When I am King – More Travel Edicts

In 2014, the would-be King in me posted two rants on driving. One was inspired by rubbernecking and the other addressed more of the exasperating things people do while driving. Recently, I was inspired to draft another Edict as I rode home on Amtrak.

I write this on the ride back to Maryland from Gotham, The Apple, Noo Yawk, the crowded, messy city of my birth. As noted in earlier posts, I like to sit by windows so I can watch the world scroll by outside. I also have one ass that fits in one seat. Airplane passengers understand this concept (except when they are in the waiting areas where they think the seat or two next to them is theirs as well).

London-Heathrow Airport (4 April 2017)

This might be a northeast thing where we are all so aggressive and self-centered. If that’s the case, citizens from the more considerate parts of the Kingdom will have less to worry about.

Let’s start with how we do queues. I haven’t even gotten to my gate and the offenses start. Lines form in the terminal corridors in front of gate agents and fast food joints. Why do people think a line should always be straight away from the counter…even if it extends to the other side of the corridor? It’s a terminal. There are people who need to move in both directions…directly through your line. No one gets the idea that it would be easier for all if someone took the initiative to bend the line to the side and get out of everyone’s way.

Speaking of lines, you have to love how we board trains at Penn Station in Manhattan. When they post the gate number, passengers will begin to line up in front of the escalator that goes down to the track…straight across the entire concourse, of course. When the escalator is open for business, then the rest of the passengers loitering around the terminal immediately rush the entrance. The scene looks like a 50-foot sperm cell…fat in the front and trailing off to a thin tail, where the good doobies who respected the line are. No way to treat your future king.

In the waiting area, it's one thing to spread out when there’s only a handful of passengers around. But when the terminal is crowded and people are looking for a place to sit, pretending to be sleeping or (worse) being totally oblivious of the people in need around you is just plain rude. More than once I have seen guys sitting in one seat with their stuff piled on not one, but TWO more seats.

Candorville by Darrin Bell

**Congratulations to Darrin Bell on his 2019 Pulitzer Prize**

Train passengers seem to be especially inconsiderate when it comes to seating. The following literally describes what I see right now. It’s like a primer on the many forms of rude behaviors. In the space in front of me, a woman has turned her two seats into a nest as she sits against the window with her feet and stuff spread out across the two seats. The guy across from her is “sleeping” in the aisle seat with his backpack on the floor of the empty window seat next to him. That’s two ways to discourage anyone from taking that seat. Across from me is the industrious worker bee guy with his computer on the tray in front but the empty isle seat has papers, calculator, smart phone, etc. He needs that seat to be his desk. Behind him is another sleeper chick who also prefers to use her backpack as a pillow rather than store it overhead.

New Rule – One Ass – One Seat. If you really don’t want another person next to you, buy another ticket. If you want to lie down or spread your stuff next to you, buy another ticket. Seats are for people, not stuff.

Candorville by Darrin Bell

I see this a lot. Even if their assigned seat is in the back of the plane, some folks put their bags in the first empty space they see in the front. That’s almost as bad as the yahoos who think it’s OK to drag onto the plane a stuffed roll-aboard AND briefcase AND shopping bag AND backpack AND food purchase. A few years ago, I complained about a certain airline but I must credit them for actually enforcing their quaint ‘if-your-bag-doesn’t-fit-in-this-box, -you-must-check-it’ rule. At least I saw a gate agent do it that one time. I’m guessing she no longer works for the airline.