The Jotter of Rotter

What a trip it was: Last Wednesday, I was scheduled to go to Albuquerque, NM to present at the conference of the Southwest chapter of the Popular Culture Association (SWPCA). It all started, when I learned that the limo service that was supposed to pick me up informed me over the phone that they have to pick me up together with a Spanish colleague. Unfortunately, she was not done before 3:50, while my pick-up had been scheduled for 3:30. The car showed up at 4 (without my colleague in it) and it took another 15 minutes to pick her up. My flight was at 6 from Dulles. Fast forward: I did not make the flight. Nor any other flight that day. When I tried to check in, the ticketing agent informed me that I have to take my suitcase with me that I wanted to check . And, there would be only 20 minutes left to get through security and across the airport to terminal C. I ran to the security checkpoint which was crowded, tried to mail some of my “verboten” stuff from the suitcase to myself with the help of one of those new mailing machines. It was, of course, broken.

At this time, I realized that this is pointless. After returning to the ticket counter, I was told that no other flight would be available before the exact same flight the next day at 6PM. I got on a flight at 8:35 as “stand-by”, just in case. The friendly ticket agent gave me a voucher for a hotel room at a discount price. I had to wait 30 minutes in icy winds until the shuttle to the hotel arrived.

The next morning, I got up at 5, was at the ticket counter at 6:30 and got really unto the earlier flight to Phoenix. There, the whole “stand-by” game started over again. I didn’t make it on one flight, but the next, I got a seat on. I arrived in Albuquerque, finally, 20 hours later as originally planned. My luggage, of course, was still in Washington. I was promised that it would be delivered as soon as it arrived. Not until the next morning at 9, did I get my suitcase back.

The only sight-seeing adventure in Albuquerque, that I allowed my self was a visit to the National Atomic Museum. They had an exhibition on propaganda, which I found intriguing. I found some new posters for my various projects on propaganda and took pictures. It was interesting to note that Albuquerque’s taxis do not take credit cards. It took the bell stand 20 minutes to find the only one in town. Welcome to the 21st century!

The conference itself was very interesting. I attended a couple of sessions and presented my paper on German, Austrian, British and US War Bond Posters of WWI.

Since the airline had scheduled my return flight erlier than booked (6.:20 the next morning) I could not attend too many of the sessions. However, I was able to get a book contract from a publisher for my book on war bond posters and as a co-editor for an essay volume on European popular culture. I addition, they were interested to publish my dissertation in German.

After being picked up by the airport shuttle at 4:30 the next morning, checking in and boarding, the plane had to wait for 90 minutes to be deiced since it had started snowing. It goes without saying that I missed my flight in Denver to DC. However, this time I was lucky and could get on the very next flight, even with a whole exit row to myself.

Now, I am back with a cold and an anxiety for my next trip.