This morning, I was at Love Field shoving a microphone in the face of Southwest Airlines passengers for the second time this week. They all had the unmitigated gall to show up, expecting a flight.

Then I had the unmitigated gall to think, “Hey, there’s a Burger King across the street from the airport. You know what I need? A Croissan’wich.” Loyal Scaiaholics will recall I’m a strict adherent to the Gluten Plus program, so really, I needed to head over there.

In fact, a couple hours earlier, we were discussing gluten in the newsroom. Actually, we were discussing ketones, which, now that I think of it, sound just as hilarious as gluten.

“I don’t think I could stick to something like that,” I explained. “I do enjoy the occasional Croissan’wich.”

The CEO of Southwest was eavesdropping, with his hand cupped over his ear, leaning up against the door in the next room, so the airline orchestrated this computer problem to force me to Love Field.

Most flights at Love Field are on time. Southwest says computer system is working normally now; all flights are running. A woman headed to Oakland says she’s not worried about Southwest’s problems this week. “It’s okay to have a glitch. Everyone’s got a glitch once in a while.” pic.twitter.com/hg6Cxs2N4y

— Alan Scaia (@scaia) February 22, 2019

Afterward, I went back to the car to file stories. Then I thought, “I’ve still got ten minutes left to get a Croissan’wich!”

I pulled into the Burger King parking lot. I went inside, ordered and came back out to eat in the car while I finished filing.

A gentleman sidled up to the car and asked if I had any cash. I have a strategy with the hobo population, which is to fish around my pockets, come up empty handed, shrug disappointedly and explain I’m not carrying any cash. I don’t usually carry cash, but if we’re being completely honest with each other, sometimes, I actually do have cash.

But my 2nd grade teacher once told me just handing cash over to a hobo [she may not have used the term, “hobo”] doesn’t help. He’ll just fritter the money away on liquor and sacks tied to the end of a long stick [she also may not have said he’d buy a sack on the end of a stick, either. She would have known to use the term, “bindle”].

I told the gentleman I didn’t have any cash, but I was parked right outside the door, so I offered to take him inside to buy him a Croissan’wich.

This led to an unusually lengthy conversation, where the panhandler wound up wanting to excuse himself to get some time alone.

“Something with bacon sounds good,” he said as we walked in.

“I had literally just taken the last bite of a bacon Croissan’wich when you walked up,” I replied.

“Hmm.”

He didn’t order a bacon Croissan’wich. He decided to go with the Double Bacon Breakfast Sourdough KING. He went to fill his drink and asked if I wanted his hash browns.

“I don’t care for hash browns,” I answered.

“Hmm.”

I started back to the car. He asked if I was a reporter and wanted to know what I was doing there. I told him I’d just been at the airport because Southwest had a computer problem and could fly.

He ended the conversation by saying, I swear, “They should reboot it.”

True Story: I really did look up the preferred spelling of “Croissan’wich” when I first posted it. #AReporterAsks