Saturday, January 07, 2006

On Planes and Post

I think it is fairly safe to say that I have a wide range of experience with flights. I've ranted about a few on here before, but decided after recent events that I'd sum up a few generalised complaints. I am fed up with variable carry-on baggage rules - given that the vast majority of planes are a Boeing 737 or whatever that other thing is - AirBus or something - I think the overhead lockers are going to be remarkably similar, thus able to support similar weights. Why is it I can take 10kg of carry-on with Ryanair, yet for 'safety measures' only 5kg with Virgin Atlantic? Where is the logic? And why is it I constantly see people with legs about half the length of mine nestled comfortably into exit row seats, while I need to apply the vaseline to my knees and ease my way into the two inch gap between the standard seats? To add to my usual list of grievances, yesterday I had to wait in an unnecessarily slow moving queue to have my passport checked upon arrival. What is all this rubbish about not having to fly with passport but using 'alternative forms of ID' - it just means that queues build up as the poor sod trying to establish you are who you say you are is running his finger up and down the long list of 'acceptable ID alternatives.' Final complaint (for now): good God, but they make you walk miles in airports. The worst I think was Dallas, where - I jest not - it took me close on an hour to walk to my gate. At a brisk pace. Carrying all my luggage. Do you realise this is approximately, at a guess, THREE MILES? And during that three miles, there was not a single cash point or banking office where I could withdraw American dollars and thus purchase some of the ghastly food options available to me. Much as I find it endlessly amusing to watch lardy people 'sprinting' towards their gate, I feel for them. We have to walk too far, and it is frankly bloody ridiculous.
A brief addition to all this: why can't the Royal Mail just deliver my post? Why? I have missed multiple parcels and letters that just never arrive anywhere, or are returned to sender with a sticker informing them that I am 'no longer at this address.' I think I worked out half the problem the other day: we received a parcel for somebody ten doors up. The postal workers are clearly illiterate. Dammit, but this makes me so mad. My gran always said that 'if a job is worth doing, it is worth doing well'. Precisely. Surely there should be a law incorporating this idea somewhere...

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