Flight Advice: Annoying Things You Can Do On An Airplane

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Flight Advice

Our flight advice would be to stay away from these, as experienced by Mobal International Cell Phone users…

1. Clipping Your Finger Nails

There is a time and place for everything. And clipping your finger nails on an airplane is neither the time or the place!

“The worst is people who clip their fingernails. It is a total lack of class and respect to have someone’s dirty and repulsive nail clippings flying around the seating area while you’re either trying to read or worse, eat something. This has happened 3 or 4 times over the last several years.”

Kevin Mullen

2. Using The Headrest In Front To Help You Stand Up

I find this is normally a tactic of gentlemen of advancing years (and girth for that matter). Not only do they find it harder to stand in their condition, it seems to have effected their ability to appologise too!

“I hate it when I am sitting in my seat…usually trying to sleep and the person behind me decides to get up and grabs the back of my seat for support, letting go as they walk away turning my seat into a catapult ,,,whip lash city!”

Glen Ridnour

3. Reclining Your Chair

This has got to be the most popular airplane crime committed. From just experiencing a lack of space to getting your scolding hot coffee thrown into your groin — we’ve all been on the receiving end of a reclining chair.

“…People who recline their seats with no regard for the people sitting behind them. I’ve had people bruise my knees, almost break my laptop (and render it impossible to use the laptop once they’ve reclined), etc. Not to mention the fact that it’s extremely difficult to get in or out of my seat when I have to practically do the limbo to move. Of course this is mostly the airlines’ fault for cramming us in, but I think it’s a perfect example of the Golden Rule… Do Unto Others as You’d Have Them Do Unto You.”

Karen White

4. Bringing Your Unruly Kids Along

You may think your darling offspring are little angels, and love to see them being active and having fun. Well you’re the only one. Children should be stowed with the luggage down below if you ask me.

“They bring their monster children on an overseas flight. They subject the entire plane to their little brats who are so misbehaved that they shouldn’t even be out in public let alone on a 12 hour flight.”

Christy Daniels

5. Cleaning Your Feet

See point number 1, and then double it!

“Once I was on a flight from Boston to Athens when a big guy who was sitting across the isle from me took off his shoes and socks, propped up his ugly (and I can not emphasize that enough), scaly, unkempt feet and started picking at them. The topper was when he took out his toe-nail clippers and started to cut his thick, yellow nails and they started popping in the air on people’s laps and in their food!”

6. Aiming Your Vomiting Baby At The Person Next To You

Mothers, as a general rule, there is never an occasion when someone wants your vomiting bundle of joy pointed at them, and that includes during a flight on a cramped airplane.

“Mother fed baby a bottle of milk that had been sitting in her bag for 2+ hours while waiting for take-off. Baby begins vomit so mother turn baby towards person in adjacent seat (me) and changes the color of my business suit.”

Best regards
Mike Altmann

7. Trying To Get An Upgrade

You won’t get one, so stop trying to ask.

“My husband always, always, ALWAYS asks for an upgrade. He’s hopeless. I just try my best to blend in with the crowd.”

Theresa Lapointe

8. Leaning Over Your Neighbor To Look Out Of The Window
If you were so desperate for a window seat you should have booked on when you ordered your ticket.

“I was seated in a window seat on a flight to Copenhagen. As the plane was coming in for landing the man next to me was leaning over me to look out the window, it was very weird.”

Crissy

9. Creating Your Own Sleeping Den

Acceptable when you were 6 and your friend came for a sleep over at your house, not acceptable when you’re a 45 year old business man on the red eye flight.

“I have a wild example for you… I was in the window seat on a flight from London to San Francisco. Sitting next to me was a guy on the final leg of an exhausting trip from Pakistan or India. He proceeded to pull down his tray table and put his feet on it, and to make himself a tent, covering himself completely, so he could sleep. Of course this improvised structure and spreadeagled posture of his impinged on my already ridiculously limited space.”

10. Making Everyone Listen To Your Conversation

You are never as interesting or funny as you think you are, so keep it to yourself.

“Non-stop talking in loud voice”

R Berkowitz

11. Talking To The Person Next To You

If you’re one of those people that says things like “you know me, I’ll talk to anyone”, then I hope to never have to sit next to you on a long flight.

“Talking nonstop to your obviously disinterested seat mate the entire flight about your **** ex wife and how terrible she is and what a great and successful guy you are.”

Patty Ellis

12. Being Too Fat

Tricky one this, and your size may be outside of your control, but the simple fact is nobody likes to be crammed in.

