train wrecks

Have you ever felt like you are watching a verbal train wreck? Last night I attended a friend of mine's Christmas party and witnessed two train wrecks. During the fist situation I was simply a bystander. We were all standing around talking and this guy was trying to flirt pretty hard core with another girl. He kept putting his foot in his mouth by saying such gender stereotypes about women and hinting that he thought this girl fell under those stereotypes. Now he has meet her a couple times, but doesn't really know much about her. In my opinion, he was basing most of his thoughts on the way she looked and presented herself. He would make such arrogant statements and kept offending her, but thinking his statements were valid. He said he was 29, but I think he was acting like a 17 year old. Simply because she is a cute blonde, doesn't mean he should assume she is an airhead. She is a very smart woman with a good job and in my opinion she is totally out of his league. I rather enjoyed seeing him put his foot in his mouth over and over again.

Later on in the night I was able to see a train wreck fist hand. Just a little back story on the party, most attendees were married or in committed relationships so being a single female, I was in the minority. My fiend had told me about this one guy who was coming that was recently single. She said he was a pilot that we worked with and lived in the neighborhood. She said he was a nice guy but seemed to display some gay traits so she wasn't sure but thought maybe his eccentric tendencies could be explained by him being a metro sexual. He was one of the first guests to arrive and I tried to make small talk with him, but he didn't seem very interested. Later in the evening this couple and a "Scottsdale Lite" (Now I'm stereotyping but typically this means possible botox/boob job, lots of money she also appeared to be a bit of a cougar)and from the minute she walked in he was glued to her for the rest of the night. It was rather humorous to watch especially when she was leaving and they did the exchange phone numbers dance. Later in the evening I happened to be standing near him, so I started a conversation. Very general, not too depth, but somehow he asked me how much longer I thought I was going to keep flying. I immediately answered probably another twenty years or so and he said Why? I quickly responded, well how long do you think that you will keep flying and he said till they make me retire. I asked why should it be any different for me. He said that THIS JOB was never meant for a career. I explained that I love this job for the flexibility and the ability to have as much time off as I needed when I have children some day. I strongly believe that some flight attendants are able to spend more time with their children even with flying then I would with a 9-5 Monday through Friday job where Id barely be home in time to feed the kids and put to bed. I thought of all people, he as a pilot would understand. I was so offended, but totally called him out and boy did that feel good. I am so sick of people thinking that once we have kids, that we have to stop flying. Did we somehow morph back to the 50's? Now don't get me wrong, it will be tough especially right now when I have no senority and can't even hold a set schedule, but it's not impossible. Shortly after I defended myself, I excused myself from the conversation. I think what frustrated me the most was that he didn't see anything wrong with his point of view and didn't apologize for making himself look like a arrogant chauvinistic pig. Just wait till we fly together one day and he needs to use the Lav, he just might have to hold it till we land.

Niagra Falls

I had a fantastic four day trip this week which included a 32 hour layover in Toronto. I have always wanted to drive to Niagra Falls, but have never had a long enough layover that wasn't in the middle of the winter. This time I was determined to make the trip with or without my crew. Unfortunately I had a very lame crew who were fuddy dudds and didn't have any desire to make the quick trip. I had thought about going on one of the casino trips to the falls for a cheap ride and prevent a rental car. I missed one bus by minutes and the next one wasn't for an hour, so I had time to check out the price of a rental car. Lucky for me I was able to get a great price on a rental from Avis (right across the street). I called my fellow flight attendants and Ted decided to go along for the venture. Now I need to tell you about my co-worker Ted. He is 76 years old and still working full time as a flight attendant. He was very nice and pleasant to be around, reminded me of my grandfather. On the hour drive to the Falls, he told me story after story after story. I politely listend waiting for him to get to the point of the story and sometimes it never happened. Well we finally made the trip to the falls, and it was amazing! It was a beautiful day the sun was shinning, and I barely needed a jacket. A beautiful rainbow loomed above and I really wanted to search for the pot of gold at the end. At one point there was even two rainbows above the falls. We got pretty wet standing above the falls, but I was able to get a couple great photo's.

