On my flight….
Tags: Frequent Flier, Airlines, Humor, Frequent Flyer, Airlines Flights

On my flight….

Many of you know that I enjoy air travel because the opportunities to be judgmental and to complain abound on the ground and in the air. Sometimes, my helpful insights affect the airline’s performance. Sometimes not. You may guess which is the more frequent result.

Today, I introduce you to the other passengers on this Airbus 319.

1A — Chain-smoked-unfiltered-Camel-cigarettes-for-sixty-years, raspy voice passenger with the leathery looking skin.

1C (this is first class. The convention of going sequentially through the alphabet does not apply to these elites). 70-pounds-of-files-and-electronics-jammed-into-the-carry-on-bag passenger who cannot lift it overhead and who innocently explains to the flight attendant who will not lift it, “I was going to put it under the seat in front of me.”

“Yes, because you thought that the skip the letters in the alphabet airline would use all consecutive whole numbers beginning with zero to identify rows.”

1D — Beige-velour-sweatsuit-wearing passenger who thinks his lilac leisure suit may get wrinkled in his checked bag.

1F — Library-book-reading passenger who silently judges those using e-readers and purchased books.

2A — Untucked, slightly wrinkled, white dress shirt under a slate blue, plaid blazer thirty-six year old who is wearing un-pre-torn denims and black shoes that were shined three gates over. 2A thinks this looks cool.

2C — 2A’s boss who thinks 2A looks like a hungover salesperson trying to recapture the glory days of debauchery 2A enjoyed at some nondescript liberal arts college that no one ever heard of, thereby allowing 2A’s embarrassed parents to say, “It has a perfect program.”

2D — Angry, top-tier-frequent-flier with no specific complaint.

2F — Nineteen year old whose boyfriend’s mom scored this upgrade, so this nineteen year old could crowd out some exhausted road warrior.

Because this is a small jet, but not one of those regional jets, the name of which makes it seem that the plane will fall from the sky if it goes into another region, the airline provides only eight first class seats. Now, we move to premium economy where, for a fee, a passenger may enjoy a skosh more leg room and that prized airline benefit of priority boarding.

3A — Passenger who thinks you ought to be ashamed of yourself for assuming that 2F was a woman.

3B — Passenger with whom 2F cheated last night even though 2F has a boyfriend and this passenger knows who that boyfriend is.

3C — Passenger who is proud of you for making no gender assumption abiut 3B. Your assumptions about 3B engaging in the cheating, however, are A-OK.

Yes, this may be “premium” economy, but it is still economy, so these passengers need the care and guidance of consecutive lettering.

3D — ”That” passenger who, in these days of mask mandates, is going to make the point that “you can’t force me to wear a mask.”

3E — Passenger who knows 3D will win. The airline won’t force 3D to wear a mask; it’ll just get the cops to throw 3D off the plane.

3F — College student, who forgot to ingest the unprescribed Xanax cleverly hidden in a box of Tic Tacs, and who is now having a mild anxiety attack because the cops are coming.

4A — Passenger who noticed the maintenance team outside the jet and is already on the phone making back-up travel plans.

4B — Snoring passenger.

4C — Passenger who has been talking loudly on a cell phone about some IRS problem that now has ……

4D — calling the FBI and Treasury Department about 4C.

4E — Vacant seat where 2F’s boyfriend would have been, but the boyfriend pretended that some school assignment was too important when, in fact, the boyfriend is at home cheating with 4F’s sibling.

4F — Complicit passenger.

5A — Frequently sniffling twenty-something.

5B — 5A’s coke dealer who let 5A have the window seat because 5B appreciates loyalty and return customers even though the airline seems not to, despite the airline giving that tag line a lot of lip service. 5B knows that platinums don’t get middle seats.

5C — 5B even bigger customer who just wants the damn flight attendant to get over here with another Jack and Coke. Before I freak the fuck out. Or complain on Twitter.

5D — Jolly rancher.

5E — Baby Ruth.

5F — Baby Ruth’s parent who was on the phone saying, “Oh, Henry!”

