I'm in Arizona right now. Lest any potential blog-reading, house-robbing freakjobs take that as an invitation to visit my home, let me assure you that my wife is packing enough firepower to start her own South American dictatorship, and she has no qualms about taking life. So back off.

Anyway, part of my trip required me to fly from Phoenix to Tucson. It's a 22-minute flight over sand and rock and an occasional patch of farmland cultivated no doubt at the expense of low-income taxpayers in New Jersey. As we prepared for take-off, the stewardess explained to us how we can use our seat cushions as flotation devices in the event of a water landing.

I'll let that sink in for a minute.

It's not her fault -- our safety-obsession leads us to make silly rules, like the one that requires stewardesses to demonstrate how to work a seatbelt, and a legal system that compels ladder manufacturers to produce 800-page instruction manuals filled with admonitions like, "do not host small tea parties on top of this ladder, as it may grow unstable and fall, causing injury or even death to you and your guests."

Commercial airplanes are a great place to find this sort of thing. For example, the next time you fly, check out that little tri-fold flyer stuffed in the seat pocket in front of you. It's usually hidden between the sick bag and the magazine filled with items that nobody riding in coach can afford. The flyer doesn't have words, only pictures. In this its creators were compelled by the twin forces of illiteracy and immigration to emulate the picture-covered walls of those caves someone is always finding over in Africa or France or some other godforsaken place.

If you look closely at the flyer, you'll discover that the FAA recommends you not light up a cigarette while sucking from your oxygen mask. They also ask that you not smoke 'em if you got 'em in the event of an impending crash. Like anybody with a nicotine jones is going to obey that rule. The second the pilot announces an engine failure, that cabin is going to haze over like an AA meeting in Winston-Salem.

The flyer's pictures of planes engaged in unexpected landings (i.e., crashing) are deceptively soothing. In each one the plane is at maybe a two degree angle, as if it just ran out of gas and is drifting gently onto a flat, soft field of grass, or a tranquil pool of water. A crash landing is just like landing at the airport, you see, except that you get your luggage right away, along with a nice travel voucher.

This to me seems counterproductive. If the whole point of these instructions is to prepare people for disaster, then perhaps we should provide some realistic pictures. How about a plane diving into trees at a pitch with its engines on fire, and the only people on board not screaming are the ones holding their Bibles? That'll get people thinking.