Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems to me as though economy or "cattle class" air travel's gotten worse. Cramped, uncomfortable, and topped off with inedible food which you're supposed to eat with reconstituted wooden approximations to knife, fork and spoon (KFS). Maybe this is because about half of the plane is devoted to higher paying customers, Preferred Economy, Premium, Business and First, leaving little room for miserable, cheapskate cattle.
"Good business model," I thought, squeezed into a narrow chair, "Charge a premium for something everyone used to take for granted, like real cutlery and edible food, and let those who can't afford it sit at the back of the plane." A parable, if you like, for the middle class, which used to be able to afford a house in, say, London or Edinburgh, and now can't. Still, the flight wasn't bad and I passed the time reading Ursula Le Guin's excellent early sci-fi.
Before you can say City of Illusions, the plane lurched and settled onto the tarmac at DFW and off we went to meet our fate at customs. and baggage reclaim. All easy and quick, thanks to facial recognition tech which will not and cannot ever be used against us. And then onto the road outside Terminal D, departures.
What a contrast to Heathrow. All about the car, and there seemed a vitality or life to the thing, prosperity even, all kinds of movement, which made the UK airport experience seem somehow smaller, constricted and staid. In fairness, LHR has direct rail downtown and DFW doesn't, so I caught a fast cab run by a Nigerian who played Evangelical sermons throughout the trip on "forgiveness," very important.
Take note, forgiveness, if we would be forgiven, is key. Theological imperatives aside, I arrived at Dallas HQ in good time and that was that, holiday excursion to the UK at an end. And what had this recce patrol discovered?
That London's Zone 1 isn't a Commie Caliphate, and neither were Ludlow, Edinburgh and Cheltenham, to say nothing of Clubland. Take heart, punters, that part of the UK's far more homogenous than DEI America. That said, soft Left globalism seemed to be the default position of the educated class, fed by its appalling BBC and execrable Guardian et al. A default which may be showing signs of cracking, thanks to the country's effectively open dinghy border. Even left-centrist people are saying enough is enough.
As they should. Why should tiny, shoebox size England provide welfare for all the world? It can't and ultimately won't. Just you watch the gleeful reaction of all those imported votes when the cash spigot's turned off, don't say messy.
Be that as it may, there were far fewer Rainbow, Climate Hoax, Trans billboards on display than in the last few years. Perhaps the mood of the Caliphate is shifting, and go figure, the UK tends to mirror US trends; does this mean a patriot shift incoming? I'd like to hope so, and in the meanwhile, it's great to be back in the Texas Free State.
More anon,
LSP
