UA 838 NRT SFO 1725 0920 744 15A Empower Y (sort of) Ch9 Y

Very good crew headed by a middle-aged fairly tall and
slim black guy.

There was a guy seated behind me who (to my defective eyes)
looked sort of like wireless - I tried to catch his eye, but
I guess he wasn't he.

to begin
Crabmeat salad on endive leaf, prosciutto ham with papaya,
vegetable sushi; balsamic vinaigrette

Fresh seasonal greens; creamy Caesar or soy vinaigrette

main course
Pan-seared filet mignon with Merlot sauce; new potato
wedges with herbs and green beans almondine

Chicken marinated with basil and chives with fire-roasted
red pepper sauce; lemon-scented rice pilaf and chunky
vegetable medley

Please advise the flight attendant if you prefer to have
sauce served on the side

Japanese Obento selection: An appetizer of sake-flavored
chicken with seaweed salad, sesame honey pork, scallop and
walnuts mixed with tofu, simmered sweet potato, plum-
flavored jelly fish and buckwheat noodles with braised
herring kanro-ni

A main course of salmon and shrimp with dengaku miso sauce,
taro potato and shiitake mushroom served with crabmeat,
eggplant, steamed rice and Japanese pickles. Served with
green tea. Items in this meal may contain traces of MSG.

The Obento was not so nice as I'd hoped (given that it was
out of Tokyo) but not nearly so nasty as last time I had it
(out of I think SFO).

Chicken: watery and tasteless, a largish serving considering
the magnitude of the meal. The salad had no seaweed in it
but was slivers of ordinary terrestrial vegetables.

Sesame honey pork was dry and tasteless, the serving the
size and perhaps the texture of a pair of i486 chips, if you
remember those.

The scallop-walnut thing was interesting: a hollowed-out
cherry tomato stuffed with blenderized tofu with a couple
walnut meats stirred in, topped with half a good, sweet
scallop and a tiny ingot of smoked salmon. Very nice.

The sweet potato tasted like honey and lemon and was very,
jarringly, sweet.

Plum-flavored jelly fish: a mess of preserved plum jam
with a strand or two of jellyfish. More texture than
taste I'd say.

Buckwheat noodles with braised herring kanro-ni were
surprisingly edible considering that I don't care for soba
and I don't care for herring. The noodles were a little too
wet, and the herring was a little too dry (and sweet), but
together they sort of went.

The salmon and shrimp were overdone almost to a crisp; I
think the ingredients had once been okay, and maybe (but I
doubt) they had been okay when they were boarded. About
3 oz of salmon and two 2-bite shrimp. The dengaku miso
sauce, which I've never had before, was like hoisin, only
not as fruity in taste - it was generously supplied and
lent its huge sweetness and not so huge personality to
everything in the compartment, including the "taro potato,"
which was made to taste just like a chestnut, the shiitake,
most of which I didn't eat as I was on the verge of another
nosebleed, and some stray vegetables - baby green beans
and a carrot coin, both woefully overcooked.

Crabmeat was represented in the form of one piece of leg
meat; okay, not exceptionally tasty.

The eggplant had been peeled and then slow-cooked to almost
a mush; it was fascinating. It also came with two pieces of
boiled okra that streamed mucus when picked up; also quite
interesting but perhaps not so appetizing.

Rice, wrapped in a bit of banana leaf or similar, was good,
especially when we took a few bumps and the stuff tried to
jump off my chopsticks.

Japanese pickles: eggplant, somewhat nasty (I don't know
how they managed to make eggplant into something I don't
like - it was acrid and bitter, almost as though they had
miraculously turned raw Japanese eggplant into raw American
eggplant); celery, somewhat nastier (I don't care for the
stuff except in small quantities as a flavoring); and
cucumber, impossible to eat.

There was another unadvertised compartment that contained
lotus root in soy and sugar - fair.

dessert
International cheese selection: Red Cheddar, Coulommiers

Eli's praline cheesecake

I passed on dessert (there's no Japanese dessert) and went
directly to sleep, do not pass go.

prior to arrival
Scrambled eggs, ham and cheese on waffle; Boursin cream
sauce

or

Fresh seasonal fruit plate with creamy yogurt

Surprisingly, I was roused by a whiff of garlic and had
breakfast. Surprisingly, it was exactly as described on the
menu. Surprisingly, it was decent although rather ugly in
appearance, a blob of soft-looking things on a waffle.

