Living on an island in the Pacific Ocean means traveling frequently by airplane.  To do that, you increasingly need to be a magician.  Not the type that wears a suit and pulls rabbits out of a hat—although that might be helpful with plane delays—but the type that squeezes his entire body into a half-meter square box that dangles from a wire over Time Square for endless hours.

I just finished a twenty-hour trek, that included over twelve hours jammed into a little box reffered to by the industry as an airplane seat.  Sure I could have spent several hundred additional dollars for a few more centimeters of leg room, but I’m not sure it would have helped.  Coupled with the fact that American (the country, not the company) airlines no longer provide any complimentary comforts—seriously, 7$ for the previledge to use one of those pillows that a lapdog would find small—air travel has become increasingly unpleasant and frustrating over the last decade.  I understand the need for profitability to stay in business, but at some point, customer service should outweigh what increasingly looks like greedy nickel-and-diming by the industry.

Living where I do, I have few options to air travel, so I think I should enroll in some serious yoga classes to prepare for my next trip.  Maybe then I’ll be to walk down the gangway at the end of my travels, instead hobbling off like I’m thirty years older than I really am.  Hmm….an even better idea would be to figure out how to magically teleport myself to my final destination with a wave of a wand.  Anyone know a talented magician?