OK, so I found something else that I really hate. When I travel majorly (i.e. not just for cheap weekends away in Europe), I have a big hard-shell suitcase that I use. It’s really cool, because you can extend a handle and wheel it that way, OR it has 4 wheels on the bottom which swivel, so you can just sort of push it across the ground, and it moves perfectly easily. When I was in the Samsonite shop in Hong Kong buying it, I was so excited about the possibilities of these 4 wheels that I put my forehead on the suitcase and then spun it around and around, and then I tried to walk in a straight line, and fell down in the shop. And during this whole activity, the shop lady is just staring at me as if to say “I hate white people”. And meanwhile my dad is all like “Yeah, we did this in the Navy and it was fun, except we did it with a ceiling fan and a baseball bat”. And there you go, ladies and gentlemen: the men who defended the free world during the Cold War were dizzy most of the time. And drunk. AND fighting over balsa wood tiger statues (The squadron’s mascot)
I think the point of that paragraph was to say that I have a suitcase that is very easy to manoeuver, due to its extendable handle.
BUTTTTTT, I really, truly, deeply, honestly hate the people who, when they take a plane trip, feel the need to extend this ‘handleness’ to their carry-on luggage. You know, the luggage that has to be tiny anyway so that you can fit it in the lockers? And every time I go to the airport now I just see people wheeling backpacks around. I mean, they really are backpacks; with the shoulder straps and everything. But then, some idiot has had the bright idea of sticking wheels on the bottom of it, and inserting a handle which makes the bag weight about a million pounds, and that’s just the least of my complaints.
I mean, seriously, every time I get onto a plane I stuff my cabin bag either in the locker, intending to get my stuff up later, because, yes, it is possible to walk around in an airplane; or I put it under the seat, get my important things out at leisure, and then do something with it. What I don’t do is wheel (WHEEL!) my fricking bag down the aisle of the airplane, then stop, look at my ticket, look at my row number, look at my ticket again, look around in case I’ve magically been transported to Narnia, and then open up my massive bag, completely blocking the aisle as I rummage through my collection of cough medications to reach my trashy romance novel that is set in 1950’s Ireland, so therefore it’s intellectual, even if it has been made into a movie starring, like, the Nanny.
I then don’t pull out: the middle section of the newspaper, taking time to refold it again, sleeping pills, laxatives, glasses, contact lens solution, travel pillow, those travel “improve your circulation socks” (which, incidentally, are a death trap, because they are made of non-natural material, so if there is a fire they will melt and fuse to your legs. Seriously. I heard this from someone who works in the Civil Aviation Department), a stuffed animal and a mobile phone recharger.
I then don’t attempt to hoist my bag into the overhead locker which is dam near impossible because it weighs so much, and then have it fall out and hit a harmless young lady (ME) on the head as she walks by quietly, because she’s not stupid and knows exactly how to get onto an airplane without pissing everybody off, thank you very much.
I just hate these bags so much. Everybody knows that the easiest and most stress-free way to travel is to take a really small carry on bag with the essentials, and then you can move around more easily and get off the plane faster. These people with their stupid bags think they are so important and actually make life harder for everybody else (= me). If they were just inconveniencing themselves, I wouldn’t give a damn.
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