The idea was to get in a quick trip to Los Angeles to visit family. A day each way in the air, four days in California. But this time we were going to do it smart: Rather than worry about missed connections and cancellations due to bad weather as a result of flying through Chicago and in to either Albany or Stewart, we'd have a friend take us to and pick us up from JFK. There's rarely weather bad enough to cancel a flight in New York City, we reasoned.

Wrong!

The arrangements were great last week We arrived at JFK in plenty of time, were dropped off at the departure entrance, zipped through security, had time for a quick breakfast and we were on our way, on time.


We looked forward to the same clockwork effort on our return this morning.

But Sunday came word of a heavy snowstorm in the Northeast, particularly bad in New York. No matter, by the time our flight landed tonight, all would be clear, we thought. So it was that we awakened at 4 this morning L.A. time to learn that our 7:40 flight had been cancelled and we'd been rebooked for tomorrow through San Francisco and on to JFK.

An hour of on-line searching and waiting for "the next available customer service representative" later, our attempt to - irony of ironies - fly today through Chicago to Albany proved unsuccessful. So we're stuck here in L.A. another day, rebooked Tuesday morning from LAX to JFK.

Now, "stuck" may sound funny, given the nice weather here and the late winter storm back home, but I was expected to be in the office Tuesday morning ... business to be conducted and all of that.

But it is what it is. So, Orvil and Sue will have to live without me tomorrow morning on WGHQ. And a handful of other pressing matters will have to wait, unless the BlackBerry is sufficient.

The moral of the story: When it comes to airline travel, there's no such thing as a sure thing.