Encounters with random southerners

I hate this country. Or at least flying in it.

Pilot – "Well folks, we should be on our way in just a second. Turns out that when the folks in maintenance serviced that engine, they drained the oil and forgot to replace it. Ha ha!"

Passenger seated next to Ed: "FUCKIN' UNION MECHANICS. PROBABLY IN A HURRY TO GO ON ONE OF THEIR DOZEN BREAKS EVERY DAY."

Ed: "The reason they do maintenance in Georgia is because it isn't unionized. They used to do it in St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis. They moved it to Birmingham and Atlanta so they could pay untrained people $12/hr to do the same work. I mean, the planes have five times as much downtime now and they don't do the work correctly, but it's cheap."

Passenger seated next to Ed: "FUCKING UNIONS."

Ed, after a considerable pause: "Heading to a big Tea Party convention in Chicago?"

Passenger seated next to Ed: "WHAT? NO."

Ed: "So, something else in Chicago for people who are impervious to facts?"

On the plus side, he didn't try to talk to me after that and I read my Baffler in peace.