6A — Candy-loving passenger who thinks wasting four seats on the set up and exit for an allusion was a waste of time.

6B — Just-ran-an-online-credit-check passenger whose 604 FICO might just be high enough to get one of the credit cards the flight attendant mentioned. And mentioned. And mentioned. And mentioned.

6C — Profreader for the New York Post.

6D — Pretty hairy legs man who knows why hyphens and commas are important for proofreaders to check.

6E — Retired kindergarten teacher who still says to her grandchildren, “You’re making me cross.”

6F — Passenger who knows that all the gentle kindergarten teachers are women who say, “Cross,” not men who shout at five year olds, “You’re pissing me off BIG TIME.” However, 6F does not know anything about 2F.

7A — Window-cover-opening passenger.

7B — Likes-the-darkness-of-window-covers-being closed passenger.

7C — Passenger who knows that this will be that kind of flight.

7D — Adult who is wearing a tshirt featuring Velma from Scooby Doo.

7E — 7D’s six-year-old child who is wearing a tshirt featuring Balsac.

7F — 7E’s thirteen-year-old sibling who giggles at 7E’s tshirt and is thinking about getting a tattoo of Nietzsche, in about five years, but worries the artist will misspell it.

8A — Silent farter.

8B — Silently-looking-all-about passenger trying to identify the source of the odor.

8C — Glaring-at-8B passenger who assumed that 8B’s investigstive behavior, such as it is, is feigned and meant only to cover up 8B’s flatulence. Plus, someone cool enough to have a premium economy aisle seat would never pass gas on a plane.

8D — Passenger who used too much of the luxury hotel’s grapefruit hair conditioner and smells like a citrus orchard.

8E — Passenger glad to be smeiiling grapefruit instead of whatever 8A is emitting.

8F — Seat out of service.

9A — Passenger with a remarkably smooth forehead who plans to cross his legs at the knee and hold the hand of …..

9B — who plans never to sit next to 9A on another plane because 9B does not want to hold hands like the two of them are google-eyes teenagers sneaking off to use the Trojans that 9B does not know 9A bought at the airport newsstand.

9C — Passenger who is flying to Vegas, meant to pack condoms, forgot them, and plans to thank 9A for the reminder. 9C is not telling what gender 9A is.

9D — 3A’s cousin who is ashamed of you for assuming 9C is a man.

9E — Passenger who selected 9F on the airline’s app’s seat selection screen and whose thumb must have grazed 9E, thereby accidentally changing the seat selection.

9F — Passenger who is friends with an airline employee who switched 9E from 9F and put 9F here because even in premium economy, the middle seat sucks.

And, 9F having taken the last seat in premium economy on “our very full flight to” wherever, we move to the economy section of our aircraft with legroom adequate for any passenger under five feet tall.

10A — Angry, top-tier frequent flier with a specific complaint: The gate agent would not assign 8F because of some nonsense excuse that 10A thinks the gate agent knows 10A knows is absurd and a total lie. The gate agent, however, will have the last laugh by putting remarks in the record about the unreasonable behavior “pax displayed after adv pax seat out b/c no seat cush.”

10B — Angry leisure flyer who is not interested in hearing 10A’s rant about “that ***.”

10C — Punctuation expert who wishes that people would say and write the truth and not euthanize English with euphemisms.

10D — Impusle-control-problem passenger who blurts out, “Stripper,” “Whore,” “Jackass,” or “Shithead” about every thirty-nine seconds. On average.

10E — Therapy-receiving, impulse-control-problem passenger who shouts out, “Expletive Deleted” about every fifty-three seconds. On average.

10F — Cured impulse-control-problem passenger eho screams “Asterisk. Asterisk Asterisk” precisely every seventy-seven seconds. Exactly.

11A — Parent who toted two Barbie backpacks, a spiderman rollerboard, and the parent’s own Tumi bag onto this flight.

