I knew it! I'm surrounded by a**holes...

...or I am a total curmudgeon? I'm not entirely sure. You decide.

I recently took a business trip across the country. My travels took me via planes, trains, and automobiles to Fort Irwin, CA via Las Vegas. For literally a 4-hour meeting and 24 hours total on the ground, I spent 25 hours metroing, flying, and driving to and from my destination. My trip was very successful, and I arrived back home in one piece. However, this trip reconfirmed my suspicion that most people are either selfish, oblivious, or stupid... or a combination of those three. Here are my top 4 examples from observing people over the last 50 hours.

4. When did it become okay to yawn or cough in public, within 5 feet of other people, with your mouth completely open? ZERO attempt to keep germs or halitosis to themselves. I was sandwiched between 2 dudes on my flight- a red eye- from Vegas to Minneapolis - one of whom was a loud talker, then turned on his reading light and did zero reading, and every 90 seconds cleared his throat with his mouth wide open. The other dude was okay until he slept with his mouth open and made some kind of odd sucking noise when he created a vacuum between his tongue and lower lip. 

3. You can afford to fly; you can afford headphones (and use them). As I was sitting in Vegas at 12am waiting on my redeye, I stopped to enjoy a healthy snack (yogurt) rather than give in to the fat girl inside me who was craving the Cinnabon in my terminal. I finally found a clean table, sit down, and hear... airport music over the speaker system? No, they generally don't play "Let Me Clear My Throat"... Was it a specter in my iTunes causing it to play songs from Jock Jams Volume 3? No. It was a lady, a few tables over, watching a YouTube video of The Roots with Justin Timberlake performing a montage of jams. Ordinarily, I wouldn't care, but it was entirely presumptuous of the lady to think everyone wanted to hear it at midnight when most people are either hungover or poor from drinking and gambling... ASSHAT. Oh yeah, and she got an upgrade on her flight. And she left her trash on the table. Ugh.

2. The right lane/right side of the sidewalk/right side of the escalator is for the slow people. Fast people go to the left. I cannot tell you how many times I was on I-15 going about 80mph and some car or pack of cars moving at what I perceived to be the pace of a constipated sloth just hanging out in the left lane. I thought they might have be anticipating passing one of the many semi trucks on the route, but no. They just decided the left lane was they way to go, so I ended up passing them in the right hand lane, which I heard you weren't supposed to do. Good news is I could travel at 80mph and not worry about getting pulled over. Going fast in the rental car was AWESOME and made the 2 hour drive to Barstow enjoyable. As an aside, if you're ever stuck in a similar position and you like rock, tune in to FM 94.9 and 96.9 "The Drive". It picks up where Vegas stations leave off and will keep you entertained until you get to Barstow.


1. Gluttony doesn't get any better than the obese dude who ordered a venti frappucino of some sort at Starbucks. Evidently what fits in a venti cup wasn't enough for him, so he asked, "Can I have all of it?" The question was weird and not really entitled or selfish, but his tone is what set me off. It was condescending and rude, to the point where I wanted to ask him if he really needed "all of it". Jackass.  

As an aside, I would like to point out the lovely disposal container for used needles in the Las Vegas airport bathroom. 

In spite of all the silliness, the trip was actually really good. I even won a whole ten dollars at an airport slot machine! I also got some great landscape pictures that I may or may not have taken while driving. Totally safe.