We got ourselves up, ready and out the door more or less on schedule and made good time to La Guardia. Once there, we got checked in and headed to our gate. Everything was going swimmingly until we boarded the plane. As we sat in our seats, the stewardess announced that our pilots had not arrived, and would not do so until 15 minutes after our flight was scheduled to depart. Then, even after the flight crew arrived, we had backup computer problems that further delayed our takeoff. Once in the air we made good time, but the weather in Chicago delayed our arrival into O'Hare. By the time we finally landed and deplaned, our flight to Osaka had already departed.
We went to customer service, only to be told that there were no later flights to Japan that day, so we had been automatically rebooked on a flight to Washington, DC, and from there we would catch a flight to Tokyo the next day, with a connection to Osaka. The customer service rep agreed that this was crazy, so she rebooked us on a flight to San Francisco that afternoon, with a direct flight from there to Osaka the next day.
After an uninspiring lunch at O'Hare, we flew to SFO, where another customer service rep booked us a room at the Embassy Suites in Burlingame and gave us room and meal vouchers, and the hotel shuttle picked us up and drove us to the hotel, 2 miles away. It turns out that the Embassy Suites is quite nice. It's built around a central atrium, with palm trees reaching almost to the glass roof, nine floors up. It's also been recently renovated, so everything was clean and comfortable.
We checked in, dropped our bags in our room and headed down to the happy hour in the atrium for complimentary drinks. (After a day like that, we needed them!) We then headed to dinner in the hotel restaurant, Rings, a steak and seafood place overlooking San Francisco Bay. Jer had lamb chops with wild rice pilaf and veggies, followed by tiramisu. Jess had fettuccine with lobster and oyster mushrooms, with apple crumble for dessert. The meal vouchers didn't make much of a dent in the bill, but the food was good, so we didn't mind.
Full and tired, we headed back to our room and fell into the king-size bed. We were asleep pretty much as soon as our heads hit the pillows.