Typical America West Aircraft

BOFH Business Travel Rant

...but at least you get to travel

In the course of being in the computer industry for a few years, I've had the opportunity to do a fair amount of business travel, and let me tell you, it sucks.

Invariably when people learn you travel a lot, they think it's neat.

"Think of all the neat places you get to visit!".

Oh yeah. Let's see, I've seen the inside of computer rooms in 8 states, 4 countries and 2 continents . Guess what? They all look the same. They have raised floors with ventilation panels carefully located so as blow cold air up your pant legs for eight hours until your underwear has frost on it. The room has 10% humidity, but they don't let you bring in drinks and if you're lucky you can watch the disk drive lights for entertainment.

But, it get's better. You get to wake up at 4:00 a.m. and deal with the airline check-in. You'rea frequent flier, which means you get to board early, which means you plant your ever widening butt in the airplane seat for an extra 10 minutes. It also means that you get to hear every excuse imaginable for why your flight is delayed. Some real world examples:

Then you get into the city you're going to. If you're really unlucky, you've been there before, if not, you have a whole litany of things left to do.

I'm convinced there should be a Business Traveller Decathalon. The events would be:

  1. Sneaking a roller bag, computer bag, garment bag and small waterbuffalo past the gate agent onto 'carry-on'.
  2. Fitting a small waterbuffalo into the luggage sizer.
  3. Clearing security without them explosive testing your computer bag, while carrying a metric ton of C4 in your roller bag.
  4. Maximum number of times you can unbuckle and rebuckle your seat belt before the person with the window seat makes it on board
  5. Fastest out of your seat on landing to stand for time while everyone else clears out
  6. Fastest out of the rental car parking lot without knowing where you are going
  7. Maximum distance traveled in order to reach your hotel
  8. Worst television program watched at 2:00 a.m.
  9. Most expensive airport food eaten with the least taste
  10. Maximum alcoholic beverage consumption per day.
That list should give you an idea of how much fun business travel is. Here's what the typical itineray would read, if it were printed as it happens. 
Departure City: PHOENIX, AZ
Arrival City: SAN JOSE, CA

Day 1:
0400: Wake Up
0530: Arrive at Airport
0630: Scheduled Departure
0730: Actual Departure
0930: Scheduled Business Meeting
1000: Arrival at Destination
1030: Arrival at Rental Car Bus Terminal
1100: Arrival at Rental Car
1130: Arrival at customer site
1135: Departure for lunch
1300: Arrival back at customer site
1330: Rescheduled meeting
1335: Key meeting personell leave for previously scheduled meeting
1336: Start making small talk to try to make the time pass
1630: Customer leaves for the day
1631: Departure for hotel
1830: Arrival at hotel
1835: First drink from hotel bar
1850: Drink rest of dinner
2000: Stumble to room
2030: Check email
2031: Stop self from sending drunken email
2100: Turn on TV

2100-0200:  Watch TV 

TV: Schedule

2100-2200:  Biography -> The Osmonds
2200-2300:  ESPN -> 1998 World's Strongest Man
2300-2400:  HBO -> Making of the Making of the Summer Blockbuster
0000-0030:  ESPN -> 2000 Cheerleading Championship
0030-0100:  Local Channel -> George Formen's Fat-Guy Grill Infomercial
0100-0200:  A & E ->  History of the Toothpick

Day 2:

0600:  Turn on TV (ESPN -> Sportscenter, CNN -> Headline News)
0700:  Get out of bed
0710:  Start shower
0730:  Pack
0800:  Check out & eat breakfast

Breakfast menu:
Scrambled Eggs, Bacon, Sausage, Yogurt, Potatoes, OJ, Donuts
Cost: $18.00

0900: Arrive at customer
0930: Start rescheduled meeting
1030: End meeting
1100: Go to lunch with customer
1300: Race to airport to try to get an earlier flight home
1400: Arrive at rental car agency
1430: Catch rental car bus
1500: Arrive at terminal
1505: Find out the next earliest flight left at 1455
1510: Go to airport bar
1515: Start drinking dinner
1730: Finish drinking dinner
1830: Board aircraft
1930: Aircraft departs
2200: Arrive to home airport
2230: Get car
2300: Drive home
Sounds glamourous doesn't it! But it doesn't end there. You still have an expense report to do, and your email to catch up on, and you need to try to workout since you've gained 5 pounds in peanuts and alcohol.

And I know what you're thinking: Why in the hell would anyone stay up until 2:00 a.m. watching that shit? No one knows! But it's the way it always works.

But wow, you have a lot of those great frequent flier miles!