Boston Globe columnist Dante Ramos just got himself into one hairy situation.
Last week, Ramos tweeted out a photo from his Houston to Boston flight that showed a young woman's effortlessly curled ponytail invading the space of his partner's seat. Flopped over the headrest, the long, luscious pony blocked the view of the mini television screen and almost landed on the tray-table.
"Congrats to the ponytailed young woman in seat 22B. You've invented a whole new way to be awful at 35,000 feet," Ramos tweeted post-flight.
Sure, we've seen fights break out on planes (like that one time a man wanted to do yoga in the aisles and no one else wanted him to), but this "ponytail passenger" just opened up a whole new viral world because, well, it happened to a journalist.
The tweet, which now has over 10,000 retweets, 9,000 likes and hundreds of witty remarks following suit (with "weave been hijacked," being a favourite of Ramos'), led the Globe columnist to pen an article entitled "The Day I Went Viral," in which he explains the situation with the "oblivious" ponytail and iPhone-using owner.
"Giving her the benefit of the doubt, I’ll assume she didn’t realize that her, er, readjustment would affect anyone else," Ramos said in an interview with Metro U.K. "At first I thought, 'What *is* that?' It took us a few moments to figure out that it was another passenger’s hair."
Shocked and surprised the tweet went viral, the columnist said he wishes his work on housing policy, transportation and higher education could get the same amount of retweets as a ponytail.
"For another few moments, we marveled at the ridiculousness of it. I took a photo, because that’s what you do these days when something absurd happens," Ramos told Metro U.K.
Even though he notes the ponytail wasn't on the seat for too long, the Boston-based journalist said it "broke an unspoken rule of economy class: Keep your coats, extremities, and expansive hairstyles under strict control."
For anyone who has experienced an invasion of space at 35,000 ft., you'll feel Ramos' pain on this one (even though we must say, that is one nice ponytail).
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