My mom and I were visiting family for the summer, so we had to fly. A woman and her son were seated behind my mom and me on the plane.

I love musicals. The one I’m currently obsessed with is the “Sweeney Todd” movie adaptation because I finally got around to watching it and I loved it! So, of course, I downloaded it for the flight.

I was watching the movie with headphones on, enjoying myself. I had no idea that the little kid behind me was also watching through the gap in the seats.

When Sweeney made his first kill, of course, it was full of blood. And I heard a tiny scream from the kid behind me. The kid’s mother attended to her precious angel and then turned to me.

Woman: “Turn your movie off! It scared my little baby!”

Me: “I’m not going to do that. Why was your kid even snooping on my movie in the first place? It’s your job to make sure your kid is occupied enough to not bother other people. I wasn’t disturbing anyone, and I was minding my own business. I’m not going to change my movie on my phone to satisfy your kid.”

Meanwhile, the kid was yelling, “Make her change it, Mommy!” over and over again.

The woman immediately called a flight attendant.

Woman: “This passenger refused to stop watching their ungodly horror movies and was showing them to my kid!”

I rolled my eyes.

Flight Attendant: *To me* “Can you tell me what happened?”

Me: “I was just watching my movie when, suddenly, I noticed that this kid was snooping at my phone from between the seats.”

Flight Attendant: *To the woman* “Ma’am, there’s nothing I can do. I suggest that you give your child an activity to do so he doesn’t see anything he isn’t supposed to be seeing.”

The woman pouted and ended up giving her kid her phone.

I work at an airline and regularly need to take business trips from Houston to Chicago. I usually go on these flights once a week, at least.

I have just boarded my flight and plugged my earbuds in to listen to my favorite podcast. I am minding my own business when a middle-aged woman approaches me, looking unhappy.

Me: “Hello, ma’am. Can I help you?”

Woman: “Yes! Please close your window!”

Me: *Confused* “Why?”

Woman: “Your window is way too bright, and it is disturbing my angel who is napping!”

Almost everyone else has their window open, and her “angel” is playing games on his Nintendo Switch.

Me: “Ma’am, your child is clearly wide awake.”

I plug my earbuds back in. She doesn’t like this one bit.

Woman: “Excuse me!”

She yanks my earbuds out of my ears.

Woman: “Close your window or I’ll call the flight attendants!”

Along comes the flight attendant.

Flight Attendant: “Is there a problem?”

Woman: “Yes! This man is disturbing my sleeping son by having his window open!”

The attendant glances at the kid, who is still playing games.

Flight Attendant: “Ma’am, your kid is awake and playing games. Please go back to your seat or I will have you escorted off when we land.”

The woman was clearly angry but complied. She kept shooting dirty looks at me the entire flight, but luckily, I got off not too long after and was glad I never saw her again.

In this case, the flight attendant’s threat meant that the woman would be escorted off by law enforcement and might be charged with a crime.

We’re heading out for a family vacation, flying first class for the first time. Our group has seven of the eight seats adjacent to the cockpit, with one stranger seated amongst us. And boy, did we find a doozy.

Right from the get-go, [Stranger] makes her presence known. We board with my father-in-law, who is in a wheelchair, to find that, for some reason, this lady boards the plane along with the “passengers that need additional time to board,” but she seems to be moving around just fine. It seems her motivation to do so was to pack her overhead compartment with her multitude of carry-on items. She also needs to use all of my compartment and half of someone else’s, too.

Okay, fine. Whatever. We can deal with it.

Then, the flight gets delayed for being short crew, and [Stranger] immediately starts demanding wine before we even leave the ground. As soon as the stewardess tells her no and walks off, she starts complaining to us.

Stranger: “First class is so s***ty with this airline!”

I’m already thinking, “Can you shut up already?” Then comes the inevitable:

Stranger: “We can just leave without the crew member, right?”

Apparently, she wasn’t paying attention because the missing crew IS THE FREAKING PILOT.

We are released back out to the terminal for a bit to stretch because the delay is so long, and we return to our seats to find my daughter’s seat occupied by [Stranger]’s friend who is flying economy. After we stand around and clear our throats several times to try to get their attention, it is obvious they have no awareness of anyone outside their bubble. After my daughter, my mother-in-law, and I all ask them to clear out, they FINALLY acknowledge that they’re in someone else’s seat.

After all this, we eventually get up in the air. Cue [Stranger] slamming glasses of wine. After the third glass, she’s obviously already drunk, because she then dumps the entire fourth glass of wine on my teenage daughter. SHE DOESN’T EVEN ACKNOWLEDGE THAT SHE DID IT. No sorry, no “here’s a napkin”. She just immediately starts demanding another drink from the flight attendant.

