…and then came home again…
Last day, but this one’s going to hurt.
Booking flights via little airports means the occasional bad connection day like this one: five hours sitting in the airport in Memphis. If I’m lucky, there will be free broadband and you and me can catch up and shoot the shit and stuff. I don’t feel lucky. Boston Logan charges for wifi; I have to assume it’s a trend.
Between the layover and the change in times zone, it’s going to be late-late-late when I get home.
Memphis. Feh. I once got kicked out of boarding school in Memphis, you may recall.
I’m not even getting fed on this flight. Nothing at all at stage one, and something called a $5 snack on stage two. According to the (surprisingly interesting) website airlinemeals.net, this is an example of the $5 snack.
You know what, though? I totally don’t mind buying food, if it means a major reduction in ticket price. I’ve often wondered how much it costs to provide those absurd and unpleasant hot meals, what with the ovens and the carts and the logistics and everything. On the upside, though, I suppose it gives the flight attendants an excuse to walk up and down checking on us, in case somebody goes all loop-de-loo at 35,000 feet.
See you in the morning, Insha’Allah.
Posted: July 11th, 2007 under adventure, family, personal.
Comments: 40
Comments
Comment from Pupster
Time: July 11, 2007, 9:53 am
I resisted the almost overpowering urge to buy something from that little cart on my last few flights. Buyers remorse always follows.
I do like drinking booze out of those little bottles though. Makes me feel GIGANTIC!
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 11, 2007, 11:15 am
Actually, Pupster, I believe when you’re flying at altitude, you ARE huge! It’s the lack of air pressure up there: you’re whole body expands. Those bottles are real-sized. One proof of this novel concept is to note how ridiculously small the seats and bathrooms become.
Likewise, when you’re on a submarine you squish down to a itty-bitty person. That’s why submarines are so hard to find. Think about it: how hard could it really be to find a spazillion-ton vehicle longer than a football field, if it stayed the same size?
Li’l submariners don’t eat much. That’s why they can stay submerged so long. Plenty of food.
Comment from Lokki
Time: July 11, 2007, 11:24 am
I’ve begun carrying my own provisions rather than accept the proffered provender when I fly domestic. Then I fart in the general direction of the stewardessses; rich farts ladened with exotic spices from my repast.
I’ll buy their booze as long as it comes from a sealed bottle.
Airline Food is bad
Bad enough I’d rather starve
Or eat the arm rest
Comment from Enas Yorl
Time: July 11, 2007, 2:46 pm
The food they give you in First Class is actually pretty good. Nice, comfy seats and they know your name. No carts because the kitchen area is right there. They have a drink in your hand before they even start loading the rest of the passengers. You know the smirk First Classers give the lower classers as you shamble by? Oh yes – there is a reason for it. 🙂
Comment from jwpaine
Time: July 11, 2007, 3:10 pm
Flown a few times in first-class…. Told my wife I’d never fly again unless it was first-class.
Come to think of it, I haven’t flown for a long time….
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: July 11, 2007, 4:02 pm
That smirk on the faces of the people in first class? It’s a grimace. What they’re really thinking is “goddamn it! Why don’t I have a private jet?”
Yes! It is me! It is I! It is S. Weasel. I am speaking to you from the bowels of sunny Memphis. They charge for wifi, but it was $6 for four hours, so what the hell. It’s worth a buck more than the $5 snack, any day. Anybody want an Elvis t-shirt?
The trip went well. Mercifully short, and nobody bit anybody. My dad’s new bass horn is…indescribable. Every time he let out that first blat, I thought, “Whoop! He’s lost control of his bowels!”
Well. I don’t know what’s more terrifying, roadkill haiku or Dawn’s maiden name.
Farquhar. Oh, the humanity.
Did I read that aright? Is McGoo out being cyborged? I’m just skip-reading here…
Damn, this connect is hinky.
Comment from Dawn
Time: July 11, 2007, 4:25 pm
well that’s the Scottish? spelling of course.
Comment from Dawn
Time: July 11, 2007, 4:31 pm
Found something for you…
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 11, 2007, 4:40 pm
Ah-ha! Weasel exists. I was starting to think you were a ghost in the machine. $6 is a small price to pay for the richness of…minions!
I’ve loved first class the times I managed to get it. When I consulted, I demanded it. In the contract and everything.
It’s true – seems they MUST have a drink in your hand before the coach-folks board. Flew to Singapore once in one of those double-decker 747’s – y’know – with the upstairs business class section? It was awesome. Roomy.
I get ‘Borged tomorrow. Titanium ball n’ socket with the knurly finish so the bone grows into it. Doc says it’ll outlast me. I’m…nervous/anxious. My doc told me to start bugging them to release me as soon as I wake up. He’s cool.
Did your Dad tramp around in a scottish kilt and all?
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 11, 2007, 5:10 pm
One addition to Dawn’s link. The old classic: super-glue a quarter or 50-cent piece or Dollar coin onto the floor. Then pick a seat and watch the fun as folks try to scoop it up while walking.
