En Route

---

---

Time is a funny thing. I'm trying to remember when I last took my morning pills...was it morning in Chicago or Prague? It doesn't really help that the sun has been rising throughout the whole trans-Atlantic flight. Either way, I'm not too worried about it. I'm just thrilled to actually be on the plane. My sleep has been sporadic and not very restful, but that is to be expected when one's legs are accordion folded underneath one's seat and one can only angle one's body enough to cramp one's rear neighbor. Throw in a couple of loudmouth strangers on either side and you've got a losing combination. Not that I'm complaining. Granted, air travel is far from luxurious, but with free pillows, beverage service, snacks, and movies, far be it from me to grouse as if I were stuck on a slave ship.

I’ll be happy to deplane though. If I have to hear my neighbor à droit tell his counterpart à gauche how to combat jet lag one more time I might shove “one glass of water per hour of flight” down his loud throat. Don’t get me wrong, I usually love sitting by people I don’t know. First of all, I can grill them on where they are from and what they are doing on this plane (after all, some of the best business deals have been made on planes) plus, once the small talk is over, I don’t have to talk to them anymore if I don’t want. However, somehow loudmouth know-it-alls are just not conducive to happy flying. Throw in some lady in front of you who’s pissed that her headphone jack doesn’t work, and flight can be downright memorable. It was the least I could do to offer to trade her seats—I wasn’t going to watch the movie anyway--but of course that would be too easy. Instead she suggested plugging her headset into my jack, which she did. (As a result, she had to keep reaching around, blindly punching at the buttons on my controller to adjust her volume/channels.)

Ah, but the wise traveler knows how to combat distraction. Tylenol PM plus the right timing equals a drug induced pleasant ride. I had the timing all planned out: I would stay awake all night before my flight, keep myself conscious up to and through dinner, and then just as I washed down my last Breton cracker with grapes and camembert, I would pop the drugs. This way I could slip into the lavatory in between coffee service and tray pick-up. Then when they dimmed the lights, I’d be ready for bed. Not too shabby a plan, and it actually worked pretty well. How’s that for understanding time?

---

Photos

The Plane
Hope we don't have to use these