Doh! Got to the Airport a Day Early to Find my Flight Delayed Four Days.

Well, that's a bummer. The forecast was for some bad weather overnight,
so I thought I'd be smart and get a hotel near the airport to avoid having
to drive up tomorrow for a 2PM flight out of Cleveland, but as soon as I
got into my room at the hotel and checked tomorrow's flight, I found out
that my flight for tomorrow (Monday) was canceled and reschedule for
Thursday(!), but that's only the domestic part... my flight back to Japan
seems to have disappeared.

My mom had just dropped me off, but I didn't have a way to contact her
to come back and bring me back home, so I'm stuck here until after the
weather clears. At least I've got a nice hotel to pass the time in. It's forecast to be an actual -15°F / -26°C
tomorrow, with a windchill of -40°F (which is also -40°C).

I tried calling the airline (United Airlines), but they're
understandably overloaded, and the phone system won't even let you wait on
hold. I took the shuttle to the airport thinking I'd talk to someone there,
but a chat with a stranded traveler in the shuttle convinced me not to
bother, so I came back to the hotel.

I told the front desk that if they get full and someone's desperate
enough to want to share a room, the extra bed in my room is open. I hope no
one needs it.

Update later in the evening

Watching the radar, the line of approaching snow actually
started to recede a bit, delaying the worst of the problems, so my mom came
to pick me up and now I'm at my folks' place again. I don't know when I'll
get out, but it's sure a lot more relaxing to be here! I still haven't been
able to contact United Airlines, but saw on their web site that they'll
wave all fees and any fare increases for adjusted schedules, which is very nice.
I'll see how things look tomorrow and go from there.

Update the next morning

Cleveland has so far been spared the
worst of the snow, and some flights are getting out. If one believes
United's web site (which one should not necessarily
do), half the flights from Cleveland to Chicago have long waitlists, and half have no waitlist. Seems unlikely.

I did find my transpacific return to Kyoto in United's online system...
according to my current reservation as shown on United.com, they have me
flying into Milwaukee on Thursday and then leaving for Japan, uh, the day
before. Not sure how that's supposed to work.

The whole point of stopping by Milwaukee on the way home is to see my
dear friend and best man at my wedding Ram Kulkarni, so I've been
trying to find a way to get to Milwaukee or Chicago today, but United.com's
system says that I have to actually talk to an agent to update my
reservation, and when I call, after playing phone-menu hide-and-seek for a
minute or so I'm so far invariably met with “I'd like to transfer you
to an agent who can assist you, but unfortunately, due to high call
volumes, all our agents are currently busy. Please call us back at a later
time. Goodbye.” (Click the link to hear to audio. The intonation of
the final “goodbye” is somehow teasing, as if daring me to waste
more time.)