April, 1996 (continued): After my unforgettable with 400 Swedish student nurses in Växjö, I boarded a flight to Stockholm, where I connected to another flight that was to bring me to Ostersund, Sweden.
That second flight sat, fully boarded, on the ground in Stockholm for 45 minutes past its departure time.
Crew members repeatedly walked slowly down the aisle, counting the passengers; something was amiss.
Then a gate agent came aboard and asked each passenger to produce a boarding pass; each of us had one. But it appeared, inexplicably, that there was an “extra” unaccounted for passenger on board; there was one more passenger on the plane than there were tickets collected at the gate.
But everyone had a valid boarding pass. How could that be? Finally they gave up trying to solve the mystery, and our 9:05PM flight left at 10:00PM.
Upon our arrival at Ostersund, I was surprised to hear my name paged inside the airport. As requested, I reported to the SAS customer service desk.
“I’m Dan O’Day,” I said. “You just paged me?”
“Yes, Mr. O’Day. You just arrived from Stockholm?
“Yes.”
“May I see your receipt for your ticket, please?”
“My receipt?”
“Yes.”
That’s what’s left of an airline ticket after it’s been used. So I dug out my ticket and handed it over.
The SAS agent examined it, then exclaimed, “This is your ticket! You were supposed to give it to them at the airport in Stockholm!”
“I gave it to them at the airport. This is what they gave me back.”
“You should have kept the boarding pass but not the ticket. You caused the whole problem for everyone!” he said.
I was much too exhausted by this time to offer a crushing rejoinder, so I just shook my head and walked away.
But it really wasn’t my fault.
