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Flying is easy. It's incredibly easy. It gives you a whole day - or a good part of one - to sit on your ass and use a cellphone, laptop or magazine for entertai

Flying is easy. It's incredibly easy. It gives you a whole day - or a good part of one - to sit on your ass and use a cellphone, laptop or magazine for entertainment. Even if you're traveling for business, you're probably not doing as much as you would in the office. If you're traveling, you have nothing to complain about. Even if you experience relative annoyances such as layovers, you still have a whole day to do nothing, or to do very little. Complaints about the airport are extremely hackneyed, and those who tell "airport horror stories" often sound entitled. The author concedes this point in the beginning, which is refreshing, but he defaults to it in his conclusion by saying that "airports are painful."

Someone 13y ago
Not everybody aspires to doing nothing. Worse, few people aspire to doing nothing on somebody else's schedule and conditions. That 'do nothing' looks like this: do nothing here for an hour or so while queuing for check in. Next, do nothing queueing for the security check; after that, do nothing sitting in some lousy chair for an hour (maybe more, but we can't tell you exactly how long), or do nothing time walking around some fairly limited shopping mall; you can't go outside. Now, do nothing for 15 minutes while boarding, do nothing half an hour or so waiting for takeoff (don't use your electronics!). Then, do nothing for a couple of hours in a noisy vibrating, badly air conditioned, crowded room, etc.
- hawkharris 13y ago
  Just like traveling from New York to California in a cattle car in the 1840s.
  - pm90 13y ago
    Well, if you were in the 1840's, you would have similarly said "Just like going barefoot...." That's not a very productive conversation now, is it? Sure, we enjoy many of the fruits of modern technology, but reducing wastage is also desirable. Especially for people who have to travel regularly for business.
squidfood 13y ago
Sorry, no. "I should be grateful if they screw us over, because they're getting us from point A to point B" isn't really good enough. Sure, it's easier than going by carriage in the old days,or from some true third-world airports. And I'm not one to complain when unavoidable things happen (e.g. people sleeping everywhere when the weather backs up). But equally, when the airports have (a) a functional monopoly and (b) fairly simple, low-hanging fruit choices to make life more comfortable (e.g. plugs, wifi, reasonable places to wait), and (c) they spend money on "improvements" that do nothing or degrade service (bigger TVs screaming at me? Really?), then it's worth not being complacent about it.
gusfoo 13y ago
Flying may be easy, but I'd challenge anyone to say the experience of getting off at JFK and finding a place to stay for the night is anything other than brutal. For such a cosmopolitan city as NYC to have such a decrepit main airport is scandalous. In fairness; SFO is ok-ish, O'Hare is nice, as is Houston and LAX.
StavrosK 13y ago
Flying is easy like being locked in a cage is easy.

Someone 13y ago

Not everybody aspires to doing nothing. Worse, few people aspire to doing nothing on somebody else's schedule and conditions. That 'do nothing' looks like this: do nothing here for an hour or so while queuing for check in. Next, do nothing queueing for the security check; after that, do nothing sitting in some lousy chair for an hour (maybe more, but we can't tell you exactly how long), or do nothing time walking around some fairly limited shopping mall; you can't go outside. Now, do nothing for 15 minutes while boarding, do nothing half an hour or so waiting for takeoff (don't use your electronics!). Then, do nothing for a couple of hours in a noisy vibrating, badly air conditioned, crowded room, etc.

hawkharris 13y ago
Just like traveling from New York to California in a cattle car in the 1840s.
- pm90 13y ago
  Well, if you were in the 1840's, you would have similarly said "Just like going barefoot...." That's not a very productive conversation now, is it? Sure, we enjoy many of the fruits of modern technology, but reducing wastage is also desirable. Especially for people who have to travel regularly for business.

squidfood 13y ago

Sorry, no. "I should be grateful if they screw us over, because they're getting us from point A to point B" isn't really good enough. Sure, it's easier than going by carriage in the old days,or from some true third-world airports. And I'm not one to complain when unavoidable things happen (e.g. people sleeping everywhere when the weather backs up). But equally, when the airports have (a) a functional monopoly and (b) fairly simple, low-hanging fruit choices to make life more comfortable (e.g. plugs, wifi, reasonable places to wait), and (c) they spend money on "improvements" that do nothing or degrade service (bigger TVs screaming at me? Really?), then it's worth not being complacent about it.

gusfoo 13y ago

Flying may be easy, but I'd challenge anyone to say the experience of getting off at JFK and finding a place to stay for the night is anything other than brutal. For such a cosmopolitan city as NYC to have such a decrepit main airport is scandalous. In fairness; SFO is ok-ish, O'Hare is nice, as is Houston and LAX.

StavrosK 13y ago

Flying is easy like being locked in a cage is easy.