Northwest, Southeast, Orlando, Part 3
The conference was over on Friday. I checked out of the Disney Hilton, hired a town car and headed for the Orlando airport. A driver with a mid Eastern accept loaded my bags and we headed out. I tried to engage him in conversation but had no luck. He was professional, polite and really quiet.
In line at check in, a very redneck family stood in front of me. They consisted of two oversized men in their early 40s with beefy, hairy arms, and big bellies that were regular processors of kegs of beer. The women were also heavy. So were the kids. In total this family represented over a thousand pounds of flesh. I hoped they weren’t on my flight. The two men pushed carts full of suitcases and boxes. I shook my head. I don’t fly that much but I know there’s a baggage limit.
When they reached the ticket counter, a no-nonsense black woman weighed everything and said, “You’re gonna have to mail all this.” She pointed to about one half the luggage and souvenirs. “Or pay extra.”
The two men looked at each other, stunned. It was obvious that they handled the travel arrangements and hadn’t bothered with details like how much they could bring back to Montana or Virginia or whatever mountain they called home.
I could see their minds spinning. They were not about to make a scene in an international airport where guards, agents and invisible people with guns made their living picking off trouble-makers.
How embarrassing is it for a redneck to get shot clutching his Mickey Mouse mug and Goofy shot glass?
“How much?” One asked.
The no-nonsense lady caculated. “A hundred and fifty dollars.”
The two men assumed an immediate deer-in-the-headlight expression. You know, big eyes, faces frozen in fear, confusion and general shut down of all working parts of the brain.
“A hun’rd fifty bucks?” The second one asked, suddenly feeling very alone.
I’ll bet that was his beer money.
The women said nothing but you could tell by the expression on their faces they’d had enough of their keg-swilling, know-it-all husbands who had led them all to an embarrassed standstill in the Orlando airport.
“Please step aside and let others through,” the no-nonsense woman said. They did as she ordered, standing in the corner figuring out how they were going to ship their Disney booty. The women were pissed. The kids were tired. This was not the happy ending that Walt Disney envisioned.
I was looking at two men who were not going to get any nookie for a long, long time.
I checked in okay and immediately entered a swirling mass of thousands of people in two lines waiting to get inspected. I made it to the first inspector who made me throw my bottled away. I drank half of it on the spot and tossed it. I then spent a half hour of moving very slowly and listening to one of the loudest, most persistent screaming two- year-olds ever put on this planet. The kid fed off his own energy. Instead of getting hoarse, his voice actually improved with each scream.
I took off my shoes, pulled out my computer, emptied my pockets, pulled off my belt and passed through the inspection machine to the great Other Side, the side we all aspired to, the side where I was again allowed to wear my shoes and hold my pants up with my belt. I could have change in my pocket and carry my computer!
I jumped on a tram, not really knowing where I was going but figured, what the hell, it’s one-way so I must be heading in the right direction. The tram spit me out at the end of the line and I made my way to my gate.