Quick! It’s an emergency! You just got an urgent call about a family emergency and had to rush to the airport with barely time to grab your wallet and your passport. But now, you’re stuck at the airport with nothing to read. What do you do??

And, no, you did NOT have time to grab your bookbag, or the book next to your bed. You were . . . grocery shopping when you got the call and have nothing with you but your wallet and your passport (which you fortuitously brought with you in case they asked for ID in the ethnic food aisle). This is hypothetical, remember….

I have a hard time with the “did not have time to grab…” caveat. I always carry my handheld device with me. Usually, I use it for my shopping lists, etc. But I also have both texts and mp3 files with books. There has been some discussion about handheld devices for reading: I prefer books, but I’ll go with digital format if I’m reading a public domain work or I have more time to listen to an audiobook.

To play the game, let’s suppose that my handheld device is out of power. Most likely, I’ll be trying to keep my son entertained. If, by some miracle, he’s not coming with me on this trip, I I imagine I’d find a newspaper on an airport bench to read. If I can’t find anything and the flight is going to be more than an hour, I may buy a book. For example, if I had to fly from Australia back to the US, I’d buy two books and a magazine. That’s a long time.

I think sometimes it’s nice to just sit and enjoy silence and thinking and people watching. I enjoy the peace of flying and just resting.

Am I the minority there? Does everyone else go out and buy something right away, even for a short flight?