The nice thing about this one is that it’s like background music – you can check up on it perodically – or out of the corner of your eye – , whilst doing other things.
Comment from Lokki
Time: July 11, 2007, 5:48 pm
Welcome Back Weasel! McGoo, Dawn, Wabbit, Yorl, JW, and I have done what we could to keep those pesky blog statistics down along with the thousands of other minions.
For what it’s worth, the Lokki’s have decided to do a weekend in Manhattan starting tomorrow morning – no, not flying there first class, but we won’t be staying at no mere Holiday Inn –
It will be a four weasel Hotel with elevators n’ everything!
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
We will be net-incommunicado, so it’s not that I’ll be sulking over the return of the uber-weasel and his strict haiku standards or the absence of the Doppelgänger-weasel-McGoo with his stiff competition in that same arena.
McGoo “Titanium ball n’ socket with the knurly finish Sounds Kinky! I am so out of touch with the status accessories of the upper classes. I don’t even have a tattoo yet.
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 11, 2007, 5:52 pm
No Lokki-muse this weekend? Rats!
Have fun, L. Wish I could afford to stay at a 4-Weasel hotel.
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 11, 2007, 10:28 pm
Anybody we know? Naah!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070711/wl_mideast_afp/iraqunrestanimal
Comment from whitishrabbit
Time: July 11, 2007, 11:06 pm
Ha, haven’t seen Uncle around, that explains it. Awesome find.
Hi, wb, weasel!
Comment from jwpaine
Time: July 12, 2007, 12:19 am
A Weasel regained!
Speaking a sudden accent
Now he’s rye chair.
Lokki and Sigyn
shape-shift to Metropolis
Trickster’s paradise.
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:39 am
It’s one o’clock and I can’t sleep and they’re cutting me in about 6-7 hours. Shit. I already feel a huge suck-like pall dropping over my existance. And, baby! – that ain’t like me at all. Mssr. Positive, here. Always and forever.
jw – I picked up Fire & Blood – the Mexican history book by Fahrenbach. I kinda wanted the TX one but it was out of stock, I guess. I will consume it after I polish off a Wild Bill Hickok biography.
And…I may write a vilanelle about @ss-patting and Wardo’s loincloth. A line came to me a little while ago while I was tossing and turning…a wonderous line…
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:41 am
Meh. I put the machine on standby to go get a sammich and NEVER got my wifi back. Then my plane was a half hour late. It was overbooked, so they asked for volunteers to bump. Would’ve gotten a hotel, food and a free roundtrip anywhere in the States…but nooooo, I wanted to get home.
Just as the drinks cart had finally wended its way to Weasel’s seat, the grandmother across the aisle began to gasp for breath. Allergic reaction. Doctors in the house? Three, and one nurse. They gave the old lady oxygen and shot her up with epinephrine and started an IV (bloodily, all over the place) and finally laid her out on the floor in first class while we made an emergency stop in Ohio (!). Offloaded her and her two grandkids and then sat for an hour while they did the paperwork you apparently have to do when this sort of thing happens.
I never got my complimentary beverage 🙁
Good thing I left my car at the airport, because the buses were all done by the time we landed. Then they’d closed the ramp that leads from I-90W to I-93-S, leaving me to make whimpering noises, stranded and lost in downtown Boston. It’s raining. I’ve been awake and on the go for very nearly 24 hours now, and the desk is all heaving and pitching under me like the deck of the…insert name of famous small boat here.
I have to go write my boss a note and explain I’ll be late. I suppose McGoo is already McGone. Let’s all beam happy hip-healing rays at McGoo, hm? And then, when it’s all over, we can call him McGimp.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:42 am
McGoo! You nipped in while i was composing my opus…
They didn’t give you nothing for sleep? Boo. Good drugs are the point of the exercise.
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:43 am
Rye chair!
Duh!
It seeped in so slowly…
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:47 am
Weas – they cut me off the opiates days ago and it really sucks and I’m really hurtin’ and I am so pissed that I can’t get to sleep and I am worried that I am *nervous* about a itty bitty cut.
So, uh, how’s it goin’? Oh! It’s already up there. I will read…
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:52 am
Oh, man, if they’ve been giving you opiates and they stopped…that’s super no fun! It hurts again AND your happy centers are supressed.
My dad showed me his scar after his hip operation (thanks. Just what I needed. Visual memory of my father’s elderly, naked ass). The scar wasn’t too drastic (and that was 21 years ago).
I’m putting booze on top of fatigue. They potentiate each other! Woo!
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:57 am
Geez. Your day sucked. I’m sorry. I think your boss should give you the day off. Hazzard pay!
Bet none of the med practitioners present on the plane had done an IV in years.
As you can read above – I’m not quite gone yet. But in a few hours…and I’m not getting any sleep.
