Trapped in America

Thinking about a little summer travel? Gasoline is anywhere from $3 to $3.30 a gallon for regular, and it's not even May. By the fourth of July we could be looking at $4. So unless you're an oil executive, a road trip is pretty much out of the question.

Also by then the oil futures will have become the airlines' present, and flights will cost more. But that's an incidental, minor worry. Because your chances of getting a flight you can pay for are minimal anyway. The whole thing is chaos. You might have cell phones up your wazoo and instant text messaging on your electric toothbrush, but if you want a reservation, let alone a good price on a trip of any distance, be prepared to spend several hours talking to India. This prediction is based on known experience, an acquaintance who the other day spent literally 6 hours straight trying to book a relatively simple round trip. Nobody knew what they were talking about, and the prices changed wildly even while they were talking. Time-consuming chaos and complete madness, all in a foreign language (excuse me, but they don't speak American over there.)

But if you actually happen to get a flight, you're faced with a couple of extra hours at the airport, and vacation without a nail clipper or scissors, or anything that known terrorists---how many of them again?--are wont to use. Not even in your checked luggage, because kicking a hole in the cabin floor to get to the nail clippers in your black suitcase (easy to find among the other black suitcases) is a well-known terrorist trick.

But even if your flight leaves more or less on time and goes more or less where it was supposed to, your adventure has just begun. You made a reservation for a rental car at a particular price, so fool that you are, you expect the actual car to be gassed up and waiting when and where you were promised. Not a chance.

It's gotten so bad that it's made Dilbert. He goes to the counter for the mid-sized car he reserved but they have nothing to give him but a single glove somebody left behind. Not so funny when it happens to you, but if they accidently have a vehicle for you, there's still the dizzying doubletalk they give you as well as a price that is nowhere near what you agreed to, and funny thing, always higher.

But if you happen to want to leave the country, none of this matters because you're an American, and thanks to our clueless leaders, nobody in the whole wide world wants you. So stay home. It's your choice.