Grant and I were scheduled to fly out of Appleton, Wisconsin early this afternoon (Monday) and connect with a flight from Minneapolis to SFO. When we got to the Appleton Airport (it was -16 degrees outside) the plane was there. Good. Unfortunately, there was no crew. Ugh! After a delay, Delta got a crew to take over the plane. No blame on that one. The awful weather caused havoc with flights.

We flew into Minneapolis for our San Francisco flight with plenty of time to spare. We walked to the gate. The plane was there. The plane had been there a while. We boarded. I stowed my warm coat in the overhead. I was home free.

Except I wasn’t. We experienced one of those ambiguous delays. We waited. We didn’t know what the deal was. Finally the pilot said they had to clean out the lavatories.

Really?

They didn’t do this earlier? I mean the plane had been there.

So we sat in the plane while the cleanup took place.

Except it didn’t.

A valve got stuck because of the cold and they couldn’t get rid of the “stuff.”

We waited one hour and fifteen minutes.

They told us they couldn’t fix the problem. They made us get off the plane. So I’m here waiting in Minneapolis. They say we will get a new plane. They say we will get home tonight. I sure hope so.

But, really, they could have cleaned the lavatories a long time before we arrived. As far as I’m concerned this is an all-timer. Delta dropped the ball big time. Is Delta a joke airline?