Airline travel

I purchased a plane ticket last week on delta.com. It was for a flight to Winnipeg to see my family.
I got to the airport and went to terminal B which serviced both Delta and Northwest airlines.
I tried to check in at the automatic check-in kiosk but no luck. It didn't recognize my e-ticket for some reason. I enlist the help of one of the staff. He looks at itinerary and tries to check me in. No luck for him either.
He tries again. At this point I'm feeling a tad anxious as there is only 40-45 minutes to my flight.

"ooohhh" he says. I see here that your flight is being operated by Continental in Terminal C.
What?!
No time to argue- I just run over to the tram and hop on to get to Terminal C. I run up to the check-in and they direct me to the top floor for internationals as I'm flying to WInnipeg CA. Once I get there they say "oh no- you're passing through Minneapolis so it's domestic -main floor at the other end of the terminal"

I get there and tell them that I now have 30 minutes before my flight and I've got to check in. I'm told I can stand in line. I ONLY HAVE 30 MINUTES I try to explain as politely as I can.
I'm told to wait in line where I wait to miss my flight and get told that I need to be re-routed.
But because it's a Delta flight(?!?!?!) I need to go back to terminal B to make the change.
I drag my now angry butt back to Delta where they tell me they can't help me because it was a Continental flight I'd missed -what did I want them to do about it?!

SERIOUSLY!

So I just firmly told them that I needed to be in Winnipeg tonight and they had to do what they could to make that happen. After a quick chat with the manager (who was actually very nice) I was on my way with a new flight to arrive 3 hours later.

So a mixed bag of some nice people who proved to be helpful and some not so nice people who were so checked out they couldn't check me in.