Bad Film Choices

So, currently, we’re somewhere over the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. I think we’re going to be in Greece in roughly four hours, but I have no idea if that’s accurate. Apparently, going to another time zone prior to getting on a transatlantic flight is disorienting, because not everything that we’ve brought that has a clock acknowledges that we’ve moved away from Chicago.

Highlights so far:

If you’re going on a nine hour flight it’s at all possible to not have a two year old with you, do that. He’s asleep now, and in the runup to that headphones mostly worked to drown out the constant screaming. It’s not his fault. He’s bored and cranky (as are we all) and the poor little guy doesn’t even have his own seat. It’s not the parents’ fault either, I guess, but I’d somehow forgotten how much toddlers love making noise.

My selfish irritation was somewhat diminished when his dad took him for a walk up the aisle and he waved bye-bye to everyone. That was pretty adorable.

Other than that, we’ve mostly been attempting to sleep, failing at sleeping and trying to find ways to stave off the fact that we’re sitting in one place for nine slowly passing hours. We could be watching the in-flight movies/TV, but there are two problems with that.

Headphones cost five dollars. I only spent eight dollars on my standard-go-anywhere-use-with-anything-with-a-headphone-jack headphones, so I’m not inclined to spend nearly the same amount on headphones I can use twice. Someone help me out here. Is there a reason for the two pronged headphone jack other than forcing you to pay $5 to watch movies on a tiny television halfway up the cabin? Is there anyone who sells an adapter to convert a normal headphone plug into one of the special trapped-on-an-airplane plugs? Though, I guess if you’re going to buy an adapter, you might as well just buy the crappy headphones the airline sells.

The movie choices. First, a mid-Season One episode of Glee. Which, whatever, I guess, but it’s not possible to at least get something that aired this year? Then again, I don’t take transatlantic trips to catch up on Modern Family, so I guess it’s just as well. Then, The Green Hornet, which I’ve actually been meaning to see, and came out this year, so it’s at least conceivable that I haven’t seen it. Currently, what’s on screen is Vinnie Jones running around in a metal helmet, because for some reason X-Men: The Last Stand is playing on this flight. Which came out in 2007. And was awful.

So maybe no one rush to tell me about how to get around paying for headphones.

Instead, Marina and I brought along the Netflix DVD we’ve been meaning to get to for about a week. And have a headphone splitter, so we can both listen. Which would be great. If the movie we watched wasn’t 127 Hours. It was great, of course, but given that I’m already a little skittish about flying, it was perhaps a drop too intense. Everyone around us is trying to sleep (and trying not to do anything that could conceivably wake the toddler up), and we’re watching James Franco hack off his arm with a Leatherman. And because that’s the only thing we brought, we can’t follow it up by spending this laptop’s remaining battery life by watching something lighthearted and not-about-a-guy-who-amputates-his-arm.

Now that that’s over, I guess it’s either back to attempting to sleep or continuing to work on getting through American Gods. Anything that won’t wake the kid.