skydiving

My friend Erin decided last year on her birthday that she wanted to go skydiving before she turned 30. So this week was her 30th birthday we drove to Eloy on Monday only to find out that it was too windy to jump. We were all really bummed, but rescheduled for Sunday. So Sunday we again made the trek to Eloy, and this time we were successful. Erin and I requested the cutest instructors and camera men and Linnette asked for the craziest ones. My instructor or guy holding my life in his hand was Adam. And I have no clue as to the name of my camera guy cause I was too nervous when he told me and couldn't quite understand him with his accent. We signed our life away and watched a video on Monday so Sunday we were able to just roam around before it was time to get strapped up and ready to go. This was a bit scary as every couple minutes, more jumpers where coming out of the sky...the anticipation growing in the pit of my stomach. OMG am I really doing this? Or is this just a crazy dream? I felt like I was having an out of body experience. Adam introduced himself and started getting me set up for the jump. He gave me some instructions and said not to worry cause he would tell me it all over again before we jumped. Then we were all geared up and ready to go jump out of a perfectly good airplane. We climbed into a trailer and then transported to the runway. Adam and I were first on the plane and thus also the last ones to jump out of the packed plane. I watched as we gained altitude and didn't really get nervous until it was time to start scooting to the edge of the plane. Erin was the first to jump, then Linnette and finally my turn. I didn't really have a chance to even breathe before we were at the edge and out the plane. Then we were falling faster and faster, I was so excited that I screamed and screamed and screamed. One of our friends said he could hear me screaming all the way on the ground. We jumped out at 13,000 ft and he could hear me screaming from the ground. I'm glad that the camera man didn't record sound on my video because all it would be is me screaming and yelling OMG! Almost every picture my mouth is wide open cause I'm screaming. Surprisingly I wasn't screaming because I was scared but out of excitement. It felt like forever before he pulled the shoot, but I think it was only a minute or so. It was so exhilarating and time seemed to go in slow motion. Once Adam pulled the parachute, it was so quiet and peaceful. Adam asked if I wanted to have some fun and so we did tricks all the way down. Landing was pretty easy and left me wanting to jump back in the plane and do it all over again. Shortly after landing, our photo's and video were ready. The whole experience was over so quickly and left me wanting more. I'd love to jump again, but I'm not ready to go solo anytime soon(if ever). Here are some of the pictures from my jump.

Life never goes as planned

My heart is crushed because I just found out that my dream of buying my very own house has died. Long story short I helped my sister with some loans for college by co-signing and now due to those loans I can't be approved for a house loan. I thought it was going to be a simple process of her consolidating her loans and taking me out of the picture. However with the economy the way it is, this isn't an option. I have great credit and without her debt I would be approved for a respectable amount that right now could buy an awesome house. I had been looking at all these houses online and mentally decorating my new place. I was getting so excited about the possibility of having my OWN place and affording it ALL ON MY OWN! Being a single woman, making little money, I never thought this would have been an option by myself. Sure I thought that some day when Mr Right and I got married, we would eventually buy a house together. As a single woman, I was ecstatic to have the ability to achieve this statue by myself. Now I am so upset because I was going to be a self sufficient woman and achieve home ownership all on my own. I feel like not only am I missing a great opportunity for an investment in my future, but also I'm stuck in limbo. If I look at the other spectrum maybe all of these obstacles are being placed there for a reason, maybe I would be making a huge mistake purchasing a home. What if I loose my job? What if I want to be carefree and take off, this would trap me here. Sometimes I wish I could just get a glance at that crystal ball or the key to the choose your own adventure books so I could have an idea as to where each decision is going to take me. Well I have no idea as to what I am supposed to do, but I welcome the adventure and hope for the best.

The joys of sitting hot!

Sitting standby at the airport can be so much fun! It seems unreal that I am paid basically $8.50 for five fun filled hours of good old airport appreciation time. I usually end up spending more than I make due to sheer boredom. Here are some of the things I will do on a "hot" shift to kill the time.

