August 04, 2008

Captive Audiences

They may sell them to someone perhaps, but not me:

US Airways will likely begin selling pillows and blankets to its customers by the end of the year, following closely behind discount carrier JetBlue Airways Corp., which said Monday it will start charging fliers $7 to use a pillow and blanket.

I fly quite a bit and always have, A few weeks ago I took a vacation with the family that required air travel. I have learned that the things I can tolerate and work around when traveling alone on business is somewhat greater than those that i can tolerate and work around when I have my wife and kids along. It was a miserable experience coming and going. Severely late flights coming and going, almost causing us to miss the boat on the way out, and leaving us completely up in the air (no pun intended) as to which day we would actually make it home, right up until we ran to get on a plane to our final destination that we only made since it was running late, no thanks to the friendly staff we put us at the back of the connecting flight so we would be virtually the last ones off that plane plane. And, of course, our luggage didn't make it. Did I mention that we weren't flying home but to Chicago so we could drop off my mother-in-law at my sister-in-laws house while we were away and had to pick her back up to bring her back with us afterwards? No? Well, our drive home was held hostage until late, and I do mean late the next day when our luggage was finally delivered. The extra expenses of kennels, missed appointments, and the almost literal draining of the reservoir of rejuvenation the vacation was supposed to provide was depressing and left me in a bad mood which lingers seemingly interminably. But I digress.

All in all, it really makes it difficult to consider flying as a practical method of transportation for another family vacation. If I have to set aside two days on each side of the trip for what should be a 4 hour flight each way, well, let's just say that the cruise lines should be pretty damned worried about the impact this is going to have on their business. Perhaps it's time to start driving to all the National Parks again.

Posted by Charles Austin at August 4, 2008 10:21 PM
Comments

There's a lot to be said for throwing the tents and sleeping bags in the truck and letting the kids cook hotdogs over a campfire.

Posted by: Jon at 09:06 AM