January 26 - Jr. Manned

I went to bed last night instead of going out.  The F3 was so exhausted during the 6 hour flight back to Boston, I was kinda glad I didn't go with them.  When we landed, I was DEF glad I didn't go with them.  My supervisor met me at the gate... I've just been Junior Manned.

This is a term for when scheduling sees you coming in from a trip and they throw you right on to a second trip.  It can only happen to Junior people.  

So they added an extra 3 legs to my trip - Philadelphia, back to Boston, then to DCA.  And a nice long layover in DC.  Turned into a 14 hour day.  At least my supervisor went and bought me a pizza to take with me.

The flight to Philly is very short, so not too eventful.  At the end of the flight, a guy in his early twenties stands up and turns to me.  He holds up a napkin, where he wrote a note.  It said "You are so gorgeous blahhhhhhhh have a chance with you".  I add the "blah" because after i read the first part, I blushed and didn't read the whole thing.  I thought maybe the kid was deaf or couldn't talk and that's why he wrote it on a note.  Nope.  When I blushed and said "aw, thank you so much.  that's very sweet."  he said "you're welcome, have a good night."  What?  Why would you stand up and show me a note, if you could just talk to me??  lol weird, but that's my first time getting hit on as a flight attendant.

On the flight to DCA, I got hit on for the second time.  Two guys were flying back to DCA from a bachelor party.  They were drunk and one was obnoxious, but they were funny.  The one guy was like 6'7 and he kept saying "can't I move into an extra leg room seat, I'm dying back here".  I thought I was witty and said "it's an hour flight, I don't think you're going to die and if you do, the F1 and I are both trained in first aid and CPR, so you'll be fine."  To this he pretended to pass out... "you're trained in CPR?"  Lol ridiculous.  They were pushing the call button and the F1 called me to see if they were being a problem.  Totally harmless, but they helped keep me awake after a ridiculously long day.

On the overnight in DC, I met up with a classmate.  She and I enjoyed catching up.  The next day I met up with co-workers from a previous job.  21 hour layover in DC was pretty nice and it was an easy flight back to Boston in the evening.

January 25 - Vegas then San Fran Layover

Our report time today was not until 2:55, so we had time to go out in the morning.  I met the F1 and F3 downstairs for the breakfast buffet.  Then the F3 and I went out to the casino.  He lives in Vegas, so he was showing me the ropes.  Said he just packed up and moved to Vegas because he always wanted to live there.

We went and did some gambling, then went back to the hotel.  On our leg to LA, one passenger stops me and says "I can't believe you don't recognize me, we've flown together several times!!"  I told him "I really don't think so because I've only been here 3 months lol"  I think someone else in the company must look just like me or something.

San Fran layover.  I decided to get dolled up for dinner because I feel like we never spend any time getting ready in this industry.  Everyone is scrubbing it a majority of the time.  We spend most of our days in our pajamas at the crash pad and celebrate our accomplishment when we shower and get dressed for the day.

The F3 and his buddy rented a car and were going out on the town in San Fran.  I Really wanted to go, but the next day we have an early report and a 6 hour flight back to Boston.  Looking back, I should've made myself go, but at the same time, I made a great decision.  The F3 on the way to Boston was Exhausted!!  They only got like 3 hours of sleep and sitting on a plane for 6 hrs was super rough.  He tried to take a nap in the bathroom lol.

Here's my hotel in San Fran.

January 24 - Vegas Baby!!

We’re working a late night flight to Las Vegas tonight.  We’re scheduled to arrive a little past 12 and I was very excited about a layover in Vegas.  I forgot that there is a 3 hour time difference and now I’m struggling to stay awake.  It’s almost 3am.  Def not going out once we get there…. Ok, maybe I will.  This is the flight from JFK to Vegas.  Man, I am not a big fan of any flights coming out of JFK.  The people tend to be ruder, pushy, they want everything in the world and constantly push the call button.  Boarding is rough because people are so inconsiderate of each other.   I was thankful to have Frankie – he’s got a Spanish flare to his announcements and “take no crap” attitude.  He dealt with most of the passengers.

January 23 - First sorta "major incident"

4 Day Trip

Layovers in Orlando, Las Vegas, and San Francisco

Our very first flight from Boston to Orlando and there’s already an issue. 

A lady gets on the plane with 2 small children who are SCREAMING at the top of their lungs.    Apparently, the family tried to fly from Providence to Orlando earlier and were kicked off of the flight because the children would not sit down in their chairs and were freaking out.  The mother only speaks Spanish and our F3 (Spanish speaker) talks to her to find out, her son is autistic.  Both children are screaming, the son is kicking the chair in front of him and the F1 is freaking out, threatening to kick them off the flight if they won’t remain seated with their seatbelts fastened. 

A whole team of people comes down to handle the situation - 2 AO’s, a Conflict Resolution Officer (CRO) comes down, and a supervisor.  Customers are getting angry because they’re going to have to hear 2 children SCREAMING for the next 3 hours.  Great start to a 4 day trip.  Did I mention the flight is almost 100% full? 

Eventually, they decide to move the mother and her 2 children to the back of the aircraft because there is 1 open seat and that way, the son will not be kicking the person in front of him.  We move 3 passengers to row 6 and move the family to row 23.  Whew, crisis averted. 

Well, not exactly, now the tv’s in row 6 aren’t working, so the 3 people we moved are pissed they were put in these seats for 3 hours and the people who are now sitting by the children are furious that we moved the screaming kids to the back of the plane.  Screaming kids and now several passengers yelling at us.

We give people free headsets, the people in row 6 free drinks and hope for the best.  What else can we do?

