Going Home
Sittting on a Continental 757 at Newark waiting for the other passengers to board. It was good trip to NJ to visit with family and celebrate a birthday, but after too much (good) food and drink I will be glad to get back to my home and my routine. New York bagels, pizza, home cooked lasaga, cheesecake, BBQ, beer, wine... about a zillion Weight Watchers points!
Due to the last minute nature of the trip, I am stuck with a middle seat. I do not have a middle seat body. I hope the passenger next to me is a child, dwarf, or Kate Moss.
Uh oh. Young couple just sat down in row in front with a 2 year old...
Crazy From The Seat
Below are my rantings and ravings from my trip back from New York on jetBlue on Monday morning. I typed my feelings of frustration and rage into my Droid as a way to cope. It was too early to start drinking. :-) My musings are stream of consciousness with little care of grammar, so 'reader be ware'. Keep in mind that I was in a seriously bad mood for reasons I do not wish to share at this time. I'm not usually this 'insane' when I travel. I have transcribed my Droid notepad text into the post below. BTW, next time I drive. :-)
I just got though Newark Airport security, and I'm sitting in the waiting area for my flight. Thank God, the security guard didn't call the FBI on me! I had a bottle of Diet Coke in my laptop bag! I know, it's my fault. I am well aware that you can't bring soda bottles through security, but REALLY! It's just a damn bottle of soda... At least the gentlemen was polite about telling me about my infraction. He held it up between his gloved index finger and thumb and said, "NOT ALLOWED!" He then proceeded to toss it in the trash. Lucky me, twenty yards after security there was a Hudson News where I could buy another bottle of Diet Coke for only $3! What luck!
...Now I'm on the plane an hour into flight. There are two annoying [CENSORED] sitting next to me eating stinky homemade food. They also had to ask for two snacks each from the flight attendant. Lady is on her second cheese blintz and Tera Blue chips. They're eating like its their last meal. I sure hope not. Maybe they know something I don't about this trip. Two kids in front and two kids behind. Little [CENSORED]wont stop kicking back of my seat. At least the screaming stopped. Why do people have kids? I'm glad my folks did, for obvious reasons, and I guess if people all stopped having kids the human race would end, but still...
... Twenty minutes later, and the brat is still kicking the back of my seat, the cabin stinks of farts or a dirty diaper or fumes from the lavatory. I'm on a flying school bus. The crazy old lady next to me, dressed in a baby blue velor jogging suit, is dancing in her seat while watching a mortgage refinancing commercial on the jetBlue TV. KID STOP [CENSORED] KICKING MY SEAT OR IN THE OVERHEAD YOU GO, [CENSORED]!! I want off this [CENSORED] plane. I have to pee, but I can't get out. I'm seated in a window seat because jetBlue gave my aisle seat away to some weird looking woman. They did this even though I reserved an aisle seat 7 weeks ago. [CENSORED]you jetBlue! My legs are cramping. I'm gonna die of a clot in my leg before this flight is done. I just know it.
...Ha! Some guy just bumped his head on the bulkhead getting back into his seat. DO IT AGAIN SILLY MAN!
... I think I have Uromysitisis poisoning . A rare and dangerous syndrome that you can get from holding in your pee. Seinfeld got it in an episode where they were searching for Kramer's car in the mall garage. I need to go. I could wake up the loons next to me, so I can get to the bathroom. I hope the weird woman is enjoying my aisle seat. I can't do it. I can't wake them up. Were making our decent. El Capitain will put on the seat belt sign soon. Its now or never.
...[CENSORED]! The crazy woman next to me wouldn't wake up. I guess it was the two smelly cheese blintzes, the bag of Tera Blue chips, and the chocolate chip cookies that put her out. I was up and ready to move, but she wouldn't budge and then "DING! Fasten seat belts please for our decent into..." Gotta shut off my Droid now. It could bring down the plane you know.
...On the ground now waiting for a gate to park this stupid plane. I WANT OFF!
...In the terminal FINALLY! Actually, it wasn't such a bad flight. It was on time and not much turbulence. I wonder what the nice lady next to me on the flight was eating. It looked and smelled delicious. Ah, there's a bathroom. Orlando International is so clean. It's good to be home.
Mets Trip
Mobile blogging from my Droid using the WordPress app. No spell check, this should be interesting. I reserve the right to correct misspellings and typos from my laptop later today.
Sitting on the plane at Orlando Airport, waiting for the flight attendant to tell us to turn off all devices for takeoff. I will be in NJ visiting family and then off to see Braves vs. Mets on Saturday at 1:10pm. This is my first game at Citi Field. I hope it surprises me. I am not a fan of this small stadium. Shea was ugly, but it was as big and loud as New York. It also looked like it belonged to the Mets. Citi looks like the home of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Note to Mets owners, the Wilpons...The Dodgers left town over 50 years ago. Get over it!
Time to stress out over the take off...not a fan of flying. Flying is fine, it's the crashing that I don't like. Gotta start my pre-flight OCD rituals. Let's Go Mets!
How jetBlue Stole Christmas
Update. February 23, 2010. From work today, I finally booked my flight with jetBlue . I was on the phone for sixty five minutes, sixty of those minutes were on hold.
There was a time when jetBlue was a special airline. Unlike Southwest Airlines (aka the 'flying bus') with their festival seating, jetBlue was affordable, the staff was friendly, and there was a TV set at every seat. An egalitarian airline, jetBlue has but one class. I'm telling you, flying jetBlue was a real pleasure, but all good things must come to an end.
In 2007, jetBlue let an airplane full of passengers sit on the tarmac for over 8 hours, and as a result, suffered their first real negative publicity to date. Not long after this incident, jetBlue created a passenger bill of rights and promised to do better. Well isn't that just super?! Eager to show the world that they had mended their ways, jetBlue overcompensated during the next snow storm, and canceled way more flights than their competitors. I know this to be true because every person flying into New York to attend my parent's 75th birthday party (their birthdays are very close, so they decided to hold one big party) never made it there, including me! Every other airline found a way to get guests to my parent's party, but jetBlue had its head up its fuselage that day.
So, the airline decided to err on the side of caution and cancel a bunch of flights, and I missed my parent's 75th (I'll catch the next one, don't worry), but what REALLY made me angry was that on the day in question you couldn't get through to jetBlue on the phone OR the web! I had no idea, at the time, if my flight was canceled or still on time. Unacceptable. I know a little bit about the web, and even if their site went down, they could have posted a static html page with flight info updated every 20 minutes. Regardless, a company the size of jetBlue should have web infrastructure contingency plans, especially if they are not going to answer the phone.
(In)security
I was going to wait until I returned home from my holiday trip to New York before posting an article about my experience of going through security at Orlando International Airport, but due the attempted bombing of Northwest Airlines Flight 253 on Christmas day, I felt compelled to post now.
On Tuesday, December 22nd, I packed my bags and headed to Orlando International to begin my holiday up North. After the normal routine of checking-in, I headed to the security checkpoint where I instantly noticed the myriad security guards just standing around chatting. Out of shape, slovenly dressed, and slack-jawed the guards joked around with one another and paid little attention to what was going on around them.
