>Bruiser Takes One for the Team
>I was a total disaster. I coughed and sneezed into a ragged Kleenex, sniffed loudly, rubbed my eyes red and raw and looked mournfully at the airplane passengers filing past me.
“I’ve been sick for three months now!” I said loudly to Hubs as a passing fat man eyed the empty seat between us. “Will this highly contagious explosive diarrhea bug I picked up in Malaysia ever go away?” The man held his breath and kept moving. I honked into my tissue.
“Okay,” Hubs whispered after a moment. “They just closed the door. We’re good.” We smiled at each other conspiratorially as I stuffed my Kleenex into the magazine holder and grabbed his hand across the seat between us, the only empty one on the plane.
Let it be known that I will do anything to get an extra empty seat on a flight. And this has never been truer than it is now that I have an infant whose assigned seat is my lap.
“Our flight is nearly full,” the flight attendant announced after we boarded the plane from LA to Nashville a few days ago. “Please make room for other passengers and do not put any of your belongings in empty seats.” Hubs and I eyed each other nervously across the empty seat between us as a flood of people filed past. Bruiser gurgled and cooed happily in my lap.
“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Hubs said quietly. I looked at Bruiser and frowned, then laid him down on his back. He hated that. Obligingly, he began to squawk loudly. I smiled with relief. There would be no need to pinch him. Hubs looked at me approvingly.
“So mean,” I mouthed. “This is so mean.” We both giggled. Bruiser squawked more angrily. I picked him up and turned him outward so that everyone could see his fussy baby face. Not surprisingly, the seat beside me stayed empty.
But the plane was filling up. A woman paused before our aisle and I had to think fast. “Gee, I hope he doesn’t scream the whole flight like he did last time,” I said to Hubs. “Four hours is a lonnnnng time.” The woman kept moving.
Once the door to the airplane slammed shut, I rewarded Bruiser by popping a full bottle in his mouth. He sucked away happily and didn’t make a peep the rest of the flight. I’d like to say I feel guilty about using him as a pawn in my empty seat ploy, but I’d be lying. He’s four months old now, for heaven’s sake. It’s time he pulled his own weight.
>Oh my goodness, that is sheer BRILLIANCE! I have stored this entire post in the part of my brain that must remember very important things.
>We fly Southwest routinely, I assume that’s what you took from Orange County Airport.Our kids have been incredibly useful in securing choice seating (early boarding, etc…). Our daughter sitting next to me is the equivalent of an empty seat because she is so tiny.My goal in life is to get the bulkhead row. At 6’1 I need the leg room.On airlines with assigned seating. Most folks have been kind in relocating to allow us to sit together. When they don’t I always try to make sure my chatty daughter sits next to them. “Hi, what’s your name? Who’s your favorite princess? I like Sleeping Beauty. I also like Batgirl, but she isn’t a princess…”Seat swaps occur pretty quickly after that.The problem is if there are dueling families vying for choice open seating….what do you do then.
>Did I mention I’m looking forward to flying with you?
>Go Bruiser!I’m flying with YOU next time, Lindsay!
>And that is a prime example of why kids rock.
>Oooh … I’m going to have to remember that one!! Nice going Bruiser (and mom)!
>I was wondering about this. Do you ever consider buying him a seat of his own?
>Nice! Now that my kids aren’t babies anymore can I borrow Bruiser for my flight in the fall ?
>Absolutely brilliant!
>Thanks for the smile. I wish I was that inventive when my kids were younger. Now I have to plunk down the money to buy them seats. Next time we fly, I might bribe them with chocolate bars to have a kicking tantrum so i have a buffer zone between them that isn’t me.ps I’m on to all those crying babies on the plane. 🙂
>For some reason, the crying babies don’t really bother me on flights anymore. What bothers me are the parents screaming at their children to behave when I can’t tell what they’re doing wrong. Oh and vomit. Vomit definitely bothers me.
>You sure didn’t lose any brains when the baby came out.
>The reason I don’t buy Bruiser his own seat is that it would put me out $250. He can sit in my lap for free until he’s two.When I was flown to SF a few weeks ago, a seat was purchased for Bruiser and every single gate agent and flight attendant was completely flummoxed that he had his own ticket and seat. Apparently, the vast majority of parents are as cheap as I am.
