MY URBAN KVETCH

Opoli: A Car Service App With Professional Cred

At the "step-and-repeat" at the Opoli launch party in L.A., 6/26/14

Here’s a fun fact - I lived in L.A. for four years without a car. 

This fact is a stunner for many, who can’t imagine life in L.A. as a mostly-pedestrian; when they learned I was from New York City, many questioned whether I had ever learned to drive a car at all. (As a Jersey girl, I had.) Truth is, it was a challenge to live in this vast city without the great public transportation of NYC, and without wheels of my own. Cabs were expensive, public transportation was unreliable. But I made it work, by offering to drive friends to parties so that they could drink without worrying about impaired driving on the way back, and by borrowing or renting cars when I really needed it. It worked. But once I got my own car, things were obviously easier.

 

Naturally, as soon as I had my own car, Los Angeles saw an invasion of ridesharing services - Uber, Sidecar & Lyft, among emerging others - that offered cheaper-than-taxi rates for the vehicularly challenged or for people who didn’t want to worry about driving somewhere. As a (perhaps overly) cautious person, I found  something about getting in a car with a stranger to be slightly scary, but Lyft especially made me feel safe, as if no axe murderers would be driving around in cars with pink carstaches and giving you fistbumps. The drivers I spoke to were regular people - non-professional drivers, but making a little extra money in their spare time. Still, I was aware of some iffy legal issues (especially surrounding airport pickups, which have been banned for Lyft & Uber), and at the end of the day, these drivers aren’t commercially licensed, and like with a cab, there was no way of knowing what the charges were before you get in the car. An app called Opoli wants to change all that, as a first step toward finding you everything you need, not just a ride from A to B. But rides are what they’re starting with, featuring drivers who are commercially licensed and fully insured to transport commercial passengers. (My experience testing the app is below this ABC news video segment, plus an offer to a number of readers to receive $50 test codes.)

 

Two weeks ago, I got into a Tesla (with an Opoli driver) which took me to the Opoli (pronounced "opp-uh-lee") app launch party (because that’s a thing now). The company founder described it as a “next generation transportation app,” that gives providers (previously known as “drivers”) and users the opportunity (therefore the name) to communicate directly with each other. After the app suggests a rate, the user can raise or lower the rate and send it out to drivers; drivers - considering where they are, what time of day it is, whether they even want another fare or not - determine what their price would be. Then the user can peruse the incoming bids, look at pictures of the drivers and their respective vehicles, and accept a bid to reserve the car at that cost, and pay using the app (which is linked to your credit card).

 

The prices run a bit higher than Lyft, but you get a certified and registered driver, in usually a much nicer car, plus you can order a car in advance for a specific date and time (like those pesky early morning airport runs). My Tesla driver said that Uber takes 25% off of the total he makes. (Another Opoli driver estimated it as 20%.) But with Opoli, he gets to charge what trips are worth to him (and with a nicer car, he can demand more) - with no commission to Opoli, customers get better prices.

 

For instance, for my trip from the iPic Theater in Westwood to my apartment in Pico-Robertson, Opoli estimated a charge of $26, giving me the option to bid lower if I wanted. I went to $23: within a few seconds, my phone populated a list of 7 drivers with different kinds of cars, different rates (ranging from $20 to $75). I went with a very nice Lincoln Town Car for $20. On a subsequent trip, a Town Car from LAX to Pico-Robertson cost me $36 (about $10 more than a Lyft and about $8-10 less than a taxi). 

 

Thus far, I’ve been playing with “Opoli money” - a credit on my account that lets me test the app without actually spending any of my own freelancer cash. Depending on my budget and on timing, Opoli might be a nicer alternative that is just luxurious enough to indulge in every once in a while. And for small businesses that want to provide insured and officially registered car service from events - or for prospective dates looking to impress someone special with a night on the town free of the agita that accompanies driving and parking - I can imagine this app doing very well.

