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It’s not everyday that you learn about defective birth control brands, WIC checks, and cheating spouses from your flight attendants, but this was no ordinary flight. While flying United Express from Salt Lake City to Chicago on Monday afternoon, two stewardesses managed to annoy almost a dozen passengers, including me.

Just as passengers began to doze to sleep, the women posted at the back of the plane (I, of course, was stuck in the last row) and went into tactless overshare mode for the next two hours. Loudly. Even noise-reducing headphones couldn’t drown them out.

Here’s a a small sample from their lengthy gab session that could have sparked a mutiny had the flight been any longer and hotter (the air jets were stuck on Sahara for the duration of the flight). This is not hyperbole: 

  • One of the flight attendants received a call from the cockpit. It was the captain, apparently. He was telling her how wanted his coffee. She was giddily repeating it word for word as the back section of the plane sat in head-shaking disbelief: “black and bitter.” (During the conversation, he rethought that and changed it to “black and strong.” I talked to the pilot as I exited the plane. He confirmed he it as he smugly smiled.
  • The same flight attendant gabbed about her birth control. Her sister took a particular brand that gave her menstrual spots throughout the month. She also had trouble with one of her pregnancies.The flight attendant doesn’t want that to happen to her.
  • She also bragged about getting WIC checks but mentioned how they don’t offer too many organic options in the bean department, but it doesn’t matter she knows how to work the system.
  • Pampers are the only diapers she’d ever uses and they set her back about $40 a month.
  • Their hate their coworker Malinda because she wears a weave, but doesn’t have to tie up her hair like everyone else.
  • One of their husbands is a truck driver and he’s probably unfaithful because he’s always accusing her of being unfaithful and “Why would he do that unless that man is cheating himself?!” He also thinks she’s screwing the pilots.
  • Hispanic and black woman shouldn’t go blond. Asians shouldn’t either. It turns their hair gray. But women who experience this get what they deserve because “that’s what happens when you go to a white salon that doesn’t know how to deal with that “kind of hair.”
  • A lot of black women have problems being black women.
  • “If someone spits on me its the ultimate disrespect. Speaking of which, remember when that man threw his shoes at GW Bush. It’s very similar.”
  • A doctor once told one of the women that she was too young to get a mammogram, but she insisted.

To make matters worse, we landed in Chicago too late to make our connecting flight to New York’s LGA and were told it would be 2 hours to the next flight—which ended up being wrong as there was another flight leaving in 20 minutes forcing us all to sprint to make it. While we taxied towards the gate, I called the customer service number to complain and they promptly issued me a $250 credit towards another flight. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll ever fly United Express again. Neither should you.
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