1. Search the internet for a couple hours. (Unless the wireless internet isn't working which happens often)
2. Watch a movie or two or three. We have a tv room and recently they added a dvd player. Now if they would only upgrade the 1970's couches to something a bit more comfortable or is that asking way too much?
3. Eat. Normally I'm really good at eating out of my lunchbox, but for some reason the food I brought is never as good as the temptations in the airport. I guess on a normal trip I don't have five hours to contemplate if it will be Chilli's or Paradise bakery. After all I deserve a hot meal every now and then.
4. Sleep. It would be nice if we had an actual sleep room, but we don't so if you can manage to tune the complaining fa's out or turn your ipod up to dangerous decibls you might be able to knock out an hour or two by sleeping.
5. Read a book. I've found that I can't concentrate in a room full of distractions so if I want to read, I have to find a quiet place which doesn't really exist in this airport.
6. Walk around the airport. I get a sheer joy out of walking around and then laughing at passengers. Sometimes I'm laughing as they run through the airport frantically trying to make connections or just their plain stupididty.....Why does it seem that people check their brains when they go through the metal detector? Sometimes I feel like I have this magnetic pull to passengers that seem to want to stop right in front of me.
7. Spend money: Many gift shops, tempting pastries and coffee at starbucks, books and cards in the book store, plus the $10 place always has some enticing jewlery calling my name.
8. Call people. I enjoy catching up with friends and family, but only if I can find a private place as to not disturb others. I get so annoyed with people who are so loud on their phones and show no respect for others who might be subjected to their phone conversations.


Well I'm two hours in and now I'm going to kill some time by eating. What temptation will call my name today? Only three hours to go....

UMM can I get a sheet?

Either I have been working way too much and my patience is thin or people are just jerks.

Lately I have getting the most cranky and crazy people on my flights. I must have this signal telling people to be nasty to me or ask me stupid questions. Last week I worked this flight to Vegas and all the passengers hated me for some unknown reason. One lady with her three kids had her lap child laying in a bassinet on the tray table. I kindly explain that she is not allowed to have the baby on the tray table and she looks at me and says "well what if I drop my baby while I am sleeping?" Like this is my problem and who the hell drops their baby? Then another passenger later in the flight asks me for a blanket. I explain to her that it will cost $7 and she says fine. When I got to the galley where we keep the nap sack, I forgot and started talking to my co-workers. A half hour later another passenger requests a nap sack and I realize I forgot to take the nap sack to the previous passenger. Rushing up I apologize for my mistake and she tells me that she no longer wants to purchase. "So you don't want the blanket?" "No I waited 2 hours and I can stick out the rest of the flight" Then twenty minutes later she begrudgingly asks my co-worker to purchase it if she promises it won't take her two hours to bring it back to her. Ok lady it wasn't two hours try thirty minutes and if you were that uncomfortable, get off your butt and come back and ask for one or ring your call button. I know I made a mistake but she had no right to be such a bitch about things. Later in the flight she asked for a beverage (even though we had just finished going through the cabin but she was sleeping) I refrained from telling her it might take me 2 hours to get back to her. Then my last conflict with a passenger on our flight to Vegas happened with a first class passenger. I happened to be in the front of the cabin when Mr 4a rings his call button. I ask him if I can get him something and he tells me no just tell Nick (the first class flight attendant) that I need him when he has a second. WTF why can't he just ask me for whatever it is that Mr 4a needs? Nick comes up and gets him his meal then decides he needs to kill some time hanging out in the flight deck. (Its a long ass flight and everyone is sleeping) I hang out up front while Nick is in the flight deck in case anyone needs anything. I decided to stop by and see if Mr 4a wants me to take his food tray away. He tells me no, then a minute later when Nick gets back he immediately takes his tray and is told "Can you tell your crew members to stop bothering me" WTF I was just trying to help am I not good enough to take your trash. Mind you all of this happened on the same flight and only to me...I was working with three other crew members and only I get the crazies?

Now today I just flew from Vegas to Orlando and had another batch of mean crazy passengers. The one that really takes the cake is when a passenger asks me for a blanket and I again explain that its not free and she just stares at me and asks well do you have sheets then? Ya absolutely we charge for the blankets but the sheets they are free. WTF who are these crazy people, I want summer to be over so all of those non frequent fliers will leave and my seasoned travelers will be occupying my aircraft. Thank goodness I have a whole 32 hours before I have to get back on a plane with these crazy people.

I'm keeping my job for now atleast

After careful consideration I decided to not take the voluntary leave and let fate decide if I was going to be furloughed anyway. Luck will have it that I was saved and able to keep my job. Unfortunately about 180 of my co-workers were not as lucky and will loose their jobs at the end of July. I feel really bad for my co-workers and hope for some form of hail Mary from the Union.

So I guess for right now I will continue my working frenzy (between the two jobs) and hopefully I don't get too burnt out. Now the big question: do I go back to the possibility of buying a house or condo? Or will I be close to getting layed off in six months. I won't be so lucky if they do another round of furloughs considering I am about 18 people from the bottom.