The Ten Commandments of Air Travel

(This is no doubt going to piss some people off. Oh, well. Isn’t that what Tuesdays are for?)

I’ve adhered to many of these rules for a while now, and I figured they were common knowledge. But the more I travel, the more I realize that they most certainly aren’t. So please forgive the obviousness of some of these edicts, but they must be stated. And with that, I give you the Ten Commandments of Air Travel:

1. Thou shalt do all thou can to hold in thou’s farts. If thou really can’t contain thine own flatulence, thou canst either get up and release it in the bathroom, or at the very least turn on thy little overhead fan thingy.
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2. When other people are trying to sleep, and thou has a window seat, thy little plastic curtain shalt be lowered so that the blinding light of the sun does not shine directly in the faces of other passengers.
   

   Thou should not do as this man hath done.

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3. Thou should store only one bag directly above in the overhead compartment, and the other bag should be placed underneath the seat in front of thou. I’m sorry if that gets in the way of thine legroom, but those are the rules. Thou should have thought about that before lugging all of thine crap onto the plane as carry-on luggage.
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4. Thou shalt be forgiving and patient with crying babies, for they are in pain and in need of sympathy. (Thou can totally feel free to get angry at any of the following: bratty children who art old enough to know better, drunken frat boys, and anyone who speaketh so loudly, they can be heard from more than three rows away).
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5. Thou shalt not bring really stinky food onto the plane, if thou can help it. I understand that thou is hungry, but that stuff is going to stink up the cabin for the next three hours. Seriously. I don’t know how thou can eat that stuff.
   

   Thy food is odoriferous.

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6. Flight attendants are not thine own personal slaves. They should be treated with respect and kindness because they work really damn hard and don’t need thou giving them a hard time or hitting on them.
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7. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s arm rest. Unless, of course, thou is seated in the unholy and accursed middle seat, at which point thou gets to use both armrests, because that’s only fair.
   

   Also, thou should keep thy unkempt toes to thyself.

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8. If thou hast an aisle seat, thou shalt get up without complaint when others in thine row need to pee.
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9. Thou should really be able to lift thine carry-on into the overhead compartment by thyself. If thou really needs help with that sort of thing, perhaps thou should have packed more lightly.
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10. Thou shalt not kill.

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