 

Because Opoli launched less than a month ago, they’re still working out some of the technical glitches. For instance, while the app predicts when your car will arrive,  LA traffic is enough of a beast to impact that prediction - my LAX trip was estimated as 25 minutes away, and I waited much longer for the car to arrive - at one point the app said the driver was 6 minutes away, and it took another 20. (But to an extent, that’s just that LAX loop for you.) One earlier version of the app wouldn’t retain the credit card information associated with my account, requiring me to re-enter it every time I wanted to reserve a ride - but customer service has been responsive to problems, and the drivers I’ve spoken to it love the freedom it gives them to determine which rides are convenient for them when. They are happy to drive, greet you with a smile, open the vehicle doors for you (many offer candies and bottled water in transit), and at the end of the ride, say - some of them almost gleefully - “thank you for using Opoli!"

 

While Opoli currently only provides access to car service companies (in Los Angeles county), it has its eyes on a future that provides many more opportunities than that, both for the providers and users. At the launch event, the company founders spoke about the platform as being more than just transportation - they imagined a future that enables consumers to find whatever they need, from a plumber to booking a hotel room. Beyond giving users the chance to name the value of the services they’re seeking, Opoli imagines itself as an opportunity to save small businesses, by offering them a chance to get their products in front of more consumers.

 

As Opoli works through its startup growing pains, the user experience will become more seamless, and enable users to access a fleet of experienced and licensed drivers with whom they’ve pre-negotiated a price for service. (If you’d like to be one of those test users, I’ve got a limited number of $50 codes so you can test it for yourselves…so drop me a line - myurbankvetch at gmail - and we’ll get you going...) 

 

Related articles

Disrupting the Disrupters: New 'Opoli' App Promises To Go Far Beyond Initial Transportation Platform to Bigger Breakthroughs in Social Commerce

Opoli App: Limousines On Call, No Pricing Surprises

Judge orders Lyft ride-sharing cars from operating until August hearing

Airplane Safety Video Battle: "Everybody Up Up" vs. "#VXSafetyDance"

I've been flying Virgin America domestically for a while; I love the inflight experience, from the order-at-your-seat refreshments to personal entertainment screens. The flight attendants seem capable and friendly (and took care of me most recently when I got sick on a flight). Virgin America has also always had a bit of a sense of humor when it comes to safety videos.

VA's previous animated video was jaggedly drawn, a bit jarring and edgy, chill and sarcastic, featuring a bullfighter who didn't know how to use a seatbelt and a nun who was traveling with more devices than you might think a woman of the cloth might acquire. And then a few months ago, a new video dawned on Virgin America - flashy, with choreography and different styles of music to drive the safety messages home, with karaoke-style subtitles to encourage people to sing along (and hopefully remember the instructions in a way that didn't induce the panic that comes with realizing that those safety instructions are supposed to guide us in the event of a catastrophic air event, but I digress, and yes, I do have airplane anxiety, why do you ask?). 

Tonight I just viewed a new safety video that must have been created to compete with (or perhaps, "pay homage to") the Virgin America style. The unlikely airline challenger? El Al, Israel airways, with a video with a kitschy, near-nonsensical vibe, that doesn't even attempt to rhyme and is so weird that I can't believe this is the first time I'm seeing it. (Video embeds and more discussion after the jump.)

Travel Diary - Esther Volunteers, Gate Agent Sneers

I'm not generally the person who makes a federal case out of delayed flights and travel troubles - this is the cost for modern airline travel. But last weekend, I flew back from New York on a flight that was severely delayed. And the fun didn't end there. This is the letter I wrote to the airline, submitted via their customer service form for Comments or Complaints  - name of airline redacted for now - with a few literary flourishes added for my discerning blog readers. - EK

Dear Major Airline,

Look, I get it. I understand that flights get delayed, that equipment malfunctions and needs to be fixed. And just to be clear, I want you to fix the equipment malfunctions, and if it even remotely looks like it can’t be fixed, I also definitely want you to switch to an airplane that actually works. I’m even willing to wait until there’s a plane that flies properly.

