Why not make it 30 minutes eh?

I travel quite a lot by plane and on a long distance flight there is a certain almost universal way that things happen, starting at check-in but more specifically at the door to the plane:

1.     Depending on your class of travel it is:

a.      Hello Mr Martin – Justin, Justin, come and take Mr Martin to his seat – whereupon Justin goes through a whole load of grovelling bollocks that makes me want to kick his head in (First Class)

b.     Hello Mr Martin, across and to the right, have a nice flight (Club or Business Class)

c.      Hello Sir, over there and to the right and then along a way (Premium Economy)

d.      Down there! (Economy)

2.     Again depending on class the next thing is loads of needless brown-nosing and interference

from Justin (I just think he likes to touch me a lot) in First, the offer of a newspaper and a glass of champagne in Club, totally bloody indifference in Premium and being jabbed with a cattle prod in Economy.

And so on and so forth until you have been fed whatever pigswill they loaded onto the plane that day – it does not matter which class you fly, BA food is complete shit.

You are then continually supervised in First as if you might explode or self harm, ignored but answered if you pose a request/question in Club, ignored totally in Premium Economy and nearly gassed with a mixture of 90% farts and 10% oxygen in Economy.

The final awakening before landing happens thus:

Economy = harsh lighting is switched on without so much as a by your leave and as you emerge from your fart induced torpor you have a shoddy and soggy plastic wrapped sandwich thrown at you.

Premium Economy the same but with a degree of hatred that BA staff appear to save especially for Premium travellers – perhaps they are mad that were not allowed to gas you?

Club – Gentle turning on of the light to be asked if you like the same shitty sandwich, but you get to have your coffee in faux china cups, each the size of a large thimble.

First – The light stay off, you are after all in bed with your BA First jimjams on and you’ll get woken later on, by hand and more often than not by Justin.

Then we come to the 20-minute farce.

The Captain, having circled Heathrow for at least 45 minutes, because a BA transatlantic flight arriving on time is a total no-no, announces to the mincer collective that we are 20 minutes from landing.

During the 8 hour flight, these workshy ne’er do wells have been in hiding, doing as little as humanly possibly and mostly having a laugh with the other crew and all of the other BA staff taking up most of the First and Club seat. Now they have a major panic, all hell breaks loose and they start to run about as if the plane is one fire.

At least one of them is still fucking about when the three bings go off that says we really are landing and any mincers still standing may well fall over.

What I’d say to the BA is this, make the staff work the whole flight, have them start to clear up at the 30 minute mark.

There will be less panic, fewer heart stopping moments and all will be calm.