Menage à Trois Bingo

In the interest of actually posting content in this journal, I subscribed to thefridayfive. Here's my first set of answers.

1. Where did you go the last time you took an airplane ride?

Reykjavik and Berlin. Well, I mean, technically, my last plane ride was the Newark-Chicago connection on our return from Berlin, and while that's a slightly interesting story it wasn't a particularly cool destination.

Tammie, Rosa and I went to Germany to visit my girlfriend Christine and her husband Rob, with whom Tammie and I both also have some kind of sexy-times relationship. And Tammie and Christine may also have something someday...there was a very nice four-way evening in Berlin before we left. But.

Anyway, when planning the trip, we found that WOW Airlines was the cheapest option to get to Europe, even including having to get to Newark...and they offer a free layover in Reykjavik. So we did that as well, and it was lovely. For a cheap you-pay-for-all-the-extras airline, the service is very pleasant.

2. Are you a nervous flyer or a comfortable flyer?

I'm pretty comfortable. I have flown many many times and I'm very used to it.

3. Window seat or aisle seat?

Aisle, usually. I have very long legs and like to stretch them once in a while.

4. What is the worst experience you've had flying?

That afore-mentioned return flight from Newark, but that was because we missed the connection due to a delay at the other end and slow customs agents. We were technically there before it left, but the airline had already closed the flight. We had to rebook a super early morning flight and stay overnight at an airport hotel.

The worst flight was probably Jet Blue to Atlanta for DragonCon 2007. It was super delayed, we sat on the tarmac for hours before leaving and were not allowed to move around, and Chris was flying with us. He's a big dude, so I was very cramped in my seat. And then the flight itself was plagued with turbulence.

5. What is the best experience you've had flying?

Ray and I arrived very last minute for a flight from London to the US, were hustled through the first-class passport line and gate check line, and on top of that we were upgraded to business class. Lovely comfortable flight, good food. I think I slept on that plane for maybe the only time ever.

From the altfriday5:
1. Who was the last new friend that you made?
scottak and ona_tangent, pretty much concurrently.
We met Ona briefly first, but the next time we saw her she brought Scott
along.

2. How often do you make new friends?
Not as often as I'd like. I'm a recovering shy person. I call myself a
shy extrovert: generally, I enjoy and thrive on the company of people,
but I'm not into large groups or crowds, and it takes me a while to get
comfortable with a person or group of people. There are occasions,
though, when the connection is very quick indeed.

3. How do you usually meet new friends?
Usually through other friends, or via ohari and lavendargrrl who both seem to be more approachable--and more
forward--than I am in such things.

Another source of a lot of my friends has been Ambercons.

4. How easy you find it to make new friends? How easy did you find it
to make new friends as a child?

Pretty easy, at a casual level. Intense friendship connections are
rarer.

As a child I was terminally shy and also (possibly "therefore") picked
on by almost all my peers, so I found it very difficult to make friends.
I have worked for a long time on defeating the shyness, and even by high
school I found it easier to make friends.

5. Have you ever made a new friend online? If yes, tell us about a
memorable instance.

Several. Let's see. There was the time I was chatting through VAXPhone
with my friend Lore, who invited her boyfriend Kirk to join the
conversation. We talked for a little while and then in glancing around
the computer lab I noticed that the person sitting next to me was
running VAXPhone as well--and in the same conversation. So that was a
simultaneous meeting online and IRL.

After that I didn't meet anybody online for years, because I did not
have a computer. In 1997 or so, I was in need of a pseudonym for online
use (I wanted to post to usenet without my legal name being traceable).
I became "fionamber@aol.com". And before very long at all, I started
being IM'd by and getting email from other people interested in Amber.
One of the most memorable messages said "You're my mommy!" It was devilmuse, and we're still friends.