So when I write to you about Flight # R5-D4*, which had been scheduled to depart at 9pm on Sunday July 28, I’m not writing about the delay of 45 minutes, which turned into 2 hours, which turned into 3 before any of us stopped counting. I’m not writing about waiting in the airport, or the crew’s behavior up to that point – staff members were apologetic and responsive, giving us $25 vouchers for shopping to ease the discomfort of delay, and some people received meal vouchers too (I had already eaten on my own dime, so I didn’t track down those meal vouchers). The trouble started once we were loaded onto the smaller plane.

After we boarded, someone realized there wouldn’t be enough seats on a smaller plane -why this only happened after our full flight from the bigger plane boarded the smaller plane, I just don't know - and the flight crew asked for volunteers to deplane. I really, really wanted to get home as soon as possible, and wasn’t inclined to volunteer for deplaning, until they announced the benefits package: a first-class seat on the first flight out in the morning at 7am, an overnight hotel stay with transfers to and from the airport, as well as 600 airline credit dollars, good on flights anywhere with the airline. If I took the 7am, I could fly in first class, a kind of comfort only dreamed of, be at work at 11, and have “earned” some money toward a vacation or family reunion at a future date.

I rang for a flight attendant: “Do you guys still need volunteers?”

“I think so,” she said, “go to the front to ask them directly before you get your bags.”

Following instructions, I walked to the front of the plane, asked them, they said, “Yes, we need you, go get your bags and come back.” So I did, walking back to the back of the plane quickly, grabbing my stuff as the flight attendants had instructed me, and exiting the plane at the front.

At the airplane door, I reported to claim the first-class seat I’d been offered, only to be told by the agent that there were no first-class or business seats on the 7am flight, only coach. (The reason I stepped off the plane, if you recall, was the promise of flying back to LA in first class.) “What about the 9am?” I asked. Only coach, he responded. Fine, I agreed. I’d take an aisle seat in coach on the 7am. No aisle seats were available, only middles, he told me. A nervous flier to begin with, I couldn’t face flying in the cramped middle seat. I sighed. So much for getting to work at a reasonable delay. “What about the noon flight?” The noon had first class seats available, so I was booked onto that. Seat 2D. It wasn’t what I’d been promised, but it would do. I'd be able to get some sleep tonight, and relax and work on the plane in the morning.

I walked the long gangway back up to the terminal gate, and when I arrived, a gate agent glared at me and sneered, “What are you doing here?”

“I gave up my seat and was booked onto another flight tomorrow,” I said.

“Why are they still sending people up here?” she barked. I understood that it was a frustrating situation, and that it was around midnight at this point, but her frustration was now squarely centered on me.

“I have no idea, but I was told that you needed volunteers, so I volunteered, and was rebooked onto a noon tomorrow,” I said.

Then she took my ticket, and threw it away. “You’re going back onto that plane,” she said. “They shouldn’t have kept on sending people up here.”

“Well, they did,” I said. “I gave up my seat a while ago, and was booked onto a flight tomorrow. I’m not going back on the plane. I’m tired and I’m going to the hotel to go to sleep.”

“You’re going back on the plane.”

“This is not acceptable,” I said.

“Fine. Take this drink ticket.” Into my hand she had thrust a card the size of a business card entitling me to a free drink.

“I don’t want a drink ticket.”

“Fine. Take two.” She shoved a second card at me.

“I don’t drink on airplanes. It makes me sick.” (If you've flown with me, you know this is true.)

“Just use it for snacks, then. You have to go back on the plane. We can’t fly with that seat empty.” (Because as we all know, a plane NEVER flies with 32E empty. </sarcasmfont>)

A guy at the counter pipes up, “I’ll take the seat! I need to get out of here tonight.”

“You don’t have a ticket, you’re not going on the plane,” the gate agent said to him.

