Flying is a bitch if you aren't the standard 150 pounds. Not only a bitch, but painful. I noticed this morning my thighs have black and blue poke marks on them from bashing into the seat handles down the aisle of the plane on the way to our seats, right at the frigging back, thankyou. I am not even nearly as big as some of the passengers and not that broad in the beam, very broad in other parts, but not in the beam. I can't imagine the colour of their legs right now.
When I got into my teeny tiny seat, always in the middle because Bill HAS to have the aisle seat, I grab my seatbelt and pray to God it goes around the part of me that IS really broad. Most of the time it does but on tiny asian airlines, they don't. So in pure humiliation you have to ask for an extension. Thank god this time it fit and I didn't have to. Now when I say fit I mean I got it done up. But for 24 hours following the flight I had a seat belt dent in my lap and I could barely feel my legs. Getting up to go to the loo is not something to look forward to. Nowadays they insist you keep your seat belt on the whole ten hours and its HARD to do up. Once clicked in you don't like to disturb the placement of the belt. It may not go back there, the one spot you can cinch it tight enough to click it.
Now Bill, his beam isn't that broad nor is his stomach, but his shoulders are ridiculous. This is why he insists on having the aisle, he can hang over. But even at that he still hangs over into my seat about 1/3 of the way. And this is just plain self indulgent on his part, because he doesn't do that when he sits beside strangers. Meanwhile I am sucking in every inch I can to keep from spreading into the poor hapless passenger in our window seat. He has already been traumatized when he saw us coming down the aisle aiming straight for him..and so he should. If he needs to wiz, it will be a good ten minute wait whilst we heave ourselves out of ours to let him out. No stepping over us as other nimble window passengers are doing in other rows.
Now its time for the safety schpiel. First of all, the exit doors are about 16 inches across. Now I haven't measured myself in years but I am pretty sure I am bigger than 16 inches...I had a tumour in me once that was bigger than that and IT went hidden for months. So I know I am NOT going to fit through that door should the time come. And if the captain yells BRACE BRACE, the safety card picture shows a passenger bent right down with her head on her knees and hands clasped over the back of her head. Are you kidding? What? Even if I could get my head past the back seat of the seat in front of me I could NEVER get my head down to my knees. My head hasn't been near my knees in YEARS! Next came the life jacket demo. The life jacket is under our seat and that means I am sunk right there. If something falls on the floor whilst flying, it stays there until the flight is over. A fat person cannot pick up stuff below their belt line. Their stomach stops them so no life jacket here. What are we going to do? Say to my fellow seat mate, as the plane is filling with water, "Excuse me a minute while I heave myself up out of this seat and turn around and bend over and get my life jacket that is probably not going to fit and if it does I won't be able to move my fat chins enough to grab the little plastic thingy to blow it up."
After a wee while, dinner service starts. This entails lowering the lap table from the seat in front. I drop the table and it smacks the top of my stomach around the bra line and stops. Okay. You can't eat lunch off a tray that is at a sloping slant that would scare a skier. So you suck it in as far as you can, take your hand and shove in your stomach so the tray can drop. Its still on a slant but usable. Along comes your tray of food. So open and unwrap, kind of feeling for the stuff closest to you because you cant see it under your gut. Now, to eat you have to pick the containers of whatever up and hold them at chin level, one by one, leaving the really hot one to last. Its so annoying.
Now its time to read, or so I think. I need to turn the light on. Of course the light switch is on the handle, which of course I can't see, its too far back and under too much personage. So I lift the handle and straaaaaaiiiiiiiiin and twist and spot the switch briefly and jab! After a few misses and accidentally calling the stewardess, I give up. Having done this before I already have my ipad at the ready in the seat pocket in front of me and I don't really need the light. I haul it out, turn it on, rest it on the still lowered tray when WHAM!! With no freaking warning whatsover the guy in the seat in front of me slams his seat back, crunches the ipad into my gut and damn near smacks my nose with the top of his seat. You see, what ever can't spread sideways in these seats, goes forward. The fatter you are the less room there is between you and the seat in front. Now, with his seat in the recline position, I can't even hold my ipad properly to read, there simply isn't room. So yet again I battle the arm of the seat and get it up and find my seat button and slowly push my seat back to make room. Usually this is fine but now and then you get a real asshole that pushes on the seat and won't let it go back. (I have learned to call the stewardess and tell her the seat is broken and could she help me put it back...usually works)
There is no way do you dare go to sleep. At this point you are sucking in and holding your not Bill side arm over and to keep it there your other hand is holding it, and pushing against Bill and trying to stay there...just so the poor guy by the window isn't going through what I am going through with Bill on the other side. If you go to sleep all that personage relaxes and spreads...right over into the poor guy's seat. So I stay awake, sucking it in and listening to Bill snore.
Eventually though, one of us will have to go to the loo. As soon as Bill heaves himself over the arm of the seat, totally crashing and banging the seat in front of him, pissing off that passenger, a blessed waft of cool air slides in. Ahhhhh, it is unbearably hot in the middle. Out I hop, its not too hard for me for some reason, and off we go to line up. You get really close and personal with everyone that is getting past you to go back to their seats. It does mean leaning right over the top of whoever is unfortunate enough to be sitting right there. Finally its your turn. Right. This is fun. Already the seat and floor are wet, thank you men who don't know how to pee and clean up after themselves. No matter how you slice it, you are going to get wet, in stuff I don't even want to think about. And when you finally manoeuvre around and sit, you are literally wall to wall ass. Try doing things you need to do when you cannot move your legs or arms. Huhhh!!! Not cool.
Ten hours later we deplane. Bill is all rested and happy and I am cranky as hell and he doesn't get it! When our travelling days are finally over, I won't be missing the flying part of it!! TTYL
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