I'm on a plane right now and may or may not be thinking about changing my name after witnessing this very morning through the airport speaker system that, yes, no lies at all, a guy named "Cameron Curly" indeed exists and deciding that he has the best super hero-esque name in the history of gay hairdressers.
I'm contemplating between the following potential new names:
Marni Marbles
Coraline Charcoal
Astra Alkaline
Tori Tarantula
and
Peter Posh. Because people say I kind of look like a posh Peter. (scratches non existant chin beard)
Reader suggestions are welcome.
There are another seven flights for me to take this year. Seven. I am trying to sum up the annual total and am both curious and terrified about finding out just how much time I've spent mostly unpaid in metal transportation tubes or waiting for metal transportation tubes. My long haul flight doesn't count because awesome destination and no work.
People who air travel to work are a separate breed. You can easily filter them from the rest of the airport crowd. They pack lightly, look polished and ready for business at 4 am, lack excitement, their eyes are tired and empty and you can sense capitulation. We've made peace with the fact that flights are no longer synonymous to vacations, rest, relaxation and exploration. They don't mean newness, socialicing, adventure. They mean business, and they make a work day just that little bit (9 hrs last week) longer. They mean lonliness, homelessness, anonymity, disconnection.
We air travellers (that term reminds me of air benders and oh goddamnit I wish I could air bend Avatar style right now) don't have time for your shitty packing skills. We have our aerosols and laptops out so as to avoid any hold ups at the screening points, in order to place our coffee order just in time to get through half, then throw it and hope our bowels move quick enough before the final boarding call. Noone wants to poop on a plane. We don't go "ooo ahh ahaa smile smile okaaay" when we get chosen for that damn explosions test. We walk quickly, avoid small talk, we know our seat number and where exactly that seat is located before we enter that 737-800. We know that there is a thing called 'plane etiquette', which includes knowing that just because you got up as soon as the seat belt sign was switched off, you are still to wait until every row in front of you has gotten their shit together and not just squeeze past and force them to fall back into their seats when attempting to disembark. Pet hate right there. It's row by row, for crying out loud. We know getting up before the seatbelt sign is switched off will NOT get you off the plane any quicker. It will only agitate your cabin crew, mate. We know that not getting up and forcing your neighbouring seat mate to crawl over your lap whenever they want to get up is raa-huude! Ageing lady next to me reading The Hunger Games, take note! We ask the dude in the window seat if we can pass him down his luggage, to make life a little easier.
I guess it's pedantic on my side to pick up on these things. But seriously peeps, learn how to fly!
Now here's an unrelated hotel room selfie.
Enjoy!
