I took the redeye out of Los Angeles last night in the hopes that the flight wouldn't be too full. Unfortunately, the 9:55 out of LAX was PACKED and there were throngs of standbys hovering nervously by the ticket counter, hoping to snatch up the few remaining seats.
Frequent travelers know that your seat mate on a flight can make or break the journey. When they call your row number you grab your boarding pass, spin the seating assignment roulette wheel, and hope for someone who doesn't drool when they slump onto you in sleep.
As I sat in the terminal I began to size up the other travelers. Who would share that cramped row of seats with me? Would it be the elderly woman who kept staring at the tattoos on my wrists with a mixture of anxiety and revulsion on her face? Perhaps the precocious toddler who was very loudly reciting the alphabet over and over and over again. Or maybe I'd be next to the swarthy Greek gentleman who introduced himself as Helios and mistook my choking on his cologne marinade for coquettish laughter.
I braced myself for the worst.
In my row I discovered a woman about my age sitting in the aisle seat cooing to a pet carrier at her feet. We chatted briefly as I settled into the window seat and I learned that inside the pet carrier was a (surprisingly calm) chihuahua named Lucy. So far so good but we both eyed the seat between us nervously.
When the third member of our odd trio arrived, we were both relieved. He was about our age, didn't have an obnoxious amount of luggage, and had not doused himself in cologne. Score! The fact that his name is Pizza (no, really) was just an added bonus.
Though I'm usually the type of person who is asleep from take-off until landing, I stayed awake for most of the flight because we all hit it off so well. We chatted about our jobs and families, shared travel horror stories and laughed endlessly about the pretzel-pushing steward. (Do you want some pretzels with that? How about some pretzels? Sir, do you need some pretzels? Here, have some pretzels) Later, we took bets on whether the driver meeting Pizza would have a sign that said "Mr. Pizza" or if he'd just hold up a slice instead.
We had a great time, but we were totally Those Obnoxious People Behind Us to the family that was seated in front of us. When three people from Jersey get together, there's going to be loud laughter in large quantity; consequently, we got That Look from the father several times which, of course, made us laugh even harder.
So much more fun than sleeping through the flight or fending off the advances of Helios.
Now, who needs pretzels?
