Trying to get home, sometime

[jay]

Last night I got a call from JL -- our 8am briefing to the deputy AA (NASA is divided roughly into 4 major parts, this is the #2 guy in the Aeronautics part) was cancelled. Okay, I thought, I'll sleep in a bit, exercise, catch up on email. Then two hours later, I was riding around with geekchick (we had a beautiful drive around the countryside, sunroof open ;) and another call -- not cancelled, but scheduled in the afternoon.

So I went to the local Kinko's (photocopy shop) and spent the rest of the evening making color prints of my presentation. McDonald's, again. Checked in to the new hotel in Arlington after midnight, talking to Nancy for awhile.

Then this morning, another JL message -- secretary called him and appointment is scheduled for 1pm. Fine, my flight leaves DCA around 4pm, no problem. 20 minutes later... the deputy AA calls JL and reschedules yet again, this time 2:30-3:30pm. JL leaves another message. Bzzzt. There were no seats available to San Francisco or San Jose from here after 4pm, when I last checked (Tuesday).

So... I'm now taking a momentary break from calling airlines. If I'm lucky, I can get on a Continental flight through Houston and get home around midnight. If not, I might have to come home tomorrow. I have nowhere to stay tonight if that happens. Sigh. patgreene has had to patiently deal with these last-minute changes before, but she has had a bad week already...

At least I cleared up a problem yesterday with our medical insurance -- they hadn't paid any claims since January, and we'd been turned over on several counts to collection agencies. They needed to confirm that we had no other medical coverage or co-insurance.

And yesterday's meetings... the FAA guys are uncoordinated. Different offices are asking for NASA to do different, conflicting roles. They aren't talking to each other. At least the food in the Dept. of Transportation cafeteria was good, far better than NASA's. Supposedly the Agriculture Dept. has the best cafeteria, must check that out next time.

And seeing Cathy yesterday was a big lift... (smile). I picked up an article of clothing from her to carry back for hopeforyou... hope that my luggage isn't searched! Whenever I fly home...

Comments

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

That level of messing about with meetings is unprofessional. To be honest, in those circumstances I'd have said that I couldn't do the 2:30-3:30 meeting because of travel arrangements. That was the third change, for goodness sake!

(and I have done that with stupidly rescheduled meetings before, and may need to again with an ESA meeting that might happen in 2 weeks, or might not)

If these people can't sort out their own schedules, they shouldn't be running 1/4 of NASA!

[brian1789.livejournal.com]

Actually, the 4th change if one counts the outright cancellation. And we finally met at 1:30, another change. OTOH, I'm trying to persuade the people running 1/4 of NASA to approve a new R&D program costing US$80M/yr for five years, so they're effectively the customer and I have to accommodate them. The same would be true of Congressional aides and the Office of Management and Budget.

While I like to get to see geekchick periodically, I can't say that I'm fond of this part of my job...