And…you’re damned right the drugs are the point here. What good is surgery if they don’t get you blasted?
Best to ya, Weas. I’ll be back in a few. McGimp! Ha!
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 2:03 am
Doc had me on “mild” ones – for when it really, really hurt. But 5-7 days ago he said “No more – clear your system!” so I been a little sore lately. Well, a LOT sore lately.
I view opiates like I view a rattlesnake – really neat and interesting – and don’t fuck with ’em. They’ll bite.
The booze should crater you shortly. Sleep in.
I’m gonna try again to sleep also. Night.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: July 12, 2007, 2:04 am
Back atcha, McGoo.
Yeah, I think all those guys were specialists and hadn’t done an IV in years. They were really nervous (except the nurse. Brrr. Nurses are scary animals). But everybody on the plane was awfully good. The lady behind Grandma had a panic attack while this was going on and the lady next to me got wadded up about her medication and her $5 snack and things, and everybody was seeing to everybody else. It was like a big ol’ hippie commune at 35,000 feet. Brought a tear to my eye; or would’ve done if I hadn’t been so dehydrated.
My boss would gladly give me the day off, but that just squeezes my deadlines closer together.
Good luck, McGoo. Soon you will be an ungodly melding of man and machine. Which is, you have to admit, pretty cool.
Comment from Sarah D.
Time: July 12, 2007, 4:02 am
You ain’t Scottish or my ass is plaid. 😀
Glad to see you home Weasel.
Comment from EW1(SG)
Time: July 12, 2007, 4:03 am
Weasel,
There are certain people that I know its not safe to travel with.
My spouse, the lovely Sarah D. being one when it comes to airlines.
I’m gonna guess that you and I should never be on the same airplane.
Oh, man, if they’ve been giving you opiates and they stopped…that’s super no fun! It hurts again AND your happy centers are supressed.
Ugh. Withdrawal sucks. Haven’t had to take any hydromorphone since February, but the last withdrawal wasn’t too bad…since I got used to it, having done it at least a dozen times in the last two years.
Come to think of it, the best inflight meal I ever had was on an Air Force C5. Cost $1.10, and the guys flying the plane were reservists doing their drill weekend. I only flew one segment with them, but they were on their way to turn in the plane after having flown a global circumnavigation.
Oh, and Dawn? Sorry not to reply to your email: a botched upgrade to my ‘puter had me speechless for awhile.
Comment from Steamboat McGoo
Time: July 12, 2007, 4:31 am
I’m up and showered and almost out of here – with no sleep.
EW1 – I read your last line as “…a botched upgrade to my pooter had me speechless…”
Now what’s interesting is that I sat here for a good five minutes – tired and spaced – honestly trying to fit this in with reality, without really questioning it. It just wouldn’t quite fit for some reason…
Comment from TattooedIntellectual
Time: July 12, 2007, 4:33 am
Last time I flew (from NZ to Aus) had an ear infection and had to be at the airport at 04-fucking-30. The swelling displaces my lower jaw so chewing anything tougher than baby food is out of the question. Which means I end up taking pain pills on an empty stomach. So, let’s do the math: empty stomach + pain meds + altitude changes + up since o’dark thirty + full bathrooms (ALL of them) = yaking up in front of two flight stewards. Not my best day.
Comment from Gnus
Time: July 12, 2007, 10:27 am
WB, sweasel. There’s a rainbow at the end of the flight. Somewhere.
McGoo, good luck and keep a stiff upper hip. LIP! That should be stiff upper lip. When it’s over you’ll be the bionic McGoo.
Say, Sweasel, noticed anything funny with email to stoatyatsweaseldotcom? I keep getting failure messages from some place in Utah. WEird place, these intertubes, sometimes.
Comment from Pupster
Time: July 12, 2007, 11:18 am
McGoo couldn’t sleep
Weasel had a bad flight home
Lightning out my ass
Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: July 12, 2007, 11:45 am
I go away for a couple of days to visit relatives and all damn hell breaks loose!
Weasel covered in blood and guts and stranded in Ohio, McGoo dragged off his drugs so’s they can slice him open, vile stories spread about happy, smiling, peace-loving badgers.
Good luck, McGoo. Welcome back Stoaty.
(PS – Iraqis are pussies. They don’t taste good either)
Comment from jwpaine
Time: July 12, 2007, 11:46 am
Okay, I’ll state the obvious:
Repairing Steamboat
We have the technology
Bionic McGoo!
Comment from Dawn
Time: July 12, 2007, 12:20 pm
I said a prayer for McGoo. I am relieved EW1 is allright. I was worried the stalker may have found them and they had to move again.
Comment from jwpaine
Time: July 12, 2007, 1:38 pm
Prayer for McGoo
Doc, while you’re fixing nature
Make sure he’s still hip.
Comment from jwpaine
Time: July 12, 2007, 3:58 pm
Please, god, don’t make me carry the entire booger/IRB-haiku load alone!
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