Mexican Turf War

DISCLAIMER:  If you’re not sure what to do, don’t touch that.  Not approved for super-sonic flight.  Controlled Flight Into Terrain (CFIT) cannot be logged as a landing.  Do not operate radar on the ground, or near fuel spills or people.
The evil alignment of planets for this doomed venture began weeks ago when I got a text from Barbie.  Something to the effect of, “Tried to find something other than this piece of shit.  See you then.”

I don’t normally pay a tremendous amount of attention to trip detail.  What time do I have to leave?  What time do I get home?  What day is it today?  The shit in the middle will generally resolve into some sort of focus when I get to work.  Barbie’s cryptic message suggests the middle part might have to be checked for infection.

The suck is obvious and malignant.  Fly the 2000 leg to LAS.  Sit for 2 hours, then fly the red-eye to MKE.  Sit in MKE for 24 hours.  Fly to SFO via <<HOME>> and sit for 18 hours.  Fly home.  I decide vaccination is prudent.  I bring the rum I thoughtfully bought for the wife last week.

Day 1:

Wife tells me to clip my nose hair before going to work.   I defer to her judgment.  She reads fashion magazines.

The driver on the employee bus has angry Ice Cube eyes.  He accelerates hard around the horseshoe before I even get my bag in the rack.  I bad drunk to my seat sharing a little ass here a little crotch there and end up sitting on my hat.

I play printer roulette and manage to print my schedule on the 5th machine.  Meet up with Barbie on the plane.  “I have a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.  Why is my bag so heavy?”  He wonders out loud.  It makes heavy gurgling clanky noises as he stows it under the jumpseat.  I take this to be a good sign.  4 hours to Vegas.  I thrill ATC Center with my sonorous check-ons.

Flying all night should be outlawed along with clowns and mullets (or any combination thereof).  The thinking is you’ll be well rested when you show up to fly all night at 1900.  This is never the case.

Kids are up at 0700.  They quickly tire of the “Leave me alone.  Daddy’s trying to sleep” game.  They can’t reach anything even vaguely nutritious.  And giving a 3 and 5-year old stove privileges proved not to be as practical as I had imagined.  The point: by the time we push for Vegas at 1945 I’m tired, and 11 hours of work lie between me and a bed.  We fly into the sun for 3 hours.

Sitting in an empty gate in LAS for two hours I see a diminutive older woman with dark spiky hair and bee-hive glasses strutting woodenly along.  Her stance is danger wide.  Her bent kneed shuffle with “glide home little angel” arms outstretched for balance, suggest the Earth is not as dependable in the “ground” capacity, as I’ve been led to believe.  She looks like she’s trying to cross a busy trampoline and do math.

She’s wearing orange plastic flip-flops and yellow bike shorts.  Not fat so much as compressed.  Like the gravity in Fashion Bug was dialed to “Jupiter” the day she purchased this ensemble.  Around each ankle she has wide gold metallic bands. Presumably, for further research after she’s released back into the wild.  This is the high point of my sit.

We depart for MKE at 0100 <<HOME>> time.  I have that warm, back of the head “I’m getting a D in math” feeling.  I concentrate on not falling asleep or touching anything with a red guard on it.  (Career-Be-Gone switches).

In the Time Magazine section of the AOM, (Aircraft Operating Manual) I find an article – Embrace your inner loser: “New research suggests it may be time to accept your shortcomings.”  This fills me with a sense of accomplishment and pride.  Embracing the whale-breach ballistics of my own mediocrity has been one of the crown jewels of my personal development.

We stumble into the hotel in MKE at 0630.  I’ve been up for 24 hours now and do not feel lemony fresh.

Day 2:

Wake up around 1130.  We kick off the day with a mile walk to the Loco Jalapeño which was actually 2 blocks away.  We break out phones.  Compare phones.  Pull up maps.  Compare maps.  Turn around.

2 highly trained professional aviators standing in the middle of the street, rotating phones like we’re trying to guess the time of day.  Divining  directions we should have gotten from the front desk before we left. Assholes by any other name.

Finally ensconced in the Crazy Pepper, and after a eat by numbers perusal of the lunch specials, I ingest a “Number 8,” which later proves to be a highly unstable foundation of Mexican yumminess on which to construct the day’s shenanigans.  If I’d had any inkling how much misery would result from this, I’d have just punched myself in the face and been done with it.

We take the not-retarded way back to the hotel.  Mr. Jim Beam is waiting patiently for us when we get back.

There’s really only one way to describe the elegance and sophistication of the Milwaukee Airport Clarion – Prison sex.  (And not the good kind.)  It is misery incarnate.  The kind of hotel that makes you question your career choices and dream of the good life in America.

