Class Warfare and Mini-Landmarks

I am currently, at this very moment, sitting in D/FW airport waiting to fly home. I am coming home from doing consulting work with Head Start, reviewing a program in southern Oklahoma. In a town small enough to not have a quality chain hotel. So I stayed in Paris, Texas. In the Holiday Inn. Which was attached to Denny's and had wireless internet.

The work was in Hugo, Oklahoma. While in Hugo, I had the pleasure of riding in one of only two elevators in town (I swear this is true), and went all the way to the top, the 2nd floor. My only other bit of excitement was going to the Paris Eiffel Tower. It took some searching, but there it was, all 65 metallic feet of it, sitting in the parking lot of the Paris Civic Center, with a red cowboy hat on top. It was awe-inspiring. OK, it was curiosity-inspiring. It was actually much shorter than the surrounding cell towers. But it did have a red cowboy hat.

My work was done early, so I went to the airport early, hoping to catch an earlier flight. I went on stand-by at 11 o'clock this morning. There is a flight from Dallas to Austin every 13 minutes. I started at #15 on the stand-by list. Slowly but surely I have crept all the way to #47. Yes, the "double-super-platinum, gold, rich white guy club" members keep bumping ahead of me. At this point, I am so far down on the class list that I worry they'll bump me from my original 6:30 flight, for being a peasant. I hope they choke on the expensive whiskey they'll have 30 seconds to drink. Double-super-platinum, gold, rich white guy bastards.