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If you put your bags ahead of where you are, you can hop up and go a little farther down, and streamline the process- it really does speed it up for yourself, and also for the people behind you.
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It sure does suck for the people in the first five rows, though. Where are their bags supposed to go now? Your shit’s in their way, and they’re not allowed to store their bags in the cockpit. And if people are storing bags anywhere other than where they’re sitting you’re going to have some overhead bins overpacked, and then anyone getting into that row towards the end of boarding will not have a place to put their bag, so they’ll have to troop down to the end, and everything’s help up. By saving five seconds when you get off the plane you may have just help everyone up by a few minutes getting on.
The easy and efficient way is very simple:
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As you’ve said, do not bring suitcases aboard the plane. Bring only briefcases, purses, and geniune carry on bags, like small knapsacks. This is the overwhelming problem, by far; on a full flight, the nitwits bringing huge suitcases, rollies and duffel bags can delay a flight by ten or twenty minutes, easily, and sometimes worse.
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Store it over your head or under the seat in front of you.
If you are not retarded it takes 10 seconds, 15 at the absolute maximum, to stand up and grab your bags. Anyone who can’t accomplish that in ten seconds is mentally disabled (unless it’s someone who is, say, very short, or old, or has small children with them, and they obviously need some consideration - but they usually park it until everyone’s off anyway, so it rarely matters) and storing their bag further ahead will not help them, and in fact will slow things down because they’ll probably forget where they put it.
You are obviously not retarded, so stowing your shit up front doesn’t really help, because you’re going to grab your shit and get moving quickly anyway, even if it’s right where you are.
Now, mind you, it’s up to the airlines to fix this, because some people are inconsiderate dicks who just aren’t aware that their actions affect other people, and some people are just slow on the uptake. Without enforcing carry-on dimension limits and slapping people upside the head, nothing wil lget better.
This past week I was on a United flight from Denver to San Fran. It was a 777, and it was half full. For those of you who’ve never been on a 777, it’s an enormous airplane, Nine seats/two aisles per row, lots of head room and legroom. The overhead bins are sufficient for a full flight and we were 50% full at best. And yet some people still could not sort their fucking luggage out.
One guy in particular - it was just amazing. He was in the first rwo of economy class. He and his wife brough aboard two huge suitcases, purses and shopping bags of varying descriptions, and what appeared to be some sort of plant. The guy honestly took thgirty minutes of bumping and pushing his way back and forth through two luggage bins and pushing people out of his way to get his shit stowed away and he was still fiddling with it during the flight, and getting off the plane was all the same nonsense in reverse. Oh, and he kept standing up in front of the TV screen to conduct loud conversations with his wife throughout the flight, finally prompting me to yell at him. (I was polite, but loud.) It was quite obvious that the man simply did not have the slightest clue or concern that other human beings were on the same plane and might want to do things like leave Denver on time, or see the television programming, or not have him push them out of the way.
Since I’m on a roll, I want to add one more thing. Some people bitch and bitch and bitch about children on airplanes; the truth is that some people just plain hate children, and will complain about them incessantly. But in all my travels I’ve had, and seen, virtually no problems at all with kids on airplanes; they’re not .01% as troublesome as the various classes of adult air travel assholes. Sometimes babies will cry, but that’s easily drowned out with earphones, and parents usually get them under control within a reasonable period of time. Once, in hundreds of flights, there was an older kid who was crying that I found kind of irritating, but I forgot about him soon enough.
We’ve never had our baby on an airplane and don’t plan to do so anytime soon, but speaking as a veteran air traveller I can say “Children on airplanes” are so far down on my list of concerns and irritations that they barely register.
