Embarassing Porn Threat
I took MonkeyBoyBlue to Amsterdam for his stag doo in 2003 - we spent many nights unable to find our own arses with both hands and off our mash. Smoking all we could in my favorite haunts, crawling back to our digs using our eyebrows - you get the picture.

Close to the end of our stay and in a very stoned frame of mind, I bought some DVD filth to watch with my missus when I got home.

Cut to Schiphol airport for the flight home, still stoned, pre check-in. I go through my bag to find my passport and find three DVDs in large, oversized boxes. I suddenly get embarassed and very paranoid and run off to the toilets where I take the dvds out of their boxes and put them in my cd wallet.

So instead of putting them in the bin, leaving them on the toilet floor or being sensible and leaving them in my luggage because they were just vanilla porn and nothing to be embarrassed about; the boxes were put in a black plastic bag and stuffed behind the pan of the toilet. Wise move and embarassment free!

I left the toilet, met up with MonkeyBoy Blue and stood in the line to check my luggage in, standing sweating with paranoia, what had I done? I've just gone into the toilets with my duffel bag, been in there for ages and come out having left a black plastic package stuffed behind the toilet pan...... FUCK! WHAT HAVE I DONE! They have increased global airport security after 11/9 - I'm screwed.

I stood in the snaking line waiting to check in for the flight and get through to the departure lounge, sweating, looking nervously around me - looking about as guilty and conspicuous as I could - or was it just the paranoia?

I got through to passport control, sweating like a porker in a pie shop, was scrutinised by a Dutch giant and then ushered on to have my shrapnel and phone x-rayed and a squealing wand stuck in my armpits and butt-crack.

Then the airport alarm went off, sirens wailed, radios had people shouting - and I was pushed through to the departure lounge before security barriers came down. The whole front of the airport was apparantly shut down whilst the bomb squad came to investigate.

And I ran - like a nutter. Through to the boarding gate where I sat and chain smoked trying to hide until we boarded and finally flew home to find that the dvds were an utter load of shite - American vanilla porn, badly edited and dubbed in German.

So the moral of this story is.... Don't buy porn when you're so stoned that you couldn't find your arse with both hands!
(Catchag "You know!....For Kids!", Fri 10 Mar 2006, 10:09, Reply)

Achtung Spitfire!
On a number of occasions, I ended up doing some work in Nuremberg with a colleage. One time around, he phoned me (this pre-dates all but the rich 'yuppie' types having mobiles) and asked me to pick his passport up from his desk in the office and meet him at the station to travel down to Heathrow. I got to the office, and there was no passport there. With no way of contacting him, I couldn't tell him until we met to catch the train.

Quite amazingly, while there were a few difficulties, we actually managed to get him on the flight and through immigration at the other end (our local contact there had to vouch for him.) They taught him how to tell people "I have forgotten my passport" in German so that he could relay the details of the amusing incident to all and sundry. Later on, he discovered that he'd actually been saying "I have eaten my passport."

The return journey was more fun though. When asked (polite chit-chat) by one of the staff at Nuremberg airport who we were flying with, he promptly answered "Luftwaffe." I was stuck with the cringemaking task of having to correct him "I think you mean Lufthansa."

The only other remotely interesting incident I can think of was when a plane I was on suddenly aborted its approach to Liverpool airport and went for another lap before landing. We were practically on the ground when it happened, so it was a little unnerving. The pilot gave us the reason in the end - another plane on the runway. Erm... I think I'll take the bus next time.

And nothing to do with flying, but if anyone says the Germans don't have a sense of humour, they're lying. I told the owner of the company I was working for the "4.2 litre Jaguar" joke (long story short - hedgehog has lost his willie, keeps asking all the animals if they've seen it, describing it as 'about this big with four spikes on the end.' A jaguar finally owns up to having eaten it because 'I'm a four point tool eater jaguar.') This bloke thought it was a great joke and told it to everyone he met, except that in his version, it was a 3.6 litre Jaguar.

Okay, so they're crap stories. I don't fly that much.
( Horatio P Lemming, Fri 10 Mar 2006, 9:45, Reply)

Who are you?
When I was ten or so, my dad used to work in Libya and Saudi for six months and come home for two weeks. Basically, this meant I got loads of cool 'guilt junk'.

One time I remember my mum and me patiently waiting for him at the airport. I spotted him at the arrival lounge and followed him to the phones, all the time wondering why he was smiling at me in an odd way.

I followed and followed until we go to the phones. "Who are you calling?" I asked.

"My family." he replied.

