Uneventful flight yesterday from LAX (rain) to Charlotte, NC (high 50s, overcast, sunsetting), then Fort Lauderdale, FL (very temperate, soft tropical breeze). The second plane was a 737-400 with cracks in the plastic of the luggage compartments and still the ashtrays from another era. I hadn't taken USAir in a while. You pay for coffee ($1, free refill) and sodas ($2). There is no entertainment at all - not even for sale, not even on the 5 hour coast-to-coast flight. No music, no movie, no games. What is this, 1969? What are we supposed to do? Talk to your neighbor? Read a book? Ah, les amis, la crise, ça craint. (Yes, I write this in English, so the French readers will suffer for my art, but they are entitled to a few compensations - if the anglophones ask, I'll try and translate those brilliant nuggets of French language, if I still can...). Of course, this rant from someone who almost never partakes in in-flight entertainment.
Good pasteurized (I kid you not) crab bisque at Charlotte airport.
Wonder if the hand-picking is done before or after pasteurization...
We spend the night at a drab hotel along the terminally depressing Fort Lauderdale waterfront. A sixties motel in between the behemoth Hilton and the equally huge, not yet open, new Donald Trump venture. An outrageously expensive but excellent dinner on the ocean-facing patio of the Ritz-Carlton restaurant - pretty much the only thing open - does restore us from our travels. The evening is spent sipping a lemon drop and watching the few lost souls, who like us an hour before, err along the interminable boulevard in search for food, a cafe, a place to sit, a shop, a light, any sign of civilization...
