The Terminal.

January 30, 2007 9:25 PM

Random things to do in the New York airports while working there?...

I'm going to be spending 12+ hours a day in the three main NY airports (Newark, JFK, Laguardia) almost every day for the next few weeks. I'm hitting two of them most days and driving between them. I'll be dividing my time between all the public pre-security areas (so no duty free, a limited range of shops and resturants).

I'll be working the whole time, but my schedule is mostly up to me, and I walk around with just a small bag or two. I supervise several people, but I essentially work on my own. So I can't disappear for hours, but I can decide where I'll be and when. The first few days I was there were frustratingly sterile and boring, but now I'm starting to find it funny and sureal. I'm enjoying people watching, but I don't get to stay still for long.

So what interesting games can I play by myself to make the most of this weird situation? I thought of time lapse photgraphy, but I'm too erratic. What should I make sure I see and do? Ideas can be airport specific, or just groundhog day related!

posted by crabintheocean to Grab Bag (7 answers total)

Make a goal to overhear at least one interesting thing a day from a stranger's cell phone call. For bonus points, post that interesting thing to the web. I'm sure you could catch some revealing/funny tidbits of people's personal lives.

Just out of curiosity, what's the job?
posted by zachlipton at 9:48 PM on January 30, 2007

Start a blog. Stat. Base it on your funny/surreal airport experiences. Update it constantly. Could make for good reading. Also, gives you something to do.
posted by sneakin at 3:06 AM on January 31, 2007

Start leaving books around, ala Bookcrossing. Unless that's an airport security issue?
posted by bibbit at 7:02 AM on January 31, 2007

Talk to the grunt workers and see if you can help with bunny patrol. There are a lot of rabbits that live near by and they often get squished of the runways and access roads. So bunny patrol goes out with snow shovels to retrieve them to keep down the vulture population (vultures are bad because they get sucked into jet engines).
posted by MonkeySaltedNuts at 8:39 AM on January 31, 2007

Seconding nneakin and zacklipton.

If you're going to follow zachlipton's advice, don't limit your observations to cellphones. Listen to everything you can.

Combine both ideas, and submit observations to one of my favorite humor blogs, Overheard In New York.
posted by Adelwolf at 8:48 AM on January 31, 2007

Best answer: Start a Where's George account, log only the bills you spend at the airport, and see how far they go.
posted by bink at 9:50 AM on January 31, 2007

Response by poster: Best answer for Bink. I'm not bored and looking for a way to kill time, I'm busy, but want to have fun with the weirdness of being in a place long term that most people just pass through. I think I might actually try to do the Where's George, thanks!

The job is totally legal and legit, but I can't really talk about it!
posted by crabintheocean at 3:58 PM on February 1, 2007