Lying in bed just like Brian Wilson did

[austin_dern]

I'm arrived; made it intact and with reasonably little loss of dignity or sanity. The most disappointing aspect of the flight was they didn't have the little seat-back screens, so you could either watch the disappointing movie they showed everyone, or read a book, or try to airline-sleep, which is like real sleep except it doesn't make you any less tired. For some reason there was what looked like a theme going, of movies starring Owen Wilson. After seeing several of them, I'm still not exactly sure who he is, although I don't mind him, certainly.

The real annoyance came from the Chicago-to-Newark leg, which earned an indefinite delay. Why? ``Routing problems,'' they announced, four minutes before they began boarding, which they weren't going to delay. What? Well, for mysterious reasons they didn't deign to tell us, they would have to take off about two hours late, but they were going to close the doors and leave the gate as scheduled. Huh? Well, this way if there were an early opening they'd be able to take off right away. And the only down side? The nearly full plane sitting on the runway somewhere in O'Hare for who knows how long. As it happened we got to leave after only (``only,'' he said) an hour and fifteen minutes. To mollify the passengers they served drinks, snacks, allowed people to view the cockpit -- with an attempted joke that it'd be ``only forty dollars per person,'' a quip I hope the co-pilot still feels embarrassed for making -- and showed much of Starsky and Hutch (they finished it during the flight), a movie which to my surprise I didn't hate. In fact, I kind of liked it, I think because of Owen Wilson, but it seems pretty new to be an airline movie.

The problem at Newark was left unexplained, except for a cryptic comment that they had only one runway open. Why? No sense telling us; better to just imagine reasons why only one runway at Newark would be open. It turned out the problem was heavy rains that slunk through the state mid-afternoon. Why couldn't they just say that? I don't know; maybe they thought we'd find it too dull to believe.

I got home, showered, went to bed, and got up 16 hours later, still tired.

Trivia: The modern pattern of naming objects on the Moon was created by Jesuit Father Joannes Riccioli of Bologne in 1651. Source: The Challenge of the Spaceship, Arthur C Clarke.

Currently Reading: Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett, Simon Louvish.

Comments

[blither.livejournal.com]

Hooray! =)

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Aw ... you always know just what to say. Thanks.

[blither.livejournal.com]

How long will you be home for?

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I'm in the U.S. through to the 21st, although I'm going to miss a lot of the days in-between, thanks to weddings and mathematics conferencing and a bunch of other little chores. Mostly it's giving me a chance to get really good and sleep-deprived.

[gafennec.livejournal.com]

They board you on time so the delay is not counted at the departing airport. The airlines and departing airport can say "we boarded on time!" But the delay does count for Newark.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know the motive is to avoid being counted as departing late. It's just the whole ``sit on the runway'' trick is one of those odd cases in which the airline and its representatives know they're lying, and the passengers know they're lying, and everyone knows pretty much why the lie is there and what the truth is, but nobody will say it, or protest strongly for truth. It's bizarre.

[gafennec.livejournal.com]

Actually; part of my Master's thesis dealt, amongst other things, with avoiding that situation. Changing the definitions so that passangers can wait in the terminal to their flight is 8th in line to take off.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

It'd be nice if they did adjust the definitions of on-time performance. No sense having people sit in the airplane growing ready to rebel when the problem is thunderstorms at the destination.

[gafennec.livejournal.com]

I concur. The transportation grid like the energy grid for the United States needs to be overhauled soon, but it won't be.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

or read a book, or try to airline-sleep, which is like real sleep except it doesn't make you any less tired.</i? This is true, I've airline-slept several times.. also class-slept and church-slept. One never gets much rest sleeping in a sitting position, it's just that time moves along. Sometimes when travelling, that's enough. I usually manage to pass time between a GBA, book, in-flight magazine and some sleep breaks. I imagine your singapore-US flights were longer than any I've taken, though. --Chiaroscuro

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I'm not positive how long the flight are -- I've not got a watch, for one thing, making timing all the more sketchy; and there are one or more stops each time -- but for a bed-to-bed estimate, I got on the taxi from my apartment at 5 p.m. Eastern Time Tuesday, and got home 11 p.m. Eastern Time Wednesday. It's a long time to go without a bed or a shower, and my vague plans to change mid-flight were cut when I noticed I couldn't get past the woman on the aisle who was sleeping. Some people are deft enough to do that; I'm not really deft enough to walk, much less avoid waking her.

[xolo.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you had a doom-free journey. Personally, I've always found it hard to stay awake on airplanes. Partly it's the vibration and droning, but I've long suspected that on long flights they're skimping on the pressure in the passenger cabin, thus cutting the oxygen partial pressure as well.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Well, Salon.com's airline pilot guy denies that any games are played with the oxygen to keep customers more passive during long flights. I'm really inclined to believe it; it's fatiguing enough sitting in more or less the same spot without enough leg or hip room for twelve hours. They don't have to add oxygen deprivation to the toll.

I have stayed awake the whole Newark-to-Singapore flight once or twice, because this way you race the sun just fast enough to get a full 24 hours of uninterrupted sunlight, so it's not like it's impossible to stay awake. It's just a long, monotonous experience.