Ah, the joys of airline travel! As I write Ann, Mike and I are sitting at the departure gate, Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport, with a reported 20 minute delay.

I suspect the delay will be more than 20 minutes because there is no airplane parked at the end of our jetway. We passengers have been through the indignity of TSA screening: remove your shoes, belt buckles, pocket change, pens and pencils, cell phones and anything else that might cause a "beep" at the people scanner.

Run everything through the X-ray machine. Reportedly horrible things will happen if you forget a pen knife or are carrying more than three ounces of liquid!

It all reminds me of running cattle through a chute. The best advice I've received is just transport yourself in your mind to a nice place and endure the mightily undignified, but supposedly necessary, poking and prodding.

Jet Blue Airline has been making news horror stories of passengers being trapped on airliners for up to 10 hours with little food, water and overflowing toilets. Evidently the flight crew didn't explain to the trapped passengers the why of the situation. Close behind those unhappy experiences are reports of different carriers diverting due to weather and then abandoning passengers at other than their promised destination.

I can imagine the feeling next morning watching the flight crew and aircraft departing empty and realizing that you have been deserted.

It makes one suspect that whoever is operating the airlines, captains included, have their priorities sadly out of whack.

Having been an unscheduled airline captain in a past life, the Air Force called us Aircraft Commanders; I took pride in looking out for the welfare of my crew and passengers wherever we happened to land.

It saddens me to hear of my highly-paid civilian brethren abandoning their customers who by rights should forever come first. Actually another part of the news reports drive me up the wall. Reporters state, "The airplane sat on the runway for 10 hours."

Now any pilot knows that if an airplane is on the runway for whatever reason, that runway is closed to all other traffic.

It never happened! Another wrong statement is parking the aircraft on the "tarmac."

Jet aircraft don't use tarmac which is the same as asphalt street paving. A loaded jet aircraft would simply sink into the surface; they use concrete.

"Parking apron" or simply "ramp" is a proper term for where aircraft are parked. To me using wrong terms casts doubt on the veracity of the whole story but I suppose the reporter thinks it shows his expertise and knowledge of the subject. It does!

Years ago I lived near Dayton, Ohio. Flying over that area one can see many many abandoned rail lines.

In the early 1900s there were light rail, called, interurban, lines serving towns large and small everywhere in that part of the United States.

I suspected that the rise of the automobile was the reason for the demise of the streetcars. I asked an old gentleman who had lived in Dayton all his life what happened. His response is instructive for today's airlines.

He said "The light rail lines all went broke! The interurban workers were just nasty to their passengers in every conceivable way.

The passengers simply voted with their feet!"

Nobody is forcing you to ride Jet Blue or any other airline. Management will eventually catch on; no passengers, no profit, no more airline.

Oh yes our flight left 30 minutes late, landed in Denver right on time, and they treated us just fine. Good job!

That is the way I saw it.