Airline travel these days is nothing like it was even 5 years ago. Sure, they still have pilots, flight attendants, cushy seats in first, narrow & uncomfortable seats in coach, loud obnoxious passengers & bad movies. The food used to be bad, but free. Now it's bad AND you have to pay for it. But now, you can't take water onto the plane. No spritzer. No coke. No gatorade, fingernail file. No scissors, so if you are planning to crochet or knit or sew, forget it. At least we haven't gone as far as the flights out of the UK, where NO carry ons are allowed on the plane - not even a purse! Airport security now has long lines to go through, and virtually no one on the far side. If you even THINK of pulling out a camera and snapping a photo anywhere near security, you'll have 10 agents surrounding you, demanding the film, camera and wanting to search you and your luggage.

All this said, my day started out quite fine. My friend Dina graciously drove me to the airport - albeit a bit early, as she had an appointment, but it was fine for me. After a slight glitch at check in (I went through the automated check in process, but the silly machine couldn't find my reservation), I breezed through security. During checkin, I heard a young lady next to me who apparently, though she was checking in 45 minutes prior to her departure (on an international flight), missed the deadline and was to be waitlisted on a flight leaving 7 hours later. I passed her on the way to security, trying to find coins for a pay phone. I remembered all the times during our travels we had to sort out making phone calls and just let her use my cell instead. A nice gal from Melbourne, just trying to get home. Apparently, check in in Melbourne for international flights is only 30 minutes. Hopefully she made it home.

From my past as a frequent traveler, I have a lifetime membership in the Admiral's Club. It's a nice little perk for when I'm traveling on American Airlines, which I was. I spent the next 2+ hours hanging out in the AC, drinking as much water and juice as I could consume and snacking on whatever they had laying around - fruit, cheese & crackers, trail mix. I watched one guy who managed to fill a plastic cup with trail mix, then, trying to balance it on his laptop, while carrying the laptop and a beverage of some sort, managed to dump the entire cup of trailmix all over the floor. He started to walk away, thought better of it, and then started to sweep up the pieces with his shoe, which, of course, merely crushed the pieces into smaller pieces and burrow them into the carpet. Eventually, he knelt down and scooped them up with his hands, leaving the remaining pieces for the attendant to sweep up a bit later. I passed the time chatting with a couple of people on IRC (for those of you who don't know, come to the freenode network, channel ##essy) and trying to do some testing at the same time.

Finally, it was time to board by plane. Another perk of the Admiral's Club (and arriving 3 hours early) was that I was able to change my seat to my favorite - the bulkhead aisle seat, right behind 1st class. Of course, 1st class would be nice, but I don't travel enough anymore to earn the upgrades. I got to the gate, expecting a giant crowd, only to find that they had already boarded most everyone. I breezed onto the plane, stowed my backpack and settled in.

There was a teenage girl in the seat next to me, traveling alone. By the way, not only did I score the bulkhead aisle seat, but it was exit row too! She offered me a stick of gum, which I gladly accepted, after having had an ear ache for the last week. Then she proceeded to talk. A lot.

Do you remember those people when you were younger? They were very nice, but seemingly not very self-confident. They often talked about themselves, and dropped comments or hints of things that were supposed to impress you? I think this is something that happens most with teenagers, and this young lady was no exception. She was very sweet though. Eventually, I managed to get engrossed in my book for a while and she turned her attention to the inflight entertainment.

The flight attendants seemed a bit harried. Apparently, even though it was a full flight, they were running with a minimum crew. There was a bit of confusion and one of the flight attendants was having to man the drink cart, which weights about 150 pounds all loaded, by herself. That doesn't sound so bad, except when you consider that the plane was still gaining altitude, so it was a bit heavier. Then they came around with the "meal" ($5 for a turkey sandwich) and "snack box" ($4 for a box containing small amounts of goldfish crackers, mixed nuts, raisins, a sausage stick, cheese and crackers and a cookie). I spent $4.

Now, here's where I get to rant a little. There were three flight attendants handling all of coach, which was full. One of them, I barely saw - I think she was working the back section most of the time. One, Kate, was mostly helping us and was extremely nice. The third was... a bit rough around the edges. She basically was quite impatient and rather curt. That's fine - everyone has bad days. But...

On the second drink pass, Ms. Curt and Kate were sorting something out on one of the carts. Kate had gone back to get something and suddenly, I felt my arm get extremely wet. I looked down and saw my sleeve was soaked and orange juice was dripping down my arm. I looked up and saw Ms. Curt. She didn't even notice. I said, "Excuse me?" and she noticed I was a bit wet and handed me a teeny napkin (the drink-sized square kind) and said, "Oh, don't worry, it's only water." and she walked off. ARGH!! I was also penned in by the cart, so I couldn't get up to go to the bathroom and try to wash my arm off. A few minutes later, Kate came back and graciously handed me a can of club soda and two thick towelsized napkin thingies to try and get the orange juice out of my sleeve (so it wouldn't stain). Now, with a thoroughly wet sleeve, that air they always have going on the plane started to feel a bit chilly. I wrapped up tighter in the blanket.

After a trip to the toilet, I came back and wrapped up in the blanket again, only to discover that I had turned it around and the part I had wrapped around my arms previously had been on the floor and was also soaked in orange juice. Sigh. I flipped it around again. About 2 hours later, I'm starting to dry out sufficiently (it's a 5 hour flight) and I made another trip to the toilet (remember, I spent 2 hours in the Admiral's Club downing all I could drink). When in there, I noticed that a 5 inch section of the back of my shirt, near the hem, had managed to take on a douse of OJ and I was just noticing it. It was mostly dry, but had orange juice stains all over it... So, I got ANOTHER can of club soda and ANOTHER one of those cool towelettes (from Kate of course) and I did my best to get the stain out. Another hour or two to go of being wet and uncomfortable.

Do you remember when you were a child, and you used to chew gum? I do. Vividly. My father used to get terrificly angry if I chewed it with my mouth open. Or if I made snapping or popping sounds with my gum. I always thought he was over-reacting and being silly, but he was my dad. And I prefered not to be spanked - especially in my teenage years. So, I learned the fine art of stealth gum chewing. Well. Dad. I now "get" it. In the last hour or so of the flight, I chose to listen to my ipod and relax a bit. Despite the fact that I was wearing headphones and the music was sufficiently loud, I could hear, as if I had nothing in my ears, the gal next to me making the most obnoxious sounds with her gum. I sat there dreaming of ways to politely (or

Labels: Food, Health, IRC, Travel