UA 427 BOS IAD 0719 0901 319 6F

Shady-side bulkhead, my favorite seat, including in F,
provided the middle stays empty. I slept through this
flight, took SuperShuttle to Bethesda, did some paperwork,
and then out of there.

UA 822 IAD BOS 1656 1833 752 13F
was 898 2210 2338 752 9A

I finished my errands way early and wanted to get out of
town, so I got SuperShuttle to pick me up 6 hours early.
Put myself on standby and became #1, but people kept
mysteriously clearing ahead of me. Ah, well, I got the
hated row 13 seat with no window, which was fine, as all
I wanted to do was drink and sleep. Had a Courvoisier in
plastic. My coupon was accepted. Snoozed.

Heard Tavi Ungerleider play a Beethoven sonata, then the
first Britten suite, then the Suite Italienne. He did a
fantastic job, and he's only 16. Someone rather tactlessly
asked my friend Marcus and me whether we were that good
at that age. I answered in the negative. Marcus didn't
deign to give a direct response, only mentioning that in
the orchestra he was in in high school, Perlman was in the
back of the first violin section, and Zukerman was in the
second violin section. This kid (and his twin brother Oren)
will go far unless he wants to become a doctor or something.

US1839 PVD CLT 1655 1909 E90 2F

Check-in took 30 seconds and security 5 minutes. A chatty
TSA person. I ended up with hours to kill, so I went to
Johnny Rocket's for a decent burger (in the In-n-Out well-
done thin patty way); as you can't get a beer here, I took
the burger to Wolfgang Puck's bar, where they let me chow
down provided I buy a beer, which I did, more than one
20-oz Sams. The combo is killer, and it's a pity one has
to do shenanigans to enjoy it. Turns out WP has a burger,
too, at twice the price, though the waiter allowed as mine
smelled pretty darn good.

Boarded early; pushed back (all pax apparently accounted
for) 12 early; took off a few early. Full F cabin on the
Embraer E190, which is an okay aircraft except for the
tiny A-side overheads. Some guy in 1D took up not only
the row 1 bin but also almost all of the row 2 bin (I
squeezed my laptop bag up there but had to manhandle my
rollaboard under the seatback in front of me.

A glass o' red was not what I expected it to be. It had
plums and lots of pineapple, a touch of Sonoma-ish beeswax.
Turned out to be Carta d'Imbarco Barbera. I hate to say
this, as this is a quintessentially mediocre wine, and US
is a quintessentially mediocre airline, but this stuff is
better than what UA serves. Through some odd alchemy it
makes Biscoffs taste as though they have eggs in them,
which they don't.

Snoozed some more. We were in clouds pretty much throughout
the flight, so there was nothing to look at anyhow.

I enjoyed the attitude of the FA and gave him an A&B.

Landed a little early, and I had time to stuff my face at
Bojangles, where the chicken, though fresh, was inadequately
seasoned, and the dirty rice was made with pork sausage.

US 311 CLT PHX 2010 2157 320 11C was 5A

My upgrade didn't clear. Though my boarding pass was
rejected with a chime, the agent smoothly processed me
through, so much for those hopes. The guy in B tried to
move me to a middle seat to sweeten a seat trade so he
could sit with his wife. I told him that I didn't want
to sleep in the middle seat, as I would likely flop over
and have to annoy one of my seatmates, whereas if I flopped
into the aisle, that wouldn't be quite so bad. He came back
with the offer that he would switch out with an attractive
young woman, and I could flop over on her, but I demurred.

Exit row is kind of nice and would be my first choice, but
perhaps not on a full full flight as this one was.

The flight was ovenlike - I'd say at least 90F, with the
vents blowing scirocco at us. Apparently, when they tried
to adjust the climate, F and the rear of the plane became
polar, while we remained tropical. I actually drank water
on this flight, that's how bad it was. Got a couple hours'
sleep only.