UA 477 BOS SFO 1110 1433 752 7A

So my upgrade didn't clear (usually, I'm #1 or 2 for
zero seats; this time I was something like #5 for
zero seats, but I had the assignment I used to have
all the time before I was exalted; I get more legroom
than I can eat, a free drink, lunch, and to be first
out the door.

Went for bang for the buck, and got an Old-fashioned,
which is 3.4 oz (i.e., a generous double) of 70-proof
booze for free, seconds at $10 each, which I didn't.

This is a little Voss-style bottle labeled "Old
Fashioned made with whiskye and bitters - contains
caramel color and oak extract." Turns out that whiskye
is among other things a word for Jack Daniels' rye.

I'd thought that drinks like this are for people who
aren't quite ready to graduate to real booze. In this
case, perhaps it's a stepping stone to water. The
drink is frankly alcoholic, rather acrid, too sweet and
too bitter at the same time - I figure the cap fell
off the Angostura bottle (figuratively) when they were
making the batch. It didn't help that the whiskye was
kind of unattractive in the same way Tito's vodka is.
The cocktail is made by an outfit called OTR in Dallas
(stands for On The Rocks), and it's the cocktail of the
month or something on United. I found an old stroopwafel
in the seatside pocket, and it helped the booze down
nicely.

On this supposedly premium route, lunch is served,
which for me was bad news - I was looking forward to
a burger or an Uno personal pizza, both $10 to normal
people but free for me; instead, they offered chicken
in bbq sauce or butternut squash pasta. Hobson strikes
again. I got the chicken, white meat strips in a sticky
sweet sauce with collards and cheese grits on the side.
An appetizer of three wilted but sweet little pineapple
pieces and six wilted but sweet grapes; dessert was a
half cup of Upland Farms raspberry yogurt.

Does it say anything that next to the opportune stroopwafel
the best part of the meal was cheese grits? These were
salty but not too salty, gritsy but not too much so, and
with a sizable dose of mild melting cheese on top.

The chicken was tenderized and tasteless, the sauce pretty
nasty, sweet and peppery but in no way good. Collards can
be good with the aid of pork products, but these seemed to
have been steamed in nothing vapor.

Thank goodness the half cup of yogurt wasn't a whole cup.

The flight attendants were signtly and cheerful.

Free movies on the monitor.

Toward the end of the flight, they came by with the Kind
blueberry vanilla & cashew granola bar, 40% less sugar
than the average nutrition bar: this had a mild blueberry
aroma, mild blueberry flavor with some strange cheesy
aftertaste, and a good number of cashews. On the whole it
tasted and felt like a granola bar, perhaps slightly better.

My seatmate offered me the honor of being first off the
plane, but I wasn't in a hurry and bowed him out.

At the club the bartender seemed to recognize me (I'm an
oriental who tips) and poured me a double Evan Williams,
ensuring I'd be suitably oiled up for my meeting with
Swisher in the evening.
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