Well, I’m only on the first leg of my trip and I already have OOOODLES to tell. I’m sitting at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol (no they don’t sell weed in the terminals) waiting to connect to Nairobi, Kenya. By the way, why is Europe so much better than America? Aren’t we the super power? I mean, even their airport is SMOKIN HOT. Anyway, it’s been about 8 hours of fly time, a 3 hour layover, another 8 hours of fly time, another 3 hour layover, another hour of fly time, and then I’ll be in Mombasa. Flight-wise, the first part went swimmingly. Aisle seat, no one in the middle, hot guy at the window seat. GETTING to the airport was another story.
I left my apartment at 3pm so I could be at JFK by 4:30pm at the latest. I normally take a cab to Penn Station, the Long Island Railroad to Jamaica and then the AirTrain to my gate. Easy as pie and it takes like 40-45 minutes for the trip. I walk out my apartment, walk a block and get a cab. 45 (yes, 45) bumper-to-bumper minutes later, we finally get from 10th & B to 27th & 8th. Normally 45 minutes is how long the entire airport trip takes me, and yet today, on the day that I’m flying internationally to a remote location where there are only 5 flights a week, Manhattan decides to go from being a regular zoo to being a super zoo and thus it takes 45 minutes to get to 27th and 8th. Now you savvy New Yorkers will note that 27th and 8th is not Penn Station. That’s because after we sat through TWO cycles of the stoplight (green, yellow, red. ANOTHER green, yellow red) and didn’t move a single block. I told the cabbie to pull over and that I would walk. Finally, I get to Penn Station. Thank God I planned ahead and allocated a decent amount of time for just such an incident. With a confident but goofy grin I blaze into the station.
Smugness is not pretty and I got my comeuppance a minute later. I stroll into Penn Station thinking I beat the clock when I see the gates are all down and there are cops yelling at people. I ask wassup. There’s a fire at Jamaica. There are no trains going between Penn Station and Jamaica and the cops won’t even let you enter the station. It’s now just before 4 o’clock. This is when I had planned to be at the airport; instead I’m at Penn Station. I’m flipping out. Being the raging moron that I am, first, I have a mental breakdown and then I storm upstairs to jump into a cab. Now, I call myself a moron because evidently news of the fire had eradicated the memory of the fact that it had just taken me about an hour to go 22 blocks and 9 avenues…and I walked for 5 of those blocks.
Anywho, I’m an idiot and jump into a cab (because like every other spoiled homo, when I’m late I just assume a cab is the best way to go) and scream that he take me to JFK. In hindsight, the A or C train would have been much wiser. The cabbie takes me clear across town (basically back to my starting point) and he tries to take the midtown tunnel. The cops have barricaded the entrance and are not allowing people to make a left hand turn into the tunnel. My idiot cab driver tries to squeeze in between the cones. A cop blares his horn and lights, cabbie freaks out and starts to drive AWAY from the tunnel. He’s yelling, I’m yelling, it was definitely a New York moment. He finally takes us around a few blocks and we manage to make a right hand turn into the tunnel.
Bumper-to-bumper the whole way (remember, no trains leaving Manhattan so everyone’s in a cab), I get to the airport at 5:15, flirt with the faggy ticket agent so I don’t get yelled at for being so late (you’re supposed to check in around 2 hours before for international flights) and get to my gate with just enough time to literally slam a vodka cranberry (my last for a while) and get on the plane.
I realize the entire adventure may be anti-climactic for you, gentle reader, because obviously I got on the plane as I am here, but let me tell you, at the time I was having a conniption and a half.
When I got on the plane I tried to smile and make lots of eye contact with the stud next to me, but I’m fairly certain he was straight. I was pretty certain when I got on that he was straight, but I really didn’t care because I’m DESPERATELY trying to join the Mile High Club. I’m halfway there. I jerked off in an airplane bathroom once just because I want to say that I’ve at least cum while on a plane, but that’s not really the same thing. Anyway, Hottie McHotterson in seat 12-I wanted nothing to do with me, so I put on my sleep mask and went to sleep.
When I woke up, I had another “Nima, you’re dumb as a douche bag” moment. I decided to watch a movie on my lil airplane TV. Of all the movies on the list (probably about 25 or so), what did I, brilliant lawyer-to-be choose to watch? Babel. A movie about Americans who get shot while visiting a foreign land. When Cate Blanchett screams in agony as they stitch her up in a hut, all I could think was “Dear God, when I get shot and they sew me up in a hut in Mombasa please let my screams be as pitch perfect as hers…and please let my hair be as shiny and bouncy too…and let me have Brad Pitt holding my hand”.
Movie ends. There’s an enormous THUD on the plane and an announcement comes on asking if there are any doctors on the plane. Someone collapsed while going to the bathroom. A doctor IS on the plane and she tends to the collapsed person until we land.
People who take dumps on airplanes should be shot. There are like 2 bathrooms, they’re tiny, they’re not sound nor smell proof, and you knew you were gonna fly, so why didn’t you shit before you got on the plane? Idiots.
Overhead items really do shift during takeoff and landing. I opened my backpack to get my headphones and a pen fell out and hit the guy sitting in front of me on the head…and then rolled off his head behind him. He didn’t notice and I didn’t bring it to his attention. Luckily it was cheap pen.
KLM hawks a lot of wares on their planes, they bring a duty free cart around and try to sell you stuff. I ALMOST bought the Jean-Paul Gautier Summer Fashion Show Limited Edition miniature perfume bottles (they’re hot, check them out), but pussy-ed out at the last minute and didn’t.
Finally (sorry, longest blog post ever, I know), I’d like to give a shout-out to Courtney and Stephanie for buying me this inflatable travel pillow. I have a couple of real travel pillows that have like cotton and stuff inside of them (and a vibrating one that Heather bought me) and always thought the inflatable neck pillows were for poor people who couldn’t afford the real thing. How wrong I was. The inflatables are SOOOOOO much better. First, they don’t take up space, and second, the support is so much better. I’m a convert, you should become one too. Thanks Courtney and Stephanie.
P.S. As I’m typing some crazy dude is asking me if he can use my computer to check his email and what time lunch is served and asking where I’m going. He also keeps getting up and switching seats (like musical chairs) but all the seats he’s choosing are within one seat of me.
P.P.S. I don’t know how gay guys survive in Europe. Every single male looks more queer here than I would if I were on a gay cruise hosted by Rosie and Nathan Lane that was celebrating Madonna’s birthday during a gay pride weekend. Seriously, it’s ridiculously gay here…and I love it.
P.P.P.S. Everything online, including this page, is in Dutch, so I'm amazing myself in being able to post this.
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