Herk,
Just to show my ignorance...I would guess your "JFK-MXP on Monday" flights are money-making flights. Put in other terms, these European flights are your "bread and butter" flights.
Factor in 10 or so cat-ranchers who fly these flagship flights.
Some are sweating, some are wearing reebok sneakers, some are taking the appetizers off the first-class setups so they can give it to the hotel staff at the layover hotel, most have no problem yelling at any passenger that gets out of line, but have a hard time getting down the aisle without dislocating three people's shoulders, all of them are taking as much airplane booze off the plane for the layover, all of them are complaining how this is the worst flight they've flown in 35 years and doing so loud enough that even the air traffic controllers can hear them, some will get onto the interphone to the cockpit and demand to know how many A/C packs you have turned off because they cant breathe and then when you ask them where your crew meal is they say "Whoops, you dialed the wrong number, try back later".....sound familiar ?
Ahhh, I miss those days.
FF