no option after getting sucked in at the grotty shopping mall checkouts
Why is everybody going on about shops at airports?
My last several recent trips through airports go like this:
(1) Arrive two hours before take-off, as that's the earliers the check-in desk opens.
(2) Queue two hours for check-in.
(4) Queue forty minutes for security.
(5) Get onto plane late, and continue to wait on plane for the other late passengers to finish queueing.
OK, if you're travelling with someone, one of you can keep the position in the queue whilst the other goes off to get some sandwiches, so you can have a "meal" consisting of eating sandwiches standing up in a queue, but there's no other opportunity to do any shopping.
Has it not occurred to airport mangements that if the punters didn't have to spend all their time queueing they might actually get to spend some money in the shops?