An open letter
to the President of USAirways

Dear Sir:

I like your airline. I really do.

Last year I spent hundreds of hours and covered well over 60,000 miles on USAirways, most of it in “coach class.” Many of those hours were comfortable and productive, due in large part to the accommodations, the seating in coach class being adequate if not spacious.

It seems, however, that in recent months you (USAirways) have launched some sort of vendetta against me, despite the fact that, I am more than likely to achieve Preferred PLUS status again this year.

Like most Americans who spend their time sitting on airplanes, behind desks, in automobiles, in front of the TV, etc., etc., etc., I am more than a bit overweight. I do spend time trying to control my girth and I am able to fit my corpus vitae, including my southern posterior into the average airline, coach, seat. Some of my traveling companions, however, insist upon making repeated, doomed, efforts to repeal the laws of physics.

It’s the old ten pounds of manure in a five pound sack syndrome. No less than four times in the last month and a half I have been seated next to “The Blob.” Actually, seated next to is inaccurate. Engulfed by while sitting, would be considered far more accurate.

First, the flight attendant seats me, next to the window, and then she pours my neighbor into and over the adjoining seat.

Now, I’m a sensitive, nineties, kind of guy. As such, I am no more or less territorial than the majority of my fellow persons. I do not propose to prevent these spatially challenged individuals from taking their rightful places on public conveyances. I merely suggest that their rightful places be identified, roped off and reserved.

I mean, here’s the deal. I spend $X2 to file an exclusive, short term, claim on a few square feet of heavier than air transportation. I resent having to share that space with 40 or 50 pounds worth of a guy who requires two seats but only paid for one. I resent spending two hours sitting at a thirty-degree angle with my arms pinned to my rib cage. And, I resent the fact that the airline that trapped me into this position has never, once, offered to subsidize my chiropractic visits.

At the beginning of most flights there is a certain amount of jockeying for elbow room on the arm rests. Once territorial boundaries have been established things settle down and achieve an acceptable “comfort” level. With the introduction of leviathan into a row of seats the normal nesting ritual is eliminated because no one can find the arm rests. As the behemoth relaxes he/she/it flows like lava into surrounding seats spreading claustrophobia as he expands. The situation brings new meaning to the appellation, Jumbo Jet.

What I am suggesting is a typically American solution to a problem that wont be going away on its own, any time soon. I am proposing that you institute a new class of airline travel, immediately. In short sir, I am proposing Lard-Butt class.

I can envision the new ad campaign even as we speak. “Have a whale of a good trip on the broad minded airline. US Airways.”

And, you sir, will have taken a great weight off the minds and bodies of the average traveler.