The Holiday season is upon us once again. Millions will be taking to the skies to visit loved ones. Yet with rising fuel costs, dozens of surcharges, and perks at a bare minimum, the skies aren’t as friendly as they once were. Flying used to be a treat, something that people dressed up for and made an occasion out of. Flight attendants weren’t just there for your safety, but to also ensure your comfort and care. It often seems like flight attendants can’t be bothered to bring that extra glass of water for your five-hour flight. And why should they? They are often over worked as it is. And to get that extra level of care that used to be the norm, you have to fly first or business class. But in this economy, it’s just not the reality for 99% of us. With people being packed into flying Greyhound buses like cattle, flying has become rather stressful as opposed to a treat. So lately, I’ve relied on myself to add my own touch of class to air travel. Instead of relying on the airline to treat me well, I take a little extra time before departure to ensure I will have my own little treat in the sky. And on every flight I’ve done this, I’ve received envious compliments from passengers wishing they had done the same. The most common remark, “Oh wow, you’ve made your own First Class!” First: Receiving a newspaper or magazine was rather common on airlines before. And while some airlines still have a great magazine of their own to peruse, it will not hold you over for the long flights. The night before a flight, I take a minute to download a magazine or book that I’ve been...

BOOM! There it is! Another flash of lighting and a crack of thunder. Nothing says summer quite like a big old thunderstorm, and while the lightning can be amazing to watch, it can also be quite dangerous. Some spectacular shots have been caught on camera and these videos, are, well, shocking! Say, let’s get out our camcorder and take some video of this thunderstorm – until lightning strikes that tree 20’ foot away! Love the slow-mo and the stills! That tree is totally lit up! In this next video from Australia, a crew of photographers is shooting an approaching storm when a large bolt strikes about 250 meters away. Check out how the dirt flies during the slow motion close-up! The Empire State Building was built to withstand lightning strikes as most skyscrapers are. Without the lightning rod on the top, the electric current would seriously damage the building, but being one of the tallest in New York City – it gets struck all the time. . In this shocking video from South Africa, lightning strikes during a live soccer (or football) game broadcast on TV.  Many of the players go down, some requiring CPR, and several being carried off the field in a stretcher. Next to Japan, where the local news has video of an elderly pedestrian getting struck by lightning in a crosswalk! Forward about 18 seconds in. Amazingly, the man is only dazed and walks off. In Texas, where severe lighting and storms knock out the power to a neighborhood. A local resident is recording video of the mass amounts of lighting strikes when one nails his neighbor’s house across the street. Fast forward to 1:05 to see the hit. Caution: the language is rather colorful. Here’s super-cool video of a passenger airplane taking off in San Francisco...

Everything I need to know about Economics I learned flying First Class last week. #1: There was one bathroom at the front of the plane for the exclusive use of the 8 First Class passengers sitting in Rows A & B. #2: There were two bathrooms at the rear of the plane to be shared by the remaining 141 passengers in Rows C – Z. #3: From my vantage point in seat A1, this was just fine. From this experience I learned two vital lessons: #1: Economic inequality is all around us in today’s America #2: It’s only a problem if you’re poor Usually, I’m a proud member of the disgruntled poor. Hell, I work in the theatre — we put the “non” in “non-profit”. In my field, the 1% refers to people earning a living wage or the award-winning playwrights that own dishwashers (Albee sold his for gin). After all, if you work in a building named for a rich person you’re a broke motherfucker yourself. So, on a plane, you’d expect to find me jammed in a middle seat in Broke Motherfucker Class (not even Broke Motherfucker Plus) reading a torn Sky Mall Magazine and dreaming of the massage chairs and air purifiers that I’ll never own, and knowing that while the half-bottle of water and micro-bag of pretzels I was allotted by Cheapskate Air isn’t quite enough sustenance to “keep me alive,” it is exactly enough to make me go to the bathroom, which means I’ll have to shake loose the blood clot forming in my leg, machete my way out of my row, and slog to the back of the plane so I can wait with all the other Broke Motherfuckers for my 30 seconds of solitude pooping into the fluorescent...

Al-Qaeda must be desperate, and on the losing end, in the War on Terror. Last week one of their members called for late night talk show host David Letterman’s tongue to be ripped out and silenced.  Wow, really? Letterman has been hosting his Late Show with David Letterman on CBS since 1993.  I’ve been watching Dave since I was a child and can’t even begin to think of television after 11:30pm on weeknights without him.  Dave had a long a crazy climb to the top, but he did it himself, and it’s like a rags to riches story Letterman was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on April 12, 1947.  He graduated from Ball State University in 1969 and had no clue what to do.  Letterman had worked as an announcer and newscaster for the campus radio station, but according to online reports, was fired after treating classical music with irreverence. With no clue what to do, Dave discovered Paul Dixon, host of The Paul Dixon Show, a Cincinnati based talk show that was also shown in Dave’s home town.  He immediately decided that’s what he wanted to do. Letterman began his official career as a talk show host for WNTA-AM radio and as a weatherman for WLWI-TV (now WTHR, the Indianapolis NBC affiliate.)  He became an instant hit thanks to his outrageous behavior in front of the camera.  He once congratulated a storm for being upgraded to a hurricane, blew up a model of the station, and predicted outrageous temperatures for fake cities. At the station, he also hosted a late night show, Freeze Dried Movies and Clover Power, a show that aired on Saturday mornings where he interviewed 4-H students about their projects.  In 1971, he also appeared as a pit reporter for ABC’s...