Originally Posted by
dimramon
After I settled in my seat, I noticed a guy standing somewhere around 23E. He was looking around and was accompagnied by a wife and a few kids.
In the meantime, a girl tried to sit down in 23F or G. The guy pointed at her and said: "Wait, don't sit down yet, you may need to sit elsewhere cuz we want to sit together". The girl just looked at him and said: "Oh, ok..."
How would you react to that? I don't think I would do too well with an approach like that.
Me: As I take my seat, "You're mistaken." Headphones out and ignore him.
When I flew ORD-SJC a week and a half ago a women with a young daughter told me to move from 3A to 2C so she could sit with her daughter. I did not like her tone, but politley asked her to ask 2D to switch instead. Because the girl was only four or five, I would have switched had 2D refused, but I shudder at the entitlement mentality of so many flyers.
Me: As I take my seat, "You're mistaken." Headphones out and ignore her.
I would not have switched. Next time, she'll know to book seats together if that's what she needs. As we used to say in the aerospace industry, "The lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine."
ORD-JAX: This time I am sitting in 4C. 3A and 4A/B are occupied by family with the most cracked out, ADD, screaming child EVER (I could dedicate an entire thread to this kid but thats another story). 3B is an older businessman who is not happy to be dealing with "Damian the Omen".
I'm not quite sure what this kid was doing. If it was really that bad, i.e. the kid was out of control, I'd call over the FA/Senior/Purser/Captain (in that order) and say, "This kid is a safety hazard as well as a nuisance. Either it goes, or IDB me, but I can't sit next to that."
Originally Posted by
drummingcraig
Mom stuffed her huge duffel bag underneath her seat eating up much of my legroom. She also instructed all three kids to do the same. Even though I didn't speak up about it I had no qualms over using her bag as a nice footrest!^
Originally Posted by
jimglot
If she had done that one to me, it would have been "off with the socks" Once she got a good look at these puppies’s she would have headed for the bin. They look more like they should be pull’n salmon out of the river!!
I understand that different people respond to these entitlement-demanding impositions in different ways, but I don't think passive/aggressive accomplishes much. Be vocal about it -- make it clear that what they're doing is rude and unacceptable.