America's most backwards airline?

I'm sitting here at Hong Kong International airport, bare-footed, admiring the majestic, mist-shrouded hills that surround Hong Kong, contemplating the next thirteen and a half hours on a plane. Based on the last three hours from Sg to HK, I am less than excited.

I took this United Airlines flight because of the connections to Star Alliance, allowing me to rack up more frequent flyer points. It's starting to look like a long term decision with short term pain, not least the fact that I am tired and running off three and a half hours sleep (I prised my non-compliant body off the bed up at 03:30 this morning to check in and have held it hostage since. Human Rights allow me to hold my own self for so many hours before I can release it to sleep) but because the flight is going to be stupendously, arse-numbingly, DVT-inducingly, uncomfortably dull.
And this I attribute to the fact that I have become so accustomed to being entertained every step of the way, so the prospect of this transpacific flight without an extensive multi-media selection just fills me with dread. I am going to have to watch whatever they have decided to show us. I watched The Blind Side from Sg to HK, which I admit, i thought was good and brought tears to my eyes (but then again, people know that i'm a big sook and cry at the drop of a hat), but the most recent crop of movies on airlines doesn't excite me.
There are also the restrictions on using PDAs or advanced cell phones to amuse yourself on flights (ok, so there's a flight-safe mode, but how long is your mini battery going to last you and how long can you play solitaire for anyway?). I can't imagine how the Singaporeans must feel, they seem to be symbiotically attached to their devices.
To be honest though, I should be sleeping. If I follow the mantra of water, water, water and live in the timezone you're heading to, i should be polishing off the litre bottle of Watson's Water (that sounds bad doesn't it, but the blurb i can read that's not in chinese says it's distilled and the water is clear) and brushing my teeth right now. It's 22:26 in Chicago. Maybe a few pages of The Economist and a glass of wine might help. And that's not to say the informative pages of The Economist are boring, far from it, but they make you think and i get sleepy when i think on planes.

So, with a fond farewell to the high-rises of HK, which do put the Singapore HDBs to shame, both in scale and uniformity, they're calling the massed throng to board. Actually, they're calling important people to board and I'm in group 4 of 4. So last to get my kit in. I'll just continue to admire the view and let my feet breath.
Shovel