My Name is Stan - Part 2

December 21st, 2007
Boston MA

I’m back in Boston for Christmas. When I lived in New York, coming home for Christmas was no big deal. I just called Budget, grabbed a vehicle and drove it like the rented horse that it was. I’d leave around 10 at night, and I could be home in 3 1/2 hours, provided they weren’t doing any late night construction.

So when I booked my travel to go home to Boston from LA, I completely forgot what a big deal going to the airport 5 days before Christmas is. Can you believe that? That has to be the selfish side of me. If it doesn’t affect me, I forget it exists. Kind of like world hunger or the Memphis Grizzlies.

In my defense, I’m not a complete idiot. I knew that the airports were crowded during the holidays, but I felt I had a system that would negate any potential delays. My copyrighted system involved leaving on a THURSDAY. See, in my head, no one gets to travel on a THURSDAY except for the President, widget salesmen, and comedians. Everyone else is just a run of the mill jackass, chained to a cubicle until the whistle blows on FRIDAY.

Part two of "Operation Exit Row" was that I was booked on the 9 PM Red Eye Flight. I felt this was another stroke of brilliance, because at that hour, all of those regular working stiffs would be getting ready for bed. There’s no way they would be going to the airport, for they had to go to work the next day. So not only would they not be on my flight, they wouldn’t even be on the road. "Boy oh boy, this is going to be the best flight ever! I’ll probably get a whole row to myself! I AM A FUCKING GENIUS!"

The final piece of the puzzle came together when I set up a free ride to the airport by calling up a comedian friend of mine by the name of Kevin Shea. (Kevin is Asian, in a good way) Needless to say, he agreed. Not because he’s a wholesome, dependable person, that was in the holiday spirit. He agreed to give me a ride cause in the back of his sneaky Pearl Harbor mind, he thought by giving me a ride, I would repay the favor by hooking him up with some road work.

I forget how we finally got to the highway, but I do remember Kevin having to make some sort of U-turn. As I started to break his balls about not knowing where the fuck he was going, he actually said something that unbeknownst to me, would change my holiday life forever.

"You still go home for the Christmas?"

An odd feeling came over me, but I immediately did what I do with all uncomfortable emotion: I ignored it. "Ahhh...fuck him. What does he know about Christmas? He probably eats frosted Kimchi. Plus I haven’t seen my family in 6 months and I’m leaving on a THURSDAY! I’ll be home in a jiffy!"

We were cruising down the highway, just as I imagined we would, but as we came towards the end of the 105 freeway, we were suddenly staring at 9 million break lights. It was classic LA traffic. Everyone was going about 80 miles and hour, and then for no apparent reason, we came to a complete stop. And a line of cars snaked its way over the horizon, towards the barely visible, giant glow sticks of LAX.

But this wasn’t the usual, run-of-the-mill congestion. This was one of those traffic jams that news helicopters hover over, like fucking vultures. And I knew somewhere there was some cheesy, talking head, newsroom personality, chuckling at my misfortune. In that moment I understood terrorism and the reason civilians aren’t allowed to have RPG’s.

Kevin, to his credit, immediately started laughing at me and telling me what a fuckin’ idiot I was. I tried to play it off by trashing him for how lonely he was going to be on Christmas. But he responded with: "I see my parents for two weeks during the summer. No one goes to my home state during the summer. I stopped going home for the holidays like 5 years ago.."

How could I be this stupid?

It took forever to go the last 1/4 of a fucking mile to get into the airport.
Thus I went from having plenty of time to catch my plane, to wondering if a new form of travel had been invented.

Kevin dropped me off and was still laughing at me as I saw the security line was backed up to the parking garage. As I watched him drive away, I realized that it was the first time I had been envious of a feature act since I was an opener. (He’s actually hilarious and is a headliner. And he would probably be headlining even more rooms if it weren’t for a video clip of a radical preacher from his local church trashing the white man.)

As I waded slowly into the crowded airport, for some reason I began talking to myself in the voice of a high school gym teacher.

"Nice move Bill. Just a heads up fuckin’ play. Way to have your finger on the pulse! It’s 5 days before the Martyrs birthday and every shit head with unresolved childhood issues is going to be standing in front of you, not taking their laptop out of their bag and forgetting to remove their belt. And you know what?...you deserve it. Why? Cause you are a FUCKIN’ MORON!"

