Sky Harbor Nightmare

It started out as a good day. What with the wonderful lunch at Carlsbad Tavern (an amazing lunch, spicy food) with mom, dad and my brother before taking off to the airport. That's when things went south as it were.

Mom and Dad dropped us off. One kennel, one bigass suit case containing our Xmas presents, and three smaller, more reasonably sized suitcases. Did I mention that in addition to Xmas presents, the bigass suitcase also had MANY pairs of shoes that Mom had given me, sandals that she no longer wanted to wear? Fred went to find a cart as HRH and I sat beside the mound of luggage looking forlorn.

A skycap approached. I told him my husband was off looking for a cart but his cart looked better. I called Fred. The deal was made. The skycap directed us to the special needs line where we ended up getting the attendant from hell.

"Hi," I said, walking HRH up to the counter. HRH was looking spiffy. Miss teflon hard ass was having none of it.

"Is that your kennel?" she asked. She nodded over to the kennel we have flown with for three times and never had anyone question us about.

"Yes." I'm thinking, "Do you see anyone else here with a dog? I don't." But I don't let any of that show on my face.

"It looks big."

"It's the proper size for a Labrador dog. We've flown before and not had a problem with it. In fact, they considered it an assistive device since she is a guide dog in training." That popped her head up and got me an immediate scoffing laugh and partial eye roll.

Great. She's a hater.

"It's too big. Hey Bob! Look at this. Can you measure this for me?" What happens next is a back and forth between Hatezilla and Bob about what the dimensions of the crate are and what the actual TSA limits are:

"33 by 23 by ... whatever... that's 72. The limit is 75. They are ok. "

"I don't think that is the limit. Did you do the front measurement right?"

Remeasures. Same result. "73, 72. They are good."

Hatezilla calls in for reinforcements. Nope. Limit is 68. Hatezilla looks at us. " That will be $100."

Fred says we can take it apart and clamshell it and make it smaller. Bob says, "OK. You really don't want to send it down there and then have it rejected."

I say "It's flown three times and no one has cared!" No one is listening to me.

Fred starts to take it apart. Problem. The screws that hold it together, aren't long enough now to hold the two pieces together. I start to feel all my clothing become two sizes too small as all the people in line behind us stare at our backs. My breathing gets a little rapid. "What is going to hold these two pieces together?"

"Tape?" Fred says.

"TAPE! Do you have any tape? Because I don't." This in my I am about to melt down right here voice, when all of a sudden, hatezilla says, "here's some tape." NOW she is helpful.

Gee thanks.

So Fred starts taping and I try to calm down and pull suitcases over for her to check in. "This bag is three pounds over." It's the Xmas bag. I start yanking out shoes, shoes, shoes, and more shoes. I can feel those people in line whispering. I want to turn around and say, I didn't pack all these shoes! I'm not a moron. I don't change shoes every two seconds. They were a gift! But they wouldn't believe me.

We put the crate up on the scale and Hatezilla says, "That tape won't hold. You should tape further down."

In a frenzy I grab the tape and start wrapping tape around the entire freaking crate. The passenger at the next counter has the temerity to lean over and say, "You should tape it around the edge of the two halves," but his wife yanks him quickly back away from me when I glance at him. Really! Is THAT what I should do?

Finished taping, I shove the crate over the edge toward Hatezilla and she hands us our tickets and ID.

"Have a nice flight."

I just walk away. We will never see that crate again. Fred says not to worry about it. People are smiling at us because of HRH. I need to get over this.

Fortunately, the TSA at Sky Harbor are very friendly. The people working the scanning line were super sweet holding everyone back and asking us how we wanted to have HRH go through the machine. She ran through wagging her tail and making everyone smile. I managed a small smile.

Then we met Bruce.

Bruce was the agent on gate A7. When we got to the gate, I went up and said that we had a service dog in training and did they have the bulkhead seats available. Bruce looked and said they were free, touched a key and said, oops, they disappeared. Then he looked at me in total silence.

Ok... Thanks for checking.

I returned to my seat. When we got on the plane the flight attendants completely ignored HRH as well. A complete city of US Airway dog haters....or at least people who don't care one way or another about them. It's just a shock from being treated so nicely to being completely ignored, but, that too I guess, is a good thing. You shouldn't get used to special treatment. And you definitely shouldn't expect it.

HRH curled up in row 15b just fine. In fact, she slept through the whole flight and was a dream. She didn't need the bulkhead. The guy in the seat next to us made my day when he said, "I was hoping I would get to sit in your row." That made up for Bruce and Hatezilla. Plus the little girl in row 14 turned around midflight and told me how pretty HRH was and how she had a black lab named Buster. She smiled at me the rest of the flight.

HRH has adoring fans. Life is back to normal.

Oh, ps, our crate made it through the baggage process!

Here is Fred carting it off the baggage claim.
Here is a close up of my amazing hyper-mad, "tape the whole frigging crate" tape job! Good job, huh?