11B — Fifteen-year-old child from 11A’s first relationship who wonders if the author who just mentioned Tumi is getting a commission like The Points Guy would. 11B gets therapy every week because 11B knows all about The Points Guy but checks bags no matter what — 11B has never heard of Nietzsche, but wants to have a tattoo that says: No Carrry Ons.

11C — Ten-year-old child from 11A’s first marriage who got upset when 11A yelled, “I told you that you had to carry the Spiderman rollerboard.”

11D — Seven-year-old child from 11A’s second marriage who asked 11A to, “Please carry my backpack.”

11E — Five-year-old child from 11A’s third marriage who cried when 11A agreed to carry 11D’s backpack.

11F — 11A’s current love interest who is happy to be going to Ohio to celebrate 11A’s 30th birthday with 11A’s parents. But, 11F wishes that 11A spent more time with 9A at airport newsstands, especially because neither 11A nor 11F remembered to bring a gift for 11A’s other child whom grandma and grandpa have been watching; that child turns two tomorrow — just like 11A’s brother in Ohio who will turn two the day after tomorrow.

11F spends considerable time wondering why Ohio is the Midwest, but Egypt is the Middle East. The distance from 11F is hardly the same.

12A — Fascinated-with-the-sanitizing-wipe passenger who, having had an unexplained aversion to moist towelettes, never used them after eating chicken wings. Although the sanitizing wipe enchants this passenger, this passenger wonders if you even read this description or were still doing the math on row 11.

12B — My-feet-are-killing-me-from-my-15K-run passenger who is untying the laces on the running shoes.

12C — Passenger who fears a barefoot neighbor.

12D — Ample-backside passenger who has, for the past four minutes been standing, bent over, and looking for something while that ass is right in 12C’s face

12E — Passenger who is surprised to find that the wifi does not permit access to themilehighclub.com. Or dot net.

12F — Passenger who had the splash of orange juice the airline served earlier come geysering out upon hearing 12E and the flight attendant’s exchange:

12E: What do you mean, we can’t access that site?

FA: We have content restrictions because everyone can see what you’re watching.

12E: I want to read the articles.

13A — Passenger who knows that it will take thirty-seven minutes for the bags to come out, on the carousel two carousels away from the promised delivery location.

13B — Kid who picked his nose in the Bad News Bears. The good one with Walter Matthau. The movie made when saying “Booger picking moron” was funny to say, and not indicative of some sort of intolerance-based character flaw. Unless you say it to someone using a tissue.

13C — Sunglasses-on-the-back-of-the-head passenger. A complete fraud, phony and fake. Only my Mother had eyes in the back of her head. I have the therapy bills to prove it.

13D — with 13E — same gender couple, each with platinum blond hair so stiffly spiked up that TSA checked to see if the hair could be a weapon.

13F — Passenger who knows what gender the couple is.

14A — High school junior going on a college visit trip and prays that someone will believe the fake ID that this numbskull mistakenly showed to the TSA agent. The college is not very good. A little better than 2A’s alma mater, but only marginally so because students at 2A’s college do not know what “marginally so” means.

14B — 14A’s Parent who has received a stern warning from 14A, “You’d better not embarras me while we are on this trip,” and who hopes that 14A never learns who Clement Atlee was and how 14B’s spineless parenting has allowed 14A to be so out of control.

14C — Three-time Facebook jail parolee.

14D — Nondescript passenger.

14E — Med student reading textbooks to learn the answers to whatever crazy medical questions Uncle Heath will ask at the big family dinner tonight, which will all but certainly devolve into an emotional storm complete with vicious remarks, shouting, crying, and door slamming.

14F — Passenger whose foot fell asleep.

15A — Passenger mistakenly thinking the beverage cart’s arrival is the time to order some six shot drink, with a cherry and orange slice, instead of the Jack and Coke that 5C has been jonesing for.

15B — ”I’ll have a cranberry juice”

Flight attendant: Cranapple is what we have.

Passenger: OK

FA: Catering did not stock any on this flight.

15C — Passenger who asks for “Cranapple” because eavesdropping on 15B and the flight attendant would be unthinkable rude.

