1. iPod and Bose headphones -- listen to the music and transport somewhere else.

2. Occasionally, watch movies on the laptop.

3. Stare out the window and watch the world go by. Enjoy the occasional interesting phenomena -- thunderstorms, aurora, mountain peaks, etc.

4. Look at the AirShow map from time to time.

5. Drink. Drink. Drink.

Read!

And it can't be old books that have been around the house for ages. New, expensive books make the time pass much quicker.

If i'm luckey, i'm poking at IFE. If not, I usually do some sudoku, and now I am the proud owner of a Nintendo DS. I have also resorted to using my laptop to play games a few times.

I often just sleep. Nothing like landing to wake you up - better then coffee if you need to hit the ground running.

As for talking - I don't like talking to people i don't know, i really don't like talking to people i do or don't know about nothing, and i really hate people I don't know talking loudly behind me about nothing.

Crosswords, "This American Life" podcasts, the Airshow, and sleep.

Forty winks
 

Sleep or read the New Yorker. I save them.

I can drift off to sleep on a one-hour flight from SFO-LAX.

Otherwise, overnight, I take Ambien and snooze for around 7 hours.

Plan ahead.

I always buy a USA Today newspaper and the most recent (or two) People magazine. I never read the magazine except when I'm flying.

I Read, do crosswords, word search, chat with FAs I know, or I just watch the world go by outside the window.

Now how can you do that on an international flights where you're can't raise your window shade?:D

Well, I do 98% of my flying on QX and they don't have window shades on their Dash-8-Q400s :D

drink, movies, drink, movies, drink, sleep, brekky, plane lands, cab home, bed.

This a LH LAX AKL SYD

read, ipod, knit

I do most of the things mentioned upthread, but like someone with ADD--that is I cycle activities ever 10-30 minutes (except movies). While it may sound strange or irrelevant, I find that constant rotation keeps each distraction fresh and I feel less like I'm trying to kill time.

Drink/Movie > Sleep.

Before a long international flight I download about 12 hours of my favorite radio shows podcasts, read newspapers and books, drink and sleep.

Movies, read, look out window, drink, sleep.