AIRLINE TRAVEL DURING THE DARK AGES

With increased air travel during the holiday season, many are winging long distances for the first time since last holiday season.  It’s awful, but is it really worse?  I came across a log I kept during one of my most memorable cross-country experiences. This was before TSA Agents, before airlines stopped serving meals, and back when airlines would lose your luggage without charging you a fee for an “Extra Service.” Read and compare to modern day travel—if you dare.

The YEAR 1997. The FLIGHT:  Los Angeles (LAX) to New York City (JFK).

4:30 AM: Picked up at home by Phil's Speedy Discount Airport Shuttle. Motto: "If we're more than fifteen minutes late, we wouldn't be the least bit surprised."

5:45:  Arrive Los Angeles Airport. Curbside check-in offers high tech Computerized Tracking System (CTS) which assures your luggage will arrive in Nepal twenty minutes before you land in New York.

6:00: Ticket counter uses new Random Queuing System (RQS). Queue is a British term meaning "You're in the wrong line, stupid." I queue up in "Odd Size" line, then am booted out when told "Odd Size" refers to luggage, not body type.

6:15: Security check. Foreign passenger ahead of me is asked: "Did person or persons unknown to you pack your luggage, pat your butt, or recite lyrics to anything by Puff Daddy?"  He responds: "My salad shooter has an embolism" and is waved through.

7:30 Pre-boarding begins for pre-boards who need assistance, assistants who need pre-boarding, first class, business class, no class, private first class, menacing youth, passengers on the wrong plane, and those who play dumb and pretend their row has been called.

8:15: Pilot announces "the fine folks in maintenance have informed me they have to re-calibrate and functionalize the leading edge hydraulic spoiler actuation pressure stabilizer, and will get on it as soon as Chief Mechanic Fat Mel finishes his donut."

11:45: Takeoff.

11:47: Emergency landing to remove Fat Mel from engine cowling.

12:15 PM: Re-takeoff.

12:45: Breakfast. Choices are: "Runny eggs with Sumpthin' Green in 'em" or "Fruit Loops 'n' Curdled Milk."

1:45:  Pilot asks if anyone has seen his keys to the liquor cabinet.

2:00: Edited for airline version of "Showgirls" begins.

2:05: Edited for airline version of "Showgirls" ends.

3:15: Pilot says "Passengers on our right side can see Columbus, Ohio. Passengers on our left side can see a hideous monster dismantling the engine."

4:45: Surly flight attendants collect breakfast trays and play Goose the Elderly.

5:00: Inadvertently land at Teterboro, N.J., long term parking lot. Pilot says he'll taxi aircraft to JFK.

5:15:  Skippy the co-pilot collects spare change for turnpike tolls.

5:30:  Detour to Hackensack so Skippy can drop off laundry and tuck in the kids.

6:15: Arrive at gate.

6:45: Computerized Tracking System claims I don't have any luggage, I never had luggage, I'll never have luggage again, and it's not that fond of my tie.

7:45: Take cab driven by man whose name has seventeen consonants and an umlaut. Ululates show tunes all the way to the hotel.

11:45: Luggage from previous trip delivered to room.

 # # #

 A Version of this appeared in the Los Angeles Times Op-Ed section in 1997

Copyright 1997, 2012

Top Ten Crises Still Bugging Me as 2013 Begins

10. Baffled why there hasn’t been a Constitutional amendment outlawing either the word “flammable” or “inflammable.”

9. Stupefied how the Media can report the pregnancy of Kim Khardashian without including the phrases “affront to civilization,” “anti-Christ” or “no-talent publicity whore.”

7. Worrying will the new tenant in the spare bedroom, Fiscal Cliff, ever pay his rent on time.

6. Curious how long my profound sense of relief will last that no one is asking: “What will Romney do when he takes office?” .

7. Realizing that I never have known how to pronounce and probably never will never know how to pronounce the words “Synclavier”, “onegin” and “yclept”

5: Concerned my Thanksgiving day cold of 2012 will never go away.