More of my handiwork. Notice how low down I taped it. Fred's stopped midway. 8-)

The Trip to Phoenix

Our journey started off easily enough. We arrived at the airport about 6 am on Sunday. We have flown with US Airways before with Bingo and expeted them to be pretty good about Her Royal Highness. When we got up to the kiosk, there was one frantic guy behind the counter and a couple of ladies further down. I asked the guy if I needed to count her crate as luggage as last time it was considered an assistive device and we didn't have to pay for it. He looked at us and then away.

"Uh, let me ask." He called over the supervisor. Sure, she said. We do it for strollers and baby seats, why not for crates. "I'll sign off on it." He turned to another lady and said, "Can you handle them? I'm full with these." Then he wandered off to his other terminals.

Fortunately, he left us with an animal lover. She LOVED HRH. "Oh, hello lover!" She said. "You are a pretty one. Let me get you fixed up." Then she proceeded to get us set up with the crate, and checked us in and got us signed off.

Then we rode the elevator to the tram, which HRH managed very well. Security didn't blink at her. After the tram ride we got off and went to get into the security line but we were waved into a special line (read very short line). That was nice. We explained to the TSA people that this was HRH's first flight and we were going to take off her leash and coat and then one of us would go through and stand there and the other would hold her while the one on the other side would call her to come through. The TSA agent said to keep her coat on. Then I asked if I could film it.

"NO." Stern look.

"That's why I asked." Smile.

I went through and Fred held HRH. We had to wait for three people to pass and then HRH got to go. I called her. She ran through right into my arms. No problemo.

When we got up to the gate the agent was already working on getting us the bulhead seat and had called up a mom and her daughter. They were moved to an empty row and had an empty seat between them. The agent apologized that she couldn't move the other person in our row.

"No worries. You have been super. We really appreciate all of your help." I tell you, US Airways personnel have always been exceptionally nice to work with and very helpful.

Once we got on the plane, the flight attendents were awesome. They even told the boy next to us, "Once the flight gets in the air, there is a row three rows back that only has one person in it and has an open seat by the window. That way, you can have more room and can give them more room for their gude dog."

Sneaky and manipulative, these US Airways flight attendants. I like 'em! As you can see from the photo above HRH was curled up in one seat are only and didn't extend over into two other areas like Bingo did. She slept the whole way and was a very good girl. When we landed I broke away quickly to find a spot for her to pee and as I was going out to the South an attendant stopped me and said that there was an official spot for pets over on the North side of baggage claim (see photo below).



Sure enough, there was. Unfortunately for HRH it was right next to the heavy traffic noise of 5 lanes of traffic and she just couldn't do her business with all that noise and commotion and humanity looking on. She wandered around sniffing and looking a bit anxious. So we went back inside.

Mom and Dad came to fetch us and we were off to lunch and to deposit our baggage at the house. Our vacation had started.

When Dogs Fly

We took Bingo for his flight last Saturday. We used US Airways as our carrier. I was plenty nervous, but Donna had given us very detailed instructions on what to expect and what to do for different situations (she is fabulous!), so I had a pretty good idea on what was going to happen. I highly recommend US Airways for anyone traveling with a service dog! They were very, very friendly and accomodating.

At check-in, we were not charged a baggage fee for his kennel because the agent told us that the kennel is considered an assistive device, which I didn't know. That was a $35.00 savings and something that everyone traveling with a service dog should know. Perhaps it isn't the policy on all airlines, but it is US Airways policy and it is mighty nice of them! Check-in was a breeze. There was no documentation requested, however, I did have the following just in case I was asked: health certificate from the vet (something extra that is not covered by SEGD and which you as the puppy raiser will need to pay for), copies of his shots (just in case, I brought two copies in case they wanted to keep them for some reason, paranoid, that's me!), brochures about SEGD for people in case they are curious and a calendar for nice bribes in case you need them! 8-)

This photo shows Fred and Bingo facing the camera in front of a railing in the airport near security.

After checking in, we got on the monorail (Bingo had not one bit of trouble with it) and hit security where we were waived over to the employee gate. That was kind of cool. Then we had a bit of a hiccup because Bingo and I went through the Xray together and his training collar (metal) set off the alarm. So, we both had to be patted down. The female security guard was afraid of dogs and didn't want to pat him down, so another guard had to pat down Bingo and she patted down me. Of course, I am trying to be helpful and get him to sit, while she is trying to pat me down and the other guard is trying to pat Bingo down. Bingo is sensing that the coat is coming off and play time is starting, so inside the glass security box where all should be calm seriousness, it's a bit of Laurel and Hardy slapstick silliness. She won't get near Bingo; Bingo is leaping around without his coat; I'm not supposed to move, but am trying to get him to sit and put the coat back on; the other guard is telling him to sit and Bingo is ignoring all of us.

We did eventually make it through and find our gate. Fred will continue the saga.



Here's a photo of Bingo curled up between the seats on the plane, so you know we did make it onto the plane!