My wife and I flew UA 1281 from IAD to MCO a week ago. It must have been uneventful; my wife let me sleep the whole way down there. :-) It was a 757; we had the two seats next to the 2R door, 7DE. The captain opted against Channel 9; the FA asked him about that when I commented that it had briefly been ATC before going to the music option. His reply to the FA was that a passenger listening to Channel 9 on one of his past flights had instigated a panic after hearing something on Channel 9, and ever since, he chose not to let passengers listen to the ATC radio traffic. Sigh.... Upon arriving at MCO, my wife and I immediately saw things that stopped us in our tracks. One of us saw the NW 757-300 in the new color scheme; the other of us saw a young lady in a cut-off t-shirt that was way too short and a pair of jeans that rode way too low. I pointed out the 757-300 to my wife and explained why it was interesting; the girl was gone before my wife realized I hadn't seen her. You know you're an airline geek when you miss the half-dressed hussy and see the new airline color scheme. :-) We flew back on UA 1502 last Friday morning. Check-in for UA at MCO was a zoo. It turns out I should have been in the Premiere Exec line since our tickets were booked while I was still Premiere Exec, but since I'm back to having no special status with United, I didn't feel like pressing my luck. After an hour in line, we got checked in and hurried off to the security area, another model of chaotic inefficiency. By the time we got to our gate, boarding for 1502 was well underway. The flight was lightly enough loaded that we had 8DF on an A320 with no one between us. The flight was more than an hour late leaving the gate; some loose piece of honeycomb jammed some valve, and it took a while for the local mechanic to identify the problem and extract the flotsam and then for the maintenance base at SFO to OK the use of the airliner that had such flotsam floating around. The captain tried gamely to give us updates every ten minutes or so, but for a long time, where wasn't much he could say because they really didn't know what they were dealing with or, later, how soon a decision would be made. On the bright side, once they were done recycling electrical systems as part of the repair, this captain left Channel 9 on, so as we negotiated light chop on our way to DC, I got to hear some pleasant radio chatter. I heard two call signs I don't remember hearing: KESTREL and AUSTIN. Kestrel seems to be Airtours International, which matches the accent I heard well enough. I can't figure out who uses AUSTIN in the southeast US airspace (or what I really heard that sounded like "Austin"), though. Any guesses? Next up: UA 837 early Saturday to SFO, and UA 220 home late Sunday after Mothers' Day with my mom. The return trip could be awful; I'm in a middle seat, and it'll be in Economy, not Economy Plus. Given what the in-flight movie will be (Jennifer Lopez as a poor maid), I'll be praying for Channel 9. :-) Nick