Airport Fun

My job used to require me to fly A LOT. We are talking 2-3 flights a week on a regular basis. That has slowed down tremendously in the last 2 years. It is a rare occasion now that I have to fly. I became very good at going to the airport; it was almost annoying to travel among rookies as they slowed everything down! These rookies and their rookie mistakes still bother me when I have to fly but that is another topic. Nothing bothers me more at the airport than the actual airline company US Airways. Southwest is my airline of choice. By far, the nicest employees and almost always on time. I have only been on a handful of US Airways flights that have been on time. This last Thursday/Friday were no exception. In fact my Friday flight came in almost 30 minutes early. How do you do that? I had to stand outside waiting for my ride to pick me up because I was so early. Anyways, my flight was about to begin boarding so the usual crowd rushes up to the podium-even though US Airways boards in zones anyways-so it doesn't really matter if you rush up to the podium because you are probably in zone 19 anyways. When the woman began announcing boarding, this is what she said, "At this time we are pre-boarding for flight 396 with non-stop service to Ontario. We will begin boarding 1st class passengers, passengers who need assistance, passengers traveling with children under 5, Elite members, Silver members, gold members, Mastercard lifetime card holders, and Visa Signature Select members." What?? I thought the list was never going to end. And why is it that someone with a Visa Signature Select Card is more important than my Visa Business Card (well, maybe it's because my card is through Southwest, but still). Next, they began boarding Zone 1. I was Zone 2. I was in seat 6A. However, by the time I boarded the flight was half full and there was no luggage space above my seat. I had to put it further back which makes it very difficult to retrieve when trying to depart the plane after landing. Ridiculous.