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June 07, 2005
32000 feet over Saskatchewan
A few observations three hours into the Detroit-Tokyo leg of our trip:
- The passengers on this mighty craft, to a person, cannot figure out the bathroom doors. You'd think it was "building the Brooklyn Bridge" instead of "opening the door to the head.
- The 747-400 is frickin' huge. And at least in this case, crowded. Again I refer to the lavs, which have been occupied more or less steadily since we took off. The plane, though, is seriously enormous.
- When possible, snag an exit row seat. We're near the galley and the head, which makes for a fair amount of traffic. But, we also have the equivalent of an empty row of space in front of us, which means we can get up, stretch, walk around a bit, and so on.
- Having a PSP on board a flight packed with small children will invariably make you a magnet for at least one of them. This one little kid keeps making laps of the plane, stopping for at least a minute on each circuit to watch me play Lumines. That's a measure of the thing's drawing power, because watching Lumines is about as exciting as watching grass grow.
- I hate coach class.
- So does Lara.
- The dinner we got was pretty spiff: shrimp, roast beef with gravy, mashed (read: reconstituted) 'taters, green beans and corn, a slice of some type of lemon cake, and a small salad. Okay, it was still airline food, but it was pretty fair airline food. My only gripe is that they were out of red wine by the time they got to us. Since I wasn't really expecting more than soda and water to begin with, though, I can't honestly complain overmuch.
- Did I mention how big this sucker is? Also, how much the wings flex, and how much the engines rattle and shake in their mounts? Now, I grant you that this is what these things are meant to do, but that makes seeing it no less disconcerting. I'm already not a huge fan of flying -- what I do not need to see is the plane's outboard engine rattling about like the gimp wheel on a Food Lion shopping cart. Not reasurring, I tell you.
That's it. Nothing deep or philosophical to offer about the miracle of flight or anything. Truthfully, I try not to think much about the "miracle" of flight, because I do indeed think it's a miracle that this giant cigar tube can be shot through the air 10000 miles at 500MPH without refueling once. Personally, I think it's a miracle that something so big can even get off the ground without some kind of giant Warner-Brothers-Acme-brand slingshot involved. So perhaps I'm not the best choice for waxing philosophic about riding with the birds and all.
I note from our in-flight display that it's 3 degrees outside. Just FYI, mind you.
At this point, it's about 6:30 back home. We're thinking that the best plan is to go ahead and try for a little sleep soon. With luck, we'll catch a few hours' worth between here and Tokyo -- enough to get us through the trip to Beijing. It'll be 10 or 10:30 by the time we get to the hotel, very likely later, so we should be able to just drop right into bed.
PS: Gauging by the kid in the bathroom line, Americans aren't the only nationality who are suckers for huge tennis shoes of questionable aesthetic value. His shoes look like they belong at the bottom of an astronaut's space suit.
Posted by brlittle at June 7, 2005 07:39 PM