Larry’s Lollygaggings
Volume I, Number 3
25 July 2008
Just thinking about…Air Travel
Apologies to my Homeland Security Princess Debbie for this one…
Traveling on (or is it IN ?) a plane is exciting. It is. For everyone. However; different ages are excited for different reasons. As a kid, I used to love every second. Whether it was walking on to see where my very own seat was or my own little tray table and magazine or how the food trays and utensils fit so neatly on each other or looking out the window through the cloud of cigarette smoke in the plane (non-smoking started the row BEHIND us) as we taxied in to see where at the gate my Grandma and Grandpa were so they could kiss me the second we got off the plane. Ahhh, the good old days of innocence and purity. Go get a tissue. Take a breath. I’ll wait.
Welcome back.
I now love flying for other reasons. Now, I know what you are thinking…I’ve really lost my mind with that line. Hey, I fly more than most people. So, whatever your collective complaints are, I get them ALL – more often – and to a greater measure. I now actually look forward to – even embrace – the things we go through for the pleasure of air travel.
Recently, in Denver, I was strip-searched because of suspicious contraband in my carryon bag. Those guys are scarred for life at that sight of me stripping. Yes, after dressing and undressing 4 times that morning, they found a can of air used to clean my camera lens in my camera bag. Great-googly-moogly! What in the name of Lindbergh is THAT doing in THERE? So, after consulting with the TSA Grand Poobah, they decided that it was a hazard to have AIR on the plane. I can’t win. I just exhaled and forfeited the can of air to the guy who before September 11, 2001 would have been asking if I wanted fries with that. Where did they get these TSA agents from, anyway? I think they couldn’t make it at the DMV. Too nasty for that place. Not fast enough. Conversation went something like, “Hey, Matilda, she can’t work here any more. Get her a TSA application.” I just saw her saying there wasn’t enough paperwork and the proper signatures were missing. Problem is, she was saying it to her reflection in the restroom mirror!” I never actually used the canned air, anyway. I just thought it made it look like I knew what I was doing when I took pictures. They always take away stuff you don’t really need. But we still freak out, like there are no toenail clippers or avocado zit cream Portland. I also have to get dressed and undressed seven times before breakfast just to have the privilege of sitting so close to the people next to me that when I try to scratch my ear, I am forced instead to tickle the mustache of the guy next to me. To make matters worse, it was a lady! There are so many levels of security that what used to be a drop off virtually next to the gate is now a hike longer than the commercial breaks during Deal or No Deal. They actually have moving walkways. Excuse me, but if it is a WALKway, why isn’t anyone walking?
Let’s see how things have changed.
Walking on to see my assigned seat? I fly Southwest Airlines. Nowadays, you need to arrive at the airport early to get a good seat. Very early. Very, VERY early! How early? Let’s just say that you are already late for your next flight. So, after getting to the airport so prematurely that I bring a cot, a 6 way power strip surge suppressor to set up (near an outlet, of course) and my High School Musical 2 pillow. Don’t start with the ‘that is so immature’ stuff - I LOVE Zac Ephram and don’t care how much they raise the prices of Tiger Beat and Seventeen Magazines, I’m buying! I cuddle up with the other homeless-looking-travelers and we share laptop battery charger splitters and read old, discarded newspapers – even if they are written in Sanskrit. I then wait in the corral to try for a coveted early spot on the seating line. Now, really, does anyone actually think that they are going to sit on a plane and have the seat next to them go untaken when the door is finally closed? Seriously, those people are more out of touch with reality than the local Hershey, PA Weight Watchers Counselor enthusiastically preparing for her weigh-in meeting the day after Thanksgiving. The number of flights are being cut down right, left, and center faster than Sheik Machmood El-Quazi Habdiji raises the price of gasoline at my local Exxon gas station. Because of that, planes are so overcrowded that last week I was seated in 52-L – THE TOILET! At first, I thought it might be OK. At least I had a seat. But if you think getting up to let the guy next to you go stretch his legs is bothersome, how ‘bout having to give up my seat every 2 minutes because someone drank too much water. Oh well, at least the seat stayed warm.
I usually get seated early, and then begin wildly hacking and sneezing while I peruse a pamphlet full of papers that say ‘Communicable Disease Test Results’ on the outside to avoid someone sitting next to me. It usually works well, but ever so often it just attracts some other hacking sneezer to sit next to me that pulls out the same papers. Uh-oh! If I’m not on early, I have the dreaded task of asking some weirdo (aren’t they all) if the seat is taken. You know, by anything other than his briefcase, family sized bag of Combos, or collection of PC Weekly Magazines. With almost 100% certainty, I will get a worse response than if I were on Broad Street in Philly trying to hock a buck washing car windows. I feel as unwelcomed as a Jehovah’s Witness going door to door in Boca Raton at the Sunset Gardens Senior Village.
