Making Plans Is Just Asking For Trouble
My friend Dawnie has come out to visit from Des Moines a couple of times. When we don't have any formal plans for when she arrives, she gets in on time When we have formal plans that revolve around a specific time, bad things happen.
Last year, she was flying in through Denver and was supposed to get in at the end of the workday. We had a big group scheduled to go to Margaritaville for dinner and the plan was to just pick her up on our way there. Her plane in Denver got held up then made repeated return trips to the gate for "fixing" before it finally took off. We ended up picking her up on our way home from dinner at Margaritaville.
She was due in on Friday afternoon at 4:45. We thought it was good that she wasn't going through Denver this time as they were having some bad winter weather. We were wrong. She flew in via Dallas and the Big D had gotten our windy weather from Thursday. Her plane ended up circling for 45 minutes before landing making her 10 minutes late to her connecting gate.
All in all, none of us were really surprised.
The plan had been for me to pick her up on my way home from work, drop off her luggage, pick up dinner and head to The Rocket Scientist's house for a poker game that was set to start at 7. Since she was now not getting in until after 8, that wasn't going to work. When she called me to say she missed her connection, she told me to text her TRS' address and that she would take a cab to there since it would be in the middle of the game.
It's not far from the airport so I thought that was a reasonable solution. I would have offered to do the same if the situation was reversed. According to my friend, Annette, it was not reasonable at all! I sent her a text to let her know Dawnie was coming in late because I figured she might want to skip poker as her reason for going was really to see Dawnie and not about the poker. She asked me if I was going to pick her up and I relayed the cab idea. Oy vey! Did I get a major guilt trip out of that. "You can't give up one night of poker to pick up your friend?"
I told Annette she was a better friend than I.
But, I started feeling guilty anyway. While I was picking up dinner, I sent Steven a text asking what his plan was. His reply was that he had no money to play poker so I made him an offer. Pick Dawnie up and I'll buy you lunch tomorrow when we all go out.
That started a huge rant about how he hates the airport so very, very much and that it's not fair that he can bribe me with food, blah, blah, blah. I did make the standard comeback: get a real job and the food bribe wouldn't be effective. Since he was probably getting lunch from me anyway, I think it was nice that he finally said he would go.
Steven delivered Dawnie without any problems. Her plane didn't get in until 8:45 and I was still in the tournament so he was a good plan. My backup was Shorty. I'm sure he would have done it even though he hadn't even met Dawnie yet.
Two lessons learned: don't make timely plans when Dawnie comes to town and don't tell Annette nothing.
Last year, she was flying in through Denver and was supposed to get in at the end of the workday. We had a big group scheduled to go to Margaritaville for dinner and the plan was to just pick her up on our way there. Her plane in Denver got held up then made repeated return trips to the gate for "fixing" before it finally took off. We ended up picking her up on our way home from dinner at Margaritaville.
She was due in on Friday afternoon at 4:45. We thought it was good that she wasn't going through Denver this time as they were having some bad winter weather. We were wrong. She flew in via Dallas and the Big D had gotten our windy weather from Thursday. Her plane ended up circling for 45 minutes before landing making her 10 minutes late to her connecting gate.
All in all, none of us were really surprised.
The plan had been for me to pick her up on my way home from work, drop off her luggage, pick up dinner and head to The Rocket Scientist's house for a poker game that was set to start at 7. Since she was now not getting in until after 8, that wasn't going to work. When she called me to say she missed her connection, she told me to text her TRS' address and that she would take a cab to there since it would be in the middle of the game.
It's not far from the airport so I thought that was a reasonable solution. I would have offered to do the same if the situation was reversed. According to my friend, Annette, it was not reasonable at all! I sent her a text to let her know Dawnie was coming in late because I figured she might want to skip poker as her reason for going was really to see Dawnie and not about the poker. She asked me if I was going to pick her up and I relayed the cab idea. Oy vey! Did I get a major guilt trip out of that. "You can't give up one night of poker to pick up your friend?"
I told Annette she was a better friend than I.
But, I started feeling guilty anyway. While I was picking up dinner, I sent Steven a text asking what his plan was. His reply was that he had no money to play poker so I made him an offer. Pick Dawnie up and I'll buy you lunch tomorrow when we all go out.
That started a huge rant about how he hates the airport so very, very much and that it's not fair that he can bribe me with food, blah, blah, blah. I did make the standard comeback: get a real job and the food bribe wouldn't be effective. Since he was probably getting lunch from me anyway, I think it was nice that he finally said he would go.
Steven delivered Dawnie without any problems. Her plane didn't get in until 8:45 and I was still in the tournament so he was a good plan. My backup was Shorty. I'm sure he would have done it even though he hadn't even met Dawnie yet.
Two lessons learned: don't make timely plans when Dawnie comes to town and don't tell Annette nothing.