Shaunce and her husband, first-time flyers, booked flights using Orbitz. They were going from their home in Houston to Mexico, and they had to change planes in Dallas.

At DFW the screens said that their flight, scheduled for 4:45, was delayed until 5. Shaunce asked something which might have been "Does that mean we'll be boarding at 5 and taking off half an hour later?" or might have been "We only have to be here at the gate 30 minutes before departure, right?" or might have been something else entirely. The American Airlines employee said, "Yes."

Shaunce and her husband strolled around the airport, and when they returned to the gate the flight had been closed. Their bags had been taken off. The plane left.

Shaunce yelled and cried and called the employee a liar for half an hour at which point the airline employee finally said she'd given them the wrong information and gave them a hotel voucher. The hotel was not up to their standards, and the airline provided neither a rental car nor food. Shaunce is very upset because the employee wasted her money (they had non-refundable stuff in Mexico for that night that they didn't get to use) and it was her wedding night and all.

At some point in the future (we learn from the Orbitz letter that that's in June) 20 couples will be flying with Shaunce and her husband to Mexico (where Shaunce and her husband will get married, according to the Orbitz letter, which kind of makes you wonder whether some of this "It's our first night married!" drama is there fore effect). Shaunce wants American Airlines to show her that she really should fly American despite this interaction with the pants-on-fire employee who put them up in a hotel overnight. (And, yeah, 42 passengers is going to make a big difference to an airline these days, so they may very well want to pacify her in some way.)

And on the subject of how this was the first night that she and her husband (whom she will be marrying in June) were married, Shaunce would like everyone at American to think about how horrible it would have been if on their honeymoons they had missed their flight. Any people who haven't been on their honeymoons yet should just imagine how horrible it was for them.

For whatever it's worth, I have not had a honeymoon and am not planning one, and I like Dallas, although I think there are almost certainly hotels there that I would like better than the one Shaunce visited.