I also play the ‘Do-be-do’ game. Taken from an idea in a Robert Fulgham book, when I am asked what I do for a living, I pretend to be something exciting. In the past, I’ve purported to be a hand model, the guy who creates the new crayon color names for Crayola, chassis engineer for the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile, and Chief of Security for the Oprah Winfrey Show. It is fun, and you should hear the stories I tell!
Little tray table and magazine? The tables are useless since even without them being in the ‘down position’ (‘down position’ is flight attendant talk for ‘down’), I have my knees so far into the back of the guy in front of me that after 2 hours, I can bill him for a Chiropractic Adjustment. All you get now is some crummy issue of “FillInTheCatchyFlyingWordHere” that by the third day of the month it has been picked over more than the peel and eat shrimp area at Golden Corral Seafood Night after the Goody’s 400 Nascar Race has let out in Talladega, Alabama. And who are these people who do the entire Sudoku puzzle without having any idea how the puzzle works? Is everyone that clouded or is it only the ones that sit in my seat before I do?
Next come the food trays and utensils. You used to look at the ticket to see if it was a meal or a snack. Now, a flight attendant throws me a bag of peanuts like I’m Jumbolina, the Ringling Brothers Elephant. And to make it worse, as though that is possible, the bag is sealed with that slick, shiny stuff that can only by a superhero. I think that last month, at 3 am, I saw Magnus Lars Yurgenson fail twice at the airline-peanut-bag-opening competition during The World’s Strongest Man competition in Vienna on ESPN-9. He couldn’t do it, but he could rip a phonebook in thirds. By the way, bald people must not get a lot of sleep. The shows at 3 am are all about hair replacement and growing stuff. Please don’t confuse them with the 10 am show-watchers. The only shows on at that time are Judge Judy, Judge Joe, Judge Hatchett, Judge Alex!!! Is that convict time? Where have you gone, Joe Wapner?
And yes, people used to smoke in the plane. Good choice – being trapped in a pressurized tube for hours and hours with cigs, cigars,hookah pipes, you name it. And there was no unique smoker’s compartment, lounge, wall, half wall, or curtain; the only thing that separated them from the non-smokers was hope. And there wasn’t much of that. My, how things have changed.
Gradma and Grandpa at the gate? Oh, forget that! Last month, I jumped out at the curbside, my wife walked around to give me a peck goodbye, and not only was the car ticketed and towed, they put a metal parking boot on my shoe and it took $324 to have it removed. I had to pay the fine because there is no way that thing would have passed security. To make matters worse, if that is possible, while I was applying for a loan so I could buy a bag of overpriced trail mix, my baggage was 17 inches beyond my reach, so the bomb squad blew it up. I would use cash, but now I have to pay extra for everything on the plane ride. They are nickel-and-diming us to death! Pay extra for a piece of luggage, a second, a third, an overweight bag, an oversized bag, a beer, some wine, a shot, a cup of water, a blanket, a pillow, a movie, some music, a good seat, a better seat, the best seat. What’s next? Standing Room Only Flights? Surcharge if we use more gas than expected? Fees for using the restroom? “Oh, sir, a number 2 – that’s gonna cost you, plus a per-square toilet paper charge”. Suffice it to say it was a rough morning.
All of this throwback thinking reminds me of when, while driving in the family minivan, my kids asked if I liked watching SpongeBob DVDs when I was a kid. Do you realize how many steps removed these kids are from what my reality was. I haven’t the heart to tell them how three of us slept lengthways in the back of a 1976 Toyota Corolla the entire way to Fort Lauderdale with my parents and 2 dogs! Videos? The only entertainment we had was fighting with my brothers - and I think my Dad would have yelled for us to stop more often if our screaming didn’t help keep him awake. Game Boys? PSPs? It was more likely a ‘noogie the little brother’ or a ‘don’t blink/staring’ contest that kept us occupied. We were so stir crazy by the time we got to our destination, we would do anything to see who was first to the pamphlet holder collection in the hotel lobby. Oooooohhhh, Luray Caverns, The Stuckey’s Museums of Spoons, and Pedro at South of The Border!
And finally, the race to turn on phone race after landing. Every junior executive checking back with the office to make sure the deal went through and his meeting is still on. I feel like redheaded step child if there are no calls for me after having the phone off for 2 hours. Looks like a bunch of meth addicts when the clinic nurse comes to dispense the daily hits.
And one more thing…do they have classes to TEACH the pilots that voice that they use?
Just thinking.
