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By Tom Anselm

I teased in a previous column that I’d tell you about our flight home from California in March. So in 500 words or more, here’s what went down (maybe a poor choice of words when talking about planes?)

Well, we boarded and sat three across, me in the middle. The guy to my right was snoring like a hibernating grizzly by the time we’d gotten our emergency procedures demo. Fun. The steward began taking drink orders. A guy two rows up shouted out “Say it loud, I’m black and I’m proud.” Okay. Now, I didn’t think that was a new vodka drink. I quietly prayed there was an air marshal on board.

The steward politely asked the guy again. Same big response.

I began to get nervous. We were, maybe, 10 minutes into a 4-hour

trip and a guy’s going all psychotic! I hoped the little yellow oxygen

cup would fall out of the ceiling, because I was getting faint.

But  calmly, as if nothing was odd about that comeback, the steward ignored the guy and asked for the next person’s order. And that was the last we heard of the man who, I suppose, was just proud to be black and wanted us all to know, which I’m  perfectly all right with.

Then it was time for snacks. It amuses me a bit that travelers are treated almost like kindergartners. We get our drinkie and our snack-snack and then are expected to be good for the rest of the day. And do you remember when it was just peanuts? I guess today’s pandemic of allergies has caused the variety of high-sodium choices to grow.

So since you can have as many as you wish, the guy behind me decided he was going to get his money’s worth, and had to take what seemed like 40 bags of Cheetos. Which he proceeded to crunch, the morsels and the bags, about two feet from my left ear. Snuffles the Bear to the right, Mr. Annoyance to the left, Potential-Terrorist-Guy two rows up. Oh, the joy.

The lovely Jill, a member of the White-Knuckles-Squeezing-Her- Rosary Club, was surprisingly amused at all of this folly. And things did settle down, until we started our final approach, that is. Then stuff got weird. We began banking, first left, then right. Then left again. Were we going in a circle? The sun was on one side, then the next. We were drifting so slowly, I thought we were just going to stop, like in the cartoons. Finally, and I mean after 30 minutes of this junk, with the cabin completely still (even the Proud Guy was quiet!), we glided onto the runway. Jill glanced out the window and there sat the fire crews, colored lights a-flashin’.

Not a good sign. We took a long time to slow down, but eventually reached our gate. As we walked into the concourse, an attendant told folks “This plane is grounded…something to do with the flaps.” Gulp.It took me two adult beverages to calm down, and that was after we got home.

No more flying for me, I vowed. Except the next day, we got two $100 vouchers towards our next flight.So, Destin, Florida, here we come this summer for a family vacay. Short flight versus 12 hours in the car? I just might take my chances.(Tom welcomes all comments. Email him at tjanselm@sbcglobal.net.)

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