Monthly Archives: March 2010

From a Perfect Ruth’s Chris Steak…to gray worms and frozen noodles…

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When I left Austin for Columbia, South Carolina, expecting a three hour flight, I’d already begun salivating on the lovely room service I’d order around 7.  Filet, medium, Caesar side salad, and a baked potato. The restaurant in the Hilton, I knew was a Ruth’s Chris…so…ah… (sound of trumpets).

When I arrived in Columbia, South Carolina, at 3:45 in the morning—starving because I’d had too much pride (which usually translates to ‘I was too stubborn’) to fall for Denial Danny’s ‘free’ granola bars—what I actually had for dinner was a Lean Cuisine shrimp and noodles.  Yes, some hotels have this little pantry and a microwave near the front desk.  I hit four minutes on the micro cooking my dinner while I checked in.  I stumbled up to my room, threw my belongings about, found a re-run of Nancy Grace and opened my cuisine.

The only way I can account for the horror under the plastic lid is that the ‘meal’ required at least twice the prep time I allowed.  We’re talking cold shrimps looking like gray worms.  I stabbed my plastic fork into the ‘pasta’ and all three tines popped off when they hit the frozen chunk in the middle. 

I went from a Ruth’s Chris steak to this…. Oh, I know…if my Emotional Guidance System hadn’t been in full hysterical charge of my actions… I might have bothered to read cooking instructions or test the food before….

Changes in my plans are unfortunate, unpleasant, and inconvenient…but not a disaster unless I decide to make it one.   I DECIDE.  YEEEEEEK….THIS IS UNBELIVABLE……….

Flight of the Immature, Part 3

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happyPigdreamstime_4906910Conclusion of United Flight 6960 from Chicago to Columbia, South Carolina.  Parts 1 and 2 immediately precede this tale of unusual punishment.  

Whoa.  Finishing up my tale of woe is going to be a bit more difficult than I’d planned.  I’m now in my Hilton branch office the next day.  I have the television on the History Channel…and, right there, splattered all over the big flat screen is a re-enactment of the Battle of Valley Forge.  At the moment, three emaciated soldiers, their frozen bare feet wrapped in rags, their eyes blank from pain and starvation…are sitting against a tree.  “Only the bravest, most loyal men stayed the winter,” the kind-voiced narrator explains.  “The weaker men long ago ran away in the night.  Those with wounds died horrible deaths, gangrene taking over their legs, inch by inch. The rest…too weak to break the frozen ground, can do no more than drag their comrades’ bodies a few yards into the woods to be devoured by animals in the night.”

Even the boney scavenger wolves competing over the gangrene ridden dead soldiers are starving.  This makes it really hard to complain about the meal I finally secured once I reached Columbia, South Carolina.  Really hard, but not impossible. I hesitate to continue….Much can be said for ignorance. …and whining is so unattractive…BUT, as I was saying…

Eventually, a guy in a blue jumpsuit delivered paperwork to United 696o on the tarmac at Chicago O’Hare  Airport.  Our plane is backing away from the gate–which you’d be thinking is a good thing. But aha!  Leaving the gate is only a delaying ploy…sort of a decoy move to keep passengers in the delusion that something is happening.  I glance over my shoulder to soak in Army Arnold’s admiration at how I’d called the situation perfectly.  How the guy in the jumpsuit delivered the needed paperwork.  In sort of in a long JIFF.  My Army pals and I sigh with relief.  It’s been fun getting to know each other…but all that was over…time to get back to our separate lives….Army Arnold and pal land cots at Ft. Jackson and I slide between cool sheets at the branch Hilton.

Army Arnold, hanging on to our relationship, punches the back of my seat asking if it is safe to fly in a blizzard such as the one outside his window?   Further flaunting my extensive flying experience and all-around travelling cool, I related several air travel stories for Arnold’s amusement.  He said he envied how I was so relaxed, so able to go with the flow.  “Oh, I dunno,” I say, “I’ve learned to take these little changes in stride.”

Once we’re in line for take-off, Arnold remarks at the number of planes ahead of us and I throw out some random number that I claim is the number of planes O’Hare handles every day. …Now our plane initiates a slow left turn out of line.  “I knew it!  Something’s wrong with the plane!” says Arnold.

