Isn't this precisely why "Tennessee Sippin' Whiskey", aka Jack Daniels was created?

I've read some of Pinworm's posts before: he meant every word :D

The parents are both inconsiderate and incompetent (the aisle of an airplane must be unbelieveably dirty.

I propose bringing back the olde tradition of "running the gauntlet."

Those mothers should have run the gauntlet 15 minutes prior to initial descent.

The airline should auction off socks full of marbles for interested passengers to rent for the event.

Other passengers could save less delicious parts of their airplane meals to throw at the culprits.

The guilty passengers would be responsible for clean up after landing.

This punishment should also be used for overhead bin hogs, those with BO, and those who play their music too loud.

noooooo...this image is now burnt into my brain...
(About time we had another "misbehaving children" thread, this is a nice one)

Drugging little Tarquin and his young sibling Reign-Beau so that the grown ups can get a bit of peace and quiet? I suggest you take that advice to the Travel With Children forum and see if you manage to escape in one piece :D

BTW, for the aisle-playing mommies, I would have happily started the bidding at $25 and would have gone up to $100 if I had been inconvenienced in my desire to hit the lavatory.

Drugging little Tarquin may work - but equally the 'drowsy makers' can have the complete opposite effect and turn them into hyper balls of electricity! It's why you should, should you be inclined, ALWAYS try the meds at home beforehand!!!

Personally I would take the risk and slip little Tarquin a mickey while mummy isn't looking - and frankly in this scenario, chances are pretty good that she won't be looking.

If he bounces off the walls then he bounces off the walls. It's a chance I'm willing to take :D

Newsflash - floors are dirty. @:-)

Were you thinking of eating off it, or something? :)

Not now. See Exbayern's post :p

I did SEA-ORD with a 3 year old who keeps to herself. Parent of a another kid wanted my kid to play with her kid in the bulkhead of E+. granted it would have affected her legroom. I declined. So she offered the aisle so I could watch my kid if that was what I was afraid of. I declined again. Ten min later her kid is running screaming up and down the aisles after a passenger dumped water on the kid by accident after we hit turbulence. My kid was contently watching The Lion King on my iPad with headphones on. Yet again I'm also one of those parents who keeps my kid occupied on a flight and out of the way of fellow passengers. Heck. I've even bought passengers a drink if my kid unconvinced them in any way. Last flight kid kept kicking the seat in front of her for like 5 minutes. I bought the guy a drink since he was obviously annoyed.

Planes used to have double the staff. FAs carry more workload than ever before. The reality with airline budgets, the FAs tend to focus on service delivery, and may genuinely do not know that there is a problem until a few minutes later. Generally, the FAs ime will address the problem in full detail once it comes to their attention.

An Airplane is a public space...all dogs should be on leashes.

I had one of those on my flight last week. Guy wearing a muscle shirt, fully-exposed armpits, blasting music out of his cell phone. Spent the whole flight chewing on a toothpick, including when he fell asleep. The woman in front of me had her bare feet propped up on the bulkhead.

For 50 bonus points, what city was I departing?

Me thinks that your cellmate, a 400-pound guy nicknamed "Tiny," will have you bouncing off the walls, the bed, etc. I'm a generous guy, so I'll send you a rope to hang your soap.

As much fun as these threads about kids are (and let's not kid ourselves, inconsiderate parents do some stupid things), I've had far more issues with idiot grown-ups than kids.

Mike

By accident. Uh-huh.

Floors are dirty - whether they are airplanes, airports, playgrounds, or any other place a child plonks itself. I think most past generations survived, I don't recall any parents telling us off for sitting on the ground places - in fact, it was the norm in a lot of places (school assemblies for example). Those floors were shockingly filthy at times (one hall had a serious air circulation problem and we would have grey butts when we stood up from the dust on the floor!)