The git had forgotten who I was. Hey-ho - at least I got some more cool guilt junk.
(Ted P 8 0 M F G 6 0 1 0 4 7 3 6 5 +, Fri 10 Mar 2006, 8:52, Reply)

CDG
Coming back from a holiday in France, 2004, we had to book in at Charles De Gaul Airport. I should have seen this as an omen as he was an anglophobe, especially as Churchill basically wouldn't trust the vain cheese eating surrender monkey as far as he could throw him.

Anyway, went to the desk early and asked if we could get 6 adjacent seats, so me, the missus, the 2 nippers and the inlaws could all sit in the same row.

"Mais oui!" our pox scarred, rim licking, checkin clerk replies, "it would be my pleasure"

The garlic eating, butt hole surfer only gave us 6 windows seats down the left hand side of the plane; 10a 11a 12a 13a 14a 15a!!!

Remind me why we liberated these cnuts?

edit: pearoast from Jobsworths but WTF!
( Fire & Forget it's the only way to be sure, Fri 10 Mar 2006, 7:47, Reply)

Soooooo many... NOT.
As a guitarist in two rather good rock bands, I, funnily enough, don't have many good airport stories. Which is odd, since I spent most of 12 years in the fucking places.

My favourite image, though, is of our drummer and bassist being so fucked up from the fun the night before in Tokyo that they decided that the floor of Narita airport was the ideal place to crash out. Cue Japanese men in uniforms and with machine guns waiting to escort them onto the plane... 'Not our problem now, Guv...'. They were both fine until they woke up. They then proceeded to be complete arses until we got back to Heathrow.
(redthing, Fri 10 Mar 2006, 0:54, Reply)

Edinburgh Airport, 1999
Was in the newsagents browsing the magazines when I spotted One Foot in the Grave star Richard Wilson. After briefly perusing the newspapers, he strode up to the counter and, in his perfect narked-off-old man voice, said, "Haven't you got any Guardians?". They didn't.

Perfect time to bring out the "I don't beleeeeve it!" catchprase, you'd think, particularly as I was standing right behind him... However, I didn't. Why? Well, the very night before I'd watched the Father Ted episode when Ted creeps up on Richard Wilson, says the catchprase and gets twatted by the great man as a result... Definitely a missed opportunity though.
(silencer, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 21:01, Reply)

Madeira
Madeira (Funchal) has, or at least had, one of the shortest runways I know of. Basically if you don't stop in time it just drops off into the sea and the plane basically has to take off again. I think that's pretty well known about.

JFK on the other hand, has four very long runways. On my flight into JFK in 1999 the plane didn't stop in time, took off again, and tried to land - I don't know how common this is.

On my way home from NYC with the college group I was with, I somehow managed to go through checkin before anyone else. About an hour before, which is odd, as they were right behind me in the queue and claim there were no unforeseen holdups. Whether I skipped a step and took a shortcut, I still don't know.Either way, I spent the time thinking I was booked in for the wrong flight but yet not having the guts to ask.

These stories are pretty crap. Sorry. The truth is I hate flying and avoid it as much as possible. I'm flying again in May (first time in five years) and am dreading it.

Hug me.
(Captain Skippy pooed in a bag and left it on your doorstep, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 18:13, Reply)

Brad Pitt anyone?
My sister and I were on a flight to San Francisco and I was writing a letter to my friend. I began describing the people on the plane, starting with the nun, then moving on to the lady with pants so tight that her legs sprung apart when she tried to cross them, and then ending at the guy sitting next to my sister.
I looked at his arms first because they were really really big... I was very impressed. Then I looked at the magazine he was reading, which happened to be Vogue. Then I looked at his hair and his sunglasses and found that they looked very familiar...but I didn't know why. We talked to him a little and almost spilled our drinks on him. Once we were off the plane a saw a magazine and realized who I sat next to. It was none other than Brad Pitt!
I was very embarrassed that I hadn't recognized him, but I think that was a welcome relief to him.
(celestie d'etoile, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 17:06, Reply)

shit !
well someone i kno is an air hostess so she has a few good stories but one of the best had to be this one man.
this man was on the plane flying to florida and he got up out of his seat to go to the toilet. well after about 15 minutes the man leaves the toilet.
the next person goes into the toilet and sees basically shit all over the floor and up the walls. air hostesses figure it must be the man so as they go to his seat he is already heading for the other toilet on the plane.
they didn't reach him so he basically shits up the other toilet. long story short the man and his wife had to scrub shit off the wall. what a great start to a holiday for them
(torture bunny lives under the kitchen sink, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 16:58, Reply)

