Flying the plosive skies

 After working on the other side of the counter, some of my friends have this weird super-server-spidey-sense.  They see egregious and dismissible faults, where I see mostly adequate or even good service.  I listen to their mid-meal service critiques and usually find myself thinking they should just relax and cut the guy or girl some slack.  After today's flight home from Texas, where I cringed at almost every syllable of a flight attendant's announcements, I can feel their pain.

Like any other craft, voice acting has a myriad of skills to master:  Interpreting the copy to understand the meaning behind the words and to whom you are speaking, the acting and comedic sense to know how, when and to what degree to convey those thoughts and emotions, the mechanics behind your voice and breathing, and the skill which was painfully absent on the intercom of Delta flight 479 from Houston: mic technique.

The first time I saw the word "plosive", I thought it was a typo.  Funny sounding word, but important to know in this business.  You form a plosive when you use your tongue or lips to stop airflow out of your mouth, such as when making a "p" "b" or "t" sound. In the voiceover world, trouble with these sounds is frequently referred to as "popping your p's" and demonstrates poor mouth placement relative to the microphone.  The result is a burst of air that slams into the diaphragm like a Mack truck causing casting directors and agents everywhere to leap for the "delete" key.

"If you are unwilling or unable to [PPPPFF]erform the duties. . . [PPP]lease notify. . ."  
As I cringed and recoiled in my seat, I glanced at my neighbors and realized that I was perhaps the only person being subjected to this special brand of torture.
If it were not for the Captain having illuminated the "fasten seat belt" sign, I would have gladly jumped out of seat 15E to move the handset 45 degrees and a couple of inches away from her mouth.  Instead, I cranked up some blues and tuned the rest of the announcements out, regaining my sanity.

. . .until we landed, when I was reminded to "[PPPlease collect my [PPPP]ersonal [BHHH]elongings"
 
Ugh.