4. Continue asking myself why I post carefully crafted, exhaustively shot, precisely edited works of video art on YouTube and get 26 hits if I’m lucky, when I could entice a kitty with a ball of yarn and go viral overnight.

3 Puzzled why people who believe intelligent life forms occupy UFOs actually haven’t figured out why they haven’t contacted “intelligent” life on earth.   

2. Wracking my brain why anyone believes in or otherwise gives a rat‘s ass about Zombies.

1. Rethinking my decision to turn down the gig as the new Chief Administrative Officer for the Large Hadron Collider, and wondering if women really care if their boyfriend has a small Hadron.

Carpet Bombing for Fun and Profit

The great Carpet Brouhaha of 2012 is over--pending my bride’s search later today for missing silverware and gewgaws. As usual, I've apparently made a big deal out of nothing. Of course, making a big deal out of nothing has provided me with a rather handsome living over the years as well as helping me become moderately reviled.  

It started as these things usually do with long time couples—a misunderstanding. Who shall stay with the carpet cleaners and who shall wannder free as a bird?  My wife argued  that since she had scheduled the carpet cleaning, it should be my responsibility to be there when the carpet cleaners come and go. I argued the rug wasn’t that dirty. I lost the argument, as I always do. She didn't even have to play the "your grandchild will be playing on that carpet in two weeks" card.

Long Story short? Carpet Cleaners were here and gone in 90 minutes. Short story long? Read on.  

As we say in the Journalism dodge, here's what we believe to be true at this juncture:

Hanz and Geraldo, the carpet cleaner team, arrived on time and smelled just swell. Okay, I have a cold, but they seemed to be well-groomed, professional, uniformed and not-drunk. This is all I ask of service people who come into my home to service my people and vice versa.  

Apparently my bride found these fine folk at reduced cost by using a coupon from an organization which, if I'm not mistaken, is better known for returning wandering children to their original owners--or if the parents refuse to accept them, to the Police Athletic League. 

As I understand it, Hans and Gretel will be doing the entire house for $29.95 and a plate of Mashed Yeast. This seems an odd choice as both cleaners have heavy Mid-European accents, are clad in Putinwear Sweats, and sport a bulge under their left underarm.  (I have since learned both Frick and Frak originally hailed from Chernobyl.)

They asked if I wanted anything "Scotch-Guarded." I replied "only my stomach" and we laughed until we wept.

I spent the time they worked here ensconced in my office. According the California EPA--my workspace is officially listed as both a Historical Site and an illegal Biohazard. Our home itself was added to the Historic Registry recently, which in California, includes any edifice built before Madonna first donned her conical yahoos.. 

Because of this historical status, I am unable to make structural changes to my office or its original wall-to-about-a-foot-from-the-other-wall carpeting. Interesting mucilage fact: My office carpet is epoxied to the floor with old cigarette wrappers and gum resin.  

Over the years, rank sentimentalist that I am, I had mentally catalogued the spills on my rug. Coffee stains, wine stains and whiskey stains, mostly. Unfortunately, the HMS Recall weighed anchor years ago, sailed out of my mental harbor, hit a reef and sank with all hands and numerous other body parts lost.  

So, should the team clean my office carpet? Speaking words of wisdom, I suggested George and Ringo let it be. It was a moot point anyway as both had left their Hazmat Suits at their office.

So now they are gone, all the windows are open, hoards of locusts are winging dry the overflow carpet cleaner fluid, and in two-three days the rugs will be dry enough to begin staining again.

Small criticism: The Carpet is now Puce.

HOUSEHOLD HINT: Few potable liquids such as Ginger Ale will actually remove set-in stains caused by another liquid. However, the old wive's tale that "red wine poured on a club soda stain will remove it" is true. Okay, maybe not "remove" it so much as "replace" it. 

Helpless in the New Oz?

One of the threads on Linked In is fuhkoktuh. My buddy Lin said  the issue just only on that thread. He said he thought I would blame him for the problem. I told him my paranoia is much wider and in fact i blamed veteran character actor J.K. Simmons for it. So...I thought maybe I should start and begin to ruin a new thread. 

So this piece is about computer technology and old farts like me and fellow old-farts-well-met like Chris and Linton and Tim.

