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chatter post

Chatter Post

Please see the most recent MOD NOTE and ADDENDUM

(updated 5 July)

Good evening ladies and gentlemen (and good day to you too, inhabitants of the other side of the world). As always - this isn't a captain speaking but I come bearing news nonetheless.

It has been brought to my attention today(/night) by our good friend OxfordTweed, that a Chatter Post might work quite well for our fandom.

I'm inclined to agree with him.

As such, here you have a brand-spanking-new post to chatter, Brit-pick, ask questions, debate, gossip, gush and generally indulge in any fannish activity that does not fall under the category of posting or filling prompts. I hope you all enjoy it

The usual guidelines apply, but mostly:

- Please be respectful to one another.

- Don't bash other (non)anon's comments/questions/ideas/etc.

- Have fun

Now go forth, chat amongst yourselves and enjoy. I am of course on stand, so if any problems arise, feel free to drop me a line.

And if you stumble across any plot bunnies here, please just drop them off home at the Prompt-Post, the rest of the herd will be overjoyed to meet them.

Or as they say in Limerick

It's been brought to my attention we are needing
A place for discussion, not reading
I hope this post will do
I'll leave the rest to you
And Beware of the plot bunnies breeding

Sorry if the poem is rubbish - I literally haven't written one since grade five.

REALLY IMPORTANT ADDENDUM

According to numerous Child Safety laws it is illegal to provide pornographic material to minors. Seeing that the majority of the stuff we have here is rather adult in nature, this Meme is consequently an 18+ zone. Failing to comply to this rule could result in the Meme getting shut down. So if you're here and you're under 18 please back button now.

Please do not post anything regarding minors in a sexual situation. It really doesn't matter how tasteful or crass it is, there are laws that classify that sort of thing as child pornography and as such, I'm afraid we're going to have to go with the attitude that safe is better than sorry.

It really is VERY important that these rules are upheld as the consequences are severe.

Other than that - go crazy guys. Any problems please just message me and I'll try my best to work it out.

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So, brand new chatter post (with an AWESOME banner, by the way. Love that!), I've got a vaguely on-topic question for you.

What are some of your more interesting travel stories? Or substitute 'interesting' for 'annoying' or 'terrifying' or any other adjective you think fits.

I cannot go to Los Angeles without getting lost. I got lost on two road trips, on a trip to go be film extras (which was organised by my partner's employers, who had hired a charter bus), on a city bus, and whilst travelling Greyhound.

I have concluded that it is impossible to go to Los Angeles without getting lost.

Not sure if this is the sort of thing you were talkin about, buuuut I had a really crap family holiday a few years ago.

My mother, 2 brothers and I went down to Canberra for two days and then Sydney for four.

Canberra was incredibly dull, or at least the parts we looked at.

We caught a cab from the Science center back to the hotel to pick up our bags before heading for the airport.
The taxi driver asked what we thought of the city.

Let it be said now that both my brothers lack anything resembling tact or foresight.

As such, the eldest idiot announces in great detail, how absolutely boring it is, naturally failing to notice that said cab-driver had numerous Canberra related memorabilia in and on his car.

This of course leads to a lengthy (and towards the end, rather aggressive) lecture from the aforementioned cab driver on:
- 'you've not been to the right places'
- 'Did you know Canberra is the only place in Australia/the southern hemisphere/the world, that has...'
- 'You can't even begin to judge it in two days. Why would you come here for only two days?!'
- '(insert any other Australian city here) has nothing on Canberra. I went there for the annual meeting of the Australian Taxi Driver's Association (there is such a thing) and it just doesn't compare'
- 'What Universities do Sydney/Brisbane/Melbourne/etc have. Crap! Canberra has..."

We finally arrive at the hotel. Everyone is glad to be shot of him - ...at least everyone that is, but the brother who started the rant, who promptly - on the cusp of freedom - suggests, "Can you drive us to the airport? We're going there next" Leading to another 20-30 minutes of continuous ranting.

The rest of the trip was rubbish as well but that in particular was the worst part

LOL
Arthur moment much?

I've never been through LA, but my sister-in-law informs me it's physically impossible to go through Schiphol airport without getting lost. Also she's overheard information desk employees bitching about passengers to each other in Dutch, forgetting that the plane-load of English-speakers they were complaining about were on a layover out of South Africa. Most of them spoke Afrikaans as a second language which, while not identical to Dutch, is reeeeeally similar in all the ways that matter.

...and that Douglas has definitely worked there.

On a flight with British Airways from Belfast to London, the pilot made this cabin address: "Ladies and gentlemen, this is my first flight," and after a long pause ended the phrase with "out of Belfast today". As the people in the cabin released their breaths, he went on: "The passengers on the left side can see below us the lights of a big city. We think it might be Liverpool, but we have yet to check our maps." The entire flight went on like this - the funniest flight I've ever been on!

