You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy.™
The constant interruptions in an air craft.
3:45 am. The alarm rings by the bed stand.
Oh My God.
Is this a prison bunk check? Are the guards gonna toss me and look for a shiv? Is this for real?
I am on the 5:30 am flight to Denver out of Monterey.
United Express is the carrier.
Really United Express? A 5:30am flight? Is this aeronautical boot camp?
Was 6 am all booked up by the real airlines? Jeez! My circulatory system isn’t even working at 5:30am.
I get to the airport by 4:50 am. It’s dark and people look like they’ve been up all night smoking cigarettes and pulling one arm bandits.
The airport is quiet. There are crickets chirping on a luggage carousel that’s not moving.
The TSA screeners are not ready for us. The gates are closed and officers are testing equipment, perhaps sending through fake bombs and preparing to implement ridiculous routines for confiscating 6 ounce containers of hair jell and tubes of possibly flammable toothpaste.
As I climb the stairs to the plane I feel drunk. I am so tired, my head is heavy like carpet fuzz.
The flight attendant dims the cabin lights and I think to myself, OK, this is going to be good. I’ll take a nap.
NOT.
Suddenly the non stop wave of announcements begins.
It always begins with a DONG and then a blast of unintelligible words from somewhere over head.
“Good morning from the flight deck. This is Captain Fill in the Blank.,” he says pretending he is a late night disc jockey. “Our flight to Colorado is going to be two hours and five minutes.” His voice is even and smooth. I open one eye, waiting for this crackling headache of information to stop.
“The temperature is 72 degrees with a cross breeze of 7 knots from the South West.”
Come on all ready. It’s not like I’m going para sailing in Colorado. Who cares how many knots are blowing from what direction? And really, what is a knot? A measurement of speed? Is 7 a lot of knots? Is it a few knots? Is 7 so many knots a boy scout can’t untie it?
Whatever happened to miles per hour?
Shut Up.
The unintelligible intercom subsides.
I close my eye and let the jet engine noise saturate me like a warm blanket. I start dreaming of Candy Land sweetness as brain waves fizzle toward sleep.
“DONG”
Good morning my name is Seth. I’m your flight attendant.”
I don’t think I ever saw Seth. I kept my eyes shut, my window shade pulled tight, my sun glasses on securely. But Seth’s voice was sweet like feminine hygiene products dripping off the girl’s room wall.
I don’t know what a man’s ballet leotard would sound like if it could talk, but I bet it would sound a lot like Seth.
Seth would proceed to irritate me for the next 2,000 miles.
He reminded me in his maple syrup and crepe Suzette voice that I could walk freely about the cabin, but when I was seated I should keep my seat belt tight and low across my lap.
“Tight and low across your lap, thank you.”
He said this so many times, I wasn’t sure what he was even referring to after a while.
“Tight and low across your lap, Thank You.
Dong.
Tight and low across your lap.
The captain has put on the fasten seat belt sign.
Dong.
The captain has removed the fasten seat belt sign.
Dong.
“Tight and low across your lap.”
I felt like a college sophomore in a psychology experiment. You know where they wake you up just as a wave of REM sleep begins to wash up on the shore of your mind.
DONG.
Alcohol and beer can be purchased for 7 dollars.
What?
Please stay out of the aisle?
Huh?
DONG
Just a reminder; No smoking in the lavatories.
Who the hell even tries to smoke in an airplane bathroom?
Dong. Dong. Dong.
Seth must die.
With eyes shut and anger filling my head, I wonder how the pressurized cabin affects the door being opened at 33,000 feet.
Can one of us open the door and push Seth into the wild blue yonder? Would it take an entire group effort of everyone in the first 5 rows?
This saccharine voiced flight attendant is more irritating than sand in my cornea.
I may have dozed off at one point because my dream was desultory.
There were angry clouds swirling, across an evil candy land board, with monkeys dressed like flight attendants smashing the side of a tin airplane with mallets.
Dong.
We are beginning our descent into Denver. Please turn off all electronic devices, restore your seat backs and tray tables to their full and locked position. And remember to keep your seat belt fastened, tight and low across your lap.
AAARGH…..
I pull up my window shade and stare through blood shot eyes at the barren landscape that surrounds Denver.
I look for Seth on the way off the plane. I don’t see him. Perhaps he pranced off the plane at the first sign of freedom.
Maybe I can sleep on the luggage carousel, I think to myself as I zombie my way along.
Where ever he is now, I sure hope Seth is having a terrible day.
Dong.
And that is crazy.™