So we’re back, and you can see how well the occasional posting went while we were in Prague. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. But I’ll probably have a few things to talk about for the next couple of days.

First: a list of things I absolutely did not miss, some to my surprise.

• Blogs (really, the internet in general). No offense, everyone whose blogs I read, but I never once thought, “Man, I feel so out of the blogosphere.” When I went through my hundreds of unread posts I skipped most of them and didn’t feel like I was missing anything either. This means I’ll be cutting some subscriptions and spending less time on the constant flow of words.

• The presidential race. Good gravy. I moaned out loud when CNN was still talking about Hillary and Obama in Atlanta yesterday. How many more months of this?

• Driving. I’m now an even bigger fan of public transportation. You just get on and get off. I wish light rail came to my house.

Second, a random thought, perhaps even a theory: Most products and services you pay money for get better over time, because the suppliers want to win more customers and make more money. This is not true for air travel. Air travel has gotten progressively worse over the years, and will probably continue to do so. It used to be (I’m told) a pretty classy affair: people dressed up, there were nice dinners and drinks, etc. Now they shove as many people as possible into the smallest possible space, throw you a bag with three peanuts in it, and the prices certainly aren’t getting any better.

There are a couple of reasons for this, if you ask me, which you didn’t. First of all, the airlines are all losing money hand over fist. So they’re not looking to cut prices. Second, they know people have to fly. It’s not that much of a luxury anymore, it’s just the only way to get to places some people have to go. So you don’t really have a choice, and if it’s important enough to you to be comfortable you can pay three times as much for your ticket and go first class. They’d much rather you do that, so I’m not really expecting the coach section to improve.

I don’t say this because we had terrible flights or anything, it’s just that air travel isn’t a whole lot of fun.