What a SCAM!<\/p>\n
I’m a bit off the Apple religion.\u00c2\u00a0 Well, to be specific, I still love the
products, I’m just a bit off Steve Jobs.\u00c2\u00a0 The Nano show pushed me over the edge.\u00c2\u00a0
Not EVERYTHING he introduces is revolutionary, not EVERYTHING is
mind-blowing.\u00c2\u00a0 The Nano is just a tiny MP3 player.\u00c2\u00a0 But, at least it works.\u00c2\u00a0 At least it’s state of the art.\u00c2\u00a0 Whereas Richard Branson is selling a second-rate product
with first class marketing.<\/p>\n
Virgin Atlantic is almost a cult.\u00c2\u00a0 Or Club Med.\u00c2\u00a0 I give Richard credit for
creating the party atmosphere.\u00c2\u00a0 If only he backed it up with a worthwhile
product.<\/p>\n
The 747 I took from London back to L.A. was older than many of its
passengers.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, he installed new seats.\u00c2\u00a0 But the bathroom fixtures had been used so much that the "H" and "C" on the spigots had been worn off.\u00c2\u00a0 And the thunderous noise from the engines was STARTLING!\u00c2\u00a0 Nobody flies 747s anymore.\u00c2\u00a0 Not only are they loud, they’re INEFFICIENT!\u00c2\u00a0 They burn a ton of fuel.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is why the first tier airlines have shifted to Boeing 767s.\u00c2\u00a0 Or Airbus 300s.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re
MODERN planes.\u00c2\u00a0 The 747 first hit service in 1970, and it shows its age.<\/p>\n
Oh, all the extras are perfect.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s a ticket counter separate from
check-in at Heathrow.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is something all airlines should have.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, on
other airlines although there’s always somebody hogging an attendant, at
least the line MOVES!\u00c2\u00a0 We all know that flying has changed since 9\/11, but half an
hour to check in to an airline that has few flights to begin with is
ridiculous.<\/p>\n
Richard names each one of his airliners.\u00c2\u00a0 Adorns them with a Vargas-style
girl.\u00c2\u00a0 And the flight attendants are decked out in pumps and red suits.\u00c2\u00a0 And
they’re breezy to boot.\u00c2\u00a0 If only they were delivering a first class product.\u00c2\u00a0 The
chicken they served at lunch was only a tad larger than a nugget.\u00c2\u00a0 I just
about popped the tiny bird into my mouth whole.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a bad sign when you’re on an
eleven hour flight and you’re starving ninety minutes in.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s not like
there’s a McDonald’s in the back of the plane.<\/p>\n
And they served a protein-challenged panini three quarters of the way
through.\u00c2\u00a0 And the final snack…was a wimpy cream cheese pocket that was inedible.\u00c2\u00a0
Why not make it like American from NYC to L.A. SELL me the damn food.\u00c2\u00a0 At least
I’ll get enough.\u00c2\u00a0 And it’s BETTER than conventional airline food.<\/p>\n
But the main reason I took Virgin was the in-flight entertainment system.<\/p>\n
Luckily I was in an empty row.\u00c2\u00a0 Since the volume control didn’t work in my
original seat.\u00c2\u00a0 I shifted to the window but the lights were so bright it was
hard to see the screen, even with the shade pulled down.\u00c2\u00a0 And the center seat??\u00c2\u00a0
The screen had a SCRATCH!\u00c2\u00a0 Actually, not one, but MANY!!\u00c2\u00a0 I mean it’s not like
I was hopping over a couple of states, I was flying to a whole ‘nother
CONTINENT!<\/p>\n
And the foot space in the center seat.\u00c2\u00a0 Half of it was taken up by some sort
of black box.\u00c2\u00a0 I haven’t seen one of these SINCE the seventies.\u00c2\u00a0 Somebody
figured out this pisses customers OFF!\u00c2\u00a0 I mean isn’t the seating CRAMPED ENOUGH?\u00c2\u00a0
Shouldn’t you at least be able to stretch your legs out a little bit?\u00c2\u00a0 God, if
I’d paid for that seat and the plane was full I would have either killed
somebody, thrown them out of the plane and stolen their seat, or killed myself.<\/p>\n
Then again, once I figured out the controller, which is probably second
nature to an adolescent gamer but is slightly counterintuitive to a videogame
challenged individual like me, I found a PLETHORA of stuff I wanted to see.\u00c2\u00a0 After
studying the "New Yorker" (read Malcolm Gladwell’s story on getting into
Harvard and the one on the L.A. "Times") and failing to fall asleep I fired up
"Layer Cake".\u00c2\u00a0 I almost went to see this in the theatre.\u00c2\u00a0 This is the kind of
stuff that Americans no longer make.\u00c2\u00a0 God, the English SPECIALIZE in these
mobster\/crime flicks.\u00c2\u00a0 Everything from "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" to
"Croupier".\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, it wasn’t perfect, but at least the camera techniques fit the
project, the filmmakers just weren’t showing off.\u00c2\u00a0 They must have cut some of
Sienna Miller’s role, since it didn’t seem like she’d hook up with the main
character at the end, but I was riveted.\u00c2\u00a0 Almost to the point where I wanted the
flight to be a tad longer, so I could watch another flick I’d missed.\u00c2\u00a0 Like
"Cinderella Man".<\/p>\n
Richard Branson is a genius.\u00c2\u00a0 A tireless self-promoter who gets us to
purchase a second-rate product.\u00c2\u00a0 THIS is the kind of individual who used to rule the
music business.\u00c2\u00a0 AND the movie business.\u00c2\u00a0 Self-made individuals thinking
outside the box who were the show THEMSELVES!\u00c2\u00a0 Now everybody’s so corporate, the soul is gone.<\/p>\n
I felt like at any minute they were gonna ask me for change for gas.\u00c2\u00a0 Or that
I’d have to pitch in and help push the plane into the gate.\u00c2\u00a0 All the while
telling me it was FUN!\u00c2\u00a0 I felt beaten.<\/p>\n
But even though they cracked a three hundred dollar item in my suitcase, I’d
take the airline again.\u00c2\u00a0 Because even though I feel safer on American, I feel
like somebody’s on the ball, they don’t have the entertainment system.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s
the contradiction.\u00c2\u00a0 The little things make the difference.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m willing to
overlook all the bullshit just to watch movies.\u00c2\u00a0 I feel like Homer Simpson.\u00c2\u00a0 Or,
then again, I’m just a classic American.<\/p>\n
So, don’t be bedazzled by Sir Richard.\u00c2\u00a0 But if you’ve been too busy to go to
the multiplex for months, HIS is the airline to take!<\/p>\n
<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
What a SCAM! I’m a bit off the Apple religion.\u00c2\u00a0 Well, to be specific, I still love the products, I’m just a bit off Steve Jobs.\u00c2\u00a0 The Nano show pushed me over the edge.\u00c2\u00a0 Not EVERYTHING he introduces is revolutionary, not EVERYTHING is mind-blowing.\u00c2\u00a0 The Nano is just a tiny MP3 player.\u00c2\u00a0 But, at least […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-32","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}