grievance: the worst airplane ride ever

Okay. I admit that part of the cause for what culminated in "the worst flight" in aviation history had something to do with me. I realized, the day before I was supposed to go to Puerto Rico for a much-needed respite from the world, that the looming paper deadline on the horizon was actually due the day after we were supposed to get back to NYC... at 9:45 A.M. And our flight was getting in at 1 A.M. So, I'd spent a bunch of "beach time" reading JSTOR articles about fallacious, semicompetitive village elections in China. (And had to spend FORTY THREE dollars on printing some of these out at the business center of our hotel. Meh.)

So... When I got on the plane to come back home, I was all kinds of prepared to just bang out this paper. And then the flight-from-hell began. The young man in front of me felt it was acceptable and appropriate to wail his arms about and yell in my face to get my attention (I was on my computer and had earplugs in so as to preempt any kind of vexing behavior by other jetBlue patrons).

"Yo, you gots a credit card?"

Bewildered and bemused, I told him that I did, in fact, have one.

"My buddy ain't got one and they not takin' cash and he wants-a get a drink. You put it on your card and he cu pay you back?"

Okay. This dude had already banged the hell out of his seat (which slammed into my computer on the tray table every time) and had been yelling like he was in a bar. But I thought "hey, this would be a nice thing to do." So I did.

Then the entire thing caused such a commotion that all of the flight attendants were in the aisle, trying to figure out this stupid situation. When I asked her for another tomato juice, she smiled and said "would you like some vodka with that?" I really would have. But the fuckin' China democratization paper. Ugh.

Then these fucking bastards essentially start jumping up and down like monkeys, laughing, banging seats. Acting like real classy characters. So I went to sit by the window.

Still fucking distracted as hell by the three d-bags, now there was also a woman in front of me sitting on her knees somewhat turned to her boyfriend, massaging him, and essentially staring at me. At first it was annoying. Then it was severely disturbing and creepy.

So, after all of these frustrations and only 2 pages of writing done, even with earplugs, I decided to take a mini nap and finish up later.

I woke up when they made the announcement that we'd be making our descent into New York.

The three d-bags were still acting like d-bags, so THAT was awesome.

I looked out the window and tried to calm down. After all, I'd just had an amazing and relaxing vacation: so relaxing a vacation was it that the only complaints I could think of (and I tried hard) were:
1. Grievance: The Terribly Annoying Noise of the Ocean Waves Crashing on the Beach
2. Grievance: Warm, Beautiful 85 Degree Weather in March
3. Grievance: Pina Coladas Melting Too Quickly in the Sun
4. Grievance: Having a Balcony
5. Grievance: Outlet Stores Closing Too Early
6. Grievance: Accidentally Falling Asleep Because You're Too Relaxed
So that's just a few. Not my best work, I concede. It's hard to be prickly in paradise.

In any event, just when I'm starting to calm down from the annoyance, there's some turbulence. I love turbulence. It's like a rollercoaster. I've never had a bad flying experience in my life, so I don't take it too seriously. But this went on for about 3 minutes and then got worse. And then it got really bad. And I looked over at one of the d-bags and he was praying. And I laughed. And then it got REALLY bad. And REALLY scary. And then I looked out at the wing and it looked like it was battling a fucking enemy. And it was pouring. I actually seriously thought the plane was going down and we were going to die.

I was sweating and shaking and about to start crying. When we finally landed, I was unbelievably nauseated. But I was also in some weird shock and was so anxiety-ridden that I couldn't even speak or look at lights. It was horrifying.

I was still in shock when we got home. So I started drinking Bacardi out of the bottle to loosen up to write the rest of the damned paper. I got myself to bed at 5A.M.

I have no recollection of what I put into the second part of that paper, so that should be interesting to say the least.

I regret I do not have pictures or video of the three d-bags, because I was so stunned by the experience I couldn't make it happen. I do however have a picture that will make you all, including myself now that I'm back in dreary New York, quite jealous.

From now on, I think I'm going to have to be one of those CRAZY bitches who pop a Xanax before they fly. Here's to unnecessary pharmaceuticals!



-caribbean moon