(From this marvelous book of flight anecdotes: http://www.amazon.de/Sorry-wir-haben-Landebahn-verfehlt/dp/3548373267 )

(Note: this is a translation from German by yours truly, of a text that was originally in English, so beware the human Babelfish effect! Original German text provided upon request. ;) )

And a story that seems to come from aboard Gertie herself:

Charter flight from Vienna to Alaska: After the ascent flight we found out that the lights in the toilet didn't work. After I had called the somewhat older stewardess, a small, also older man in blue overalls appeared to assess the damage. Then water began dripping into the cabin from several places in the ceiling. The technician was back, this time with a ladder. Only the air conditioning, no worries! Eventually aisle lights, power and entertainment system failed too. We began to worry and announced this to the stewardess. The charming answer was "Why do you worry? The engines are still running!"

That's Carolyn, all right. :D

Oh hey I live in Canberra! Your brother is right, by the way, it's horribly boring. And our taxi drivers are rubbish, it's such a small place yet they still get lost going somewhere that's twenty minutes away. I know more about Canberra's roads than most taxi drivers do. *headdesk* I'm here for uni then I'm out of here, it's a dreadfully dull city.

Um anyway sorry for the random comment, you don't tend to come across many Aussies (particularly those who've been to Canberra) on the internet. Hi! :)

The chatter post was a brilliant idea! :D

Luckily, I've never had a truly interesting trip (see icon for definition of interesting), but the most memorable was a two-stops trip from San Francisco (or San Jose, memory fails me) to Bucharest.

It was for work, so they booked me the cheapest flight they could find: two stops, one in Chicago and one in Warsaw, with LOT.

I am sure Polish cuisine has nothing to do with plane food on LOT flights, and that's all I'll say on the subject.

The stopover in Warsaw was... one hour. Those of you accustomed to travelling will have already seen the punchline. As we were peacefully lumbering over the Atlantic, with a considerable delay right from Chicago and no signs of stepping on it to catch up, I could see I wasn't going to make it in time.

I hadn't managed to sleep at all during the flight. I had the most horrible seating (for me): smack in the middle of the three seats island in the middle of the wide belly. Hi, social claustrophobia!

Noon in Warsaw. I had, of course, missed the connecting flight. Ground crew gave me the choice between a one-stop flight which would be departing in a couple of hours, and a direct flight which wasn't until late evening. I heard "connecting flight" and had the instant mental image of an endless string of missed connections which would eventually leave me stranded in a foreign country and possibly a different continent, while my luggage explored Europe without me.

There was a lot of linguistic triumph to be had with the airport officers when I tried to find some information and failed in three languages - alas, the young man only spoke Russian and a few words of German (and not the few words of German that *I* knew). The communication breakdown let to my being unfed for close to 15 hours, which in addition to lack of sleep turns me into a gremlin. (The ground crew gave me two meal tickets, because the missed flight was their fault, but I could only redeem those coupons after the security checks, and then I couldn't have left again to explore the city.)

I want to praise the Tourist Information Office in Warsaw airport though; the lady spoke excellent English and gave me all the info I needed to go see some sights in the few hours I had. Off I went, with my carry-on backpack and a laptop bag hanging off my neck, to explore the (rebuilt) historic centre of Warsaw. It was awesome. :)

And then, in the evening, when I was running on 30 hours of awake time, the flight to Bucharest was delayed due to fog. >.<

I have to say, seen from up in the air, brightly lit cities blurred by a thin smudge of fog look eerily beautiful. Seen from the descent flight, however... well, there's not much to see, until suddenly bump! - there's the runway. :D

Brilliant idea, I think a good few of us are prone to chatter. :P

I'm currently knees deep in trying to knock out the first of my 3

queer_fest, anyone else participating?

Once my Mom and I were going to fly to Phoenix, AZ from Manchester,MA with a stop in Chicago, IL. We left at 5:30 pm Eastern Time and we were meant to arrive at 9:30pm Pacific Time. That is not how things went down.

To start off with there was an hour delay getting us out. This wasn't that big a deal, really, and we used out time to acquire food, and thank god because otherwise we may have died of starvation. Our plane takes off and everything is going normally until the intercom comes on to inform us we'll be stopping off for a while in Detroit, MI due to a storm in Chicago. We land and after a half an hour of sitting and waiting he let's us off to stretch our legs. My mother uses this time to take us through the gate and back so she can smoke a cigarette.

After an hour or so he calls us back onto the plane, has us sit there for about fifteen minute and then regretfully informs us that, false alarm, he can't leave yet. We repeated this process- get off the plane, go through gate for smoke break, wait awhile, get back on plane, then get off again- three times over about three ours. I am, of course, drinking coffee like my life depends on it the entire time.

We finally take off again and head for Chicago, and then fly around Chicago's airport for an hour waiting for permission to land and watching lightning out of our windows. (My mother and I actually thought this bit was kind of awesome.) We land and as the airport has closed and our plane is long gone we pass the gate to get in line to reschedule.

