have you holding in the air slowly eating away fuel to minimums until the weather clears...Could have also been an aircraft ahead in line with technical difficulties, having to get the hell out of the way so that others behind it can move. Perhaps there were all international departures in line, with large "Heavy" category aircraft each requiring to hold for 2-minute wake turbulence separation before starting takeoff roll since the preceding departure would twist their aircraft like American 587 if they didn't wait... Or maybe it was too much volume on the route your aircraft was planned to use, and planes need to hold on the ground for spacing restrictions...Or m,aybe it was too much volume on the routes aircraft ahead in line were planning to use....As for Delta saying it was due to "ATC": blaming "ATC" as a cause for delays has always been the airlines' way of deflecting technical issues. I bet airline ops personnel are told to enter "ATC" when entering anything else would incriminate them or if they just plainly have nothing else to use...Whatever, yes I know Delta treated you poorly. You just had a bad day. Try and resolve the flight-reassignent issue with Delta, but please keep everyone else out of it.