Delta airlines???

Ok, just for future reference, will someone please offer to slap me the next time I want to fly Delta? This LONG saga has tales of delayed flights and [very] RUDE agents. We were at O'Hare with plenty of time for our flight. Not checking bags, because I've already recounted more long tales of lost luggage! After we checked in and got through security relatively hassle free, we should have KNOWN something was wrong....but about 30 minutes before our flight was supposed to board, we saw the board quietly change itself to a departure time that was an hour and a half later! No announcement, not even a "ding" like when they're about to make an boarding call. No explanation. So one or the other of us began to wait in a line to ask an agent......but Sunday must have been the day for every flight in the US to cancel or delay! Really. There was a group trying to get to Laguardia that literally stood (or should I say leaned full force) on the counter for 45 minutes. No exaggeration. There were only another 8-10 of us also wondering about OUR flights, but the gate agent did nothing to help anyone except for the party of 3 people monopolizing her time. Like...the rest of us were paying customers as well, and possibly we were missing potential re-booking because she couldn't just give us equal time. If anyone works for Delta (or knows someone)...I'm sorry for you...this rudeness was rampant all through the entire Delta concourse. Debbie and/or I tried to ask several other agents about our flight... everyone curtly said "you have to ask the agent at your gate!"...which, of course, we did NOT have!
I decided to call Delta and after several attempts got a woman who tried to re-book us. Gave us a flight to Cincy (same connection as our original) and then a connection through O'Hare! and then on to Paris. I'm just thinkin' here, why do I want to fly to Cincinnati, only to turn around to come back to O'Hare for a flight to Paris??? I speak the truth, I had to explain this to her 3 freekin' times. My sister is rolling on the floor beside me in hilarious laughter. I managed to make my "friend" on the phone see the ridiculous-ness of leaving O'Hare only to return several hours later and said "why can't we just stay here and THEN take the flight to Paris? Oh, now there's an idea. What she did not tell me was that we needed to go to the international terminal. She just said she had re-booked us on a Delta flight. Somehow I found one agent in the whole concourse who was nice enough to look up and treat me like a human being...she said, "oh, that's operated by Air France - you need to go to the other terminal!" Well, thanks for your help. Finally someone with solid info. We realized that now we just might have to hurry a bit...went outside security, found the escalator to the trains, which, as the agent standing there told us, come every 4 minutes. Except the one we needed. Seriously? After spending all that time trying to find someone to help us, now we're in danger of actually missing the flight??? Train arrives, we get on and ride FOREVER to the other terminal, where we sprint up the escalator to get in the security line. We now have 25 minutes till the flight. Get up to the security person, who says we have to get new boarding passes...all the ticket counters had been empty when we ran past them. We protested and another agent told us to bypass the line and come straight to him on our way back and he'd "whisk" us through.
Running back to the Air France counter, where there were now 2 agents, there was a lovely woman who listened to our explanation and immediately called the plane to hold it. Ah...of course...Air France is operated by courteous people!!! What a concept. Being that it's the "Paige girls" (as we are referred to) the boarding pass machine is out of paper. I do not kid about this. The agent is very nice, but has trouble loading the cards into the machine. Now, we know they're holding the plane and all, but still, how long will their patience hold out? She hands us the passes, asks if we have any serious emotional connection to our previous boarding passes (also a sense of humor? almost too much to handle in one day...) which we do not. We take off running again (needless to say, this is seriously aggravating my plantar fasciitis) and find the agent who told us to come to him for immediate help. You may not believe this, but when we got there, he said, "just let me check these children through, they're going to Poland" (yes, we have Polish ancestry...however in this particular situation, we failed to see how that was more important than our flight leaving in 8 minutes) We waited for a minute or two, but even as we stood there, more children got into the line! We lost count at about 30. Debbie, who isn't particularly known for her assertiveness, says to me, "we're not doin' this" and promptly cut across 2 lines to - yes - "jump" the line to be first. You go girl! Now we've got to take off shoes, take out computers and liquids...and...I wish I were joking, but just ahead of us there were 3 20-something gals who practically unpacked their entire suitcases and then had about 3 jackets each to remove...we considered crashing the metal detectors but then realized the consequences of that would truly make us miss our flight. I get through first, begin putting on my shoes, and hear my name "would the Jill Winch party please proceed immediately to your gate?" Oh, ok. We were thinking of getting coffee first! Like..... we had just made a career of running through airports!!! We get to the gate and onto the plane. Took our first real breath since we started this whole process...found our seats and they were the last 2 in the section, against the bulkhead. (as in, they will not lean back for sleeping?????) This is one of those, "am I here?" moments. Before sitting down, I asked the attendant if there were any other seats available that would lean back...she, of course, told me we had to get in the air first, but she'd check.
We were in the middle of the row so each of us had to step over someone. (would this story be any good without that little tidbit?) The asian lady on my side wasn't too happy and made it difficult for me to get into my seat. Which, as you may surmise, made it more difficult to get out again when the attendant came back a little later to tell us there were 2 other available seats.
We moved, thinking these people will never see us again anyway, which probably made all parties very happy. Looked at each other and said "we're on our way to Paris!"
Flight so uneventful we were a bit bored after our day's experiences...(NOT!) Good dinner, not a great selection of movies...less than desirable amount of sleep. I always think that the other people who seem to be sleeping must be pretending just to make me jealous!
Sometime during the night as I woke up to go get a drink of water, I saw some pink light and realized, if it's a Monday morning sunrise, we must be in Paris! (isn't there a song something like that?) Cabin lights were turned on and breakfast began to be served. Ok, maybe it was only something LIKE breakfast. I've had some great meals on Air France flights. This was not one of them. Not even in my imagination (which is quite fertile sometimes). Their coffee is traditionally terrible, and the sour yogurt and hard roll seemed more like prison rations than food. (cutbacks everywhere I guess).
Once on the ground, we walked...s l o w l y....toward the passport control. Thank the Lord we had not checked any bags because at this point, there's no telling where they might have been. For now, we had all the time in the world and didn't intend to hurry for at least the next couple of days. Had a long wait...who cares?...some fun conversation with a young single mechanical engineer whose company was sending him here for 3 months to work (he thought he could get the work done in one and then travel around the country for the next 2...smart guy...cute too...where is my niece Mandy when we need her?) Once Deb got her first ever passport stamp, we were officially in France! Bienvenue at Paris.