Jan and I have arrived safely in Florida and everything’s just fine – but it certainly didn’t start out that way. Iberia is Spain’s national airline. Where do I begin?

I guess the trip started in the Barcelona airport, so let’s start there. What is wrong with Spain? They want so badly to join the rest of the developed countries of the world, but they never seem to get past the “pretty package” stage. They’ve got the whole “beautiful architecture” thing down, but once you enter an establishment, you might as well be in some starving third-world nation. Heath care facilities, schools, government offices, the post office, and yes, the airport all suffer the same problems. It’s like a huge free-for-all! Instead of neatly formed lines for each flight or destination (as you would expect), there’s just this mob of sweaty people pushing each other while lines stretch back and slowly meld into one another in front of the fifteen check-in counters all labled “Other Countries”. I half expected to be ambushed by a throng of old ladies carrying cages filled with chickens. You have to pick a line, plant your feet firmly, make sure no one sneaks past you (old ladies are the worst), and wait. And wait. And wait. Is a simple red velvet rope too much to ask?

I beeped when I went through the metal detector. I had removed my wallet and my mobile phone. So when they passed the little hand-held metal detector over my body and the thing started to go ballistic around my midsection, the guy asked me, “What’s that?” “Oh, that’s probably my belt buckle” I answered. “OK, carry on.” Note to self: hide pistol or detonator in belt and leave from a Spanish airport.

The three hour delay in Madrid wasn’t much fun either. I’m sure it would have been at least palatable if they had told us what the hell was going on. I could have taken a nap. But instead, they decided to make the boarding call over the loudspeaker and so everyone rushed the gate only to find that no one was actually boarding. And there we stood. For over an hour. And every time we asked what was happening, all that snotty little guy at the desk said was, “We will be boarding in two or three minutes.” He repeated that line every 5 minutes for about an hour. That bastard. I felt really bad for all the senior citizens on line. They looked tired. Oh, and I’d like to thank the two robo-wankers behind us on line for complaining as loud as they could about the circumstances and raising my blood pressure to previously unseen levels. Why can’t they get annoyed on the inside and then write about it afterwards in their weblog like the rest of us? We finally boarded the plane after about two hours. And then we sat in the plane for over an hour. Doing nothing. Still, with no news from the airline.

But then we took off! And what a pleasant flight that was. First impressions, as we all know, are very important. The first thing I remember about the plane we were on was looking for the entertainment guide in the seat-pouch in front of me. I wanted to know which cinematic gems would be projected on that little grey screen at the front of the cabin, just in front of that guy with the really big head. The green splotches on the screen looked like remnants of some long forgotten food fight. Anyway, my first impressions included discovering that one of the arms of the pull-down table in front of the pouch was falling off its hinge, finding one honey-roasted peanut and some shards of broken glass inside the pouch, and then reading about the made-for-TV movie we were to watch starring Tom Selleck called Monte Walsh. Did you know that Tom Selleck hasn’t made a film intended for the cinema since 1999’s The Love Letter? In fact, he has only made three films in the past 10 years! Watch Monte Walsh. You will understand why.

This Iberia flight was the cheapest one I could find from Barcelona to Miami. It was not worth the amount of money we saved. Life is too short. Do yourselves a favor: fly British Airways.