Disconcerting antecdotes from a Washington D.C. airline ticket agent who comes into contact almost daily with our "highly intelligent" elected officials:
"I had a New Hampshire Congresswoman ask for an aisle seat so that
her hair wouldn't get messed up by being near the window.
I got a call from a candidate's staffer, who wanted to go to
Capetown. I started to explain the length of the flight and the passport
information, then she interrupted me with, "I'm not trying to make you look
stupid, but Capetown is in Massachusetts." Without trying to make her
look stupid, I calmly explained, "Cape Cod is in Massachusetts;
Capetown is in Africa." Her response - click
An aide for a cabinet member once called and asked if he could rent
a car in Dallas. When I pulled up the reservation, I noticed he had
only a 1-hour layover in Dallas. When I asked him why he wanted to rent a
car, he said, "I heard Dallas was a big airport, and we will need a car
to drive between gates to save time."
An Illinois Congresswoman called last week. She needed to know how
it was possible that her flight from Detroit left at 8:30 am and got to
Chicago at 8:33 am. I explained that Michigan was an hour ahead of
Illinois, but she couldn't understand the concept of time zones. Finally,
I told her the plane went fast, and she bought that.
I just got off the phone with a freshman Congressman who asked, "How
do I know which plane to get on?" I asked him what exactly he
meant, to which he replied, "I was told my flight number is 823, but
none of these planes have numbers on them."
A lady Senator called and said, "I need to fly to Pepsi-Cola,
Florida. Do I have to get on one of those little computer planes?" I asked
if she meant fly to Pensacola, Fl. on a commuter plane. She said,
"Yeah, whatever, smarty!"
A senior Senator called and had a question about the documents he
needed in order to fly to China. After a lengthy discussion about
passports, I reminded him that he needed a visa. "Oh, no I don't. I've been
to China many times and never had to have one of those." I double
checked and sure enough, his stay required a visa. When I told him this he
said, "Look, I've been to China four times, and every time they
have accepted my American Express!"
A New Mexico Congresswoman called to make reservations, "I want to
go from Chicago to Rhino, New York." I was at a loss for
words. Finally, I said, "Are you sure that's the name of the town?" Yes,
what flights do you have?" replied the lady. After some searching, I
came back with, "I'm sorry, ma'am, I've looked up every airport
code in the country and can't find a Rhino anywhere." The lady
retorted, "Oh, don't be silly! Everyone knows where it is. Check your
map!" So I scoured a map of the state of New York and finally offered,
"You don't mean Buffalo, do you?" The reply? "Whatever! I knew it
was a big animal."
Now you know why Government is in the shape that it's in!"
Not that Americans are much more intelliegent in the private sector. These next anecdotes are from my own personal experiences with fellow Americans.
I was at Yellowstone Park with a group of tourists, waiting for the Yellowstone geyser to "do its thing". When it came time and the steam and water spurted high into the air and then subsided, a woman in front of me said: "Is that all it does?"
While visiting the Coliseum in Rome, I heard an American exclaim: "I didn't realize the Nazis did so much damage during the war."
And finally, while a park ranger was explaining what an intelligent society the cliff dwelling Indians of the great Southwest were, a lady asked: "If they were so intelligent, why didn't they build closer to the highway?"
No comments:
Post a Comment