Denial Danny, designated flight attendant, is already digging in his bag of fabulous free treats.  This is not good.  Pilot Positive Pete comes on the intercom:  “Well, folks, because we had to wait for the paperwork…well, enough time passed for ice to collect on the plane.  (Arnold gasps and punches the back of my seat.)  So, ladies and gentlemen, we’re now returning to the gate to have the wings de-iced.”

The plane goes a few yards and stops in a cross track.  Positive Pete amends his promise: “Actually, we cannot head into a gate to get in the line to be de-iced….We cannot locate an open gate, so we are now in in line to get a gate,  where we will get in line to be de-iced, then will return to get in line to take off.

Tick…tick.  We begin hour three on the plane.  

My Emotional Guidance System is going berserk, screaming:  This is horrible!  I can’t take this!  However, since I have Army Arnold behind me saying out loud what I am thinking, I must not crack, I must continue to feign sophistication and self-control.  Next to Army Arnold’s genuine terror of flying…if I were to unleash my relentless bitching over my inconvenience….Well, I’d look a bit petty.

Thus, I am repeating to myself: “While the changes in my plans… are unfortunate, uncomfortable, and inconvenient ….this is not a disaster unless I decide to make it one….While the changes in my plans are unfortunate, uncomfortable, and incon….”

Okay.  We’re in a gate, in line for de-icing. Denial Danny unleashes the beverage cart.  Not good. We aren’t going to be airborne in any hurry.  Army Arnold is asking his buddy if it’s true that if you’re in the military you can order alcohol on planes?  As Danny hands Arnold his Coke (full can, definite bad sign), Arnold asks Denial Dan if the pilot has ever flown in a snowstorm before.  After beverage service is complete, Danny is back to pushing ‘free’ pretzels.

6960 is now almost four hours old.  The Army boys aren’t going to make Ft. Jackson by midnight, but I should be under those comfy covers by then.  Because now the craned de-icer equipment is spraying us down.  The plane swaying like a baloon as the de-icer pressure spaxxrer sweeps along, ArmyArnold is starting to babble about how maybe he should have gone to college first, but he needs the Army money to go, but maybe college isn’t that important…..

“Alright!” Positive Pete exclaims as if we’d just safely swung across the Grand Canyon on a rope.  “De-icing is complete. We are ON OUR WAY, ladies and gentleman.”

You’d think the words…ON OUR WAY would indicate imminent movement.  But no.  We sit, tray tables in upright and locked positions. Denial Danny pops into the aisle with his plastic goody bag informing us that silly old Positive Pete meant that we were now waiting for a runway assignment. As he passes my row, D. Danny warns he only has two ‘free’ granola bars left.  I pretend I can’t hear him.  A move I shall deeply regret.  (Note eventual menu for the evening.)

Snow swirls outside.  Army Arnold pushes his knee into the now familiar dent in the back of my seat.  I turn around.  Nothing to worry about, time-wise, I say. Because we’re already late, traffic control is probably waiting to give us a good spot, I said, because I’m so cool and know everything.  Arnold squints at me.  “It’s snowing,” he says. “We never had snow in California…I should have taken the bus the whole way.”  He drains his Coke.

Tick…tick…tick…an hour passes since Pete’s jolly send-off. “While the changes in my plans….are unfortunate, inconvenient…”  Denial Danny comes by and asks me if I need anything.  From his expression I’m pretty sure that uncontrollable, self-destructive part of me that takes over when I’m pulled over for a speeding ticket…has now taken charge of my relationship with D. Danny.  Now that my true self had slipped out, like the many lawmen before him, Danny isn’t going to be cutting me a break.

Tick…tick…tick… Then Petey said, “Oops! Sorry about this ladies and gentlemen, but we’ve waited so long here in line to get in line that we’ve iced up again. We’re going back to get in line for the de-icer.”  He keeps making statements like the one above as if we were supposed to be thrilled.  An hour later the de-icer returns.  Tick…tick.  “Oh happy Day!” the de-icer runs out of anti-freeze.  We get de-iced.  We wait to get in line for take off. We are into hour six.  Six. Army Arnold is asking me stories about my childhood the way people do in movies where the players all know they are going to die. 

Tick…tick.  Take-offs currently suspended due to visibility. Denial Dan doesn’t come around much any more. He did take a bathroom break in the rear luxury spa, but he blew by me so fast I wasn’t able to stick my foot out in the aisle.

