<p>Last year my youngest son…around 6’3+"…was flying west coast to east coast and H upgraded to get him one of the aisle seats with a little extra room (economy plus or whatever it’s called?) so he would be more comfortable for the long flight</p>
<p>He was 20 at the time but he has a very young face…looks about 16 to me!</p>
<p>A 40ish man, several inches shorter, comes up to him and very loudly demands he change seats with him, to the middle seat behind him in the next row. My son checked his seat assignment and just said, gee, sorry, I’m in my assigned seat.</p>
<p>The guy got really worked up and started yelling about young punks with bad manners, etc.</p>
<p>The FA had to get involved…guy remained very loud and abusive for the rest of the flight. Very rude to the people on either side of him. Ended up spilling a drink on the woman next to him–she thought the guy was aiming for my son’s head. The FA filled out some sort of incident report at at the end, and apparently that guy has been banned from the airline.</p>
<p>One of the only good things to come out of 9/11 in my opinion. The FAs no longer take as much from ridiculous passengers. I was on a flight where a fellow passenger was giving the FA a hard time over nothing. I turned around and gave the guy a look…made eye contact with the FA to let her know I was watching the incident. Other passengers did the same. I eventually told the guy to calm down so we could all have a peaceful flight.</p>
<p>You all should know that if you are involuntarily bumped, you don’t have to accept their crappy “voucher”, you can insist on cash. It’s your legal right (but they don’t want you to know it…). The reimbursement price is higher for international flights (up to $600 per person???) so I wonder if the original family of five had demanded cash compensation and that is why the airline forced a few hapless passengers off instead.</p>
<p>Also, those vouchers have limited use. Only 5 - 7 seats on each plane are reserved for all voucher AND frequent flyer use. It makes it very hard to find a flight you can use them on, especially if you’re flying in a group. After a bad bumping experience with US Airways, I make sure I carry a copy of the federal law with me, just in case. In my experience, every bumped passenger had had a confirmed and assigned seat and was bumped anyway.</p>
<p>None of these laws holds true for charter flights though.</p>
<p>Boysx3- I heard on the radio awhile ago that there is thought to be a link between soy milk given to infants and peanut allergies. I thought that was interesting.</p>
<p>I think I would have told the lady that I paid extra for that seat, so pay up. ( I actually probably would have chickened out but…). I am feeling pretty lucky about my flights; I hope I continue to miss these people.</p>
<p>Boysx3 & Onward-
Many years ago I read an international study that found that peanut allergies were pretty much unheard of among children who had not eaten peanuts before the age of two. They had one difficulty testing the results for American kids in that they couldn’t find a single American child among the sample who hadn’t eaten peanut products before their second birthday.</p>
<p>Well, my D ate a peanut product for the first time after age 2. The second time she had a pb&j, she had her reaction. I initially thought the reaction was from the fresh strawberries she was eating at the time because she hadn’t had those before. It turned out it was the peanuts though.</p>
<p>She was on soy formula, because she was lactose intolerant. She had issues with the soy formula too and ended up on nutramigen. She has slight allergic reactions to soy now (scratchy throat) and other legumes also (lentils, chick peas/garbanzo beans, etc.). They are nothing like her peanut reaction though!</p>
<p>I do not know anything about this organization but I did find it interesting. I love peanut butter and feel very sorry for anyone with an allergy to peanuts.</p>
<p>2016MarnardMom-My daughter also now has a soy allergy that didn’t develop until college. It has since grown to include other legumes like your daughter’s, but luckily she doesn’t have an anaphylaxis to soy, just the itchy hands, ears and throat. We were out to dinner with family the other night and she must have had too much soy as she can have some soy sauce, so we had to leave dinner as she didn’t have Benadryl with her. She keeps two EpiPens on her at all times, but doesn’t always keep Benadryl, much to her mother’s dismay :(</p>
<p>Onward-I also love peanut butter and we do keep it in the house, but we only use paper plates and plastic knives when my daughter is home to avoid cross contamination and don’t eat it around her.</p>
<p>Well, I’m certainly guilty of giving my kids lots of tofu at an early age. Vegetarians, with weight issues, it is low cal protein. Who knew, 20 years ago? </p>
<p>The allergic D had PB a few weeks shy of her first BD and we went right to the ER. No formula ever. Her identical twin sister then had no peanuts till age 4, and has never been allergic to anything. Soy has never been an issue. But the peanut allergic girl has a lot of hay fever, and various other non food allergies. </p>
<p>I eat PB when she’s not in the house. Luckily, my other two never liked peanut butter.</p>
<p>It is an enlightening link, except that my D was born in 1994 and was no longer using soy formula by 1996. She outgrew her lactose intolerance and was drinking milk by 1995. She also has asthma and tons of non-food allergies (32 of the 34 things they tested her for were “severe” reactions). She manages, after having shots for several years, taking claritin or zyrtec daily and keeping an inhaler at all times. Her dad is the same way, but doesn’t have the peanut allergy. The peanut allergy is a mystery to us. My ex husband blames it on me for eating a lot of peanut butter while pregnant. I ate just as much when pregnant with my son though. </p>