“Look, what I don’t understand is that you needed me as a volunteer five minutes ago and now you don’t. What changed?”

“There was a couple that was traveling together, so we gave them priority. You’re single, and because you’re alone, you need to get back on the plane.” (She might have said, “because you’re traveling alone,” but it was late, and – as a former singles columnist – this is the language I remember.)

After nearly three hours of delay, I didn’t want to be the person who held up the plane, so I picked up my stuff, and with one last line from me about the treatment being unacceptable, I returned to the plane, promising that they’d be getting a letter from me. The gate agent who had booked me followed me out, and gave me a consolation prize - a $100 voucher for credit toward a future flight, which forces me to spend more money on this airline before I can claim it, something I am not inclined to do based on this experience.

In summary:

• I was offered a specific package of benefits to convince me to deplane, and once I deplaned, that package (first flight out in the morning, first-class) was withdrawn for both morning flights.
• After I accepted the second choice deal (first class, but on a flight 5 hours later than promised) and climbed back up the gangway, I was greeted with inappropriate and unacceptable attitude from the gate agent.
• I was told that I had no choice but to get back on the plane because they couldn’t fly with an empty seat.
• I was treated rudely throughout the process.
• I agreed to return to the plane rather than to further delay the plane after a three-hour delay.  
• Aside from the gate agent at the door to the airplane who had made “the mistake” of booking me onto another flight after I deplaned, no one from the airline expressed any apologies for anything, not even for the truly appalling behavior of the gate agent inside the terminal.

When I relayed this story to others, they asked me if I had taken the names of the people who had told me to step off the plane, or the person who had verbally abused me at the gate. I hadn’t: I was extremely tired, and it didn’t occur to me that a company like this one would dangle one offer and substitute another, or that a gate agent would take her frustration out on me. I fly often between New York and L.A., and as airlines usually note, we all have a choice in air travel. Based on this experience, the airline has proven itself untrustworthy and I am extremely unlikely to choose this airline in the future.

It would help as a gesture of goodwill if you would follow through on the original promise - a first-class, transcontinental ticket on a future flight and 600 airline credit dollars – or at least credit me for the cost of the flight that the airline botched so badly. It has been suggested to me that I send this letter to the head of customer service and the president of the company, but I thought I'd try this channel first.

Thank you in advance for your attention to this matter.

*In the original post, I referred to this flight as TK-421, which was an inside joke for Star Wars fans, but which apparently led some readers to believe the errant airline was Turkish Airlines, which - of course - on a domestic flight JFK-LAX, it was not. You'll see if you follow the above link, that TK-421 famously left his post to check on some equipment on the Millennium Falcon, at which point he and his co-guard (TK-422, if I'm not mistaken) were attacked by Luke and Han who donned their uniforms to save Princess Leia. I have now changed this fake flight designation to R5-D4, a malfunctioning little red droid with a bad motivator, which is not entirely inappropriate, given my experience. Are we okay now, internet people?

Look Who's Talking (in Vegas, about Going Hollywood)

What happens in Vegas...is that I end up on a session panel at TribeFest, the conference/gathering for young (and youngish) Jews that JFNA is organizing at the end of March:

Pitchfest! Jewish Stories Go Hollywood!

Join G-dcast's Producer, Screenwriter, and a panel of celebrity judges in an interactive Hollywood style pitchfest. Each team gets a (very) colorful Jewish story that we promise you've never heard before and develops its own red carpet, scene-stealing pitch. (We'll coach you on how the experts do it.) Then send your best rep up on stage to dazzle the executives and convince us why YOUR story should be turned into an animated film. Big sunglasses provided. (Session produced by Sarah Lefton, with supporting cast turns by Sean Mandell, Josh Walters, and Esther Kustanowitz)

Since I'm the "celebrity judge" who lives and works closest to Hollywood (geographically, Beverly Hills ain't far), bringing the celebrity glamour will undoubtedly be my responsibility. So, who will I be wearing? Stay tuned to this blog for details about the televised red carpet coverage. (Jewels will of course be by Harry Winston - some traditions you just don't mess with.)