From the top down: a slice of green pepper lent a very
odd aroma and taste to the dish; the sauce and slice of
yellow cheese had sort of melted together; then there was
an unadvertised slice of tomato that actually tasted okay;
then your usual machine-made ham; then a slightly vanilla-
scented waffle, still crisp despite the weight of gooey
things on top of it. Peculiar but not really bad.

bseller had lent me a copy of March of the Penguins for the
flight, but unfortunately my Empower was wonky, so I relied
on battery power to draft this report instead (I think I
could not have gotten through the movie with the battery).

Drink service continued until about 15 minutes before
landing. At last call I asked for the names of the crew
for a letter to the 1K feedback line (does anyone know if
these letters go through?). Got charming handwritten notes
from both of them before landing; they must have some
practice in writing thank-you notes if they can dash them
off in 10 minutes while collecting cups and junk and making
sure everyone's seat belts were fastened, and so on.

It was pretty much how I would like C class to be: friendly
but neither obtrusive nor obsequious service; comfy seats
(I can hardly imagine seats that suit my back and my bum
better than UA's). It was in the food department that I
feel the offering fell down, even the Japanese meal trying
to make quantity up for quality.

Immigration and customs took about 10 minutes; then the
so-called elite security into SFO domestic, into which
the checkers were allowing all and sundry, was clogged
but only took maybe another 10 or 15. So I was in the RCC
to do my mail shortly after scheduled landing time.

UA 176 SFO BOS 1105 1937 752 2D Empower N Ch9 Y

Completely full flight. They were urgently soliciting
volunteers, but the offer was for the redeye arriving the
next morning at 8, and people didn't seem eager.

Decent though rather unfriendly crew (not just by contrast;
they biotched and moaned about certain of the pax within
hearing of the other pax).

A fairly bumpy ride coast-to-coast, but I was in a state
of somnolence from Courvoisier and whatever red rotgut they
were pitching, so I felt little or no pain.

The dinner offerings -

"Small pasta shells stuffed with cheese or short ribs."

The latter was a 6-oz slab of chuck pot roast in a
tomato-onion sauce - fairly tender, quite tasty, although
salty as anything. The sides were the mixed sweet and
regular potato thing that has become common and green beans
almondine. The sides had suffered from having been heated
in a too-hot oven: the potatoes tasted of scorched marjoram
and the beans were limp and soggy.

Also offered (no comments on these) -

Salad with buttermilk ranch or Asian sesame dressing

Sourdough or regular roll

Ice cream (vanilla and chocolate) with a cookie

Despite being put into the Gardner hold for a few turns we
landed on time.

UA 823 BOS IAD 1340 1527 733 1A

I was having trouble with the telephone service so went to
the airport a hair early to catch my e-mail. Shortish line
at security, but even so, they put me into the priority
line. Immediately a captain pushed past (not a big deal),
but three crew queued up obediently behind me. I said, you
guys go on ahead (one guy and two gals, all around my age);
the guy said thank you and forged ahead, and the others hung
back. I said, I'm using guys in the generic sense, whereupon
one of them chuckled and made a slightly witty remark and
went on ahead, the third continuing to hang back. It was
not a meaningful exercise, as the lane was cleared in like
five minutes. After a pleasant chat with the front desk
people at the club I had more than ample time for the e-mail
but was somehow unable to log into Flyertalk or my bank
website. Enhanced snacks at the RCC: Ruffles, Jelly Bellys,
Brach's fruit juice snacks, Piroulines, fresh fruit.

As I was in the dread row 1 I left early to snag
an overhead space; still, the F cabin was mostly full by
the time I got there, but there was still enough room.

The crew manning the plane turned out to be the ones I let
ahead at security, so that should be a practical lesson for
those who would exercise their elite passengerly powers
against uniformed intruders in the security line.

Asked for a Courvoisier - there wasn't any, and the lead FA
said she'd call to see if there was any in back. Negative.
As I was finishing my substitute (juice) she came back with
a nip. They lied, she said. So I got my drinkie after all.

Quite bumpy flight - apparently the winds were quite fierce.
The FAs were all pretty cheery, and the service - not just
to me - was attentive; matronly in the positive sense.

We landed within the on-time parameters despite heavy
headwinds.

Carol met me at New Carrollton, and we went to Duclaw's
for a burger and a beer. After a lot of seafood, rice, and
dumplings, a burger is a good thing.