Home!

Traveling home, Eugene to Denver was my first flight of the day.  I sat down in my window seat and waiting to see who would be sitting next to me.  It's sort of like playing the lottery, and my odds seemed pretty good.  There were only 50 passengers in all, and not a single one was a baby.  One by one they boarded the plane: attractive young woman, old lady handing out candy, guy in a Red Sox hat, another attractive young women.  I actually started to get a little optimistic, which is how I knew that the only obese man on the plane was going to sit down next to me.  Yup.  This man was three inches shorter than me while we were standing, and a foot taller while we were both sitting down.  At least he didn't smell funny, which is more than I can say about the fellow sitting in the seat in front of me.

Two and a half hours later--shortly before my legs required amputation, we mercifully landed in Denver.  Flying is always hard on my legs, but doing an intense weight training session within 24 hours of flying was definitely a bad idea.

Denver was an easy layover, with most of my 45 minutes spent walking to the new gate.  This time I was fortunately enough to sit next to a 30-something woman who didn't weigh over 350 pounds, so I considered that to be a success.

And then there was Chicago.  It was scheduled to be an hour and a half layover.  That was before the plane was over an hour behind schedule.  Why?  Why couldn't this happen in an airport with free wifi.  Why don't I just pay the $10 for wifi?  I don't know--it's the principle.  That feels like too much money.  It's clearly not, but because my gut reaction is that it's too much money, I'm going to stubbornly refuse to pay, and just make myself miserable for 3 hours.  My only solace is the knowledge that the same thing is going to happen when I return to Eugene in two weeks.  Curse my irrationality.

But Chicago wasn't all bad.  They had this gem in the bathroom.

I must have spent 30 minutes in the bathroom just waving my hand over that toilet.  Anything to pass the time. Then, before I left the stall, I made sure to pee all over the toilet seat, just so that the next guy felt like he was getting his money's worth.  That thing was really cool.

By the time my flight was finally ready to depart, I was too tired to care about anything anymore.  I think I actually fell asleep shortly before boarding began, and when I woke up, I was standing at baggage claim in Hartford.

Some observations.

Apparently leggings are the thing to wear for young women traveling.  I'm not sure where I stand on that issue.

To the man in the Chicago bathroom who stood the urinal and exclaimed, "worthless piece of shit," we all have trouble going from time to time, but insulting you penis is not the way to win his favor.

To the middle aged man waiting for a flight to hartford, when you're able to sit upright and rest your laptop on your stomach, it might be time to face the fact that you have a problem.

Every time I start to think that maybe I've been too hard on humanity, maybe most people really do have value, then I watch how they de-plane.  It is a travesty.  For the love of god, airlines, start charging for carry-on bags.