Navigation & Music Control
 [ BACK]  [NEXT]                       Issue #046 - 06/29/1997

Taking Flight

Air and Travel Funnies

Hello, All!
     We finally have nice weather here, after a long, cold
Spring.  Now that the weather here has become so much better,
everyone's jumping on flights to get out of here.  Well isn't
that just the way it goes?  Why is it when I fly, I always get
the aisle seat next to someone who has to go to the bathroom
about every 5 minutes?  The best airline food tip I ever heard is
to order the Kosher meal - even if you're not Jewish (you have to
ask when you book the flight, by the way).  It's always chicken,
for one thing.  And the quality of the food is better because
they only make a few of the Kosher meals.  That's a plus right
there.  I was on one airline not long ago where even the bag of
peanuts was old and stale.  The picture on the bag showed a plane
with propellers - three of them.
     SUNDAY FUNNIES Thanks this week to: Bruce Gonzo, Bob
Martens, Tomoko Naito & Mike Fagan, Ellen Peterson, Kerry Miller,
Stan Leung and Junji Taniguchi.  OK, folks...  As Sunday Funnies
taxis out for takeoff, store your carry-ons and be sure your
seats are locked in the upright position.  It's time for airline
and travel stories...
     Have a great week!

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STILL THINK THERE ARE NO STUPID QUESTIONS?
-----------------------------------------

The clerks who field calls from passengers have a much harder job
than we usually imagine.  It isn't just giving out the schedules
and fares.  Here are some of the stranger questions asked by
callers to one of the major airlines in the US:

   - "Can I ride inside the kennel with my dog [in the cargo
     compartment] so I wouldn't have to pay for a seat?"

   - A woman who wanted to know why she had to change clothes on
     a flight between Chicago and Washington - she had been told
     she'd have to change in Pittsburgh.

   - One man didn't know how to spell the name of the town he was
     from.

   - A man who failed to recognize the name as "Iowa" as being a
     state.

   - "Do I need a foreign passport to fly to West Virginia?"

   - When a woman from New York was asked by the reservations
     clerk what city she wanted to go to in Arizona, she asked,
     "Oh... is it a big place?"

   - A woman in Denver who had never heard of Cincinnati.

   - A man in Minneapolis who didn't know there was more than one
     city in the South ("wherever the South is").

   - One woman in Nashville asked, "Instead of paying for [my]
     ticket, can I just donate the money to the National Cancer
     Society?"

   - A man in Dallas who tried to pay for his ticket by sticking
     quarters in the pay phone he was calling from.

   - "Does your airline fly to exit 35 on the New Jersey
     Turnpike?"

   - "Do you fly to [telephone] area code 304?"

   - "When an airplane comes in, does that mean it's arriving or
     departing?"

   - "Can I get a free round-trip ticket to Europe by reciting
     'Mary Had a Little Lamb.'"?

   - One woman who wanted to fly to Hippopotamus, NY. Assured
     that there was no such city, she became irate and said it
     was a big city with a big airport.  The agent asked if
     Hippopotamus was near Albany or Syracuse. It wasn't. 
     "Is it near Buffalo?," the agent asked.  
     "Buffalo!" she said. "I knew it was a big animal!"

   - A man was trying to catch a flight to Maconga.  When he was
     told that no one there had ever heard of Maconga and that
     the airline certainly didn't fly there, he finally showed
     the agent his ticket: Macon, GA. He was put on the next
     flight to Macon, Georgia.

   - "I can't go stand-by for your flight because I'm in a
     wheelchair."

   - "I have a connecting flight to Knoxville.  Does that mean
     the plane sticks to something?"  

   - "I want to go to Illinois," the caller said to the clerk.
     "What city do you want in Illinois, sir?"
     "Cleveland, Ohio."


--------------------

     ... "Thanks for calling and have a nice day."

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STILL HAVE QUESTIONS?
--------------------

Some of the dumb questions asked of Park Rangers in various
U.S. National Parks across the country:


          Grand Canyon National Park 
          -------------------------- 

               Was this man-made?

               Do you light it up at night?

               I bought tickets for the elevator to the bottom --
               where is it?

               Is the mule train air conditioned?


          Everglades National Park
          ------------------------ 

               Are the alligators real?

               Are the baby alligators for sale?

               Where are all the rides?

               What time does the two o'clock bus leave? 


          Denali National Park (Alaska) 
          ----------------------------- 

               What time do you feed the bears? 

               Can you show me where the yeti lives? 

               How often do you mow the tundra? 

               How much does Mount McKinley weigh? 


