Samoan Joe

Michelle and I had four long fights on the various legs of our honeymoon. The first long flight – from London to New York – was pleasant and comfortable enough and passed quickly thanks to the small screens that were on the backs of the seats which allowed you to choose from a variety of movies. The key factor on this flight, which made it the most comfortable of the four, was the fact that Michelle and I were sat together in a row of two rather than having to share a row of three with a complete stranger.

The complete stranger however is to be expected on a long flight and so one can only hope to have a person you would barely notice… and be disappointed they get what’s given.

Coming back over the Atlantic Ocean on the flight from San Francisco to London I have to admit the man beside us was not a bother at all. I call him The Quiet American. Nevertheless, knowing all too well that when one door opens another closes, I was unsurprised when the passenger in front of us turned out to be The Jerk. The Jerk at countless times throughout the nine hour flight seemed determined to force his chair to lie horizontally and therefore onto Michelle’s lap. Being inconsiderate appears to be, like yawning, contagious as myself and The Quiet American soon discovered when The Jerk’s companions soon joined in on his endeavour for a lie down on an Economy Class airplane chair. At one point in The Jerk even had the audacity to turn around to look behind as if Michelle were somehow preventing him from carrying out a function the chair was not designed to include. This inspection was met with my best dead eyed glare which The Jerk seemed to correctly as a non verbal “Go ahead punk, make my day.” Yet despite The Jerk and his almost equally boorish companions this flight was still not so bad when compared to the seven hour ordeal that was Samoan Joe.

On the flight from New York to San Francisco (connecting to Hawaii) we had a woman sitting next to us who I refer to as The Oriental Snorter. This travelling companion was an elderly oriental woman who, as her title would suggest, sniffed and snorted throughout the flight. I’m sure you will agree that this alone could be too much to bare for over six hours, yet I try to be considerate. After all The Snorter must have been suffering from either allergy or illness to have been snorting in the first place and for this reason I try to forgive. What I do not forgive is her feet.

As well as the snorting The Snorter also saw fit to put her legs up on the cramped seat causing her well travelled and clammy feet to touch those unlucky enough to be sitting beside her. This one stranger I’m sure has your skin crawling at the thought that you could have had those feet touching you or had to listen to the ceaseless snorting and sniffing. And still even she could not prepare me for Samoan Joe.

***

I hesitate before type the story of our flight from Hawaii to San Francisco for I know that no word can be written that can truly do justice to the horrifying discomfort that was Samoan Joe. But type I must, for some legends cannot be untold.

***

It was a fantastic holiday but despite the long journey ahead of us my new wife and I were glad to be leaving for home. Having endured The Oriental Snorter on our last long flight Michelle and I felt the universe owed us a break on this first of a series of flights which would begin on a Tuesday and end on a Thursday. Our ticket numbers were amongst some of the first called onto the plane, and although we were in a bank of three seats the third remained empty as those around us became occupied. A foolish dream filled our heads with glorious visions of comfort and even spreading out a little on the long flight. As the plane filled out we even had the courage to speak our dream aloud, dared to believe it could be true! And then I saw Him.

Samoan Joe is not just a man. He is a man that in many years gone by one may have found residing atop a beanstalk. His head is the size of a year old child curled into a ball, his hands are the size a frying pans and most likely have the same density and his body is the mass of a small town. Exaggerating, just a little, though I may be I’m sure your grasping my point; he was big. Really really big. Not fat. Just BIG.

The poor man had to cram himself into our row of three. It is the equivalent of a person of normal size and bulk sitting on a child’s chair and then pulling themselves into a chills desk. His knees were all but up at his chest, he struggled to keep his huge gorilla size arms to himself and as a cherry on top his small daughter (who was seated in the next row with Joe’s wife) kept screaming, not crying, screaming when she had to sit in her seat on the often turbulent flight.

Had been sitting nearby Joe I would have unquestionably looked on at the unfortunately apportioned mans discomfort with deep pity. Of course I was not sitting nearby I was right next to him. Despite the fact I am aware and was aware even then that Samoan Joe laboured to leave me with as much of my seat as his magnitude allowed. Regardless that I know if he could have avoided my neck having had be at a forty-five degree angle he would. There was only one thought in my head and one thought that remains about that considerate giant of a man. That one thought, bore out of frustration, discomfort and bitterness was, is and forever will remain, simply and unfairly, “You bastard.”

Relativity Speaking

Albert Einstein explained his Theory of Relativity in his most simplistic way when he said "Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. THAT'S relativity."

I like that quote a lot and I believe wholly in the theory. The reason I bring it up is that in my work lately I keep scribbling the above title again and again. While most people might keep this to themselves fearing a mental collapse from reality I have chosen to write about it.

See, using Einstein’s quote as an example, my work when busy is a pretty girl, time passes very quickly. For quite a while now however my work has been the equivalent of talking with a girl with a body like a moulded turnip and the face of a person who has not merely fallen from the ugly tree but one who has hit every branch on the way down, fell in the putrid cess pool at the bottom and had the fence surrounding the tree fall and impale them. It’s slow. Painfully slow. Watching a minute pass is gut wrenching. And the later the day gets the slower time passes.
I was on a late on Friday night until 20:00 and it felt like days passed. It’s incredible to watch the fatigue set in on a bunch of people who sit at a desk all day but by good it does.

Anyway I’m not moaning about it, I still like my job and I’ve came up with a cunning plan to help the days pass more quickly. And that plan is this. Literally THIS. When I write time passes like water through an eighty-six year old, very quickly. Recently I haven’t being been doing it because I forgot that even the smallest thing can be interesting if told the right way. So I’ll concentrate on the oddities of people and write it down on a wee pad to post later. Now that I think of it I’ve still not told the story of Samoan Joe. So I’ll start there.

‘Till then.

PS. This is a really crappy post and I apologise for that but I was having a four way conversation in the middle and forgot my point.