Chris said he hated new technology when he doesn’t understand it. Agreed.

Here’s my theory. The fault dear Brutus is not in ourselves, but in the idiots who write instructions about installing and working with new technology

I actually installed a router once. I could do it BECAUSE THE INSTRUCTIONS WERE BRILLIANT.

It took only one clarification phone call, picked up on the first ring. The guy’s name at the other end was not "Trey" and he did not have an accent that made it seem like everything would be allright, when in fact it never was. This guy answered my question clearly. I was not told to go to some Freakin’ FAQ thread were idiots like me who are confused come up with wrong answers for other idiots like me.

All us old farts require is logical, linear, sensible directions. And maybe a nice glass tea.

The instruction that got me most was when I needed a new keyboard. I bought a new one and rented a laser cutter to burn through the Plexiglas -strength plastic wrap it came in.

Instructions said to insert the installation CD that came with my keyboard, and detach my old keyboard and mouse. I did that. Then of course I could not go on to the next instruction on the CD because I HAD NO FREAKING KEYBOARD OR MOUSE!!

THE YOUNG PUNKS UNDERSTAND WHAT TO DO IN THAT SITUATION.

FORTUNATELY I DID TOO. I BRIBED ONE OF MY GROWNUP SONS TO COME OVER AND INSTALL IT.

And why the HELL is the tally light so goddam tiny and out of my sight line so I don't know I've locked my caps which I do often because I'm a shitty typist?

Now I want to do an audio book. record it myself. I dread figuring out how to do it and get it distributed. Halp!

Now, iof uyou’ll excuse me, I’m gonna go listen by golden oldie by that dead astronaut, Neil Young: “Helpless, HelplesS, HELPLESS.

Paulie sez: Newtley May Remarry

In this pre-SuperTuesday Editorial MOBPAC spokesman Paul E. Almonds warns a depressed Newt Gingrich is not a happy camper. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNigIhFJGgI&feature=youtu.be

Old Coot's Crackin' Christmas Collection

Old Coot Hat & Camera

The Old Coot with a  Camera presents his Top Five Great Christmas Presents to give to friends and loved ones. Here's a hint: Number Two is "booze." He also unveils a hitherto undisclosed talent--music. Accompanying himself on his Mighty Organ, OC-WAC presents bold interpretations of Holiday Classics. Look for an album soon.

Our Maine Hurrication (with videos)—Summer, 2011

Where we Went: Kennebunkport, ME.

Why we went there: Because we so admire George H.W. Bush, who Summers there.

Real reason we went there: Relatives, lobstuhs, and the ceaseless need to observe Yuppies in their natural habitat.

Our Habitat: Rented home near water—too near water at times.

Uninvited Guest: Hurricane Irene  

Method of Transport to Site: Aircraft, Car, Gossamer Wings.

Favorite Meal on Plane: Animal Crackers.

Favorite Marx Brothers Movie: Ditto. 

Least Popular Sound on Plane: Unhappy infant wailing I pagliacci vesti la giubba as performed by a herniated Luciano Pavarotti with tacks in his eyes and while being water-boarded.

Question Angrilly Asked of me in the terminal: “Was that your baby?”

What I said: “No.”

What I wish I’d said: “Yes, that’s why we left him on the plane.”

What I felt: Sorry for the kid, sorrier for the parents.

Aviation note: Virgin America charges $25 a bag for checked luggage.

Advice: Wear all your clothing when you fly Virgin America.

Was the Weather Good? Ayup. Except for the Hurricane.

Lobstuhs & Hurricanes: Shortly after Irene blew by, a Lobstuhman friend of my wife’s cousin, Tracey, hauled in 798 pounds of Lobstuh in a single day, a personal best.

Footnote:  He had pulled up half his traps before the storm and set the others deep.

Anecdotal Conclusion: Hurricanes are good for Lobstuh fishing.                                                                                                         

Good News about Lobstuhman: Generous soul. Gave said cousin free Lobstuhs.

Good News about Cousin: She shares.

Karmic Payback: Later, we took Tracey to the airport for her flight home--leaving the same time as ours. Well into the drive, she realized she’d forgotten her wallet.

