Modern day travel (AKA The three day post)

I am a nomadic couch potato.

Well, if you have followed any of my blogs, or … weirder yet … actually MET me in person, you will have long ago realized that I am pretty much an oxymoron (I said OXY thank you), and definitely a bundle of contradictions. For instance,  I remain a technophobic technophile. So nomadic couch potato is not all that far a stretch for me.

Back in the days when I was more on the nomadic side of nomadic couch potato, I used to really enjoy traveling. Not just going places, but the actual TRAVEL part of traveling. Some may not remember such times, but once upon a time, airports were FUN. And flights themselves were actually something to look forward to. That was before an over-informed, over-technologied society decided that actually being social and friendly with other humans FACE TO FACE is  a dangerous and undesirable thing to do.

I have not travelled in a long while, but thanks to the new age of travel (plus that excess of technology I was complaining about a sentence or two ago) I am now sitting in an airport well in advance of my flight, with …

… Sorry folks. I had a few interruptions. Things like actually having to board planes and such. I kept a running commentary via social media so my recent journey is well documented. Instead of trying to wrack my already vacation addled brain, I will simply copy and paste:

• Um … are airplane wings supposed to make that noise? Hmmmm.  Made it to Reagan alive. Sadly only halfway there. Where’s the bar?
• Halfway on my trip from Massachusetts to N Carolina. Total flying time will be about 3 hours. Total TRAVEL time … About 9 hours. Enjoyment factor so far … let’s just say I can’t wait to walk 2200 miles!
• 88 photos already and I haven’t even gotten there yet. I was just bored! I DON’T have a problem! I can turn the camera off ANYTIME!
• How did anyone survive airports before social networking? Oh yeah … bars. Remind me again why they are often outside the security gates?
• Gotta start stretching soon. Almost time to flap again. Gotta love these new age airplanes! Already wore out the soles in my sandals too!
• We will have to flap hard to get THIS plane in the air! @ Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA)
• My bad. That was the bus. The plane is actually smaller. Much easier to flap for that one!

Anyway, my whole point when I started this ramble a couple of days ago was to not a few observations about air travel these days. So here goes:

1. Hare Krishna types still exist, especially at 6am in the morning. They just now call them coffee shop employees. But they basically work the same way. Unnaturally smiley and happy and trying to get your money.
2. Mass and time are relative beyond security gates. When a plane arrives or leaves may or may not have any bearing on when it is scheduled to. And the size of the portions of any food product compared to its price has little or nothing to do with how it is in the REST of the world.
3. Customer service basically means you are a customer and something may or may not happen if you ask nicely (and pay extra).
4. "Modern" planes are basically sardine cans with wings.
5. Modern technology has pretty much ensured that conversation no longer exists.

Yep. Thanks to "progress" (definition, constant advance in unneeded technology purely for the sake of profit, ensuring humans are dependent on technology and paranoid as hell), TRAVEL itself is no longer fun at all. Good thing the ARRIVING is a whole different story!