Around the World in a Bad Mood! Read Online Free Page A

professional, simply have them call the toll-free complaint hotline, 1-800-YOU’RE SCREWED . . . and one of our customer-care professionals will give them twenty free miles on WAFTI so we can have another chance to better serve them on a future trip. Twenty miles may not sound like a lot, but when people have so many complaints it really does add up quickly! Welcome aboard WAFTI, where we are upping our standards.”
    He then pirouetted back into the semicircle with a grace and ease that would put Tommy Tune to shame, and the entire group crescendoed into the final tag of the song with a glassy-eyed, feverous, near-religious zeal.
    We Apologize for This Inconvenience Airlines
    We’re upping our standards (upping our standards)
    Up Yours!
    There was not a dry eye in the entire group of Stepford Supervisors. As for the trainees, we stood frozen in astonishment, mouths agape (almost spellbound), until someone slowly started to clap. This broke into a full round of applause as the group bowed and then went into a reprise of the tag line. More applause, and then the orange-skinned man announced that it was time for us to learn the song, and with that he went into a whirlwind frenzy of passing out sheet music that was registered, numbered, and labeled “Property of WAFTI.” I guess that was meant to discourage us from stealing the sheet music. Not much chance of that.
    Throughout the training program trainees were forced to endure many little indignities, not the least of which was the constant reminder that they could be released from the program at any time. One definitely sensed that big brother was watching. Even in the barracks (WAFTI housing for trainees, conveniently located on the property), we began to wonder if our dorm rooms were bugged. The instructors must have had their evaluation meetings on Thursdays because on Fridays, which were known to all trainees as Black Fridays, there would always be one or two less people in class by the end of the day. It would start out like a normal day, we would all be sitting in class, the teacher pontificating on the differences between the premeal beverage service and the postmeal beverage service when suddenly the door, always located in the back of the room, would slowly open and June Larson would appear. No one ever had the guts to actually turn around to see her, but you knew it was June because of her fragrance. She’d quietly walk up behind her victim, tap him or her on the shoulder (a move that came to be called “the claw”), then the victim and June would leave the room together. You never saw the former trainee the rest of the afternoon, or the rest of your life, for that matter. Here today, gone tomorrow. Later, one of June’s underlings would come in and remove the victim’s belongings and we never heard anything more about it, except for occasional sobbing or screaming as the poor sacrificial lambs made their final exit from WAFTI. It really set a great tone for the weekend, kind of livened up the atmosphere around the barracks. The survivors would spend Saturday and Sunday in paranoid states of misery, wondering why someone was dropped and who would be the next to go. Rumors would be flying around as to why the poor slob was released: “She failed too many tests!” “No, she lied on her application and they discovered she didn’t really attend Harvard after all!” “Actually, what really happened is that they found out she was an ax murderer who was wanted in seven states.”
    These sorts of rumors would circulate all week until the next Black Friday when there would be a new victim and his or her departure became the topic of discussion throughout the following week.

Advice to New Hires
    I HAVE TO ADMIT there were some close calls for me. After all, it is common for a spirited, sassy gal like myself to have sporadic altercations with authority. But somehow I escaped “the claw” and successfully