“For me, the most annoying thing people do on an airplane applies to a very select group of people–those who are wider than their seats, and who proceed to pull up the arm rest between us (without asking) and “flow” into my seat. I once spent 10 hours squashed against the window with 1/3 of my seat taken up by someone else’s thigh. Since then I have been much more assertive in insisting that the arm rest remain down. I paid for my entire seat!”

Wendy McIlroy

13. Dieing

May be not one of the most common problems, but it seems at least one person’s had this experience…

“Once the guy next to me died. I felt bad for him.”

Eric Jones

14. Hitting Everyone With Your Bag As You Board

What on earth do you need such a big bag for anyway!

“Having a shoulder bag stick out from the body so that when the person walks down the airplane’s center aisle, the side of the back hits everybody’s arm on the way through. There is at least 1 or 2 of these on every flight. If you are in seat 1C, you are bound to get bumped even more often because of people cutting the corner.”

15. Stopping At The Bottom Of The Steps As You Disembark

At what point did you think that stopping and blocking a right of way of people who’ve spent the last who knows how many hours trapped on a plane while you adjust your hand luggage was a good idea?

“Stopping right after you get off the plane to get the roller handle on your bag extended, nearly causing a multi-person pile-up behind you. These people tend to do the same thing at the top of an escalator. The people walking behind you don’t appreciate getting stopped in their tracks and then waiting for somebody to get their “roll on”…”

16. Rolling Your Carry On Luggage Down The Plane

As it says below — “It’s called carry on not a roll on”

“And while on that subject, It is called a “carry on” not a “roll-on”. If you can’t safely navigate that roll-on down the aisle, maybe it was just a little too big to be brought on the plane anyway. Even if it has a roller, carry it once on the plane, don’t make everybody wait on you as you get caught on seats on your way down the aisle.”

17. Being Too Eager To Board

The plane is not suddenly going to leave without you unless you stand within a metre of the gate. Just get out the way and wait your turn.

“Crowding around the door before your seating area is called. Why do people feel it is necessary to block the walkway to the jet way as soon as the plane starts boarding. Stand to the SIDE until your row/zone is called and everybody will get loaded faster. I can’t even count how many times I stood behind somebody thinking they were in line/queue to get on the plane only to find that they weren’t, they were just standing waiting for their zone to be called, so I had to try to squeeze around them to get in the “real” line to board.”

18. If You’re A Pilot, Keep The Commentary Relevant

I don’t need to be told we’re cruising at 30,000 feet more than once. I especially don’t need to be woken up to be told it.

“Pilots who insist on giving you the flight play by play. On occasional informative message is appreciated, but some pilots tend to ramble and well, frequent travelers are usually sleeping/reading/watching a DVD, or working on their computer and don’t need the constant interruption.”

Gary Fowler

19. Overdoing The Duty Free Perfume Testers

Perfume should add a delicate and seductive note to the air as you pass, not make the eyes water of the person next to you.

“Wearing a lot of perfume is at the top of my list. I have mild allergies which really clock in when flying, and maybe it is the recycled air. and after five or ten or fifteen hours of the same smell morphing, mingling — well, you get the picture. something mild or organic is considerate, but strong overpowering smells are really rude.”

Lisa Siegel

20. Using Other People’s Storage Space

Maybe we should introduce a rule that says if you can’t fit your luggage in your allocated space, you should be forced to have the rest on your knees for the entire flight.

“What annoys me the most is when people use other people’s (my) overhead space with their bulky belongings! That ticks me off no end. (And I’ve used only the most polite way of wording this gripe.)”

Betty Sheldon

21. Entertaining Yourself Noisily

Any continual noise you make on a flight is going to be annoying, so give it a rest.

“Overnight flights when one person in business class loudly shuffles his cards as he plays solitaire by himself, when everyone else is trying to sleep.”

Larry Hansen

22. When You’re Oblivious Other People Are Sleeping

Just wait until you try and sleep after you’ve kept your neighbors awake for the past few hours!

“On long night flights from U.S. to Europe, there always are some people who stay up all night talking,drinking, with lights on. Even with ear plugs, sleeping is impossible! Once, I woke up to find the white trash bleach blond in the seat behind me, with her red polished nails about two inches from my face. Yucck.”

Roselyn Fredricks

Based on the experiences of Mobal International Cell Phone users…

Share your vacation experiences using the only phone you can use in almost any country in the world. The Mobal World Phone is the best way to keep in touch with family, friends and colleagues.

If you have experienced anything annoying whilst on a airplane, then please share with us. Or if you’ve got any flight advice, just leave a comment below.

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