Tony DeyalTony Deyal
MY COLUMN last week about the end of sex did not go down too well with a few people. Without calling any names, I could say that someone close to me, so close in fact that any closer and we would be featured in the Kama Sutra, said, "Speak for yourself." Another old friend whose several divorces and many affairs label him flagrantly heterosexual, said that the real problem was all these gay marriages, the "L" word thing, with homosexuals not only coming out of the closet but jointly owning the house. "It's not the end of sex," he said. "It is the end of sex as we know it." I almost echoed, "Speak for yourself" but realised that could be misinterpreted.
As actually happened to an employee of U.S. Air with the last name of 'Gay'. He recently boarded a U.S. Air flight to San Francisco with a free travel voucher. Soon after he sat down, someone else came and claimed he had the same seat assignment, so Mr. Gay moved to an empty seat. The airplane began to fill up. U.S. Air employees with travel vouchers must surrender their seats to paying customers so that when the flight became completely full and still more people needed to get on, a flight attendant went to the original seat of Mr. Gay and asked the man sitting there, "Excuse me, are you Gay?" The man, somewhat stunned, said, "Well, yes, as a matter of fact I am!" The flight attendant said, "I'm sorry, but you'll have to get off the plane." At this point Mr. Gay, who had been watching all of this, jumped up and said, "Excuse me. I'm Gay!" Then several other men and women, on their way to get married, jumped up in anger shouting, "We're gay too! They can't throw us all off!"
SAFETY REASONS
There was a time when I had a 'gay old time' in the Flintstonian sense on airplanes. I once travelled on a Ward Air Charter flight from Toronto to Trinidad where the liquor was free. Whatever the altitude at which the plane flew, I was much higher. Flying was fun and still, for many people, a new experience. There is the story of the couple, Mr. and Mrs. Jones, who were on a Continental Airlines flight that had four other stops before arriving at the Dallas-Forth Worth Airport. At the first stop, a little white truck drove up to the plane and they watched it pull up to the wing of the aircraft. Mrs. Jones asked her husband, "What's that truck doing?" He explained that airlines never completely fuel up a plane for safety reasons.
This process was repeated at the next three stops, and again Mrs. Jones watched the plane being fuelled each time. At the last stop, her husband said, "You know, in spite of all these delays, we're making pretty good time." Mrs. Jones pointed out the window and said, "I don't know about that. If we were doing so well, how come that little white truck is still keeping up with us."
Now, several hundreds of thousands of miles and 911 later, flying is no longer fun for me. A journey of a thousand miles no longer begins with the first step. It starts with a two-to-three hour delay. Last week on my way to St. Lucia from Miami, having arrived at the airport at 5 a.m. for a 6.30 a.m. flight to connect at Puerto Rico on a 12.30 p.m. flight, there was a delay in Miami which led to another delay in Puerto Rico. Instead of arriving in St. Lucia at 2.30 p.m., I arrived at about 8.30 p.m. American Airlines did not even apologise or offer lunch vouchers. Worse, the journey from Miami to St. Lucia are on what American Airlines call 'Eagle' airplanes, little propeller planes that the late Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, George Chambers, called 'shake and bake'.
DANGEROUS TERRITORY
There is a story about a little boy who asked his mother about those little planes. They were flying American Eagle and the boy asked, "If big dogs have baby dogs and big cats have baby cats, why don't big planes have baby planes?" The mother, realising the dangerous territory into which the question could take her, told her son to ask the Flight Attendant. So the boy asked the flight attendant who responded, "Did your mother tell you to ask me?" The boy admitted this was the case. "Well, then," the flight attendant replied, "tell your mother that there are no baby planes because American Eagle always pulls out on time. Tell her I said to explain that to you."
While that might not have actually happened, there is a true story about a quick-witted United Airlines flight attendant who was dealing with a long line of very disgruntled passengers. One particularly unpleasant passenger broke the line and demanded entry into first class. The attendant replied, "I'm sorry sir. I'll be happy to try to help you, but I've got to help these people first, and I'm sure we'll be able to work something out." The passenger was unimpressed. He asked loudly, so that the passengers behind him could hear, "Do you have any idea who I am?" The attendant smiled, grabbed the public address microphone, and announced, "May I have your attention please. We have a passenger here at Gate 14 who does not know who he is. If anyone can help him find his identity, please come to Gate14." With the other people behind him in the line laughing hysterically, the man glared at the attendant and shouted angrily, "Screw you lady." Without any hesitation, the flight attendant smiled and said, "I'm sorry, sir, but you'll have to get in line for that too."
Tony Deyal was last seen complaining that after reading about Tahiti he asked a young travel agent what is the best time to get to Tahiti. Looking at Tony's receding hairline and expanding stomach, the young man replied, "Between 18 and 25."
