Today was a helluva day in sports. Wimbledon participants Nicolas Mahut and John Isner are tied 59-59 in the fifth set of their match, setting all sorts of all-time records, including longest match played. The United States scored a goal in extra time against Angola to go from fourth place to first place in their group in World Cup early-round play. The win set up a Sweet Sixteen matchup against Ghana.

I spent most of my day at two airports.

Yes, today largely sucked. But I want to hand out some accolades to people who made it suck less than it could have. And then yes, I will tie this post back into baseball.

First thumbs up goes to the couple dozen people watching the U.S. play Angola at a bar at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport this morning. I’m not a huge soccer fan by any stretch. I don’t pretend to understand the game like I do football or baseball. And many of the passengers watching the match obviously were the same – they were excited with every scoring opportunity the U.S. had, even if they didn’t understand how they earned those chances. It was a lot of fun watching the waning moments of the matchup with a bunch of fired up people I’ll probably never see again.

The problem with my watching the game with those folks was that I would rather have been boarding my first flight of the day, which was from New Orleans to Chicago O’Hare International Airport. But weather issues in Chicago led to a delay. It was originally supposed to be a couple hours, though it was later un-delayed. Or at least the delay was shortened. We were able to get on the plane for Chicago and, surprisingly, takeoff from New Orleans without sitting on the tarmac (I feel bad for the folks who had the same scheduled flight four hours before me – they boarded something around three hours after their scheduled time and then sat on the tarmac for awhile before actually taking off).

This leads to my second thumbs up for the day – to the guy at the information desk working, I think, for the city of Chicago. I didn’t catch his name. I should have. But he helped me three different times with a smile and a ton of patience – which I can’t imagine was easy after dealing with hundreds upon hundreds of people trying to figure out how to get to their destinations on a day in which Chicago went through several morning and afternoon storms.

Ultimately, when I landed at O’Hare, my connecting flight to Minnesota had been canceled. As was the one I was hoping to catch by flying stand-by. And I narrowly missed booking a flight on Southwest Airlines when someone beat me to the reservation while I was filling out the registration forms for the low-fare carrier’s website.

So I was stuck in Chicago. Which leads to Accolade Number Three – and my tie-in to baseball.

The third time I asked my friend from the city of Chicago for help I queried him about how to best find a hotel. He offered me a pink sheet of paper with a web address and a phone number. I logged on to the site I was directed to and within just a couple minutes I had booked a room. It wasn’t the most convenient site. It was in Schaumburg, at the Wingate by Wyndham, some 20 miles or so outside of Chicago proper. But it was affordable and easy to book, and the guy I called at the hotel’s front desk from the airport gave me easy-to-follow directions to catch the shuttle.

So, here comes the biggest prop. About 30 minutes later, I got a call on my cell phone from the guy at the Wingate. His shuttle was running late, caught in the horrendous rush hour traffic. Not to worry. He booked a stretch limo for me and eight or nine others that would pick us up and take us to the hotel.

When we got here, he and another happily checked us in. My luggage, I said, was somewhere between New Orleans and Minneapolis. Could he suggest a place where I could buy a change of clothes? No problem. Kohl’s was but a few blocks away. The hotel could shuttle me there if I wished (I walked – I needed the exercise after several hours cooped up at the airport).

What about dinner (okay, finally getting to baseball)? No problem, he said. He handed me my room key and pointed at a photo of the Fox and Hound, where patrons of the Windham could get 20 percent off their meals by showing the key.

I went from Kohl’s to the Fox and Hound, taking care of my biggest concerns. While at the restaurant, I was served by an attentive waitress, I engaged in conversation with a couple other decent guys, I was served a few strong drinks and, most importantly for this blog, I watched a half-dozen ballgames on several big screens around the perimeter of the building.

So, what’s my point? I don’t travel a ton. But I’m out on the road enough where I’d like to start building up a collection of places where I can go if I want to watch a football or baseball game. So, if you are a frequent traveler and you want to make sure you can watch your favorite team, where do you go?

Or if you grew up watching your hometown team but left for work or school, where do you go to keep make sure you don’t miss the game? Please, do me and your fellow sports fans a favor and provide some insight on where we can go in the event a day like mine happens again anytime soon.

So, in closing, apologies to those who think this post is nothing but a self-serving rant. I admit, I needed to vent about what was a frustrating day. But I do also think us sports fans can help each other out in the event that such days happen to me or any one of us again. I hope you’ll indulge me.

And, so, a final thanks to those who made a sometimes frustrating day pass more easily. And thank you to those who will make future travel experiences pass more enjoyably. I appreciate your help too.