on the road

So, you would think that a wedding getaway/holiday that started with some asshole (hereinafter known as Mr A) jumping a queue I'd been in for 30 minutes just because he was in business class could only go downhill. Well, I walked up to him and told him what I thought of him, and he wasn't at all repentant - the weird thing was the airline apologised for him! What? I asked the airline, to his hearing - of course - if it was fine for him to act like a jerk and have them apologise but they went quiet. So, the septuagenarian couple in front of me had to wait for Mr A to get checked in, but what was sweet was the couple and I became good travel buddies and Mr A couldn't look anyone in the eye for the entire flight - delicious 9 hour payback.

Anyway, it all got better... once on the plane it hit me how some things have become obsolete in my short lifetime - pretty wild to think about! One of them is airline ashtrays, and the whole idea of smoking on airplanes. The sight of all those glued-shut ashtrays just reminds you how old most planes are, but think about how far we've come: you could actually have lighters, lighter fuel, tobacco, smoke... all that good stuff up there in the air, and now you're not even allowed to carry a bottle of water to your seat - of course the duty-free shops are cleaning up :) There's always a good financial angle to all these alerts, prohibitions, curtailments of rights... I saw a guy who was transferring flights get stripped of two bottles of whiskey in Switzerland, yet he'd just bought them in duty-free and hadn't been warned. I see a whole new recycling sale industry developing... Biggest irony though? While we were limited to the tiniest carry on bags ever, the people who boarded in Switzerland seemed to have huge bags; a Jewish guy - of the big beard and long curly lock crew - on the plane even reached into his bag to get Pringles and - oh my God! - juice!! See how stupid it sounds that we were all staring open-mouthed at a guy becasue he took juice out of his carry on bag? But then again, two guys were thrown off a plane just for looking a certain way. I wonder what would have happened if they had reached into their bags for a bottle of fresh juice...

Shopping: I just found out that this really forward thinking basketball star - Stephon Marbury - started his own clothing label so young boys could have cool gear for less and not have to resort to crime to look fly. The label is called starbury (starbury.com) and they sell basketball shoes for $14.98, work boots for £9.98 and most of their other gear for $9.98. Of course I had to support the cause so I hooked my self up in Connecticut. Otherwise, I've been good!

The other great thing is because I'm here for family I've been road-tripping with my Mom and, man, have I been asleep with this writing stuff. Things have been going on around me and I have no idea; it's good to catch up...

Later.

what i'm reading/listening to

listening:
Woyaya by Osibisa

reading:
my own stuff to realign my writing in progess :)