          Mesa Verde National Park 
          ------------------------ 

               Did people build this, or did Indians? 

               Why did they build the ruins so close to the road? 

               What did they worship in the kivas -- their own
               made-up religion? 

               Do you know of any undiscovered ruins? 

               Why did the Indians decide to live in Colorado? 


          Carlsbad Caverns National Park 
          ------------------------------ 

               How much of the cave is underground? 

               So what's in the unexplored part of the cave? 

               How many Ping-Pong balls would it take to fill
               this up? 

               So what is this -- just a hole in the ground? 


          Yosemite National Park 
          ---------------------- 

               Where are the cages for the animals? 

               What time do you turn on Yosemite Falls? 

               Can I get my picture taken with the carving of
               President Clinton? 


          Yellowstone National Park 
          ------------------------- 

               Does Old Faithful erupt at night? 

               How do you turn on the geysers? 

               We had no trouble finding the park entrances, but
               where are the exits? 


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RATING: **  PRICE: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
------------------------------------------
     Two Danish tourists in Budapest, Hungary thought that they
had picked a nice, fancy restaurant for dinner and drinks.  They
had no idea how fancy - the bill came to more than $6000.  "These
are our night prices. We charge what the market will bear," the
Halaszcsarda's Restaurant's business manager claimed.  The
restaurant may be fined $176 for price gouging. (Reuters).

          [ You mean they only left a $600 tip? ]


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RUN, BAMBI, RUN!
---------------
     While demonstrating 'touch-and-go' landings to two trainees,
a pilot instructor instead demonstrated a 'touch-and-hit-a-deer'
landing with their plane.  The plane's landing gear was damaged
and the instructor was forced to make an emergency landing at
Nashville International Airport. The pilot and his two trainees
were not hurt. (UPI)

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ACCENT ON TOURISM...
-----------------
     A Japanese woman touring in England took an unexpected trip
recently - she wanted to catch a flight to Turkey, but put on a
train to Torquai (a holiday resort in Devon, England). 
     "I kept saying 'Turkey, Turkey', but because of my
pronunciations they put me on a train to Torquai," said Kumiko
Tsuchida. 
     Police helped the 40-year-old woman find a bed for the night
in Torquai and she was put on a plane to Istanbul the next day.
(UK Daily Telegraph)

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NOT OUR BIGGEST OR BEST AIRPORT... BUT NOT THAT BAD!
---------------------------------------------------
     The three-letter airport identifier for the Sioux City,
Iowa, airport will be changed.  The old abbreviation was
extremely unpopular with local people in Iowa and was attacked by
state officials there.  The Federal Aviation Administration
finally agreed that SUX is an unacceptable abbreviation for the
facility. 


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DO YOU KNOW ME? (TAKE 1)
------------------------
     A man named Tan Yu tried to buy $1,836 worth of chocolates
and liquor at the Manila airport in the Philippines, but both his
American Express and his Visa cards were rejected by the
airport's verification machine.  That might be a commonplace for
most of us, but Tan Yu is a Hong Kong real estate magnate
currently worth about just under $8 billion. When called,
American Express assured the shop clerks that he was good for the
debt. (USA Today)

     [ Any bets he'll be buying some airport shops in the near
     future? ]

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DO YOU KNOW ME? (TAKE 2)
------------------------
     A single agent at Denver's old Stapleton airport was
re-booking a long line of inconvenienced travelers from a
cancelled United Airlines flight.  Suddenly an angry passenger
pushed his way to the desk.  He slapped his ticket down on the
counter and said, "I HAVE to be on this flight and it has to be
FIRST CLASS."
     The agent replied, "I'm sorry sir.  I'll be happy to try to
help you, but I've got to help these folks first, and I'm sure
we'll be able to work something out."
     The passenger was unimpressed.  He asked loudly, so that the
passengers behind him could hear, "Do you have any idea who I
am?"
     Without hesitating, the gate agent smiled and grabbed her
public address microphone.  "May I have your attention please?"
she began, her voice sounding throughout the terminal.  "We have
a passenger here at the gate WHO DOES NOT KNOW WHO HE IS.  If
anyone can help him find his identity, please come to the gate."
     With the folks behind him in line laughing hysterically, the
man glared at the United agent, gritted his teeth and swore "F---
you."
     She just smiled and said, "I'm sorry, sir, but you'll have
to stand in line for that, too."
     The man retreated as the people in the terminal applauded
loudly. Although the flight was canceled and people were late,
they were no longer angry at United.

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               Life is a journey...  There is no tour guide.

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© 1997 by Bill Becwar. All Rights Reserved.