Up In the Air

Over the years, I’ve been very fortunate in the airplane neighbor department.   (A quick nod to my electrician – a blog follower and lovely person who I met on a flight around 2008.  He and his friend saved my life while we were trapped on the runway for 3 hours with no food. Well, they had no food after I ate their entire bag of mini Oreos without technically asking.)

I know, "golden Oreos" sound gross. But beggars can't be choosers. 

This week, however, my luck changed.  My airplane neighbor was horrendous.  Zero chance of the trip ending in an exchange of contact information and misty eyes/sad hearts while passing through customs.  Sometimes you just know things won't go well, and I knew right away.

We were on flight to Heathrow in seats facing one other.  Our introduction started when he proceeded to remove his shoes in my section then throw all his items through my seating area into his.  A simple solution would probably include walking to his own seat and just placing them down. He told me "I feel like I'm in a prison" - this was funny because he had an empty seat to his right and also apparently had ample room to stretch body parts into my comfort zone to the left.

As long as you cough when the shutter goes off, they can't tell.

Just in case you are wondering, there is no better time to unbutton your shirt and scratch yourself for at least ten minutes, freeing mountains of chest hair (sans undershirt of course). The next logical step is to recline the seat and relax, making sure to fully expose your sweaty pit stains.  Then when you enter your Zen-like state, you should use the hot towel to wipe your sweaty face dramatically and enjoy a quick snort/cough combination into it. Then promptly place it on top of our divider so I can hope it will fall and grace me with traces of your DNA.

Did I mention he smelled?  And not even of body odor but like cologne that is only applied before a Middle School Dance.  And not by the kids.  By the janitor who is trying to pick up a single mom in the parking lot.  My nephews wouldn’t even wear that crap. But hey, at least he got his moneys' worth because that scent lingered for a solid 7 hours.

I'm glad there was something stuck in his beard, deep on the bottom under his chin, because at that angle I could see it clearly from my seat.  I really had to flex my mental muscles to try guessing what it could be.   For you wrestling fans, picture Captain Lou Albano…but this was not an elastic band.  It was definitely a crumb from breakfast or some type of soap-like residue that has been forming a ball for a few weeks.

When this guy's beard is more manicured than yours, it's time to take a hard look at your life.

The suffering stopped as soon as I got the green light to raise the partition separating our faces.  Until, of course, the damn thing wouldn’t stay up.  So not only did I tell this guy he was gross by way of opaque shield but I had to hold it up for 10 minutes figuring out what was wrong with it.  He finally reached over and pulled it into lock position himself.  And yes, it’s slightly uncomfortable when you require help with the hiding process from the person you are trying to hide from.  It’s sort of like asking a guy during a bad date to please delete your phone number/email promptly and not to try finding you on Facebook.

Luckily I made it home with no grossness in the adjacent seats.  But be certain that if he was even in my row, I would have screamed "rape".