Why yes, we take American Express.

I just got an email from Delta Airlines, telling me their EATS menu has been expanded on flights over 1 1/2 hours. For the bargain price of only $5-$12, I can buy a sandwich, some hummus and carrot sticks, or a "Chicken Bistro Salad." Apparently it's bistro because it has nuts on it.

This bugs me. Flying and I have an abusive relationship to start with; I love the convenience and speed with which I get to the places I dearly love to go, but I'd really like to be treated like I wasn't a package to be shuttled about at the airlines' pleasure. In the past year I've flown on 22 Delta flights (yes, I am a hopeless travel whore, and I hope never to change). And on those 22 flights, I have not once departed on time. Often I have arrived at my destination hours late; twice I've been delayed overnight. For the pleasure of being shuffled through not one but two security checkpoints (yes, at some airports they make you take your plastic baggie through security to get it examined before the line where they run you through the metal detector), being forced to stand for some time barefoot and jacketless trying to balance a laptop, a purse, and your sneakers, and then hustled to your gate just in time to realize you've been delayed for an hour (or two, or six), you can expect to pay outrageous fares, fees, and taxes sometimes equivalent to a down payment on a new Kia. (Example: a recent fare search to Athens revealed the flight would cost $884, plus another $472 in taxes. This is actually more than the down-payment for my 2006 Corolla.)

But the delight doesn't stop there. On board you can expect to sit in sub-zero or Saharan temperatures, and don't expect that air conditioning nozzle to affect the atmosphere. The flight attendants come around offering you tiny bags containing 8 peanuts and, if you're really lucky, packets of cheese crackers, but only on flights longer than 45 minutes. If you're flying from Jackson to Atlanta, you're screwed, sorry...would you like some Dasani in a 3-oz. bottle? Apparently they expect passengers to make like camels and drink up ahead of time.

Having flown a few times in first class (always through no direct, paying action of my own), I can say that life is better behind that blue polyester curtain. They refill your drink without looking at you as if your request for another is somehow killing Somalian children, and they have Sunchips and chocolates in addition to the standard-issue peanuts. They offer to take your coat, and bring it to you along with your connecting information before you land. There is enough room to cross your legs without impaling your seat-neighbor with your heel.

My question is this: why the discrepancy? Would it really be that hard to extend the courteousness to the back half of the cabin? I understand we can't all eat Godiva, but surely we're all entitled to a smile, and maybe the whole can of Diet Coke? Companies are entitled to profits, sure, and if someone wants to pay the extra $500-$22,000 (yes, a Sunday flight to Sydney could set you back that much) for first class, then I see no reason to discourage them. My issue is with the coach mentality; it's too reminiscent of the Titanic, without the funny hats and Molly Brown. We're packages, to be loaded on and off as frequently as possible; our delays, our plans, our very lives are of little consequence in the grand scheme of making it into the black at the end of the fiscal quarter.

And now I'm being asked to pay $12 for a salad with nuts on it. But the bright side? They take American Express. So with enough of those I can earn frequent flier miles and do it all over again.