{"id":1316,"date":"2007-01-27T13:28:40","date_gmt":"2007-01-27T18:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/come-fly-without-me\/"},"modified":"2007-01-27T13:28:40","modified_gmt":"2007-01-27T18:28:40","slug":"come-fly-without-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/come-fly-without-me","title":{"rendered":"Come Fly Without Me"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week, my boss & I went over the year’s conference schedule, to figure out who’s going where. As it turns out, due to a couple of local-ish shows and changes in our production schedules, I’m not going to have to do too much business-flying this year. It’s a nice change from the past 3 years, which saw plenty of work-flights and lots of Xanax-ingestion.<\/p>\n

I can trace my air-anxiety to a takeoff to Phoenix in October 2003, where the first 90 seconds out of Newark were the most harrowing moments of my life. Since then, I’ve been a nervous flyer. Not in extreme “Get me off this plane!” ways, but I tend to take bumps pretty seriously. It’s silly, and I’m able to get over it sometimes by preoccupying myself with music (the louder and more techno-y, the better) or that aforementioned anti-anxiety drug.<\/p>\n

I bring all this up because Donald at 2Blowhards has a great post about Scary Airports<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The airports I’ve flown into that make me nervous tend to be those in cramped locations. National Airport near Washington and New York’s LaGuardia are two examples. National is tucked next to the Potomac River and its main runway is about 6,900 feet long (and seemed shorter the last time I used it, 15+ years ago). La Guardia’s runways are about 150 feet longer, but the airport is boxed in by Long Island Sound. Unless you’re landing to the north (and waving at friends in the Shea Stadium parking lot), landing approaches are over water.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Personally, I don’t have a problem with coming in over water. Although I recall that a flight during my trip to Sweden & Denmark in 2004 allowed passengers to look through cameras on the plane’s exterior, as part of the in-flight entertainment. The approach over water (I think it was coming into Paris for the connection at CDG) was a little disturbing from nose-cam.<\/p>\n

Anyway, give his post<\/a> a read, and make sure to check out the comments, which are fantastic.<\/p>\n

(Bonus: a YouTube video of planes landing at the incredibly wind-cursed Wellington airport in NZ<\/a>!)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week, my boss & I went over the year’s conference schedule, to figure out who’s going where. As it turns out, due to a couple of local-ish shows and changes in our production schedules, I’m not going to have to do too much business-flying this year. It’s a nice change from the past 3 … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Come Fly Without Me”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-le","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1411,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/us-pharmacopeia","url_meta":{"origin":1316,"position":0},"title":"U.S. Pharmacopeia","author":"Gil","date":"March 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"A month ago, I mentioned the amazing tox breakdown from Gerald Levert's autopsy. 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I recall reading an interview with her a bazillion years ago in which she mentioned that the heart condition could kill her at any time, and that the knowledge\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Comic books & strips"","block_context":{"text":"Comic books & strips","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1502,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/cause-effect","url_meta":{"origin":1316,"position":3},"title":"Cause? Effect?","author":"Gil","date":"May 11, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"According to ESPN.com, Ricky Williams tested positive for pot again. Obviously, that's not news. 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Here's a list of reasons for that, but I'm not sure which ones have the most weight: I suffer from anxiety I suffer from mild depression and\/or this winter has depressed the crap out of me I have a lot\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 3 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 3 comments","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wintertime-blues#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":642,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/prioritize","url_meta":{"origin":1316,"position":5},"title":"Prioritize","author":"Gil","date":"September 26, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Your Virtual Memoirist, dear reader, is nuts.I still have 3 articles to write in the next 3 days, before spending 2 days helping to run our annual conference. I may or may not have to put together a panel discussion the morning it begins. 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