Mistake

I seem to be making more & more mistakes as I grow older. The latest was when my lovely wife decided to go to a Women of Faith thing in St.Paul, MN. Our son-in-law pointed out to our daughter who passed it on to the L.W. that it is cheap to fly between Milwaukee (our favorite airport in the region) to MSP (Minn-St.Paul) and they would be glad to pick her up.

So I promptly made reservations in the afternoon (since it was easiest for Scott to pick up my L.W. after work) for the flight there & evening for the flight back (so it was after the event). The flight was $108 with taxes & fees which was a reasonable price. I sent the reservation info to Tera, Scott & the L.W.. No one noticed that the flights were for the week before the event! Only when I was talking to the L.W. that there was plenty of time before something else she had to do & she said the thing we were talking about was the same weekend as the Women of Faith. I told her my interpretation of the date & she corrected me (we checked the web site for the WoF event but as usual the L.W. was right & needless to say I was wrong).

So then I tried to use the website of the airline where I had purchased the tickets to change the reservations for a week later but it told me I would have to call the airline 800 number. This should have warned me of dire consequences. I called the airline & was told the tickets were non-refundable/non-transferable/non-human. He told me that if I paid the small fee they would give me a credit for the tickets; this seemed like a reasonable idea since I had made the mistake. Turns out the small fee is $150 (remember above the price of the ticket : $108); so I could pay the $150 plus the $108 I was already out or a total of $258 or as I did today re-booked the flight as a new flight (with the L.W. checking to make sure I did it right this time) for another $108 for a total of $216.

So now we have a E-Ticket for 2 flights from MKE to MSP (one of which we can't even give to someone else to use) for one flight to St. Paul & back. It is best to not make mistakes!

Wise men profit more from fools than fools from wise men; for the wise men shun the mistakes of fools, but fools do not imitate the successes of the wise. Cato the Elder

Laughing at our mistakes can lengthen our own life. Laughing at someone else's can shorten it. Cullen Hightower

No one who cannot rejoice in the discovery of his own mistakes deserves to be called a scholar. Donald Foster

Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake. Napoleon Bonaparte

An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field. Niels Bohr

mistake (n) an action or judgment that is misguided or wrong • something, esp. a word, figure, or fact, that is not correct; an inaccuracy
ORIGIN late Middle English (as a verb): from Old Norse mistaka ‘take in error,’ probably influenced in sense by Old French mesprendre.