AIRPORT PERSONALITIES

It’s amazing how many cool people you meet when you go to things where you have to travel. I’m not really a fan of airports, but I’ve met my fair share of interesting people there…and I came across a few this weekend when I went to my friends’ wedding in Michigan.

For example, on Friday, I got to the airport, sat next to some guy on the plane that smelled like urine and sat for a while in Cincinnati where my layover was. It was crowded as anything, so everyone was sitting shoulder to shoulder in those weird sticky pleather seats. Being the communications major I am, I started to talking to this guy sitting next to me. Why? Cause he had a fuzzy beard down to his chest like an Amish guy!!! But I knew he wasn’t Amish cause he had a cell phone and was holding an Organic Chemistry text book. (Amish folks haven’t picked up on our latest communicative technologies and they grow all their stuff so they probably know all the secrets of the earth and don’t need to study modernized courses such as organic chemistry.) We talked about Daylight Savings time - He was a cool guy.

I get on the plane to Lansing that night and I was kinda tired from working all day and it being pretty late at night. All I wanted to do was close my eyes. BUT NO! Some girl, who was kicked out of Air Force basic training sits right in front of me and feels the need to vent. And it couldn’t be someone who quietly strikes conversation. This girl, first of all had a thick Irish accent, but claimed she was from Minnesota...?!?!?! and she spoke like she was screaming into a freakin’ megaphone!! This chick turns to me and goes, “DON’T EVER HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE AIR FORCE!” I assured her I wouldn’t cause I thought they all were pansies. Then she says that its her service and they kicked her out of basic training cause she hurt her knee or something minor like that. Then she continues to tell me how hard core the Air Force is cause she had to do this and that and whatever…and she kept asking me if the Army/Navy/Marine Corp does things as hard as the Air Force does. She goes, “Can you believe they have Sgt. Majors living in Duplexes!? That’s rough!” I was like, “Bitch please!” …Ok, not really. But I told her that OFFICERS in the Army live in Duplexes and that the Air Force provides the best luxuries as far as bases and living quarters. I was like, “Believe me…you guys have it made…” She couldn’t see it…and that’s usually the case with Air Force, always complaining about how hard their slack is…

So on the way back, I caught a standby flight into Detroit. Just as we were boarding, Ms. USA WORLD 2006 walks up to the gate in her sash, 3 foot high crown, and 4 inch plastic tacky looking heels. Seeing as how it was like 3:00 pm…in LANSING, Michigan…it seemed too far fetched to conclude she had actually just won the crown. And I’ve heard of Ms. USA and Ms. America but I’ve never heard of Ms. USA WORLD?! What the heck?! I walked behind her and looked at her crown – and when I say it was tall, I mean it could’ve knocked her over – seriously, it looked like she got this thing at the dollar store! It was adjustable in the back like a daggon baseball cap! And the back didn’t have diamonds, it was plastic and the front of it had those little beaded sequence things that are supposed to look like jewels. For all I know she probably hot glued those suckers on there!!! I wasn’t buying her fake smile either. I wanted to grab the intercom from the flight dude calling the rows boarding and yell, “Ladies and Gentleman, now boarding Wannabe Ms. America…please join me in congratulating her on her fraudulent efforts!!! HURRAY!!” So we’re boarding and she ends up sitting in the back of the coach seats with all the un-beautified average poor folks! I laughed to myself wondering if this was for real…when all the sudden the MALE stewardess…oops I mean “Flight attendant” walks back to her and goes, “there’s an extra seat in First Class, would you like to sit there?” What moron isn’t gonna go sit in First Class?!? So she walks up the aisle, her crown scraping the top of the plane, smiling and nodding at everyone. Faking your way as a beauty queen to get bumped to first class...

that must have been her talent...