But, get this…this is the best part….It is now 3:15 in the morning.  We take off….and here it is…wait for it….Denial Danny picks up his mike and ACTUALLY SAYS…”We at United want to take this opportunity to thank you for choosing United Airlines and PERSONALLY extend an invitation for you to join the United Frequent Flyer Program….Just fill out the brochure you can find in the seat pocket in front of you….

 Oh, and the final menu on reaching my destination….to be revealed in next post.  Not a picture post.  No one should have to see what I stuck my plastic fork into that early morn…with dreams of granola bars in my head.

Do WHAT With Those Pretzels, Ma’am?

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stuckdreamstime_10375578Remember, our goal is to work toward improved emotional functioning…to have our actions (inward and outward) be more and more determined by our Best Thinking…that is our Thinking Guidance System…and less and less have our actions determined by emotional pressure from other people or from within ourselves…our Emotional Guidance System.

And this continuing example represents one, feeble psychologist’s reminder of how tough efforts toward maturity can be.  My goal is that my own humiliating lack of mature functioning will inspire some other soul to do better…

Dateline:  Chicago O’Hare. Second leg of re-routed trip to Columbia, South Carolina. (See ‘A Case of Attempted Maturity at 30,000 Feet’).

Technically, the journey to Columbia was supposed to be completed three hours ago, and I was supposed to be enjoying a club sandwich and a glass of iced fume blanc from room service.  But, I’ve adjusted.  I’m doing great.  I’ll make good use of having an extra three hours in the airport.  I’ve proved something to myself and, hopefully, showed you guys what can be done if you give your Thinking Guidance System a chance.  After several determined minutes of repeated saying to myself: “While the changes in my plans… are unfortunate, uncomfortable, and inconvenient ….this is not a disaster unless I decide to make it one….”  I was almost giddy, I felt so ‘in charge’ of my emotions. 

I enjoy a sandwich while standing since no chairs are available in the jammed food court.  But, I’m cool.  My special person called on his way to the basketball game, asked me how I thought it would turn out, and I LAUGHED and remarked I was sure it would be great fun.  There had been a pause, then he asked, “Wow. Where did you get this enthusiasm, missing the game and all yourself?”  

Not knowing what awaited, I twittered back something nice, something airy and sophisticated, showing off my hard-fought managing of my Emotional Guidance System.

United Express 6960 boards right on time.  Swell.  Things are looking up, I pat myself on the back for handling the inconveniences of air travel with the maturity of a guru.  I smile at my fellow travelers.  Behind me are two young men heading to Ft. Jackson for basic training and then to who-knows-where.  I thank them for their service.  One, we’ll call him Arnold, since he’s joining the Army, mentions that he’s never flown before.  His seatmate from the same small Ohio town, cuffs him on the back.  I add reassurances….because I’m such a seasoned and easy-going flyer.  Because I can read the future and everything’s going to be just fine, I say, motherly like.

Army Arnold is the first one of us to crack after we’d sat unmoving, the door not closed for over an hour.  “What if something wrong with the plane?”Arnold asks.  “Oh, not to fret,” I say. ”This kind of hold-up happens all the time.  They can make up the time in the air.” 

“Good,” Army Arnold says, because they have a bus to catch and a two-hour ride to Ft. Jackson.  “Not to worry,” I patter on, “you’ll be there before midnight.”  Now right here, some sort of survival instinct should have kicked in. Why do I have to make things worse for myself by talking about things I know nothing about? 

Ten minutes later, the pilot, Positive Pete a voice who I will come to know well, comes on to ‘update’ our adventure party.  It seems the airport computers usually sending pre-flight data are down…Thus, the needed paperwork, as we speak, is being hand-carried… and, as soon as the paperwork arrives, we’ll be off in a jiff.  Of course. This is not a disaster…unless I decide to make it one.

That word, ‘jiff’… a jiff.  A JIFF.  So innocent, so reassuring.   Our flight attendant, Denial Danny, passes out free granola bars.  Now, I’m not bitching about the granola bars….it just seemed a bit of a reach when Denial Danny’s emphasized the word ‘free’ as if an ounce of sugared oats should make us even with the airline for being late. …Sometimes, late at night, in one of my many branch Hiltons…a cruel voice calls to me out of the darkness…taunting me with just one word over and over.  JIFF.