You can check out my new TribeFest speaker's bio here.

TribeFest Begins: Schmoozing & Food Complaints Expected

I'm sure that the food at TribeFest will be perfectly fine. But that won't stop us from complaining about it. For instance, when the Jews left Egypt - a place where they were enslaved - some of them wanted to go back because the food in Egypt was better. Also, let us not forget the great Hadassah Chopped Liver Incident of 1998. Those of you who were there remember what I'm talking about.

But all of this is preamble for the fact that as I type this, Jews ages 25-45 are converging on (if not already weekending in) Las Vegas, schmoozing, networking, dancing and getting their Jewve back. (That's a new word, people. Jew+groove. Combonyms are fun.)

Tomorrow the content begins, with sessions on various subjects, big musical performances, and the undisputed headlining component of the program, my session on "Passion to Paycheck," undoubtedly will be mobbed by folks wanting to crack the complicated, challenging world of Jewish communal service. So if you're going out in Vegas Monday night (the last night of the conference), prepare to hear this a lot: "OK, I'll go out, but I have to get up early Tuesday for 'Passion to Paycheck' at 9:45am."

I'll be there, representing all the organizations I usually represent at such conferences, and hoping to have some time to socialize with some friends old and new visiting from locations like Denver, San Francisco, New York, DC, Boston and Ann Arbor, MI.

I'm not sure how much time I'll have for blogging, but in the interim, you can get your fix from Twitter: follow the #tribefest tag, or check out my Tweets at @EstherK. If you're interested in how my first time in Vegas went, check out this vintage video from the Israelity Tour in 2008. 

And remember the adage: what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, as long as you don't bring 1200 members of the tribe with you. 

 

20 Things to Do in an Airport During a Snowpocalypse

And now, a slightly mad, but slightly comedic interlude:

