Sunday, September 23, 2007

the end of the luggage's adventures

Sept. 13th. 2007


Hi Everyone,

I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying the fall semester. You may
remember that British Airways lost my bags while flying from New York
to Brussels. A traumatic experience, as I was forced to wear Mike
Lashinsky's ill-fitting slacks for a week straight. When I came home
from Europe, I called British Airways every day for about a month
trying to track down my bags. They were in Milan, Paris, on a
Lufthansa flight to Dallas, they spent about 3 days circling the
Carousel at JFK and then back out to Dallas. A really nice summer
vacation for my dress shirts.

BA eventually stopped returning my phone calls and I basically gave up
on the whole thing. I had bought new clothes for work and had almost
forgot how much I enjoyed wearing some of the ties I owned. But this
morning, September 13th, at approximately 5:15 AM, an unmarked white
van stopped outside my house. This woke my step-dad, a light sleeper,
who went to the front door just as the van was pulling away. At his
feet, a crumpled black garment bag. Not immediately recalling my
ordeal with BA, he was nervous about opening it. Was it garbage? A
message from Don Corleone? Terrorists? He finally saw the tags on the
bag and, realizing what it was, brought it inside.

When I woke at 6:30 and shuffled to the kitchen for breakfast, I saw
the bag on the floor. Christmas in September! Tearing open the bag
like there was a Super Nintendo inside, I found all my shirts and ties
were folded into complex origami shapes. No flashy new (old) wardrobe
today. A summer traveling the world can do that to a suit.

For the record, it has been 12 weeks since I left for Brussels. BA
claims that the average turn-around on misplaced baggage is 72 hours.
I'm not a statistician, but I think I may have beat the curve on this
one.

Again, I hope everyone is doing well. I miss you all and I'll always
remember our time together in Brussels.

Best,

Conor