Getting Drunk in First Class

What do consultants and kindergartners have in common? Quite a bit actually, with one exception; kindergartners are probably more well behaved than the Total Dickheaded consultant. Lets take a look.

1. Cutter! - Consultants usually show up to the gate early so that they can lean up against their Tumi bags with a Bluetooth headset stuck in their ear and stand around with a smirk on their face. They can’t stand it when some other wise-guy analyst rolls up in front of them with a Samsonite roller bag who is banging out emails on their Blackberry. This dickhead doesn’t look up because he knows that 10 people in the gate area wants him dead. He is usually in seating area 1 at best and will stand in front of everybody like nothing ever happened. Secretly every person in the gate area hopes that he trips on the jetway, falls over his Samsonite bag, and crushes his precious Blackberry on his way to his shit infested exit row economy seat.

   What pisses consultants off even more is punk ass 50 year old sweet old lady in seating area 6 that stands all the way in the front and claims ignorance as an excuse to be the first person on the plane. If the gate agent pulls them aside and tells them to take a hike, consultants get a little smirk on their face and think, “That’s right bitch, please step to the back of the line!”

   When the gate agent turns her head the other way and lets that old hag on the plane, consultants usually think “What the fuck!? I pay $2,000 for a first class ticket and you let this social security draining bag of bones on before me!?”. If you’re one of the many fliers who earned their status, your gut reaction is probably much worse as you wish even more terrible things upon the old hag.

   The smarter, more experienced frequent flier will usually figure out how to slide into the front of the line from the side when the aircraft starts to board. This is the more preferred and tolerated cutting tactic; you don’t have to stand around for 30 minutes looking like a complete jerk-off with the thought that everybody else at the gate wants to murder you. Those who are watching you pull your little stunt think, “That clever little bastard… hell… I do the same thing when I show up late!”

2. Milk and Cookies time!- Ah yes, warm milk and cookies. It will shut any obnoxious first class flier up. If you’re a flight attendant, and you’re dealing with some demanding asshole first class flier that just won’t the hell shut up, some warm cookies and a glass of cold milk will keep his trap shut for hours.

   Its funny, on the ground most of us don’t give a rats ass about cookies. We might eat them if they’re laying around in front of us right out of the package, but maybe not. If anything, most of us think of cookies as something to take away from a fat ass client during breakfast when he really fucks up on a deliverable.

   Why is it that a warm cookie tastes better in a $4,000 business class transpac flight 36,000 feet above the Bearing Straight? I don’t even like cookies, but god damn they’re good when you know 250 other shmucks behind you in economy on the plane don’t get one. I don’t really want the god damn cookie; what I want to do is run through the economy cabin with that warm cookie in my hand, wave it in front of everyone’s face, and yell at the top of my lungs, “You don’t get one! You don’t get one!”. Every dick head that paid for their business or first class ticket knows this as they savor every god damn bite of that delicious, succulent, “you can’t have one” chocolate chip cookie.

3. Beverage Service - This one is more for those frequent economy travelers. Ah yes, the beverage service. For some reason we all feel obligated that we have to get a drink when the beverage cart rolls through; even if we just finished chugged a 2 liter bottle of water and have to piss like a homeless meph addict that downed a bottle of Jack Daniel’s.

   Why is it that we can’t let a beverage cart pass us up? Is it the fear that if we don’t get a drink now, we’re forever stricken to a world of thirst and anguish? Is it that we’re so scared the dry air will dehydrate us like a big bag of teriyaki beef jerky? Or is it that we’re just like a bunch of god damn pigs wallering in our own shit  that we call an “economy cabin” who can’t pass up a free diet coke?

4. Points and Upgrades - Point systems are stupid and so our upgrades, yet countless hours have been billed to clients talking  with other fellow consultants about various schemes and strategies on how to optimize points and upgrades. Consultants spend more time clamoring about points and upgrades than they do on client work!

   Think about it, you have a bunch of consultants that worry about nothing but optimizing synergist processes. Throw them into a room with upgrades and points and they’ll crank out so much bullshit about how to maximize your earning and utilization yields that it will make you dizzy.

   How stupid is it that any frequent flier salivates over points, bonuses, and specials?  We’re like kids in a candy store, we want more more more… give me more points! Give me more upgrades! I deserve this first class seat! Its bullshit, and we all know it. We don’t deserve those seats; hell, most of us are just AMEX card carrying asshole’s in our mid-twenties that are spending the clients dime on our over-priced tickets.

   When we do get our upgrades, we stand around with a smug look on our faces and flash everybody at the gate our first class boarding pass. When the gate agent starts boarding the plane, you plow through everybody hitting them purposely with your laptop bag saying with a condescending tone, “excuse me,” as you steamroll their economy class asses. You’d get on the public announcement system and tell every dickhead in the terminal that you scored a first class seat if you could.

   After your ass is firmly planted into that posh, $3,000 first class seat; you recline your chair and take that glass of orange juice that you didn’t want in the first place so that you have something to sip on as you stare at everybody else while they board the plane. With your legs crossed, drink in hand, and that smug look on your face you start making eye contact with the economy passengers as they all make their way towards the back of the plane. “Get back there,” you keep telling those asshole’s with that dickheaded look in your eye, “I wanna get this plane off the ground so I can start ordering shots!”

5. Shitty Food - I’m writing this from a flight where I just got the most god awful BBQ piece of shit sandwich I’ve ever seen in my life. Had this been served to me on the ground at a restaurant, I would have picked it up, thrown it on the ground, drop-kicked the waiter  while simultaneously grabbing his hair and shoving it into the sandwich on the ground while screaming, “My fucking dog wouldn’t even eat this shit!”

   Things are much different when you’re 35,000 feet up zipping along at 550mph. When this piece of shit is thrown in front of you, you slowly pick up your work as if everybody in the economy cabin is watching you behind a 1-way mirror. You slowly start turning your plate in every which direction to figure out where to make the first cut. Finally, you sink your fork into that crappy BBQ sandwich, cut it ever so carefully with your knife, and slowly bring the fork towards your mouth. Mmm… eating shit never tasted so good… but man is it great when you know the dickwads behind you are munching on a bag of snack mix, maybe 2 bags of snack mix or a snack box if they’re lucky.