20 THINGS TO DO IN AN AIRPORT DURING A SNOWPOCALYPSE

1. Create new and exciting hashtags for use on Twitter. Recommended terms may include: #snowpocalypse and its shortform, #snowpoc, #snowpoc10 or #snopoc. Also possible are #snowetry/#snoetry, #sno-mg/#sno-mg-d, if you prefer. Be creative! You’re not going anywhere!
2. Turn your curiosity into exercise! Count people who are sleeping on the floor in the exact same position, and every tenth one, poke with a coffee stirrer. Then run. If you get caught, just tell them someone asked you to make sure they were still breathing, and add a “you’re welcome!” at the end. Or opt for a more playful approach, and when they tackle you (or have you tackled by security) say, “OK, OK! Now I’m ‘It’”!
3. Examine the nutritional differences between an Odwalla Blueberry B Monster and a Naked Juice Blue Machine. 
4. Run around the terminal mimicking the flight pattern of the “JFK Birds.” This is not my hallucination. There are at least several small birds in the terminal, who have been here every time I have been here over the past 4 years. (Next time you’re at El Al at JFK, check it out.) Clearly they live here and we are visiting in their world: what better way to pay homage to birds who don’t want to live outside in a snowpocalypse than to run wildly about the airplane terminal where they live? Suggested musical accompaniments include: “Fly Like An Eagle,” “Free Bird,” and if you’d really like to make sure your snowpocalypse neighbors never forget you, “Bird is the Word.” (Sorry.)
5. Appreciate the simple, dairy-free pleasure of hot green tea and honey that you squeeze from packets into the paper cup that – even doubled – is impossibly hot.
6. Prepare lawsuit addressing the burns that may result from your use of the doubled paper cup which has NO warning whatsoever that the beverage you were about to consume was extremely hot and required caution.
7. Listen in on Israelis’ conversations (Hebrew-speakers only, sorry). Are they complaining, using their iPhones, or drinking lattes and eating yogurt parfaits? Give yourself one point for each of these activities in which they are currently engaging.
8. Count the Uggs until you can’t stand looking at them. Uggh.
9. Someone in the airport has really weird hair. Find him or her…NOW!
10. Shhh! Do you hear typing? Someone may be blogging your experience, right now! Find him (because, let’s face it, if it’s not me, it’s probably some Mac user who has figured out to hack into the JFK wireless without paying) and ask him if he plans to “tweet it out” when he’s done. Also, if he has hacked the wireless, obtain the code, because paying $8.95 a day for internet is bullshit. Power to the people!
11. Take bets: Which closed-locked-and-protected-by-a-metal-gate airport shop will open first? Upper Crust? Wok & Roll really isn’t a morning flavor, but who knows? Duty Free? Which stores will accept your airline food voucher? Which will run out of food first? Where will the food riots begin? There are literally nearly a dozen stores to choose from, and three of them are Hudson News, so choose your draft picks carefully in each category.
12. Think way back to before your flight was cancelled. You were sitting there in the airplane, waiting (and waiting) for the takeoff that never came. But what did come was a plague of screaming children. Not just one or two at various intervals, but a core constituency, constant, beginning as a frustrated hum and escalating to “bloody murder.” Now that you’re in the airport with time to spare, blindfold yourself, and let your ears do the walking, as you try to identify these children only by their screams. (“35E!” “Hapless dad with poorly behaved twin!”) Then feel sorry for their parents – even the best parent who is able to magically calm their toddler for most of the day is under stress now. Cut them a break, shoot them a look that says, “I know it’s not your fault.” And then find a spot without so many toddlers. Because your sanity’s important too.  And besides, all of those crying children remind you that you’d like to start crying too.
13. Place more bets! Which passenger from your flight is most likely to completely lose it and start yelling at airline personnel? Which one will fashion a shiv out of a comb and a BlackBerry charger, and who will be injured first in the resulting melee?
14. Play Jewish geography with the group of Birthright Israel kids who are leaving, or who at least think they are leaving. Later, they’ll sit on the runway for 9 hours until someone comes to rescue them, but for now, “who do you know?” will suffice as entertainment.
15. Wander into the airport bar, and wonder why Eric Idle is narrating the football match, and then realize it’s not Eric Idle, but some other British person. (It seriously sounds like Eric Idle, though.) Then consider getting excited about London, but realize that you may not get there.
16. Sit in the pub and wonder who could drink such an enormous beer, let alone multiple glasses of said beer.
17. Try to identify people in the airport who could understudy the cast of “Lost.” You know, just in case. Then pray they’re not all on the same airplane. Or at least, not on your airplane. 
18. By now you’re fully aware that lots of flights have been cancelled, as people from different countries and cultures flood the departures terminal. There is no better time to take up a new language, make new friends from other countries, or engage in racial profiling.
19. Cry. Again. I mean, this is ridiculous.
20. After the most violent outburst yet by members of your flight who are incensed by additional delays, be consoled by a sensitive guy in his late 20s who, amazingly, makes you laugh as you’re recharging your BlackBerry. When he tells you he’s on his way to London to meet up with his Ukrainian girlfriend, realize that things are on their way back to normal.

 

Snowpocalyptic Airport Sleepover 2010, Part 1: "What Blizzard?"

It’s hard to pinpoint the exact moment when I realized that our flight was never taking off.

Indications came early, as snow swirled light and fast en route to JFK, and intensified as I arrived at an airport with what seemed to be no designated area for my airline. A customer service desk, unmanned, bore only a sign with an 800 number to call for more information. Calls to that number went to an automated system which was never answered.  I reached out to @VirginAtlantic on Twitter and was informed that the staff would be available to help us slightly in advance of check-in, so we sat and waited, talking with fellow passengers about their long road to the airport. Many of them had been stranded by the previous closures at Heathrow – their New York vacation extended because they couldn’t get home.