Inside the terminal it looked as though the government had been overthrown. The mass confusion and overall panicked look on everybody’s face made me afraid to glance over my shoulder, for fear of seeing aircraft fire lighting up a Best Buy.

For the life of me, I don’t know why I don’t learn from past mistakes. I stick my head in a hole. I get punched in the face. I take my head out. The sting wears off. Then I stick my head right back in the same hole.

And when I fuck up really bad in life, my response is not to remain calm and try to think of a solution. Instead, it is to immediately lose my shit to a completely unacceptable level, and then I follow it up by having random angry thoughts directed at complete strangers.

"Why do all dumb cunts wear Uggs?...Look at these fuckin’ idiots....Just a sea of stupidity....And no one is wearing a condom...."

So as I looked around the ticket area, rather than remain calm and accept that this is par for the course during the "Happiest Time of the Year", my brain just started to babble hurt, hate, and conspiracy theory, as I tried to gauge whether it was better to stand behind the old couple or the family from Laos, with the cardboard luggage.

"Is this what the New World Order is going to look like? God I’m glad I don’t have any kids. I wonder how the North American Union will effect the NHL. Will Winnipeg get a team again?..."

It took about two and a half hours to get to my gate. It would have only taken an hour and forty-five minutes, but no matter how much the TSA rent-a-cops yelled out the rules, the random shitheads, didn’t seem to be catching on.

I swear to God if they would occasionally shoot someone in the leg, for waiting until they were at the front of the line to begin taking their jacket and shoes off, the world would be a more violent, yet faster moving place.

My red eye flight back to Boston was due to leave at 900 PM. By the time I got through security it was 8:45, so I was sprinting through the airport.

"...That fuckin cock suckin’ muther fuckin’ Muhammad Atta..."

There are very few things in life that match the panic of thinking you are going to miss a plane. On the scale of horrific things, I think it’s ranked just before drowning and right after having your crotch set on fire.

The anxiety level is ridiculous. When you actually think about it, it’s not fatal. In fact, I’ve missed about 7 flights in my career and nothing bad has ever happened. I was never stranded and then forced to ride in the hull of a FED-X plane. They just put me on the next available flight and I got home a little later.

But for some reason when you are in the moment of thinking you are going to miss your flight, you completely lose all touch with reality. Your brain takes you to a heightened "fight or flight" mode of awareness and you start to behave as though you are going to miss the last chopper out of Vietnam.

I was so freaked out that I actually contemplated the "Sophie’s Choice" of leaving my ancient 8 pound laptop behind.

"Fuck it...maybe I’ll get a new one for Christmas...I NEED TO BE MOBILE!"

When I finally arrived at my gate I expected to see a gate agent closing the jet-way door, as my plane was being back up by that little truck. Instead, I was relieved to find that the plane had not left. In-fact, not only had the plane not left, it hadn’t even arrived yet. And my flight 9 PM flight was now due to leave at 9:30 PM.

At first there was relief. A little bit of peaceful blue, spilling into my mind.

"Ahh...9:30 is not that bad. I can chill out...Maybe even grab a magazine..."

But that calm only lasted for about 8 seconds.

"Would you look at this fuckin’ twat with her bag on the chair. What a fuckin’ cunt. Doesn’t she see all the people standing up? Oh yeah buddy just stand right fuckin there blocking the flow of traffic. Fuckin’ corduroy slacks and a comb over.. What kind of friends do you have where they don’t tell you how fucking bad that looks. I wish I had my own plane with a giant bed and a big seat belt..."

As the evil troll in my mind continued to rant, I scoped out a small section of all weather carpet, sat down, and caught my breath as I checked to see if I lost anything during my sprint.

About ten minutes later, I had calmed down and was actually having fun waving at this toddler in a stroller. I love how kids wave. You know the way they open and close their entire hand? That always cracks me up.
Anyway, I stopped waving at the kid after about 45 seconds, because when it isn’t your kid, that game quickly goes from being cute, to: "What’s with the sex offender?" It’s a sad state of today’s world, but I get it.

Anyway, some residual paranoia made me glance up at my flight info on the board and I noticed that it was now scheduled to leave at 10:10 PM.

"...10:10?...It just said 9:30...and it was supposed to leave at 9...oh no...oh God no...Don’t do this..."

