Tearing across...

terminal C, pens, coins, and sweat flying off of me, on the verge of passing out in exhaustion, I reached Gate 25 to be told that I had missed my flight. Couple of things that struck me - a) I was way, way out of shape than I had thought I was b)Missing a flight probably ranks somewhere up there alongwith...I actually cant think of anything like it...in terms of dissapointment/sadness/'miserableness'.
And it didn't end there; it was time to get on the Stand By list - a long list headed by lots of sad faces like mine, and me the 25th one (or 27th, it was too pathetic to make much difference anyway.) Flying stand by is bad enough but with so many ahead in line, it was a forgone conclusion I was not going to get anywhere near Chicago in the next couple of days. After hanging around and watching people with 'Confirmed Seats' breezing by I had to do something. The rainbow after the downpour, unexpectedly, was a very helpful Continental Customer service rep. who offered to change the ticket at no extra cost to next weekend. I'm not sure if that's standard practice (I was specifically told that it was a special "Passenger Courtesy"), but I atleast left with a another confirmed ticket in hand.