Airplane Travel

Of all the topics that are ripe for our demolition, surely airplane travel is among the most bland. After all, what tepid comedian, clad in an ugly sweater and acid-wash jeans, hasn’t ripped on the airlines? If you ask us, airplane gags are up there with disquisitions on the traffic in Los Angeles and the differences between men and women on the list of all-time boring topics for comedians list.

Even so, dear reader, we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” simply can’t help ourselves. Although we’ve mentioned this topic before, we must do so again. One of the junior editors here at “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly”—let’s just call him “Chip”—has recently taken a few flights, and he is still red with anger as a result.

First, perhaps we should note that nothing is as stale and fetid as airplane air. We don’t really have a gag to accompany this observation, but it’s darn true. Why, the air’s cleaner at a Grateful Dead concert. (Okay, so there’s your lame gag. Happy?)

We must also mention that we are ineluctably assigned the worst seat on every airplane—jammed in between the toilet and the engine. Apparently, the geniuses at Jet Blue haven’t figured out how to seat someone in the engine, so we must take in its unpleasant roar from a bit of distance.

As if this weren’t sufficiently horrid, the chucklehead who sits in front of us always leans his seat back far enough for us to do dental work on him. He doesn’t ask at all, just blithely slides back—as though we wanted to get a close-up image of his dandruff for the next three hours.

And then there’s the bit about the bathrooms. We, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” appear to be the only ones on God’s green earth to avoid these déclassé outhouses like the plague. They’re dirty, scummy, and mephitic.

But you’d never guess this from the frenzied run to the toilet on the part of happy air travelers. The minute these boobs hop on board, they head right to the John. Geez, these people are stupid. No wonder Billy Joel sells so many albums.

Then there are the flight attendants. If you ask us, pretty much every one of these ladies looks like she used to be attractive 20 years ago, but is now a horrid wreck. It’s as if advertisements for the gig ran as follows:

Are you a peroxide blonde with ghastly roots? Do you apply makeup with a jackhammer? Did men call you pretty 33 years ago?

If you answered “Yes” to any of these questions, come fly the friendly skies.