I am supposed to fly out of Tampa on Wednesday morning. I was to be using a non-revenue, standby ticket on Southwest Airlines. Why non-rev? Mainly because I had the opportunity and figured why the hell not…it saves me about $500.

However, now I am left trying to figure out how to play things. Tropical Storm Fay is set to come right through the Tampa Bay area on Tuesday night / Wednesday morning. The storm looks like it will be north of here already by the time my flight leaves, but that doesn’t mean everything goes back to normal at Tampa Airport.

You combine a standby ticket with probable flight delays and cancellations due to this storm and…well, it isn’t looking good.

Talk about timing.

I am monitoring the situation and may end up purchasing a one-way ticket to Seattle in order to get the hell out of here before the flight schedule gets all screwed up here in Tampa. Buying a ticket this late in the game isn’t exactly cheap. But, I need to make the decision soon. And the problem is that I won’t really know what this storm is going to do until it is bearing down on us.

As for the storm itself…it doesn’t worry me. Sure, it’ll mess some things up, but it is mainly going to be a big rain event. It doesn’t look like it will be a hurricane when it comes through. So, we’ll have flooding, down trees, maybe some lost power. But, I’m not worried about anything. Been there. Done that.

Except for it screwing up my flight to Seattle. We’ll see.

UPDATE: Fay is now shifted and they predict it will come in down near Ft. Meyers. For now, I have elected to re-list my flight for the early morning on Wednesday. Then, if I get bumped, at least I have every flight that day to get the hell out of dodge.