As we sat there, the rumors started about a potential airport closure on the horizon, which – to any rational person – seemed, frankly, like the right thing to do. It would be annoying to go back to the beginning, but we’d understand. Snow every which way meant zero visibility and high winds. But that was a decision for the airline – and there were still no Virgin Atlantic staff members in the terminal. Nothing we could do.

The VA staff arrived, put up the signs, and started processing us in that long serpentine line that at the end of it you hope there’s a log flume or some sort of other lineworthy attraction.  And honestly, we thought there was – it was called VS004, and it would carry us to London. That was our light at the end of the long check-in process – getting to where we were going, for some of us, after days or weeks of delays.

And so we moved through the line, like links in a centipede, processing our checking and our seat assignments and our baggage. We took our bags to the drop point, passing them through a machine that scans for – what, exactly? – whatever it scans for.

As I moved toward the security line, I realized that I had forgotten to remove my neck pillow from my luggage and I sensed a mild disturbance in the force. I’d buy a new one, I thought, quickly followed by “hey, the flight’s going to be canceled so if I buy one, I’m going to have two the next time I fly.” The thought was fleeting, like the sleet, I hoped.

Then I joined the security process – even with no line, it is a process. Haven't flown in a while? You'd be shocked. All outerwear – coat, scarf, gloves, hat, sweatshirt – removed, in a bin. In a separate bin, the computer. In a separate bag, the liquids that are dangerous if their containers contain more than a collective several ounces. Oh, and shoes! Don’t forget our dangerous shoes! In some airports, you must put them in a bin. In others, you must under no circumstances put them in a bin! They are wily creatures, those shoes, which apparently present regionally specific issues when it comes to security scans.

That sleet turned to snow, the ultimate powdery white cliché covering the horizon and blotting out everything in sight. How would it be possible for us to fly in this weather?

Virgin Atlantic's Woes Continue - And I Have Only Begun to Blog....

As you may know, I was among those stranded at JFK Airport when a blizzard prompted the cancellation of hundreds of flights on December 26 of last year. My Virgin Atlantic flight  - which had been cancelled on the 19th due to a blizzard at Heathrow and rescheduled for the 26th at 6:05pm  - was cancelled after we sat on the plane for two hours because of a blizzard at JFK, and was rescheduled for 6:05pm the 27th, then delayed to 7:30, then to a boarding time of 8:15 that didn't happen, and eventually, after great protest from the passengers, finally took off after midnight on the 28th.

Virgin Atlantic still denies that passengers were due any compensation for the experience, even as JetBlue once again proves its menschier status by giving their stranded passengers 10,000 points, scoring customer satisfaction points among its inconvenienced passengers.

What's the problem? Why won't Virgin Atlantic make compensation to the 250 of us who were on VS 004? According to USA Today, Virgin Atlantic (via spokesperson Greg Dawson) claims that "monetary compensation is not due" to the people on our flight - who "had to sleep in the airport terminal because all hotels nearby were booked" - because the snowstorm was an 'extraordinary occurrence.'

Travel writer and the main Twitter voice of our Virgin Atlantic experience Jason Cochran hasn't given up on the idea of compensation, and continues to battle the customer relations and public relations departments via email.

But apparently, Virgin's petulant behavior extends far beyond our particular flight - according to Bnet's Brett Snyder, "Virgin Atlantic has decided it won’t pay Heathrow Airport’s owner BAA anything until an inquiry into last month’s days-long shutdown is completed. Virgin Atlantic is acting like an impatient child here, and runs the risk of making relations with its most important airport even worse."

This preposterous experience just doesn't seem to end. And least of all for writers. Because Jason is still on this situation - it's his job to be. And as for me, while I'm not spending every day fighting about it, I definitely have more to say. Because all the elements of this experience combined into something resembling a psychological experiment in how far people's patience can be stretched before someone cracks and goes postal.

