routines interruptedcanada 2016 – july(8)
click to read the canada 2016 posts

 
Driving up to Toronto and getting on a plane to Sault Ste Marie is amazing. The twelve hour car ride has become a 4 hour drive. My favorite part is Porter’s inflight service. They actually serve a nice red in glass tumblers.

The only hitch is Porter, as of yet, doesn’t have a phone-app for a digital boarding pass. The pass gets sent to email and you show the QR code in the email message. (For the trip up, I printed the boarding-pass and therefore didn’t have to fuss with email on my phone.) My parents take me to the airport and I convince them to not come in, because I am going directly through Security and the waiting area.

At check-in, I show the agent the QR code from my email using my phone. When I ask about Security, she reminds me that I’m early and can wait in the outside area. (I know I’m early and one reason is to go through security quickly and without standing in line.) At Security, the agent also reminds me that I am very early and then she asks for my phone. (Apparently looking at the boarding-pass isn’t enough.) I give her my phone and start loading everything – camera case, brief, laptop, belt, hat and shoes – onto the belt. Once on the other side of the scanner, I start putting everything back together. I’m sitting in the waiting area when an attendant announce that someone left behind their cell phone. In my head – OMG, what an airhead, like totally. A few minutes later, I go into my brief to check if any new texts have come in and realize I don’t have my phone. Guess I’m the airhead! I’ve taught myself how to use the phone-apps to check-in and get my boarding pass. I’ve not used my email to do the same and interrupting my routine and handing my phone over made me forget the get it back from the security agent. I retrieve my phone and start reading on the tablet.

When the plane is ready to board, I again show the email and am allowed to proceed to the tarmac. On the plane, the attendant is checking boarding-passes and when I go to show her mine, the email is gone. What the fuck! She politely asks me to sit and wait until she’s checked in the rest of the passengers; she will use her passenger list to verify my seat. The surprise was that the next passenger after me had the same problem – her boarding pass email had also disappeared from her phone. The problem got resolved and I went to my seat. (The email QR code had not been downloaded from the server and when I lost connectivity, I lost the email.)

Had to tell Rose the story, because she is compulsive about printing out her boarding passes fearing that the technology wont work and she will be left behind. Well now she has proof that her fears are not unfounded.