Let's pretend we're a wee bit more than a week ago again. I'm soooo eager to start writting entries in this blog on current events as they happen but hey...as they say « first things first »...So please bear with me here. We're Thursday, January 11th, around 1:30 AM. I can't friggin' sleep my poor head boiling, my train of stupid stressful thoughts completely mixed up. To add to that, the famous quote « Anyone who thinks that they are too small to make a difference has never been in bed with a mosquito » had never taken as strong a meaning than on this night... Yesterday, I spent the whole afternoon and evening trying to stuff the miserly 20 kilos I am allowed for my coach class flight to Dublin in my bags. Most of it is nothing but a superfluous huge amount of clothes, shoes and other creams, beauty products, and so on that I forced inside the smallest and lightest suitcase I could find at the Zola Color up my home's street 3 hours before, for 30 € to boot...C'mon! 20 kilos for 3 MONTHS?! 0_°
Stubborn as the most headstrong mule this world has seen, of course I thought I could push for more like we always did with my folks when we used to negociate like crazy, wear 3 pairs of pants, 5 sweaters, and stuff our carry-on luggage to the fullest...What nice memories! « Put some more on the kid, P.! They'll never have the gut to stop her at the doors...And hide this inside a sock! » Oh the excitement! Oh the fun (or rather the "craic", we're in Dublin now...hehe)! Just like a nice travelling tradition. Just like a game. Tricking the luggage checkers. Hiding in a corner of the airport (oh do I like airports...) to put the last touch to the game strategy (almost a battle plan with my old men's take on it, they were sooooo into it, that was so fun for the kid I was...), perfecting our Michelin bibendum looks. Playing cat-and-mouse with them agreeing obliquely to be nice with some little smirks on their faces when they saw us arrive and hardly managing to hide their bursting off laughing LOL. What a desperate little clan (yeah I told you, we're switching to Hiberno-English now, no such words as "family" allowed here...). And, sorry, I'm getting carried (far) away there... But actually, get used to it or leave warned without slaping the door behind you, because that's how I tend to write. I've tried, but there's no way I could change apparently (and do I want it?). I can't help being ludicrously talkative, going off-topic mostly in claptrap anecdotes and...that's what I'm doing right now. *blush* Think I got my message across, anyway. Here's to bouncebackability. Back on track. Bottom-line : Erm... Not. Impossible.
Just like during these pre-departure nights, I couldn't have found sleep the night before of course as I said, but back then that was only because of excitement and overjoy, here stress and bad anticipation was added to the feeling mixture... The problem is things (that is to say, mostly airlines policies...cuz' deep inside underneath the rusty exterior used to hide it I am still very much the child of yesteryears...) have changed since then. Excess luggage fees are a big fat issue nowadays. Like... litterally. They had to make this sacrilegeous attack on this great travelling fun, those greedy killjoys! Packing lightly is a largely neglected art for most people, and the airlines are cashing in by reducing our free luggage allowances, those dumbos (If you haven't noticed I am going the Captain Archibald Haddock route there in terms of curse words... I know what a reference! *turns red* ^_^ I don't want this blog to be rated PG-13 ya know...We all have little bros & sis back home who may ocasionnally be lurking, guys, haven't we?...) ! So if your luggage weighs more than their outrageous limit allows, you'll be charged for each extra kilogram at über-exorbitant rates. Not only have the airlines tightened up on what they'll carry for free, but they've now much more likely to charge you for the extras. In the past, from my little girl's memory of it, you were unlikely to be asked to pay, especially if the checkin staff were busy, but now you'd probably have to deburse the extra charges each single time even on fun companies like Air Madagascar where you think you're at an endearingly funny disfunctional family reunion watching all the pre-flight procedures take place.
I have even been told it is believed that some airlines pay their counter staff bonuses based on the amount of extra charges they levy on their passengers. They're the evil incarnate... %*µ$¤£}+°]@ç#~&!!!!! Grrrrrrrr. Destroyers of one of the coolest pleasures of travelling. Those filthy airlines power that be should be drawn and quartered! Quartering is too soft for them. They should be eigthed, sixteenthed! Beheaded! Stretched on the rack, iron maidened, strappadoed!!! (A reference to a scene taken out from one of my guiltiest pleasures, Gimore Girls...*blush#3* I know, I know. I'm so ashamed...) All torture methods and devices wouldn't be enough for such a flat out crime against the travelling humanity! Of course I'm peaceable and 100% against torture but, that's how I'd react in all my gloriously unappologetic childlish way : throw a fake tantrum & be excessively excessive. Boohoo. And, you, yes you would burn to do the same in this situation, c'mon admit it. I say, let's make a petition. But, wait, oh of course you, guys, must fly far more often than I've been able to during the last few years... So you all know that and this sounds like I've been kept in a cave on top of the highest Nepalese mountain during most of our epoch. Well, oops, but spoiling my rediscovering of travelling by air was not a good idea checkin guys! Anyway, I still had to pack & unpack to repack 3 times (to the very least), have my brother lying and jumping on the suitcase, wear 3 sweaters, 2 coats, 2 pants and 3 pairs of socks, hide one of my carry-on bags and look very « bony » carrying the weigh of my stupidity all the way to Dublin through airports and streets, still leaving behind a souvenir in the form of a whole bunch of stuff thrown hastily in my mother's car... (NDLR: You guys can breathe now...XD *hides in shame* Told you my "style" was chaotic...Warning : Trying to read Delsa's posts out loud can cause serious damage to your health...) My shoulders and back remember it. Yeah! Game on! But I had the last laugh. No excess fees (despite 2, 600 kilos too much) and now someone's dresser is full and doesn't need refurbishing like some others! ;-P But...What about the return? Uhoh...
(First entry (At last! Yeaaaahhh! Better late than never...) based on the events of the 10th & 11th of January 2008)