Ahhhh
This year, me and mrs maddave were booked on a flight to sunny Greece. We had tickets, we had passports, we had luggage. What more could you need to get on your flight to Greece. We calmly queued for 1.5 hours at Gatwick where we were served by the grumpy Greek man. He took our tickets for our flight to Greece, read them, taped on the computer, booked our luggage in, and then wrote on the boarding card the time we should be at the gate. "Many thanks" we hollered to the hairy baffoon as we walk away looking forward to the hour of duty free shopping. "but wait", my darling mrs maddave squeels, "the boarding card time he has said is an hour after our flight is meant to leave!". Hmmm... yes that is a strange pickle. I take a goosey gander at the boarding card. Oh yes thats the problem. "He's only booked us on the wrong fucking flight! We're now going to cyprus!" How the hell can you get booked on the wrong flight when your tickets say GREECE!

So our bags are now whisking their merry way to the Cyprus plane and we have to leg it to the gate since we took 30 minutes trying to sort it all out at the checkin again! Never fly with Thomson. Thank god the holiday was free....
(maddave, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 16:56, Reply)

many flights, no time
1. Coming into New York for a two-month 'holiday' (read: trying to get a job and a visa from the inside out), I had to fill in an immigration form. I did this. As I got to the desk I realised I'd failed to fill in the back section, where you tick (or not) boxes admitting to membership of pinko subversive organisations, have a pocketful of semtex on you and dislike cheese. Nick pen off fellow passenger and fill this in. Hand it over to the nice man. Blag the 'holiday' story with the official. Smugly get through.
As some of you may (or not) recall, my big claim to fame (until something better turns up) is that I was in NY during September 11. Which promptly happens. Report self as not dead to the British Embassy, as I'd heard you were meant to.
Discover when I'd dragged myself off the plane back in Blighty, having failed to stay, that had 9/11 not happened and the company I worked for had been able to sponsor me (teh US stopped giving out visas the same day), that the card I'd filled in but had quite stupidly forgot to actually sign would therefore have resulted in quite potentially a long night in the clink and deportation. Jolly good.

2. Flight aged 13 back from Portugal on my own (ooh, exciting), MASSIVE storm over London. A small irritating child next to me (American. I wish I could say differently, but I bet you knew it even before I wrote it) has been bashing me with toy locomotives etc for an hour. As we circle London, slowly we can see the epicentre of the storm. I kid you not, it looked like a mushroom cloud. Plane starts to sound like it's breaking apart. Kid crashes two toy cars into each other repeatedly, shouting loudly "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEEEEEE!!!!!"
Kill it hard.
We did land safely though, if a bit shaken.

3. My brother. Where to begin. So many stories. I still like the time he got stopped coming into the States after the scanner beeped. He was 14, but they still took off his belt, shoes, and most importantly here, his watch. He didn't beep the second time.
What made us laugh once outside the airport is the fact the watch handled and approved by the men with guns was an official Russian Airforce watch my dad had smuggled out of Russia, and at the time tensions were briefly back up between the two countries. My brother is tall, broad shouldered, blonde, blue-eyed, chisel-featured, and couldn't look more Russian Military if he TRIED. He also looked about 30 even as a 15 year old.
Just a few seconds more attention from the yank with an AK-47 and we would have been in for a long night.

I will post the funnier ones another time. I have none right now.

TA!
(niceandwarmandhot vive la résistance, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 16:13, Reply)

LAX
I'm just back from Oz and, on the way back, had to stop over in LA. (oooh - you globetrotter you!).

As I got off the plane for a 4 hour stopperover I was gasping for a fag. So I lugged my baggage about a mile to terminal 6 where the only smoking area in the entire pigging airport is. And when i got there it was fucking closed. As there was rain forcast!!!

Cue Legless having a monumentual tantrum in LAX.
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 15:11, Reply)

Upper deck on 747's
anyone else seen the BA cabin crew stuff rags around the doors to stop what I assume was condensation..
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:16, Reply)

Dumped
I had an on and off relationship with a girl over five years or so.

She went on a year long round the world trip during which she sent me two postcards (that should have been the clue).

She dumped me when I met her at the airport. I think I have posted about this before. If so I'm sure I mentioned she had a big nose.
(Wascally Weasel now with 100% fewer jokes., Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:16, Reply)

LAX
Was the first airport I landed where two runways where in use at once for landing.

Amazing watching another plane seemingly a few yards away racing for the runway LOL
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:14, Reply)

Qwak!
I once went to meet a friend at Heathrow as she was coming back from NZ with a bunch of luggage.

I decided to do up one of those boards that very bored looking meeter/greeters wave hopefully at arrivals.

Mine said Qwak! in big letters and helpfully had a duck picture drawn next to it.

