Number Five

Because of the shitty way airlines treat people. We’re forced to strap ourselves into smaller-than-theater seats with no leg room. No matter what size, shape or smell you are you’re packed in like sardines. And now we pay for blankets, pillows, drinks, and snacks if we want them and gawd forbid you want a real meal. If something were ever to go wrong with during the flight, the passengers are the last to know. We’re cattle, kept barely satisfied until they can dump us at the other end. And we pay them out the ass for the pleasure.

Number Four

The TSA. Not just their guidelines about fluids, but that all their guidelines are fluid. From one agent to the next they don’t work the same. I could stop now cuz you all know what I mean, but I had friends who worked for TSA and the stories they told me… well, there’s more bullshit there than you could ever imagine.

Number Three

Ginormous airports that always seem to schedule my flights at opposite ends and have no easy way to get from point A to point B. And especially at Atlanta’s airport, their penchant for last-minute gate changes, not next door but across the fucking airport. Name the one place where you are the most tired, confused, rushed and anxious and I’ll bet it’s the goddamn airport. And the parking! Or rather, the not-parking. Even something as simple as picking someone up at the stupid airport is a nightmare.

Number Two

The bullshit over packing. What you’re allowed to take on the plane and what you have to check. You’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you do. You want to carry everything with you (for me this means my electronics and medication) but you can’t get at it anyway on the cramped plane so why bother? Except the stupid airlines lose bags every flight so do you really want to take the chance of getting where you’re going and having no medications?

Number One

Restless leg syndrome which only bothers me on planes. That and a physical response to anything that goes straight down. Roller coasters, planes, certain elevators, backyard swings – these things make me tense up and can’t move or even breath. Completely my problem, but alcohol helps.

I understand why there aren’t trains anymore. When flight became more affordable to the masses the speed and overall convenience was the death of rail travel. Trains couldn’t compete then. But I’ll bet most vacation and even some business travelers would actually prefer trains at this point. The overall hassle of being trapped on a plane traded in for a few hours more but with freedom of movement and a place to stretch out? Hell yes, people would take trains now. I know there are a few commuter rails in the east but we have nothing around here. Maybe through Tuscon.

By the time you figure in airport driving, parking, baggage checking, security check, boarding and then getting out at the other end, would rail travel really take that much more time? And would it be worth it?

All this is the real reason I drove to Florida. And why I have no desire to go back to Dragon*Con. And why I chose San Diego ComicCon over Balticon. And why I really don’t want to go to North Carolina. Because of the long flights. Hell, even the short flights are putting me off.