15D — Button-down-collar-shirt-and-short-pants man who has no idea how absurd he looks.

15E — Passenger who likes the sound of de-icing the jet.

15F — Moron who complains about deicing because, “We are going to be delayed,” which this aerospace expert does not identify as better than “We are going to drop from the sky, crash, and die.”

16A — Otolaryngologist.

16B — Oologist.

16C — Ophthalmologist.

16D — Ornithologist.

16E — Orthodontist.

16F — Obstructionist.

17A — Leisure traveller with no idea that the 45 minute connection time at the hub means a misconnection because it’ll take 25 minutes to get off this plane, another 25 to walk from gate A1 to gate D46 only to find that the gate change to A2 was not put on the in-airport displays until this passenger passed concourse C.

17B — NFL fan who is travelling to see a game and expects that the fan’s team will lose because of ineptness.

17C — Another NY Jets fan.

17D — Optimist whose best hope of being seated in row 16 were dashed.

17E — Oppositionalist who is happy to be anywhere but row 16.

17F — Passenger who will spill the Coke (not the kind 5B sells) all over the tray table.

18A — ”What do you mean? No food? That’s crazy?” passenger who has no idea how the business cycle of airline economy class food has bottomed out.

18B — Kick-the-seat-in-front-of-the-passenger even before 17B reclines it. This is inevitable. This passenger is on every flight, every single flight.

18C — Accustomed to “no frills” airline service passenger who is giddy and gleeful that this plane has engines.

18D — Accustomed to “no frills” airline service passenger who is having difficulty seeing what’s so great on this “mainline” carrier.

18E — Accustomed to “no frills” airline service passenger who is high on benzodiazepines and repeatedly exclaims, “Wow, this is mad cool.” These kinds of passengers use interjections and exclaim, but do not ejaculate. Thus, the “interjections are usually followed by an exclamation point, or by a comma when the feeling is not as strong” rule from Schoolhouse Rock demands a comma after “Wow.” And, yes, 7F is giggling because I wrote “ejaculate” about oral things.

18F — Passenger wearing the horseshoe pillow now, while walking to the seat, just so everyone knows that this passenger brought the horseshoe pillow aboard.

19A — Business traveler whose enthusiasm about catching this earlier flight overpowered the passenger’s attentiveness to detail. The increasing loud demands of, “I am a titanium-Porsche-Orchid-Touchdown-Stratosphere level super elite customer with your garbage rental car company. I am telling you that you’ll be fired if you don’t bring my laptop computer here right now.”

19B — Polite person peeing in his pants passenger who is laughing because he can hear the rental car agent saying, “Are you on a cell phone? You’re breaking up. What were you saying?” while the rental car agent is accessing hard core porn sites on the forgotten laptop.

19C — Pink shirt, pink ribbon, pink wristband wearing passenger whose shirt says, “FU Cancer.”

What? Cancer sucks. Not every passenger is a joke or set up. We can all agree that health and wellness ate essential.

19D — Perplexed passenger who wonders why 19C is not wearing pink pants or, for that matter, any pants.

OK. Are you happy now.

And, cancer still sucks. Disease, illness, and struggles suck.

19E — Ptivate investigator 2F’s boyfriend (you thought I forgot about 2F) hired to monitor 2F just in case 2F returned home early and was likely to catch the cheating scoundrel in the act.

19F — Facebook addict.

20A — I-was-in-the-last-row-last-time passenger.

20B — Other airline’s employee who is flying for free.

20C — I-smell-the-toilet-chemical passenger.

20D — I took the laxatives in anticipation of my colonoscopy passenger who is happy to be adjacent to the lavatory.

20E — Unlucky passenger in the last row middle seat.

20F — Mystery shopper who plans to send a thorough, but poorly written report, to airline leadership, so inside the boardroom echo chamber, executives can interpret the ambiguities to justify thinking, “This is what our passengers want.”

Oh. The flight attendant has closed the boarding door. I must put my “smaller” electronic device (a term that sounds sinister) into airplane mode.