Twenty minutes later it was pushed back to 10:40PM.

"....Oh fuck...Please God don’t let me be on one of these flights..."

Then they moved the gate.

..."you motherless fuckin’ cunts..."

When I arrived at the new gate, my flight was now pushed back to 11:00PM, and that’s when I began speaking out loud to no one in particular.

"This is fuckin’ bullshit. The fucking plane is on fucking radar. They know where the fuck it is and how fucking long it’s going to take for it to fucking get here. So stop giving me the fuckin’ truth in 20 minute fuckin’ increments."

That’s what I hate about airline travel. They treat you like a child. Like if they just told me at 9 PM that the fucking plane was still over Iowa, I could have done the math.

"So, let’s see.... That gives me roughly three hours to get just drunk enough that I can still board the plane, but pass out for the rest of the flight. Perfect. See ya’ at midnight."

But they don’t do that. They have to keep the fuckin’ herd together. So they keep you on the edge of your seat for hours on end and create the artificial fear that if you leave the immediate gate area for even a minute, the plane will somehow pull up, 250 people will get off, and another 250 will get on, and you’ll spend your entire Christmas sleeping on the tile down near baggage claim.

"Yeah, buddy why don’t you talk a little bit louder, you’re SCREAMING for fuck sakes...I fuckin’ hate wingtip shoes..."

The final time they put up was 1159PM. We didn’t board until 12:30AM. But they never switched the time to later than 1159PM. I don’t think that they felt we could psychologically handle it. It’s the same philosophy as selling something for $19.95. $19.95 is considered a good deal. But if you sold it for20 bucks, somehow everyone would then realize that it’s a complete piece of shit.

"Look at this douche. He looks like the kind of guy who gets drunk and falls overboard during a cruise....Why are you eating yogurt?..."

As embarrassing as my temper is, I do take pride in the fact that I don’t unleash it on people I deem as innocent.

For example: Unlike most douche bags I don’t yell at the people behind the counter, when my flight is delayed. (I prefer to curse amongst the passengers and their children :P ) I realize that the gate agents are merely innocent messengers, that somehow ended up having to do this horrific job.

I can’t imagine a worse, "Well I guess I’ll do this" job, than being a gate agent. The murderous fantasies they must conjure up as yet another out of shape, IRATE customer, is screaming at them while the faint smell of Cinnabon mocks the entire conversation.

I am by no means defending the airlines. I hate the fact that they won’t come out and just tell you that a three hour delay is going to be a three hour delay. That’s the kind of shit that makes me snap.

But when it’s a situation that involves bad weather, as much as it sucks, it’s not their fault. So at that point, I would just liked to be given the option of finding the closest bar and having some drinks. I mean, I get it. It’s snowing. What the fuck do people want them to do? Fly into a blizzard?

Whenever I hear people bitching in that situation, I always fantasize about one of the pilots walking up behind the gate agent with a cigarette dangling out of his mouth and in a barely audible Clint Eastwood voice, utter. "Put them on the plane. They want to go? Let’s fucking go."

A lot of those pilots are Vietnam/Iraqi War Vets. So you know they’re bored shitless flying those airborne greyhounds back and forth over the heartland.

A guy like that would probably love nothing more than to reclaim a little of that combat mission excitement, by flying into the heart of a hurricane. Then he could open the cockpit door and scream over his shoulder:

"IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED?!?!?!?!?!!!!!! IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED!?!?!?!"

These people who complain during bad weather are probably the same ones that freak out every time there is the slightest bit of turbulence. I hate when you hit a bump and then they shoot you a look, begging you to reassure them that everything is OK. They have this fuckin’ scared rodent-like expression. "Oh my God. Are we going to die?"

I wish I had the balls to throw karma to the wind and be like, "Yes your fear is true. We are going down. We’re all going to die, and the worst part is, you’ll have 10 minutes to think about it as we do barrel rolls before taking out a soybean field/crystal meth lab, just east of Hayes Nebraska."


"....Jesus Christ...if your feet look like that why would wear sandals?...Are you somehow blaming the rest of us?...Why am I still going home for Christmas? Great question. I’m old enough to have a 15 year old that resents me for walking out ten years ago...I need some NyQuil."

PART 3 NEXT THURSDAY (PROVIDED I DON’T GET ANOTHER VIRUS)