Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
Welcome to your new Stadtsflughafen. You will obey!
I took a flight recently for business. I came away with a few impressions.
The first step of the journey was to visit our friendly government website describing which substances, devices, and articles of clothing were allowed on a plane that day. Hmm, although there's only about .7 ounces of deodorant left, that container is a 5 oz container, so it's on the no-fly list... Ditto the toothpaste, guess I'm checking a bag...
3:30 am: the alarm goes off, and I stumble out of bed. The taxi will be here in 30 minutes... Blargies... Food. Peanut butter, sure. Apple juice. Augh! Why is the refrigerator light so bright? The sun won't be up for another 3 hours, I don't need this kind of blindness right now.
The phone rings, and I answer. "This is Ian."
"Hello, this is the Greytop/Yellow cab company calling."
"Hel--"
"We are calling to let you know that your taxi will be there in two minutes. Click"
Urgh. Slam remaining apple juice. Say goodbye to blissfully-sleeping Kristin. Into the cab.
"Good morning, Mr.. Ian, right?"
"Yeah, that's me."
Forced, too-chipper conversation. This is the cabbie's first time? Oh, today. He knows how to go, right, because he went to college down that road. Ah, a BA in Poly-Sci? Wow, that's... yeah, you're driving a cab.
Seattle is pretty before sunrise. I wonder what the other drivers are doing on the road at... Ugh, 4:20 am. No one should be awake at this hour.
Fiddling with the tiniest credit card device in the world. Receipt. Shuffle forward into the line... Line? Check watch -- yep, 4:30 in the morning, and there's a line at the ticket counter. Must remember: never travel on a Monday morning again.
Plastic smile on the person behind the counter. She labels my checked bag. "Sir, would you mind just pulling this off for me?" The strap has offended her. Into the side-pocket with you, non-TSA-compliant strap! Little bag (with potentially deadly .7 ounces of deodorant! and toothpaste! inside) dissappears into the krill-straining maw of the metal whale.
Security line. Long tape barriers stretched out to keep the mob in line, only there's no mob. Stentorian voice: "Remove your shoes. Take off any metal objects and place them in your bag. Place your laptop in a separate bin. Place your shoes in a separate bin. Your belongings will be searched. Your orifices are ours for the probing." What? The Orwell is strong with this one. A low-production-quality video accompanies the Big Brother speech, showing a lifeless automaton obeying the stern commands. A suspiciously phallic "metal detector wand" sweeps over the dull subject on the screen, but the scene cuts before anything "happens."
Shuffle forward. No crowd, but you still have to wait. "Sir, do you mind if we re-scan this?" "Do I have a choice?" I don't say. "Of course not," with a plastic smile. Can't upset the TSA people, or they'll have that "wand" out. Citizen, relinquish all freedoms! Your flight might take off without you!
They didn't find any bombs or 3.1 oz bottles of hair gel, and hand my bag back. I re-attach all the metallic fiddly-bits to myself, and shuffle down to the subway to the N gates. Frightening, Stalinist mosaics of frustrated travelers, straight from Monopoly money, stare down at me, mocking the shuffling pre-dawn zombies.
Automatic, driverless subway train pulls up, and the zombies swap places. I sneak a glance at the robot's guidance system -- those rails are only a foot apart! Who decided on such a narrow gauge track? What am I, some kind of subway-track nerd? The robot drives us on, along an Oruboros track to nowhere.
Up, up, into the N gates! Two sets of escalators and one set of stairs. I'm the only person who opts for the stairs. So static and unpowered. How will I ever manage?
The sign points thataway, at the furthest corner of the building for my gate. The Alaska Airlines tuba song from their 80's ads plays in my head, replacing the Communist Russia march which had been playing. I march forward, sweating under my bag, past the sports bar (open), bagel restaurant (closed) and the newsstand (closed). What's wrong with this picture?
At last, rest. At my gate, with only... Check watch. Oh look, I'm an hour and a half early. Sigh. Ah, the gate attendant is here, I can check to see.. if.. That sign-board they're booting up is showing the Windows XP startup screen. I should have known, we're all doomed! And it's throwing errors! Ugh.
...
So, yeah. It could be safely said that flying is not the most enjoyable thing I've ever done.
Posted at 22:19 permanent link category: /misc
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater