Return your seats to the upright position

So I saw this story about a fat guy on Air France today. Since just this week I made a whirlwind tour of airports - St. Louis, Houston, Anchorage, Seattle, back to Houston, and home again to St. Louis - all in the space of about thirty hours, I thought the story was particularly germaine. For those too lazy to take a break and read the story linked above, here's the gist:

Some big fat guy tried to get on a flight and the French ticket agent - normally such a caring and polite breed - told him that if you take up two seats, you have to pay for two seats. The fat guy got his feelings hurt, naturally, and is suing the airline. Probably the ticket agent didn't explain that if you buy two tickets, you get two meals. It's a win-win, really. But I digress.

This whole mess about charging fat guys extra because they take up too much space is a slippery slope, if you think about it. I can already see the next step - making skinny guys share their seat with someone else. I mean how can airlines justify giving some beanpole an entire seat when there's plenty of room left over for another skeleton or an unaccompanied minor (if the parents were there they'd probably object, the big whiners).

And I think this is what happened to me on my flight from Anchorage to Seattle, and continuing on Houston. Because I am of above average height, I usually try to get an exit row seat so I have a little extra room. but on this particular trip I was travelling with two kids - mine, it turns out - and they aren't allowed in the exit rows. So I wedged myself into the less-than-generous normal seat, and no sooner did we get up to cruising altitude, than the woman in front of me reclined her seat as far back as it would go. She was completely undeterred by the howls of pain which originated in my kneecaps, moved past my vocal chords, and escaped from my mouth. She was back far enough that while I was reading my book, I kept choking on her hair. She was very nearly lying in my lap. The side effect of this was that since I had to rearrange myself to accomodate her, every time the flight attendant came by with a cart of some sort, she either ran over my foot, banged me in the knee, or both.

What really annoyed me, though, was that when her meal came, she left the seat back in the reclined position! It just seems spiteful, really. She's doing extra work to sit up and eat, just so she can reserve her spot in my lap. I guess she was afraid someone else might come and sit there.

After the meal was over, she actually tried to get the seat down farther. Fortunately for my groin, the seat had its mechanical limits. She seemed disappointed, looking up at me from my lap. "Sorry, sweetheart," I told her. "I paid for the whole seat."

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After we got to Houston, having just missed our connection to St. Louis - literally by seconds (thanks a lot, Continental) - we got to sit at George Bush International Airport for about 4 hours. While we were waiting, I eventually needed to visit the restroom. When I entered, what I found there horrified me on many different levels. Seated in the first stall, trousers bunched at his ankles, was a man conducting business both on the toilet and on the cell phone, simultaneously. I have to wonder if the other party to the cell phone deal was aware that he didn't have his colleague's undivided attention. I mean honestly, there is such a thing as too much connectivity, isn't there? There's a reason pay phones never really caught on in the john. Just because you can make a call there, doesn't mean you should. And to actually conduct business like that? "Yeah, Phil, I'll get those contracts...right...over..." his voice morphing into a strained grunt. Classy.

Would you have noticed that?

So my wife and I have developed a little game that bears sharing with the world at large. We call this game "Would you have noticed that at the mall." The object of the game is to casually brush up against your opponent, touching them in what would otherwise be an inappropriate manner (if you know what I mean) without the recipient of the harrassing gesture realizing they had been groped. It is sort of like combining sexual harassment with picking pockets. Bill Clinton meets the Artful Dodger, as it were. There are no hard and fast rules so creativity is encouraged. So long as the player on offense (a term which, in this case, has meaning on several levels) derives some purile satisfaction, and the defensive player remains unaware of your advances, you win! After you execute your move, you ask your opponent, "Would you have noticed that if a stranger did that to you at the mall?" If you are met with rolling eyes and a disgusted, "Yes, I would," then you lose (although the awkward, ham-fisted feel you just copped is your to treasure forever). If on the other hand, the harassee seems not to know what you're talking about, congratulations!

One problem we haven't quite ironed out of the game is that it is pretty easy for the defensive player to cheat. Merely asking the "would you have noticed that" question is a big tip off that a groping has occurred. Even if the feel itself was undetected, going for the win gives it away. So far we have had to rely on each other's honesty, which, for us, seems to be working out reasonably well. My wife and I have had a game going for a few years now, and the score is pretty well tied. If you decide to play, you'll want to assess the honesty of your potential opponents. You'll also want to advise your adversary of your intent to play, and be sure they are up for the game. Otherwise, if you find out that you suck at it, you may get more than the aforementioned disgusted eyeroll - I can not be held responsible for any lawsuits, restraining orders, or bodily injury sustained by you or anyone else in connection with an ill-advised and poorly timed WYHNTATM match.

I have noticed that the game seems to be catching on with the general public. Almost every time I am at an airport, on any form of public transportation, or at an actual mall, someone tries to go a round with me. I usually notice, though, and often tell the other player that I know what they did. I haven't yet developed my skills to the point where I feel comfortable initiating a match with strangers, though.

What's that? Oh, I am 35 years old. Why do you ask?

My what is elevated?

So a couple of months ago I went to see a doctor, an engagement which included a blood-letting. The nurse used a needle, not a leach, and afterward I didn't really feel any relief from having the bad blood extracted. In fact, when the initial test results came back, they showed I have too much bilirubin in my blood. I am given to understand that bilirubin is formed when red blood cells decompose, and the liver is supposed to clean the bilirubin out. Mine, however, does not. After a second test a couple of weeks ago, the doctor determined that I am afflicted with a condition called Gilbert's Syndrome. It's named after a French guy, evidently, as it is pronounced "zhil-bear." It makes me feel very sophisticated to have such an elegant sounding disease.

So how long do I have, doc? Give it to me straight...don't sugar coat it. If I don't eat a pound of bacon for breakfast every morning, continue to not smoke, don't step in front of any moving cars, or go hunting with the vice president, the best I can hope for is another fifty-five years (sixty, tops). Gilbert's Sydrome is a completely benign, asymptomatic condition that hardly warrants status as a syndrome. Typical of the French, really. Even their diseases run away screaming like a girl, and let cholesterol (the bad kind), RJ Reynolds, traffic accidents, and shotgun-toting politicians do their dirty work.

Now that I have a real disease, my first order of business is to get myself a special license plate so I can park in handicap spaces. Whenever I go to work, or the library, or the grocery store, I see parking lots that have about two dozen handicap spaces, and there are never more than a couple of actually disabled people in whatever place you're going to. Even at a crowded mall, you never see more than maybe four wheelchairs or people on crutches. It used to really bother me that all those special spaces went unused, or else were occupied by what I thought were perfectly healthy reletives of disabled people just taking advantage of the hadicapped license plate. Maybe they too were suffering from Gilbert's Syndrome, or some other similarly impotent French disease. Anyway, now that I am disabled, I will appreciate not having to trundle myself, bilirubin-laden blood and all, that extra thirty feet from the parking lot into the Piggly Wiggly. I am also thinking of forcing my landlord, through the court system if necessary, to build a wheelchair ramp up to my front door, even though I do not require a wheel chair, and am moving out in a couple of weeks anyway. The point is, I feel that I have been discriminated against long enough. I will no longer tolerate such blatant anti-gilbertism (or is it gilbertphobia?).

I may form some kind of foundation as well. We'll have special walks to raise money for Gilbert's Syndrome research. We'll sell yellow rubber bracelets embossed with the phrase "Say No to Bilirubin." Some of the proceeds from the bracelet sales will go to pay for my two recent blood tests. The rest will go towards a copy of the new Eric Clapton CD. Unless the Make-A-Wish foundation gets it for me. Then the bracelet money will help me purchase a bottle of bourbon, you know, as payback for the whole missing enzyme gambit. Take that, stupid liver.

Is that a bomb in your pants?

So last week I had the pleasure of returning to England for a few days to meet with colleages and wrap up some left-over research business. Now typically anytime I am involved in air travel, something goes horribly wrong. I've been delayed, subjected to traffic accidents, had my luggage lost, been party to bus accidents, been seated next to smelly, loud children (sometimes not even my own), and that's just on the way to the airport! Haha, but seriously folks...

Anyway, this most recent trip to the UK was going swimmingly, suspiciously free of anything even slightly irritating (I did get seated next to a mother with a nine-month-old baby on the trip home, but they both slept almost the entire flight, so what do I care?) Both going over and coming back, all the flights were on time, I managed to get the really comfortable bulkhead seats where I can stretch my legs all the way out, it was perfect...until I was collecting my bags at customs coming home Sunday night. That's when things went a bit pear-shaped. First, I had brought back a plastic crate full of books and other assorted items that I had left either at my office in Durham or at a friend's house. When it came down the baggage claim belt, it was wrapped in a plastic bag, and the crate was completely smashed. I think all of the contents are still there, fortunately. But then a woman from Customs and Border Protection came around with a dog who was sniffing at everyone and their luggage (the dog, not the woman). The pair of them had past by me once while I was in line to have my passport checked, and the dog ignored me. Then they came around while I was waiting for my luggage, and they ignored me again. On a second pass a few minutes later, the dog started sniffing me and stuck his nose in my crotch (as dogs do), so the woman started asking if I had any prescription drugs or food in my pants. I didn't so I told her no. She took my customs declaration form and wrote "K9" on it and off she went. Then they came around a third time, and this time the dog started nosing around my busted-up crate. "Oh, great...some malevolent and
opportunistic baggage handler has shoved some kind of contraband into my crate during their 'repair' job," I thought. Anyway, she asked me what was in the crate (the woman, not the dog), and I told her it was mostly books, a pair of computer speakers, and other assorted items one tends to accumulate at the end of moving across creation. So anyway, my backpack finally came down the belt and I was on my way to check out with the customs guy, but of course since my customs form bore the clever K9 mark, I was subjected to "additional screening." I was fearful that I would be put into a dark room while some giant woman named Frieda snapped on some elbow-length rubber gloves and asked me to bend over. To my great relief, it was just a couple of guys who rifled through my computer bag and my backpack (although they did slip into some rubber gloves beforehand). So, while it was a little unnerving to have all of my dirty underpants enthusiastically examined for hidden drugs or explosives, then put on display for the delight of my fellow passengers, at least I wasn't groped by anyone. They didn't bother unwrapping my plastic crate, though. So the two items that the dog actually showed interest in - my crotch and the crate - were left unmolested. My backpack felt humiliated and dirty afterwards, though.

For the record, neither my crotch nor my plastic container contained anything worth getting excited over. I know that doesn't sound right, especially in relation to my crotch, but you know what I mean: I wasn't smuggling anything illegal.

Anyway, I should have known that I can't get away from a transatlantic flight completely free of inconvenience. I think from now on I will just drive...