A few additions to this node to help you deal with a long boring flight and not feel like
hell on earth when you arrive, from someone who has flown too often and too far.
Bring two
books. Bring three. Otherwise you'll finish one, and hate one, and be stuck with nothing to do. Running out of reading material on a sixteen hour flight is no fun. Airline magazines will not entertain you.
Bring a
game or three. Load up your laptop or palm pilot with games. (You can even get the original Adventure game in palm format now.) Put headphones on, so you don't piss people off with the bleeps and plinking noises of the game.
Air rage is not a pretty thing.
Bring a
notepad or
writing paper, and draw
caricatures of your fellow passengers and send them to your best friend. Write a letter, a real one, in ink. Make up crazy stories about the very annoying tall person in the row in front of you, and get your revenge for the way he puts his seat back so far that it's scraping your nose.
Try to remember all the
poetry that you were made to learn in junior school. Amuse youself with memories of that teacher with really bad curly nasal hair who mocked your pronunciation when you were reciting what you had learned. Regret, for a moment, that you didn't have an old-fashioned education and thus several volumes of memorised text to amuse you. Attempt to write a rude
limerick that features someone from your destination. Go back to your book.
See how many languages you can count in. See how many languages you can swear in.
Move. Walk around as much as you can.
Wiggle in your seat. Twirl your feet. Don't sit still. The risks of
thrombosis are mugh higher if you are completly static. Also, walking up and down the aisles means you get to see what everyone else is up to, and how foolish they look with their fuzzy masks on. This helps with the caricature drawing.
Try very hard not to think about how much you want a
cigarette. Wish that you had remembered to buy
nicotine patches.
Don't drink any
alcohol. Yes, it's tempting, and it's fun to get that instant buzz from lowered tolerance, and it's free, and it helps you fall asleep, but you will pay for it later. The effects are heightened, and you are more likely to get a socking hangover than you would on the ground. You will get more
dehydrated than usual, and it can have a bad impact on
jetlag.
Avoid
fizzy drinks. You'll get all bloaty. It's something to do with the pressure in the cabin. Stick to still water or juices.
Make sure you are not wearing tight shoes. If you are, don't even think of taking them off because you'll never get them back on. Drinking
tomato juice, or eating
bananas, can help with preventing swelling up. It's something to do with the
potassium.
Don't wear
foundation. Or, strip if off when you get on the plane, and then slather your face with
moisturiser unless you want your face to fall off.
Don't wear
tights, or any nylony things close to your skin. You'll feel all prickly and revolting after about six hours in the air.
If you are on a long flight, and need to be smart at the other end when you arrive, pack some comfy saggy cotton clothes in your
handbaggage, and change as soon as you get on the plane. Ask the
cabin crew if they will hang up your suit (or smart stuff). Even if you are not in business class, they will often oblige. Otherwise, fold it up and put it in the over head locker. You'll be less crumpled, less smelly, and far more presentable this way.
Drink more water.
Brush your teeth before you arrive to avoid that bottom of the budgie cage feeling.
Sleep. If you can.