It LOOKS like a prison.  2 floors.  Small windows.  Copious usage of Industrial beige.  Clarion – helping you feel depressed about being away from home since 1987.

The rooms are antagonistically small.  Opening the bathroom door completely blocks the main door.  The accordion mirror door is off the track and won’t close.  (Incidentally, I scare the shit out myself the next morning at 0430 thinking some fat Mexican in a towel is hiding in the corner.)
Everything looks like it’s probably bolted down.  The TV actually is.  The wall mounted AC unit is 6 feet off the floor in that uniquely Midwestern way.  Apparently wall decorations would only conflict with the industrial “stop hitting yourself” motif.

Barbie gets ice.  Cokes are $2 a piece from the vending machine.  I buy $8 worth of mixers and off we go.   We take turns with YouTube  selections.  We drink.  We order pizza from some local Italian joint.  Eat the whole thing.  The Beam evaporates of its own accord in 5 hours of super-sedentary happy time.

Barbie turns me on to Method of Destruction: “Anally Inflicted Death Sentence (AIDS),” “Bubble Butt” and “Spandex Enormity.”  I watch the flag waving outside and am proud to be an American.  Hit the sack about 2000.

You’d think there would be more funny in this day, but as it turns out, 2 guys sitting in a prison cell drinking all day is a surprisingly monochromatic experience.

Day 3:

Wake up at 0200 and can’t go back to sleep.  Give up and get in the shower at 0430.  The scary Mexican is waiting for me when I get out.

Headed to <<HOME>>, my tummy begins to make ominous and uncomfortable sounds.  There is cultural unrest.  The Mexicans are fighting the Italians on the mean streets of my lower intestines.  I can’t tell who’s winning, but I am going to lose.  Bad.  And soon.

Shitting on the airplane ranks just slightly above Nairing my balls.  (A “fuck off it’s not funny!” experiment in being colossally stupid resulting in 2nd degree chemical burns.  But that’s another story.)   We have an hour to go when the streets of Intestinisco catch fire.

I look over at Capt. B.  He fares no better.  Wild cow eyes of incontinence.  Waxy desperation is coming off him in waves.  He looks tense.  We make fun of each other.  He caves. “I’m not gonna make it.”  He lunges out the door for the lavatory after coordinating with the FAs.  I spend 15 minutes in the oxygen mask of victory.  It is fleeting, but it’ victory.
We’re 30 minutes early in <<HOME>>.  I have to go poopy really bad now.  Gate is occupied.  We wait.  Emergency out-gassing is not at all appreciated by the Capt.  I sit very still and practice not shitting my pants.  When we finally park, there’s no jetway driver.  DANGER!  DANGER!  STRUCTURAL FAILURE IMMINIENT!

When the door opens, I bolt out of the cockpit and follow three little old ladies up the jetway.  They are old people oblivious to my presence even though I’m ping-ponging back and forth looking for a hole.  Takes most of my self control not to just punch them all in the back of the head.

I hit open turf in the terminal and speed-waddle to the John in that totally undignified ass-pinching way that screams “This man has to take a massive shit” or “is gay and in a real big hurry” to anyone who cares to look.  (Which is of course most everyone.)  Bowelvacuation is accompanied by “bath house dance party” sounds of ecstasy.

Back among the living, we push for SFO.  At cruise I beg aspirin for my shoulder.  Flipped my golfcart about 5 years ago.  Never been the same.  Digging for my relief, Barbie discovers half my “not properly screwed closed” bottle of Don Q has soaked through my clothes, bag, his bag and his clothes.  Smells like professionalism and duty.

I fly us into SFO on the Quiet Bridge Visual to 28R.  Basically a step down merge with the Pacific arrivals for 28L.  This is a cool approach.  The 2 runways are 1200 feet apart which means when we roll out over the bay headed west for the airport, I can tell what the guy in the big jet to my left in 37F is wiping off his tie.  If you do the join quickly or aggressively, collision alarms go off.  Children cry.  People ask for your employee number.

I do it nice and easy.  This is as close to formation flying as we ever get in the airline world.  Big 777.  I can see both our shadows on the water as we glide toward the runway complex.  (Nice.)  I do not descend while I’m enjoying the show.  Eventually, it dawns on me that I’m high on the glidepath.  Like 3000 feet high.  They tell us not to pass the 777.

Meow I’m in the awkward position of trying to slow down and go down.  Something <<My Airplane>> is notorious for refusing to do.  “Fuck you.  Pick one.”  Sums up the aerodynamic quandary I’ve put myself in.

We hang everything out.  Landing gear, spoilers, flaps.  Hover like a blimp as I bleed off 60 knots and 3000 feet of head up my ass.  Get settled on the glideslope and engines spooled by 1000 feet.  Barely.

