Week 13: People on Airplanes

As we all either return from spring break or get ready to leave, a lot of us will be boarding planes. Fair warning: it's going to suck. I've been traveling the skyways my entire life because, like many others, I'm a privileged white kid. It has very rarely been a pleasant experience. There always seems to be someone talking too loud, grabbing my seat, taking up too much space, or just generally being the worst. I've summed up those four types of people below.

Seat Grabbers: These people, either due to obesity or severe lack of self motivation, are unable to get out of their seat under their own power. This means that in order to use the rest room, which they must do six times during your one-hour-long domestic flight, they have to grab the back of your seat and heave themselves up. This would all be well and good if the seats were made out of concrete, but as myself, you, and other rational human beings know, they are not. So when Jabba the Hut behind you decides it's time for bathroom break number four, they hang onto your seat for dear life and it rocks more than your least favorite high school friend's head at a Nickelback concert.

Worst place on earth. Also probably a seat grabber's nirvana

Seat Shakers: You've heard of restless leg syndrome? Well these people suffer from restless life syndrome. I had a seat shaker in front of me on my flight to Las Vegas, and she single-handedly made those some of the worst four hours of my life. These people adjust their sitting position endlessly. Now, getting comfortable isn't an issue. We're all crammed into a steel and aluminium tube for a number of hours, so by all means get into a position that lends itself to bothering me the least. However, when these people adjust their sitting position, they do so with the force of a dump truck dropping off a load of smaller dump trucks. She almost spilled my drink several times and made it nearly impossible to keep anything on the tray table. I really had no way to combat this other than to mention her in my blog, so here we are.

Can't blame the kid. That guy looks like a textbook seat shaker

Loud Talkers: When on an airplane, please keep your annoying conversation and your cackling laughter to a minimum. This really applies anywhere, but the difference is that on an airplane I can't leave (no matter how much I may consider it). Nobody wants to hear about your Aunt Lauren, your coworker Darrel, or your cats. Keep to yourself and we all may just make it through this with a shred of sanity. Also, this is unrelated, but please, for the love of God, keep your feet in your damn shoes.

You should be ready to sit the hell down, Kristen Wiig

Your Roommate Who's Only Flown Like, Three times: If you have a roommate who has only taken planes on three different trips (before this one), let's call him Carter, don't take him with you. He will call connections "connectors." He will look out the window the entire flight and point out things on the ground. He will insist that you download the American Airlines app so you can receive flight status updates and view your boarding pass (even though you get it via email). He will talk about the quality of the landing for three hours. Do not take him with you.

He also might look like this

Planes are some of the worst places on earth. They charge you hundreds of dollars for a few hours of misery and take you to a place you'll probably hate. My advice? Stay home and watch Netflix. That costs $8 per month and you don't need anybody else around to use it. Perfect.

I hope you all enjoyed this two-blog bonus week. Have a great, flight-free weekend and I'll see you all right here next week.