Hopping between flights it’s probably all too easy to get wound up by what seems like the simplest things. In this case it’s luggage – and the flight I’ve just come from showed why. We all got on board some weird looking jet called an MD88 and tried to put our bags into the luggage compartments, or “bins”. It quickly became clear that there wasn’t enough room for the carry-on items everyone had. The flight, which was full, left slightly late as people ended up ramming bags under the seats. The reason wasn’t the amount of carry-on luggage but the sheer size of it.
I’m not exactly sure where this trend has come from but everyone around me seems to have a new type of bag. Gone are the sports bags, back-packs and satchels and in their place comes what I can only describe as another suitcase. They’re massive great things and no-one seems to be weighing them. They range from laptop-size bags with extendable handles up to a suitcase which is the same size as the one I have in the hold containing my clothes. Because they’re rigid and large there’s no real room to move them around and they usually have to go into the overhead compartment width-ways so that they don’t stick out. Worse still is the fact that they have wheels, so not only do you have to wait for Mr Marketing Executive to fiddle around with the bag to make it fit in the heavily laden compartment, but you also have to wait while he attempts to find out how the handle goes back down.
I mustn’t go on about it too much. Although blogging all this is a great way to spend time on a flight, I guess I could watch King Kong instead. Hmmm.. This film isn’t too bad.. However, perhaps it’s my logical mind, but I have to point out a couple of points which don’t make sense to me. Now sure, they trap King Kong despite the fact that the sexy blonde girl, who spends nearly the whole time running around in what looks like her night gown, becomes his friend. But what I want to know is – how exactly did they get him back to New York? King Kong is massive – he can carry round sexy blonde bird, who at this point in the movie is getting very wet and now muddy, in his hand. So just how did around 15 people get him back to the ship? Did they put him in one of their little wooden landing boats? Errr… No. Did they bring the main ship towards the rocks and dump him on that? Errr.. No – the ship would have grounded. Did they stay on the island and drip-feed him ethonol until another boat arrived with cranes and stuff? Err … No – they used about 4 bottles just to knock him out and the sheer logistics of building some floating pontoon thing to get him off the rocks and into an incredibly large ship armed with cranes don’t even bear thinking about.
In the end King Kong gets shot to bits, which is a little unfortunate for the hairy guy. Personally I was quite happy with the film during the middle 40 minutes when he was chasing the blonde girl and she was tearing her outfit. In fact, just start the film where she appears and finish it just before they knock King Kong out with ethonol, that’s fine by me.
Some huge lady has just dragged herself down the aisle on her way to the toilets at the rear of the plane. She is, and I think it’s reasonably fair to say, on the wrong side of the obesity scale. I don’t even want to know what’ll happen when she tries to get her incredibly ample frame into a bathroom the size of a postage-stamp. Yes, I’m aware I shouldn’t mock, and she does seem quite content with her gargantuan proportions, however I’m a little less sure that the poor guy who’s wedged into the seat next to her will agree.
That’s it – I promise. No more ranting and raving, well maybe just the one more point. I’ve “bing bonged” one of the cabin crew here and asked for some water. I now have a cup full of Desani water. I wanna know just who came up with this stuff. Some bright spark at Coca Cola must have ran up to his boss one day and said….
“OK, I think we’re doing well with the soft drinks but I’ve had an idea how we can get some additional revenue. You know all these guys selling pure, natural spring water from deep underground springs or fresh, naturally filtered mountain water ? Well, how about we do the same – but to cut costs and simplify the whole deal we’ll just get the water out of the tap and then bung in some minerals after?”
“Wait”, says his boss, “..your idea is to sell the honest, hard-working public what is essentially just tap water for a hugely inflated price?”
“Well yeah, but lets not forget those minerals”, says the guy.
“But people can’t be that stupid can they? They’ll never fall for it !”
Well apparently they did.