Jetlagged
I used to be able, long ago, to sleep on planes, but apparently this useful and sanity-saving skill has been lost. There were all the usual impediments to sleep: a screaming baby, screaming kids, etc… I put my earphones in, wrapped my sweater around my head and tried to sleep for about 5 hours.
It didn’t work. So now my body has absolutely no clue what time it really is.
I was talking to a colleague who was also flying back on the same flight (but fell asleep instantly…) about what could be done to make flying more pleasurable. Just about the only thing would be to hook everyone up to some nice hospital-quality anaesthetics in the waiting lounge and bringing us around in arrivals at the other end. Just completely erase the experience of flying totally.
There wouldn’t be many takers to begin with, but I think people would slowly realise that travelling without:
- screaming infants/small children,
- airline food,
- extreme tiredness and
- DVTs.
would actually be far more pleasant. Because the last thing you want, after a really good holiday/ conference/ whatever is to spend 9 sleepless hours in a noisy tin can suspended 38,000 feet in the air…
November 21st, 2005