Quoting Tracy R Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
So we all pay. And if you are especially overweight and cannot reasonably fit in one seat (and who hasn't sat next to that person?) they can charge you for the seat beside you and leave it empty. It isn't fair for the other passenger to have your flab falling over into their lap. Especially on a 15 hour flight to, oh, say, VIETNAM.
As a fat bastard myself.. I've always felt bad and made it MY responsibility to make sure this doesn't happen. I've been avoiding flying as much as I can, like driving to/from SF for a few LinuxWorld conf's vs flying. Planning to vacation next summer though when I should be down a lot more. Those that try to deny it's a problem because of their size are selfish and sometimes a little stupid about it, if you ask me.
I was surprised to find that some airlines (like Delta, at least a couple years ago) basically had zero policy for these cases. You basically just wedged in there. Southwest had the best policy if you ask me: if you didn't fit easily into a seat (basically the arm rests had to be able to lower all the way) you were required to book a 2nd seat. However, if the plane wasn't full, you would get a refund on the 2nd seat. They gave you a special 2nd boarding pass to leave on the seat next to you to reserve it too. One time that work put us on Delta and the flight was full when I called (the person who did the reservations said they asked and the airline had no policy so she didn't bother doing anything) I paid the difference to bump myself to 1st class (was really cheap actually, since it was full) to save myself and another person, from being uncomfortable. Was nice being up in 1st class again too. :)
BTW, I'm tired of being a fat bastard and have been back on a program to lose the weight and am committing more this time. Already down a nice chunk. I did pretty well about 10 years ago and kept most of the weight off, but then gained it (and then some) back when my career took off and I was putting in 60-80 hour weeks (minimum) for 8+ years. I'm past that.. so that won't happen again. Finally realized it wasn't worth it anymore when I was neglecting my health, well there were other issues too, but I'm not going into that here.
-- Mike Marion-Unix/Linux Admin-http://www.miguelito.org "Thanks for inquiring, the spell chicker works fine." --Computer Stupidities http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
