USO TOUR 2010 - DAY 1

Naughty By Nature, Sway & The Wonder TwinZ
Africa & The Persian Gulf

At what point do you finally start to say, “Enough is enough”?

I’m sitting on my ass for the fifteenth hour.  Only two or maybe three more hours to go until I finally reach my destination.  I knew what I was getting myself into when I agreed to take this trip but it’s reaching that point where enough is enough.  The human body can only take an airplane seat for so long.  This morning I woke up and boarded a flight to Africa.  Three planes and fifteen hours later I’m almost there.  If I never sit on another plane again it would be too soon.  Who am I kidding… I’ll be doing this same routine again in a few days.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining.  I’m so excited about this trip that I could hardly wait to begin, yet still, we all eventually reach our limits.

We started on Delta Airlines in business class from New York.  Almost seven hours later we landed in Amsterdam and got off to switch planes.  Next up, we flew six hours to an unspecified city in Africa.  So far, this was all cool, we had Delta business class, my seat laid flat and I was not crammed into a coach seat.  Now here’s where it switches up a bit.  For the last leg of the flight we switch to a small airline.  It’s always the airlines that I never heard of, that scare me a little.  It’s not a bad airline.  The waitresses are very nice and in 1980, I’m sure this bad boy was a top of the line jet!!!  But today, in 2010, after sitting through two flights in “real” business class with all the room and amenities in the world, I may possibly have gotten a bit spoiled there for a minute, because the stains on these walls, the single armrest to fight over and the seat that leans back two inches, feel more like a glorified coach seat than anything else.  To top that off, I was thinking that we had one last flight and we were done but apparently they forgot to tell us that we would be stopping in another country real quick to let a few people off.  We were, thankfully, allowed to stay on the plane while we made our pit stop, but with a plane still full of people they bring on the cleaning crew.  WTF?  Vacuums, brooms, spray cleaner and all.  It just seems strange as I sit here right now.  I’m overly tired but unable to sleep anymore, I’m antsy and ready to get the hell off of this plane but yet I still gotta raise my feet off the floor so this guy in an orange vest with his loud vacuum can clean under my feet.  Maybe it’s just me, maybe i'm just getting tired of being tired.

Either way, I think I can safely say we’re almost there.  Just squeeze these last few new-comers onto the plane, pump some air in the tires, clean the grass off the propellers and wait for the pilot to finish his cigarette.  I ‘m not one to complain and I know it sounds like i'm doing just that right now, but there definitely comes a point when you say enough is enough.  By this time tomorrow morning, I will be waking up in an undisclosed location with the US military, excited and ready to entertain the troops once again.  This is what we came for and this is what we are all looking forward to.

Uh oh… tray tables up, electronics off… we are off once again.  Gotta go….