!@#$%^&*o fom sunny hazy Los Angeles! Today is day 3 of my annual vacation to visit my family in Burbank, Los Angeles, Hollywood and the Valley. First on my trip was the flight from Washington Dulles Int'l Airport (IAD) to Los Angeles Int'l Airport (LAX). Flight 205 left at 0941 from gate D2. Takeoff goes smoothly until we feel 3 shudders and the captain comes on: "!@#$%^&*o passengers. Ummm it seems we have a bit of a engine problem. Our number 1 engine is working, but not as well as we want it to, so we are going to be landing back at the airport in another 20 minutes." Apparently, the engine had actually had some flames coming out of it, thankfully it didnt blow. Well we get back to the airport and we get off, and they tell us to wait in the boarding area as they are going to try and get another plane. Well about 30 minutes passes before they finally give us an announcement and tell us to go to another gate. The scheduled leave departure time was 1215 but that was optomistic. Well they fly another plane in and tell everyone its open seating (which some people complained heavily about since they specifically requested certain seats). Well we are about to board when the gate person tells us there's no pilot which has us thinking that our pilots decided to skip off the rest of the day. So then they tell us they have 20 seats available on the planes throughout the day, and they will do our best to help us, which to everyone says besically "We've done all we can, good-bye." So everyone goes down to the Customer Service desk with one agent at servicing 10+ people with about 20 minutes a person. So i decide to use the Easy Check in service desk and call the service agent and get a flight at 2146 later in the evening which would get me into LAX around 2310, which was really inconvenient for everyone in my family to pick me up. So i wait it out and go on standby for the 4 other booked flights leaving the day and i manage to get on the one leaving at 1647. And i end up sitting in the plane for at least an hour before it actually takes off because (GUESS WHAT!) theres more ENGINE TROUBLE! apparently they had to replace a part in the engines so thankfully tyhe rest of the trip went uneventful All i know is if United ASSS up on my way home, I'm never "flying the friendly skies" again!