All the while, she’s keeping her mask down while she is drinking, but the second I take mine off to drink some water, this lady grabs my arm.

Stranger: “Put your mask back on!”

Are you serious? You’ll complain about a mask but you’re totally okay touching strangers? Okay, lady.

At that point, I finally told the stewardess about everything, and they stopped serving her, but she still spent the rest of the trip complaining about how s***ty this airline is and trying to talk to my daughter, who was legitimately worried this moron was going to puke on her. Poor kid.

My son and I were on the last row of an airline flight. Three teens were in the seats across the aisle. They seemed quiet during the flight and I really didn’t pay attention to them. Then, it happened. They jumped up from their seats before the plane came to a stop at the gate.

Teen #1: “Let’s get out of here!”

There was no way in h*** I was going to let them rush to the front of the plane, so I stepped out into the aisle to block them.

Teen #2: “We’re late for our connecting flight!”

Me: “No, you’re not. The plane landed fifteen minutes early.”

Teen #3: *Shouting* “We’re diplomats!”

Me: “All three of you?”

Teens: “Yes, we’re diplomats!”

Me: “You mean you have a parent who is a diplomat?”

Teens: “No, we’re diplomats! We need to get to our connecting flight!”

Me: “You need to wait your turn like everyone else.”

Teen #3: *Shouting* “You’re being racist because we have brown skin!”

Me: “No, you’re in the back of the plane and need to wait like the rest of us.”

Teens: “BUT WE’RE DIPLOMATS! YOU’RE BEING RACIST!”

The teens then started crawling over the tops of all the seats, over people’s heads, toward the front of the plane. At some point, I lost track of them because my son and I had to gather our belongings. When we finally made it into the terminal, several airport staff, including security, had detained the teens and were explaining to them that they could not possibly be late for their connecting flight because we arrived early. One of the teens spotted me and started pointing vigorously at me.

Teen #3: “There she is! She wouldn’t let us pass! She’s being racist because we have brown skin! WE’RE DIPLOMATS!”

I explained the whole situation to security. They asked me if I wanted to press charges. Since none of the teens had actually touched me, I declined and went on my way.

A few minutes later, my son and I were sitting near our connecting gate, and guess who came laughing, scampering, and skipping through the terminal without a care in the world? The teens saw me and one took out a camera phone and started filming me. I just sat there, bemused. 

Teen #3: “Ooo, you’re in trouble now!”

I checked social media for a few days after that and never saw a viral story about some old white lady being racist. Go figure.

I board a plane and take my seat by the window. There are two empty seats beside me and two more across the aisle. The seats are labeled by row number and then by letter, so each row has ABC on one side and DE on the other. A woman with three girls boards. The mother looks at my row, her ticket, and the girls, and sighs heavily.

Mother: “That’s my seat.”

Me: *Standing* “Oh, I’m sorry, I—”

I look at the seat assignment and see that I am, in fact, in my own seat.

Me: “Oh, no, this is my seat.”

I sit down again.

Mother: *Loudly* “Can I get some help here? This girl won’t move out of my seat!”

Attendant: “Let’s see what we have here. Can I see everyone’s boarding pass?”

I hand over my boarding pass but the woman crosses her arms.

Mother: “I paid for a window seat. That’s my seat.”

Attendant: “Can I see?”

Mother: “She’s in my seat.”

Attendant: “Ma’am, if you would show me your boarding pass—”

Mother: “No! That is my window seat!”

The oldest girl speaks up.

Oldest Girl: “Mom, just show her so we can sit down.”

Mother: *To me* “You’re going to be sorry.”

She hands her boarding pass over with a flourish.

Attendant: “Yes, ma’am, you did pay for a window seat.”

Mother: “Ha!”

Attendant: “Over there.”

She points across the aisle.

Attendant: “You’re in E, not A.”

Mother: “What?”

She grabs the boarding pass and looks at the assignments again.

Mother: “Oh, A, E, big deal!”

Attendant: “Please take your seat, ma’am.”

Mother: “Fine!”

She pushes two of the girls into the opposite aisle and scoots in beside me.

Attendant: “Ma’am?”

Mother: “What?!”

Attendant: “Your window seat is over there. You’ll have to move.”

Mother: “Oh, my God!”

The woman got up and switched with the girl at the other window. I sent a silent thanks to the flight attendant, who gave me a subtle nod. I put my headphones in, so I don’t know if the woman caused more trouble, but as soon as we landed, she grabbed her daughters and pushed through the other waiting passengers to be one of the first people off the plane.