Airplane Entitlement

I fly a lot due to an elderly mother in another state. Not the kind of flying I did when I was working full time, but still, 20k miles a year or so. Most flights are fine. Yes, they are more crowded than they used to be. Yes, there are more delays. Most people handle it well. Those who don't, wow, they really don't.

Mot recently I had a very pleasant flight - nice polite seat mate, good conversation, and enough leg room. I did chuckle at the woman who was all upset with the gate agent. You see she showed up with a carry-on bag, a camera bag and a purse, plus she had purchased magazines and other items from Hudson news and had a bag from them as well. The gate agent would not let her board until she consolidated down to two. Apparently this was quite unreasonable of him.

So true

Were you told that his "special needs" was being a di*khead?

I fly a lot and my way around that is that I generally sit on the aisle or window (since I board early as a frequent flyer) so I position my under-the-seat carryon towards whatever side is bordering the middle.  That makes it much harder for the middle person to encroach on my under-the-seat space and leaves me room for my tootsies should I choose to stretch them out.  And I think "neener neener neener" to myself because that is also how I roll.

Air travel sucks. Either you miss your connection, or the flight is delayed or cancelled for some reason, or they misplace or lose your luggage or you get stuck next to the most irritating fellow passenger. Air travel sucks.

Last time we flew Southwest, the gate agent had called for A 15-30 multiple times to board (after a three hour delya). The lady at the front hadn't moved which meant the rest of us couldn't move either. My dad politely points out that the line is supposed to move forward and when she still doesn't move suggest maybe we all walk around her. She finally gets her ass moving and stops at the person that checks in your ticket and tells him that my dad shoved her. They pulled my dad to the side and told him if he touched her again (he hadn't touched her at all) he would be removed from the flight.

I don't travel too often, maybe a couple times of year, so I don't have any "good" stories, lol. The worst I've seen, fortunately, is people who board near to last and expect to have a group of seats together (on Southwest, anyway). The last time I flew, we boarded with less then probably 10 rows left left. They started doing the "take the first seat you see" spiel and of course people don't listen. The last people are boarding and a family of three, with a child maybe 10ish, boards and of course, is continuing on looking. I heard them tell someone who offered their (single) empty seat by them, "we need two together." Well, good luck with that, you were obviously one of the last boarding. I don't fault them wanting one parent to sit with the child, but if you're that concerned, you need to fork up to $10 or $20 or whatever it is to get the priority seating for the sake of your child.