Jill Murray

I love flying. I know it’s not very greenhouse-gas-reducing of me, but it’s true. I don’t fly terribly often, but when I do, I like to make an event of it. I make it my personal mission not to get frustrated in line at customs, or bored waiting at the gate.

To commemorate each flight, I used to steal in-flight safety cards, and truth be known, I may well return to that fine hobby someday. I guess I’m just not that worried that the person flying next after me won’t know not to wear sensible pumps when jumping down the yellow slide. Or perhaps I think that flight attendants have nothing better to do than re-stock stolen safety cards– that they have a cargo hold full of the things. I don’t assume I’m original. There are others like me.

As you can gather, I’m not quitting because I’ve suddenly acquired a sense of social responsibility. No siree. Rather, I have discovered the in-flight wonder that is SkyMall. You’ve seen this magazine too, right– pages and pages of complex and strangely affordable objects with no discernable practical purpose? Objects so eccentric, you cannot imagine who the market for them might be: The sumo-wrestler coffee tables make you gasp and giggle; your parents, you’re sure, would dismiss the automatic watch-winding boxes as “crap”; even your great uncle Harold, inventor of The Picnic Machine* would have thought of better things to do with a penny than drop it into one of SkyMall’s myriad change-sorting gumball-machine devices.

Unlilke the in-flight safety card, one is actually encouraged to take the SkyMall magazine home, although I can’t imagine people become more likely to buy the stuff it contains once they’ve been freed of claustrophbic, sensory-depriving in-flight conditions, and have more time to think it over. Or who knows, maybe someone out there will sentimentally buy a pop-up hot dog toaster to remind them of the sinus pressure they experienced on the approach to a three hour layover in Detroit.

After I came back from Irene & Chad’s wedding in Salem, MA, I had wanted to write a post about my favourite items from the Skymall catalogue, but once I started choosing all the items I wanted to comment on, I realized I had way too much material for one post. And really, do miniature cotton-candy machines and homing golf balls every get boring?

NO!

So I’m going to make this into a weekly series until I run out. Enjoy.

*Apologies to The Large White Mocha, whose great uncle actually did invent a Picnic Machine. I am neither making that up, nor being clever. This is just one of the many reasons why the Mocha ought to blog. Ask her about it sometime. It’s a good story.