<p>S, born in 1996, was on soy formula. I presume it would have been the new one since he was a March baby. He was (still is) lactose intolerant. He eats peanut butter every day and has no allergies. I too make PB&J on a paper plate with a plastic knife to avoid cross contamination. I continued to do this after D went away to college and it dawned on me sometime in late October that I could probably use a real knife as long as I washed them all really well before she came home again. I still use the plastic though. Old habits die hard I guess!</p>
<p>^^^^^^Yeah, I thought the same thing. No disrespect intended, but the crazy passenger stories are so much more entertaining than the personal allergy anecdotes.</p>
<p>Boarding one of my few SW flights ever, I looked for an open window seat. Finally relieved to see one, I crawled past the other row occupants and got myself ensconced. My row companions were rather goth looking alternative types. After I short time, I realized the odor in the air was their clothing, which was black denim, made blacker with accumulated crud. The odor of dirt and BO became more and more apparent the longer I sat there, and I ended up spending the flight with a kleenex pressed to my nose, head tilted against the window. It was a rather long 3 hours. They never said a word to me, and the flight was full, so no alternative, but to put up with the situation.</p>
<p>I’ve got one too, to help end the allergy hijacking of the thread (pun intended). </p>
<p>My D and I were flying back from Providence after visiting Brown last fall. A teenage boy and teenage girl were sitting behind us. A middle-aged couple was sitting in front of us. The boy and girl behind us were clearly boyfriend and girlfriend who were having a hard time keeping their hands off of each other. About halfway through the flight, the woman in front of us got up to use the restroom. She came back and mentioned to her husband that the kids were not in their seats. The dad got up and went to stand outside the only occupied restroom. As his daughter and her boyfriend came out, he told his daughter to sit with her mother and he sat with the boy, letting him know in no uncertain terms that he was not going to be anywhere near his daughter again if he had anything to do with it. This conversation continued the whole rest of the flight while the mom was giving the girl a good talking to in front of us.</p>
<p>My D and I just kept exchanging glances, both pretty horrified that this had happened! When we got off the plane, she said “I can’t believe anybody would disrespect her parents that much to do that on a plane with them there!” I was pretty glad my D was horrified! </p>
<p>I don’t think that boy will be traveling with that family again!</p>
<p>I feel that a lot of crazy passenger stories would not exist if the crazy passengers had read the operating airline’s Contract of Carriage and had some common sense in addition to that. For example, a person who does not hold elite status on that airline, did not originally have an assigned seat, and checked in close to departure often has the greatest of being IDB (Involuntary Denied Boarding), regardless of their need to be at the destination. Of course, the airline must ask for volunteers first ad pay compensation according to federal law or European Law if the flight departs from the EU or the airline is EU-based.</p>
<p>I’m lucky in that my major travel annoyances tend to be people who put their feet up on the bulkhead or the seats in front of them and gate agents who do not follow airline policy in regards to upgrades and such. I haven’t been asked to switch seats much in the last few years, which may be thanks to the fact that I generally select exit row seats and passengers under 15 cannot legally sit there. I’m not opposed to switching seats, but wonder why it is so important that an apparently healthy adult couple needs to sit together on a 5 hour flight, let alone a 45 minute one.</p>
<p>On a recent flight, I was upgraded to first class from a middle seat because the passenger who was originally assigned the first class seat had children under 15 (they were around 8 and 5) and had not paid the unaccompanied minor fee for them. As Delta requires children under 15 to be accompanied by an adult flying in the same class of service or pay the unaccompanied minor fee, the passenger was not to be upgraded. This is a Delta-specific rule that worked in my favor.</p>
<p>A couple years ago, I was flying SLC-LAX and the young, somewhat attractive couple next to me briefly considered joining a certain club while sitting in their seats with the little red blankets. This was a full flight, but most passengers were busy watching Auburn win the BCS National Championship . The guy decided to sleep for most of the flight instead.</p>
<p>Have flown recently and don’t really have any crazy passenger stories. But when heading out to vacation a couple of weeks ago, DH and I were surprised that when our daughters printed out their boarding passes, they were in first class! That was a nice surprise for them, especially for my tall D1.</p>
<p>TWO TIMES, United refused to give us seat assignments ahead of time - the website said they would be given to us at the gate. Well, guess what, we were bumped both times! The next time it happened, I got on the phone and refused to get off until I had seat numbers. </p>
<p>My trip to and from Texas last week on American was actually pleasant, probably because my dad got my tickets and he’s a Platinum member. Quick check-in line, NO charge for two checked bags, short security line, and extra legroom. Wow! On one of the long flights, there was even an empty seat in the middle with a tray for drinks. This was in coach. The guy on the other side of the empty seat said he hadn’t paid extra and had no idea why he got the perk.</p>