Look for the first part of my recollections to appear later today.

Snowpocalypse! (video)

Some scenes from the snowpocalypse of December 2010 at JFK Airport. Taken around 7am, the morning after we were stranded at the airport. No additional music was added (except in the intro and outro) to preserve the eerie silence that we were all trudging around in.

Sleeping at JFK: Hot Tips for a Quick Nap

Stuck at JFK (or any major airport) overnight thanks to a Virgin Atlantic or other airline flight cancellation? Put off by a hard, dirty floor that's probably crawling with human germs and rodent feces? Well, get down off your high horse and embrace the inevitable - the human body can only take so much walking around an airport before you need to catch forty winks. Plus, if you ever get to that conference in the UK you're supposed to present at, you'll want to make sure you don't sleep through your own presentations! So here's how to get comfortable when there’s no comfort able to be found!

Step One: Scan & Select Your Space

As soon as it becomes clear that you'll need a place to sleep, the prime sleeping spaces will go quickly, so scan the terminal like you're the Terminator, assessing the potential spots for their potential comfort based on your internal programming: Are you seeking solitude? Heat? The company of others? Find a piece of floor that reflects your preferred sleeping sensibilities: if you stake out your own space, people may give you a wide berth, resulting in your own island of space in a crowded terminal. Or, if solitude is threatening to you (single females, you may wish to consider this) or is in a dark location away from the public eye, you may wish to seek out a trustworthy-looking group of similar-age individuals - this selection may be a bit rowdier or more brightly lit, but may appeal to your sense of safety and community.

Want to recharge as you recharge? Make sure to locate the "sleeping spaces" next to electrical outlets: if you have a power strip with you for some reason, now's the time to use it and become very popular.

Step Two: Sterilize Your Space

Make sure your chosen space is clear of obvious garbage that will muck up your sleeping experience - steer clear of sticky patches of spilled Coca-Cola or snowy wet boot tracks, for example. If you have 3 oz of Purell in your Ziploc bag of allowed liquids, now's the time to use it to sterilize the space. (Or save it, to clean yourself once you rise up from your nap.)

Step Three: Build Your Bed

Then spread out a blanket and – what’s that? You don’t have a blanket? Wrestle one away from one of the airline staff members (they claim they don’t have them, but they DO!). If your airline doesn't have blankets, you may go to another airline with a cancelled flight. They don't know who's on which cancelled flight, so the important thing is to get a blanket from someone before everyone runs out. You can then use it as a mattress (recommended for comfort and hygiene reasons) or as a first layer over your shivering body in contact with the near frozen floor.  and build a nest out of that and whatever you have on you: your coat, scarf, a hat pulled down over your face to block the light, an extra pair of pants stuffed into a laptop sleeve and used as a pillow: be inventive. It’s like Project Runway, only - let's face it - you are probably never going to get to the runway.

Step Four: Tweet Your Position

Obviously.

Step Five: Secure Your Stuff - To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Once you've built your bed, now's your chance to lie in it. But before you close your eyes to enjoy the wrenching back pain of sleeping on a rock-hard airport floor, make sure your valuables are secured to your person: this may entail things like using your computer bag as a pillow, threading a bag handle around your arms or legs so you'll feel it if someone tries to nick it, or trusting a virtual stranger who says he or she will watch your bags whilst you sleep. There may be a price for generosity like this - like your photo ending up on Twitter - but it's a small price to pay to greet the morning (or the later part of the morning) having had 20 minutes of sleep, isn't it? When you wake up, it will be time to battle with the rest of the hungry airport zombies for food at airport eateries with dwindling supplies, so you'll want to have had that 20 minutes to fuel your attack strategy. 

We at My Urban Kvetch hope that you've enjoyed this practical travel guide to sleeping at international airports. Stay tuned for other helpful guides about overnight airport bathroom survival and use of nearly useless food vouchers at eateries that don't accept them or have 200-person lines and minimal supplies.