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Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?

I recently went to a conference in Ponte Vedra, FL, home of the Sawgrass golf resort, where I got to stay. It was a great conference, dampened only by the length of the flights and the inexplicable fact that the Marriott charges $13/night for Internet access. What is that all about? I’ve stayed at $80/night places that had free Internet. Anyway…

The flight out was fun because after a four-hour flight to Houston, with a meal, I got to see my parents! They took me to lunch and got me back on the plane. Short but very sweet. Then it was just a one-hour flight to Jacksonville.

Flying back, though, was awful. Why you ask (you were going to)? Because I flew from Jacksonville to Charlotte, NC, a 1-hour flight that gets me almost nowhere near my destination. Then, I had a flight from Charlotte to home. A 6 HOUR FLIGHT!! Yeah, that’s right, bold AND caps. That was a miserable experience.

Made all the more miserable by the choice of entertainment. You’d think the airline would understand that nobody enjoys a plane for 6 hours. No laptop battery in the world is going to last that long, so you are guaranteed to be bored. The airline has a responsibility to entertain me at least part of that way, right?!

What movie did they choose? Think of the worst movie to watch in such a situation. Airplane? Nope. Alive? Nope. The Accidental Tourist? Possibly, but probably not.

No, the airline chose the actual worst movie. That movie? Million-Dollar Baby. For about 2/3 of the movie, it was great. She was like Rocky, only without all the silly sentimentality. But then came the end.

* Please note, this next paragraph contains a spoiler. You will have to highlight it with your mouse to read it. Read at your own risk *

Who on Earth decides to show a movie where the hero ends up a suicidal quadriplegic where (as the film manipulates you to believe) the only humane thing to do is to KILL HER? On a 6 HOUR FLIGHT!! At the BEGINNING of the flight?! With heavy turbulence and NO MEAL?! Okay, that last part doesn’t quite relate to the movie, it just bugged me. I guess it was part of the overall experience, which was miserable.

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I think airlines need to be more aware of the overall experience their customers are having and cater better to that. I don’t care if the movie won 800 Oscars, it sucked and shouldn’t be shown at the beginning of a long flight with no meal. I seriously think the airline hated me.

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