Why I Love Airplanes So Much

Well, beloved readers, I take up pixel and keyboard once again. It's been a long while since I've made a post, because I've had actual direct contact with human beings to discuss the sort of things I tend to discuss in this particular venue.

Of course, now that I know I have an audience, I'll make sure to keep up to date here.

So, background information: I'm getting married, and my affianced happens to live in Maryland. As such, it seems that I've spent more time on airplanes during the past five months than I have in the entirety of my previous life.

And this is how I came to realize how much I love airplanes.

Now, I'm not talking about the Cessna variety of airplanes. While they are undoubtedly a wonderful place in which to vomit, they simply can't stack up to the marvelousness of the Boeing 7-something-7's that I've been using so frequently of late.

There are an awful lot of things that you aren't allowed to take on an airplane anymore. Everybody knows about the prohibition on liquids and gels. But just in case you're not a part of everybody, you aren't allowed to bring more than three ounces of any kind of liquid or gel on an airplane. See? Now you're part of everybody! Feeling special? You should be.

Of course, there really are some liquids and gels that are allowed on planes in amounts greater than three ounces. Quoting from the TSA's website, here are the highlights:

• Breast milk
• Vaseline
• bone marrow
• blood products
• transplant organs
• prosthetic breasts

Also from the TSA, here's the weekly report of disaster they've averted:

• 23 passengers were arrested due to suspicious behavior or fraudulent travel documents
• 31 firearms found at checkpoints
• 3 artfully concealed prohibited items found at checkpoints
• 18 incidents that involved a checkpoint closure, terminal evacuation or sterile area breach

Let's give them a big pat on the back. Especially on finding those artfully concealed items. That's a true achievement.

Whenever I travel, I only take a carry-on bag. I have one that's quite small, but I can still fit whatever I need for about a week and a half inside it. My fellow-travellers, on the other hand, seem to bring whatever size luggage they like.

Ever seen one of those size-checker things for carry-on bags? Apparently, if your bag can't fit into it, you have to check the bag. More apparently, those size-checker things are just for show.

It might be amusing if one were required to smash one's bag into the size-checker box with a baseball bat or sledgehammer until it fits. People can always be counted upon to do the right thing if you make them suffer enough when they don't.

I always do the same thing on an airplane: I read a book, and I drink a cup of tea. It's nice to have a routine. Especially a really solid routine. When the stewardesses come around to ask what I'd like to drink, I tell them I'd like a cup of tea.

"Hot tea?" they ask. This is an interesting question, because there is no other kind of tea on the drink menu.

"Yes," I reply. "Two creams, two sugars."

A short while later, I receive a cup of hot water with a still-wrapped teabag floating in it. (Okay, so that only happened once. Still...) I also get one packet of non-dairy creamer, and one packet of that saccharine sugar substitute.

It's so nice when people listen carefully after they've asked you a question.

Now, there are other interesting uses for saccharine and non-dairy creamer. Saccharine, for example, is wonderful if you want to feel as if someone punched you in the stomach five minutes ago for the next three hours.

Non-dairy creamer is much more fun. Next time you have access to some, put it in a tablespoon. Hold the spoon four to six inches above a cigarette ligher. (Sorry. A butane lighter. Smoking is bad.) Light the lighter, and gently tap the spoon so that a light shower of dust falls down onto the flame. Pretty cool, huh?

It's even more fun if you take a fistful of non-dairy creamer and throw it into a campfire.

Also, next time the opportunity presents itself, burn a ping-pong ball. Use one of those long-handled barbecue lighters, though, if you have one.

And if you take those styrofoam packing peanuts and add them one by one into a small container of gasoline, stirring frequently, you can make napalm. It's a lot of fun to play with. Just remember that it creates a resin-like substance that will never come off of any surface on which you burn it. So don't be like me and burn a permanent black spot on your parents' driveway.

I also burned the outline of a sponge on their driveway last year on Guy Fawkes' Day, but I won't go into that here. You can find the post from that event in the "Classics of the Form" section.

And the moral of the story, apparently, is "airplanes bad, fire good". Sounds reasonable enough to me.