Something You May Not Know about Me: I never get mad at someone who regifts Lobstuhs to me.

Long Story Too Long Already: We retrieved the wallet and made both flights with mere hours to spare.  

Who I saw in Maine I hadn’t seen in years: Legendary Boston Golden Throat, raconteur, and erstwhile Junket Best Buddy, Dana Hersey.

Where: At a saloon in Portland.

Why Portland? Dana has a pied a terre on an island in nearby Casco Bay.

How he looked: Tanned, rested and not the least bit dissipated.

How I looked: None of the above.

What I watched waiting for Dana’s ferry to arrive: A Dude with a silver-wrapped box on his head playing guitar while a woman played a musical saw. 

You’re making that up, right? I’m not. Never accuse me of deception until you know if I have video evidence.

Video Evidence: It’s for moments like these I always carry my Flip Camera.

Who we did not see in New England: A good high school friend and wife, who Summer in New Hampshire.

Why not: Rain, wind, floods, destruction, locusts, fire ants, rabid Sea Lions.

You’re making that up, right? Yes. Video too hard to fake.

Side Note: My friend, a successful and award-winning vintner, had to leave for his vintner place to harvest his Topo Gigio grapes. Excuse me, his Pinot Grigio grapes.

What You May Conclude: All I know about wine is this--The quality of the box a wine comes in does not relate directly to the quality of the wine contained therein.

Guests who visited and stayed with us: My Cousin and her boyfriend, plus one of my wife’s best friends and her husband.

And: They arrived bearing wine and food.

Furthermore: Neither was served from a box.

Further Furthermore: My cousin bought me a belated birthday present, a “Wayfarer Inn: Cape Porpoise” ball cap. I now wear it on the Left Coast to make Republicans jealous.

MVP: Salaan, Hostess/relative. Salaan is a Dotty Cousin, in her seventies, and had open-heart bypass surgery two months prior to family gathering. She drove up from Virginia, cooked, washed, shopped and cleaned everything in sight.

Runner-Up: Barbara, her 82-year-old sister, and a tweeting maniac.

Second Runner-up: William, One-plus year old toddler who is learning to walk and likes Peek-a-boo.

Third Runner-up: William’s exhausted Mom & Dad, Tricia & Fabrice.

Biggest effect of Hurricane Irene on us: 24-hours without power.

Unexpected Feeling: I felt sorry for President Obama.

Why? Powerlessness sucks.

My Ailment on Trip: What I thought was a pimple on my back was actually a festering, puss-filled, grotesque, infected thingy needing medical attention.

How I found out: It burst and left a dark stain on my old KCAL News T-shirt.

Status of shirt: I still wear it. If people ask, I tell them stain is where the knife went in.

Status of You: Went to great Urgent Care place. Got urgent pills. Took pills urgently. Wife and cousin cleaned and dressed wound. Grimaced for sympathy.

Prognosis: I’ll be ready for the playoffs.

What did I learn? Pimples sometimes aren’t.

Summer Summary

Upside of Vacation: Saw remnants of Hurricane. Had Lobstuh. Avoided 105 heat in Calabasas. Chatted up relatives. Ate good food. Drank good wine. Met good people.

Downside of Vacation: Not creative for two weeks. Gained too much weight. Car battery died while gone.  Missed seeing some people I wanted to see. Too many tourists.

Miscellaneous Knowledge Gained:  The Red Sox won’t be in the World Series. Weathercasters in New England know their stuff. If your Barista is talking to her boyfriend, come back later, or accept that your latte will be all but undrinkable. Maine brewed Frye’s Leap IPA is superb. Maine has bugs, including No-see-ums and EEE-carrying mosquitoes. You can get tired of Vanilla ice cream w/blueberries. And Lobstuhs.  Add meat to vegetarian lasagna, and it is delicious. Tofu should be re-categorized as Industrial Waste. In a pinch, a decent Cab works as a breakfast wine. Bring mud shoes to Maine. On, the last full day we were there, the weather was glorious. We will return. Why? Let's go to the video...