the last bit would have had the most effect for reasons described above
Oh, I understand the physics all right, but this is
not what happened to me in terms of symptoms. The ears blocked up coming down from 5000' to 3000', and proceeded to get no worse from there to the ground. (Just as well, really.) (What was I doing at 5000' anyway? - well, just experiencing the novelty of an aircraft that could actually get that high without taking the whole hour about it.)