>”a seat was purchased for Bruiser and every single gate agent and flight attendant was completely flummoxed that he had his own ticket and seat. Apparently, the vast majority of parents are as cheap as I am.” That’s completely untrue in my experience. Most people want their babies in carseats on flights, penny-pinching or not. If that seat between you had filled, I can assure you that all involved would have wished he had been secured in his carseat for at least part of that flight.
>Forgot this:It’s a link, but it’s a valid one and it won’t kill anyone to take a few seconds to at least scan it.Especially if you plan to fly with your kids. Thanks! http://www.jetwithkids.com/book_freeChapter.html
>Actually, what I wrote was not completely untrue. It was not even partially untrue. Why would I lie about gate agents having trouble grasping the concept of Bruiser having his own seat? Every single one I encountered asked me, often more than once, often incredulously, “He has his own seat on this flight?” Even the article you linked to says:”I was told by numerous airline reservation agents that I did not need to buy a seat [for my baby] and actually was discouraged from doing so.”I’m aware there’s a risk involved, but I’m taking more of a chance putting Bruiser in a carseat and driving on the interstate than I am letting him sit in my lap on a plane flight. Even when he had his own seat on the plane, he was out of it at takeoff and landing nursing, so that he wouldn’t have problems with his ears.
>I’ve yet to fly with my son, but all of my friends with kids under age two that do fly often, do so without purchasing the child a seat. And that’s because they’re self-described as cheap. And proud of it!
>LOL, nicely done!!!!
>God that is mean, but so good.I coulda used that first one on a flight a few weeks back. But no, I got the large grouchy man who thought it was something I was doing against him to need to pee once during a three and a half hour flight.
>Love it.But have to say, that this anonymous commenter is kind of irking me.We took our son on a plane at 2 months, 4 months and he’ll be flying again next month at 16 months…on my lap. Obviously the airlines wouldn’t give it as an option if it wasn’t safe, and like my husband just said as I explained this to him, if the plane crashes a carseat isn’t going to save the child…Also, if you anon is claiming that Pediatricians think it’s better for kids to be in car seats, how come ours tells us to nurse or give him a paci when taking off and landing…what sense does that make????Good Post Lindsay.
>I’m one of those people who did buy a ticket for my then-infant and his seat. But in my defense, I was traveling with my two other kids (and my husband and I wasn’t paying for the tickets!) and knew that I was going to end up with the toddler in my lap and it would just be easier this way. And it was. The baby slept in the carseat the whole time, it was a breeze at the airport, since we gate-checked his stroller, and then we had his carseat with us and I wasn’t worried about it getting banged up or broken in baggage (which happened to my stroller on a different trip).Obviously, I wish I’d read this post before I took my trip. I’d have still had the empty seat. 🙂
>that is brilliant and hilarious!! I’m going to have my husband, who travels more than he is home, read this immediately!!!
>You are clearly flying Southwest aka SkyGreyhound. They say the advantage of a C pass is that you get to pick the cutest person to sit next to. You should be flattered so many want to be your pal.
>I wish that worked on international flights. There are no empty seats. As in NONE. I would not be surprised if they announced standing room only on an 8-hour international flight, that’s how tight we are when go to see my parents.Twice I’ve splurged on an extra roundtrip ticket for my one-year-old son so he could have his own seat because there was no way I was keeping all 30 pounds of him on my lap the entire time.And on all four flights I was asked to hold him on my lap so someone else could have his seat, a seat that I PAID FOR. “But you said he’s not two,” the flight attendants told me.”But he has his OWN TICKET!” I screeched. You’re smart to keep the extra seat, but I can’t say that it does much to further the cause of people traveling with babies.
>Bwahahaha!
>Mwaaaaa haaa haaa haaa!That’s good, really really good. But my question is what airline are you flying that there isn’t already assigned seats anyways??
>hahahaha I have so done this with my kids when traveling. Sometimes they have even worked for me when I wasn’t trying to get them to, like the time I was flying to Canada on Alaska Air and they called my name while I was standing at the baggage carousel. I was traveling alone with two toddlers. I turns out they had already rounded up all of my luggage for me, had it on a cart and one of their employees not only helped me to the entrance of the airport, but she waited for a cab with me and helped me load all my luggage and install car seats so that I could get underway easily. She was kind and cheerful and I thought it was awesome service.
>HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!