That Holiday feeling…….my Tums might work on it…..

I wrote this several Christmases’ ago and just found this and thought you might enjoy it. Remember this was before TSA had a mandate to grope everyone. 

Well, it’s the holiday season again. I know because I am stuffed in an airplane going to worse weather than I live in, in Colorado…Florida. I was reminded of the fact by people pushing me out of the way trying to board an airplane, 40 minutes late, like it was going to leave without them.

However, these flights give me time to reflect. I marvel at a persona ability to convert Wal-Mart bags into carry-on luggage. At the idea that an image of a Cowboy is not altered when they have to spend fifteen minutes in security trying to take off and put on their cowboy boots. Humiliating to walk through in your barefoot, worse to have the entire terminal watch you try and find your feet.

I love the way airline personnel believe that everyone at this time of the year has never flown before and will believe anything they tell me. Worse is it took until the fourth person for me to figure out that I was being had.

My favorite thing to do is to get on the airplane early and then watch worldwide wresting. Match one is the customers trying to shove their 85 pound carry-ons in the overhead compartment. Round two are the flight attendants trying to wrestle those same bags into the overhead compartments. Round three is the wrestle between the flight attendants and the passengers as the flight attendants tries to identify the Wal-Mart packers and tell them their bags are going to be checked. The final round is the flight attendant pulling the bag down the aisle towards the door with a passenger holding the other end screaming, they can’t live without their bag. I guess the rest of their heart monitor is in the plastic bag and if is too far away they may pass out. (Take all the bags!!!)

The final indignity is the race to exit the plane.

But I got to know my knees again. It’s not that I don’t know my knees, but that I don’t spend that much time each day with my face within inches of them as they are jammed into the “seat.” “Seat” being a slightly over used term in this case for the torture chamber United now calls seating on some of their flights.

I did save some headaches this year, and a lot of money. I feel guilt not supporting my local merchants. However, high speed wireless, free access and a beer at a bar are much better shopping. Maybe if the local retailer hands me a beer and a chair I’ll shop there again.

I connected through Chicago where I had plenty of time to play one of my favorite Chicago games, where are the outlet’s hiding? Chicago was obviously built prior to electricity being invented because outlets are an endangered species. As such you end up seeing all sorts of outlandish attempts to recharge all sorts of things.

In this last incarnation of the game, I saw a battery pack under at a ticket counter, a MP3 wearer wedged between a column and a wall in an abbreviated yoga position, and dozens of computer cables snaking around corners and across the lobby. I was eating across from the yoga MP3 wearer and when that person left it took everything not to run over and plug in, even though it would have meant interrupting my meal every 10 minutes to explain the luggage was not Unattended.

I finally found an empty ticket booth with a plug. The screen in front of me kept counting down the time until the flight departed. I counted down the time until the kiosk would fill and I would be evicted. I gave myself 70 minutes before departure… Come on baby charge. Should I have answered the phone that kept ringing at the terminal?

You know. Scrooge was not that far off………. :)

I’m heading off to family for the holidays. The posts will keep coming but I may be a little slow on responding to comments.

What do you think? Leave a comment.
 
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