Things I've Always Wanted to Ask Northworst Employees

Now that I've been frequenting terminal A at Reagan pretty much every weekend, I've encountered hilarity like you wouldn't believe. From the incompetence at security to the screaming ticket counter employee, I always find something entertaining enough to keep my book in my carry-on bag.

As I've been trying to build up as many frequent flier miles as possible so that I might be able to one day collect a free coach ticket (of course, this won't happen until I earn 25,000 miles.) I've been in the air every weekend this month (or, will be, as I am journeying back to MI this final September weekend for Goddard's wedding) for a wedding and a baptism.

I think that they designed airport waiting room chairs in a moment of insanity - they're made of weird fake leather, so that no one can manage to sit up straight for more than a few minutes before sliding to the edge. Before you know it, your knees are higher than your head. How did that happen? The pleather isn't as bad as the freezing metal armrests. I suppose they don't want people laying across an entire row of chairs, so they found recycled jungle gym pipes, stripped off the gleeful red paint, and screwed them to the pleather in such a way that you almost don't get out alive. Maybe it's part of some master plan to make the seats on the actual airplane seem comfortable, I don't know.

Right, so as I sit at the gate in the most amazing chairs ever made, Ms. Crazy Northworst Employee #1 gets on the microphone and begins screaming something in a language that I can only assume was English.

I'm not going to try and recreate her accent. I just don't understand why they gave her the microphone at all (btw, it's the same lady as here), since NO ONE COULD UNDERSTAND HER. People are frantically looking around cluelessly, hoping that someone will eventually rise, stand next to her, and start TRANSLATING. Because at this point, she could be telling us that our plane is scheduled to crash into Lake Erie and WE WOULDN'T KNOW.

Which brings me to the things that I have always wanted to ask Northworst employees:

1. So it's not required that you speak English, then?

2. Where can I buy that hooker eyeshadow?

3. Is it statistically impossible to seat me next to someone who actually brushes his/her teeth once in a while?

4. Are scrunchies part of the required uniform, or are they some kind of approved add-on that you ordered from some Girl Scout-like uniform catalog?

But they still get me from DC to MI in a freaking hour and a half, so they're pretty much awesome in my book.