It's fun just standing there with a studied, bored expression as people look at it and go by.

I'm going back to the airport and making this a minor hobby. I think I'll have a board with "Gimp" on it next time.
(Wascally Weasel now with 100% fewer jokes., Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:12, Reply)

Another vote for CDG being worst airport in the world
Ahh yes Charles De Gormless airport. For those who know it, picture the long rubber walkways up to security/immigration. The queue for immigration stretched all the way back to the walkway. Cue a massive pile-up at the end of said walkway - what a mess!
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:04, Reply)

JFK
Chap in front of me was rummaging in his bag for something when one of the security guards came over and shouted at him. He had put the green immigration waiver form in his mouth and the guard was incensed !
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:02, Reply)

Heathrow
Went down the wrong section by accident - one where if you cross a line they have to re-check your passport and boarding cards.. a joked with the security guy saying it was a bit silly as I hadn't left the terminal. Twatmangle just glared at me and so I spent the next 15 mins going backwards and forwards over the line until he threatend to have me removed from the airport.
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 14:00, Reply)

Found my work colleagues..
.. had doctored my passport by putting a silly picture over the top of my photo, removed it before reaching heathrow

When I got to where I was going I called the office and got one of the locals to pretend to be an immigration official to wind them up saying I had been arrested. Very nearly got them to go to the australian embassy in London to post bail..
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:57, Reply)

Seoul airport (Kimpo)
Landed in Korea, got stopped by immigration and asked if I was their for business or pleasure..

said business and the fucktard said "it's 5.30pm too late for business"

I had to explain that I may actually go to a hotel and do some work in the morning..
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:53, Reply)

Some other airport..
..watch a mum carrying her baby over her shoulder.. little git then borked all down her back.. she didn't know and continued to pace the departure lounge..
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:51, Reply)

David Coulthard..
..me and a mate stood behind him at Lisbon airport making F1 engine and Murray Walker sounds.. he laughed..
( Signify, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:50, Reply)

Holy like swiss cheese
I was 9 (this was 1993) me and the family went to heathrow to welcome back my Grandma from her NZ holiday, me and my cousin thought it would be nice to let of some party poppers when she came through arrivals, cue 3 sub machine gun barrels pointing at my chest , a lot of shouting, and a little bit of wee coming out. I was royally in trouble for that one
(mcmadhatter, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:45, Reply)

Ski Trips
I have plenty of stories but a recent one of a mate is the best I've heard in a while.

Super cheap boarding holiday to Tignes, flight booked to Grenoble from Stanstead, car hire from Grenoble and parking pre paid in Tignes.
So the train breaks down to Stanstead, they miss check in by one minute, forcing them to rebook a flight leaving in 6 hours to Lyon. Ring the car hire up and get that swapped to Lyon. Arrive in Lyon and pick the car up, one them dosn't have his licence and the other dosn't have a credit card (lesson learnt - always have a credit card), so by this point they're pretty fucked off and hop in a taxi from Lyon to Tignes (£300!!) forfieting the carpark cash and the booking fee on the car hire. 7 days of shite boarding as it hadn't snowed for two weeks later their time to go home came, so it's a bus to the nearest town, and two trains to Grenoble. Unfortunately Grenoble airport is no-where near Grenoble (think London Stanstead without public transport!) so another taxi ride for 150ecus.

Another mate had a similar issue with transport to Tignes having got to Lyon a day late he finally convinced the coach firm to take him, and managed through the power of internation signs to get the coach driver to put some porn on as he was the only passsenger at the back.
Filth Bag
(GBDennis, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 13:29, Reply)

time zone stupidity
My girlfriend is beautiful, caring, witty, intelligent, smashing bottom etc. but sometimes, real shtoopid.

I never tire of reminding her of this one:

We were flying to Switzerland the night England were playing Switzerland in the Euro 2004. I managed to watch most of the first half in the departure lounge, but eventually they called us by name to get our arses to the departure gate.
I was pissed off because it was a pretty good match, so my girlfriend comes out with the classic "don't worry, you can watch it at the other end- they're an hour ahead so they'll still be playing when we land"

Just one more to add to the list of "Dana-isms" - where logic and speech are sundered.

Got time for another (off-subject) Dana-ism?
Good. When driving through Calais earlier this year she commented on how flat the landscape was. I said "that's because the Germans bombed the shite out of it in WWII. She nodded sagely and said "oh of course".
Actually, how about a QOTW - dumb things your partner has said?
( MontyyouterribleCUNT I gave Jeremy Kyle cancer, Thu 9 Mar 2006, 12:42, Reply)