Off to the hotel.  We change into civies and march across the highway for resupply.  (I’m down to a half bottle of rum and wringing out my clothes yielded only damp disappointment).  We buy beer and nest in a human sized room.

About 1630, when the beer is mostly gone and we can’t think of any new YouTube selections, we embark for happy hour at yet another Mexican place.  Barbie shames me into a tequila shot.  I don’t like tequila.  (Which is like saying I don’t like being stabbed.)  I’m not about to back down, but I come really close to decorating the bar and his Jesus boots with Meximent.

A man reeking of car salesman sits down next to us at the bar as I quell my gorge.  Dark suit.  Slicked back hair.  Shooter fingers for the bartender.  And the watch.  Big.  Shiny.  Lots of gold and silver.  An extra link or two so it dangles on his wrist.  He shoots his cuff a few times to make sure it’s in plain sight.

The Capt. and I launch (loudly) into a conversation about SPWs (Stupid Pilot Watches, of which I’ve owned more than a few.)  Acres of dial.  Multi-function and fierce.  Big gaudy rotating bezel computer for quickly calculating how many chicks will assume you have a tiny or no penis.
If you can accessorize one of these wrist gargoyles with a pair of Ray Ban Aviators, you are guaranteed not to get laid.  Ever.  This is the sterilization ensemble.  Add a class ring and a permanently attached Bluetooth and viola!  You are a full blown asshole.  Literally a walking O-ring of pretentious fuckheaditude.
Somehow, amazingly, I get the impression that The Closer next to us is taking all this as a complement.  He preens.

We pay up and amble back to the hotel.  En route, illustrating his point on how irritating and wondrous kids can be, Barbie kicks a purple flower.  It explodes, and his right hippie slipper vanishes in midair.  Literally.

We poke around in the shrubbery.  Find a dead cat but no shoe.  I try coaxing the shoe out with gentle language.  Nothing.  Maybe it’s seeking political asylum, realizing a lifelong dream of a place where liberal footwear is free to pursue its dreams without prejudice or fear.  A place…  O.K. seriously, where the fuck did it go?   We search for five minutes before I CSI that it might be behind us.  There it is, lying on the sidewalk like a stupid punch line.  We carry on.

Back in Barbie’s room we mourn the passing of Don Q with Everybody Loves Raymond re-runs and Bud Light.  Things unspool pretty quickly and I’m nigh nigh by 2100.

Day 4:

As a “can’t we all just get along?” gesture, I try to drop the kids at the pool before heading downstairs.  They don’t want to swim.  This will not end well.

In the lobby, Barbie looks worried.  Somethin gin his posture suggests intestinal revolt in the near future.  We share a Laugh of The Damned and get on the shuttle.  Break formation in the airport for coffee and breakfast.  My intestinal streets are quiet for the moment, but war is coming and I am afraid.

In preflight, ACARS comes back with an elevator trim setting of 6.66.  This is a bad omen.  We pass the point of no return as the main door closes and we push for home.  At cruise it’s all over.  I am going to Shit on the Airplane or shit my pants.  But not first.  He caves.  I mock.  We make the call.

The flight attendants assemble for our emergence.  Their code word is “Thriller” in honor of Kato’s recently departed, kid can-poking compadre, Sir Michael Jackson.  I try not to laugh and fail.  Mr. “Soon to be in a better place” goes out to make poo poo.  One of the friendly twins comes in and glares at me while I breathe free 100% oxygen.  (We have to have someone watching the peep hole since somebody (me) has to fly the plane.)  She wants to talk.

“Why you gotta wear that mask?”  I have to pry it off my face to explain that the Time of Useful Consciousness at this altitude is probably about 5 seconds.  If we had an explosive decompression with Capt. “Shitting-his-brains-out” locked in the happy place, and me up here alone, and I pass out………..

” I know that.  I mean, why you gotta wear it?”

‘Oh.  Sorry.  Regulations.’

“Oh.  It’s bright up here.”

He comes back a new man.  I am jealous and tense in my concentration.  It’s finally, and horribly, my turn.  Winning the “not going first” contest rewards me with the fragrant company of whatever morally bankrupt abortion crawled out of his ass.  This is not funny.

I hold my breath.  Drop trau.  I’m in the lav for 15 minutes.  Hunched over so I don’t hit my head.  Knees, elbows and shoulders pressed against all things pee.  Decide holding my breath only exposes my delicate interior pink parts to his corrosive aftermath.  Breathe shallow.  NEVER shit on the plane.  I reach my pants on the 2nd try.  A personal best.

The rest of the flight is <<HOME>> standard.  Vectors for spacing.  Slow to 210.  Speed up to 280.  As we taxi to the gate, Barbie says he’s hungry.

‘Me too.  Mexican?’

“Fuck you.”

– end of line.