I was thirteen when all this happened, so I might as well have been a bag trolley for all the help I was, so Mom had me either holding her spot in line so she can have a smoke, which I absolutely cannot blame her for at this point, or trying to scrounge up some food. I was never really successful at the food bit, but I did find a place selling coffee that I snapped up immediately. Mom get's a flight from there to St.Louis, MO and then, FINALLY, to Phoenix so that was sorted, at least.

However, the airport wasn't letting anyone past the gate until 4 AM the next day and neither of us were comfortable sleeping in the cots they had lined up, so we got in the gate line that was long enough to stretch outside. My mother chain smoked for an hour with some guy while I stared at them both, long past my already limited ability to communicate with humans.

Once we got through the gate everything was mostly fine- we had breakfast, got on our plane and arrived in St.Louis. Mom discovered the smoking room and made use of it while I sat at our gate and stared at the screen listing incoming and outgoing flights. About half an hour before boarding was scheduled to start, our gate changed to one on the other side of the airport. I notice this, grab all our bags, poke my head into a smoking room that could not be breathed in, and informed my mother that we need to move. Finally (FINALLY) we get on our plane only to find out that our pilot legally can't fly our plane due to having had to stay up all night for obvious reasons. We wait a bit and a new pilot is provided.

We left the Manchester airport at 5:30pm ET and arrived in the Phoenix airport at 12:30pm PT the next day, and spent most of our first day in Arizona sleeping.

...I'm reading back over this and filling with shame over all the typos.

It seems that about 3 out of 4 times when I go to use the toilet in an airplane, from out of the blue comes... turbulence. (Not related to my activities in the toilet, thank you very much.)

This is especially fun as I am female and choose not to actually sit on the toilet seat. Balancing acts ensue.

/TMI

Only 1 out of 2 times for me, but that's probably because 3 out of 4 times turbulence starts just when I've obtained the tomato juice / hot coffee / other colourful and/or hot beverage of choice. How does it know?

I had my passport confiscated by French police. I don't speak French. They (at least claimed) not to speak any English or Italian. This is a pretty terrifying experience.

Long story short, I got my passport back after several hours of incoherent sobbing, and I got fined for train ticket fraud because a train conductor incorrectly validated my ticket.

I'm really not that keen on French train travel now.

Oh, my goodness. Yeah, those are clearly straight from the flight logs. XD

There's a bus driver in town here in Vegas who will do stuff like that. He likes to freak out the tourists by saying that the buses run on Casino hours; they stop at midnight, and start at 12:01.

People like my mum who tend to miss subtle jokes like that get crazy worked up when they're going somewhere at 11:30pm that's miles away from their hotel. XD

I looked at that thing and became instantly confused.

It's not too bad, should be interesting though a lot of stuff is in fandoms I don't follow at all.

Are there any other Qi fans here?
I was just wondering if I'm the only person who is reminded of Arthur every few seconds because of Alan's antics :)

I know

afullmargin has Alan Davies in her head as a visual for Arthur. Which, I do have to admit, it does fit on some strange level.

I never thought of that, but now - YES. I will never again be able to watch QI without thinking of Arthur. XP

This is...brilliant!! That's definitely them all right!! XD

I was caught in a thunderstorm in a tiny plane from Sydney to B*****a when I was 9 or 10 years old. Up until then I had loved storms, now I'm terrified of them and will break into tears if I don't have someone with me to cling to. We ended up being in the air for over two hours longer than we were supposed to be, overshot our destination, had to turn around and come back. By this time we were probably running low on fuel and we basically had an emergency landing at a closed airport...in L*****e - an hour and a half away from B****a. The airport was reopened for our little plane, but fortunately nobody was hurt. (The turbulence rattled my glasses from my face, it was that bad and we were on the edge of the storm). I woke up the next morning with dried blood on my nose from a nosebleed from the night before.

One of the most terrifying things was the pilots having only a vague idea of where they had landed. The storm was bad enough to completely throw them offcourse and mess with their instruments. (Sometimes, I dread getting onto a plane because I'm imagining it crashing, but it's mostly the storms I'm afraid of.)

I'm always paranoid about going to the loo on a plane for that exact reason.

OMG, hell yes! As was already stated by my delightful cohort, I'm a total Alan Davies fangirl and I think by the second episode of Cabin Pressure I had already established Alan as my head visual - as much as I love John I can totally see Alan playing the role.

Could you imagine if they were somehow combined in the same fic? I think I'd die. Haha. And you know Arthur would be a fan - and think Stephen is a genius, but a bit mean.

Not just a strange level, I tell you. :P It's head canon.

Any Aussies here? Just wondering if there are any, and if so how you first found this piece of awesomeness that is Cabin Pressure?

I'm only here because I followed Benidict from Sherlock... =)

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Proof that "Air England" stands for British Airways :D

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sleepless in Warsaw

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TMI

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