Abby

Grrr! I am beginning to wonder why I like Northwest Airlines so much.

When I checked in yesterday, I was given a free upgrade to First Class for my trip from Denver to Detroit because of my Gold premier status. I was also told to ask for a waitlist position on the flight from Detroit to London.

So, when I got to Detroit, I asked to be put on the stand-by list. I was told "we don't do upgrades on international flights" by a snooty gate agent.

"Really? Is that a new thing?" I asked.

"No sir. We haven't done international upgrades in years." He told me.

Funny! Of the eight trips I took to London last year, they had upgraded me on three of them. Hmmm!

Later, while waiting for my flight, I was called to the counter and asked if I would mind giving-up my bulkhead isle for a middle seat further back. I demurred explaining that, being six-foot-four I would prefer not to have anyone ahead of me. The problem is that I really didn't want anyone leaning their seat against my knees all the way to the UK.

Unless they had a different bulkhead or had an upgrade available, there was no way I wanted to change. The gate agent thanked me and said she would try and get someone else to move. (As an aside, no sooner had I sat down the gate agent announced that they were still looking for a volunteer to be routed through Amsterdam to London Heathrow. They offered a First Class upgrade all the way to London and a voucher for future travel… I tired getting back up there, but someone beat me to it.

So here I sit, next to Abby and her family. Abby is a precocious three-year-old. No, not "precocious…" what's that word I want? Oh yes! "Obnoxious!"

Whoever put fresh batteries in her yesterday should be shot. Now, granted! I never sleep well on planes, but tonight I have not slept period. How can I with the chanting of the Abby all evening.

"Abby, don't do that!"

"Abby! Sit down!"

"Abby! Don't jump on Mummy's lap!"

"Abby, leave that man alone!"

…and so it goes. I have possibly heard Abby's name called a thousand times in the past two-thousand miles. The good news is that there are only three thousand miles to go.

Bill Cosby has a routine he used to do about a little boy named "Jeffery" that he met on a plane whose mother didn't stop saying Jeffery all the way from New York to Los Angeles. I remember that routine so well, and can sympathize with him. I am about to ask around and see if anyone has a knock-out pill that we can slip to Abby!

I suppose that I should have known that there was going to be a problem when the Abby's mum said to her husband as they were settling in "What? This flight is only eight hours long? Well, I guess we won't get any sleep. The flight isn't long enough!"

Oh well, I guess I will try again to read for a while and hope that Abby settles down. Can this flight really be less than half over?

I hope wherever you are this evening, you're able to sleep!

Don Bergquist - 22 April 2007 - Northwest Airlines Flight 32, Somewhere over the North Atlantic