Once we got up in the air, the kids settled down, like the mom told us they would.  They just don’t handle the seatbelts or the change in pressure well.  We ended up having to lock off a lavatory for this family though because the little boy pee’d all over Everything – mirrors, walls, floor, everything.

Turns out, the lady’s father is on life support in Puerto Rico and she’s connecting once she gets to Orlando.  They’re going to pull the plug, but are waiting for her to get there to say her good-bye’s.  She suspects her daughter is autistic too, but the doctors won’t diagnose her because she is so young.  I’m really glad they were able to make it on the plane.  The other passengers ended up being pretty understanding too.

Another thing I learn on this flight is that it’s very common for people to sue airlines, especially when it comes to people with Special Needs.  That’s why so many people came to deal with the situation.  At least that’s what the F1 told me.  I wonder how many lawsuits there are each year.

January 22 - Another Winter Storm, Seriously???

I was on the phone with my dad today, on my way to hang out with my mom, and he says “so how is this winter storm going to affect you getting back to Boston?”  What??? What winter storm?  At this point, I have 2 more days scheduled off and I planned to go to Boston Wednesday so I could get my passport updated.  ANOTHER winter storm???  I feel like the last several times I’ve gone home, some stupid storm hits the North East and I have to go back early.   I spent the next several hours researching how to get back.  Here’s what happened:

8:00pm Flight– Cancelled
3:00pm Flight – 12 Stand-bys and a completely full flight
7:20am Flight tomorrow – Available.  I sign up.  Next morning, flight is delayed 3 hours and I end up having to sit on the jump seat for 3 hours to Boston.
1:10pm – make it to Boston.  Missed my passport appointment, but I decide to go to the office anyways.  My passport expires in a few weeks, I Have to get it updated.

I get to the Blue Line T station and am waiting in 7 degree weather.  The train doesn’t come for 40 minutes!!  (It’s supposed to come every 5)  OMG, I feel like destiny is against me updating this passport!  What’s the deal?  Then… my cell phone dies.  Have you tried finding your way around without a GPS lately? 

I finally make it to the passport port agency, go through security to get in, upstairs, escorted by police officers and sit down with the passport lady.  “I’m sorry, we’ve already shut down our systems for the day”.  AGHHH!!!  Seriously???  I probably should’ve pushed back a little more about it, but I didn’t.  She signed me up to come in on my day off, Jan 28.  Great.  Hopefully, I can make it then.

January 18 - 19 The rest of our camping trip

We all just hung out at the camp site during day 2 of the trip.  We played cards against humanity (amazing game), drank, went swimming and played at the fire.  At night, things got a little crazy.  We all sat around the fire and sang country music all night.  I have to say, when I get drunk, I'm an amazing singer.  Haha

I showed the girls how to do the wobble and apparently we did a lot of dancing.  Everyone ran out of beer so one of the guys started passing fireball around the fire and we all took swigs.  Gee I hope we don't get mono.

I made a mistake at the end of the night by telling one of the guys "if you can find another beer, I'll funnel it".  You better believe he found a beer.  You Also better believe I'm true to my word and I funneled it ... and promptly said "honey, I need to go to bed".  Let's just say the next day hurt, although I tried my best not to complain as we canoed for another 3-4 hours back to our cars.

Awesome trip :)  Can't wait for next year

January 17 - Canoe and Camping Trip... arctic style!

For some reason, I can't access my schedule from months ago anymore.  I guess that's good because it'll help me catch up on my posts faster than I was going before... because I was catching up on every single trip lol.

The weekend of January 17, Justin and I went kayaking and camping with a bunch of his fraternity brothers.  I love that this group of friends is always doing new/fun stuff.  On Friday, I drove with Justin to Tampa so he could go to a work conference.  I sat in the lobby the whole time working on tax stuff while Justin was in meetings.  He'd sneak out to bring me food and things.  It was fun.

The tax work is feeling a bit overwhelming.  There is so much to research.  Then I need to apply for a Tax Preparer ID, have to research and buy a tax software, need access to a tax software, how much am I going to charge, need to design a business card, etc...  I wasn't expecting it to be so overwhelming.

Needless to say, I had plenty to do.

The next morning, we drove down to Arcadia to meet the group for camping.  The paddle down was a blast, but half of the group had no idea how to canoe.  Justin, meanwhile, was determined to keep in front of the group while his friend Joe (and his wife Kayla) kept trying to pass us.  It was a fun ordeal until multiple canoes tipped over while racing.

We picked a spot along the river and set up camp.  Good thing we did it then, because we had enough time to find fire wood and get the fire going.  It soon got insanely cold.  I have to say, on our next camping trip, Justin is not in charge of the food.  We had bare minimalist stuff, while everyone else was cooking gourmet stuff like ribs and chili, we had hot dogs.

That night, I thought we were going to die because it got so cold.  I couldn't even drink beer because it chilled me to the core.  Everyone went to bed pretty early and Justin and I huddled together, trying to keep warm.  I wasn't sure we were going to make it.

We woke up to find out the temperature had dropped to the low 30's during the night.  At one point there were pieces of "frozen water particles" falling from the sky.  Ice covered everything.

Justin, the great outdoors man that he is, was the first person up.  He got the fire going, started some coffee for me and made breakfast.  He takes such good care of me.

Justin has all of the good pics on his computer, but here are a few.

Everyone's stuff

I've no idea how some of these canoe's floated

Ice on everything the next morning

Ice inside our tent even!!

This was at 8am... after it'd warmed up a little.

arctic style!

January 15

Certain parts of this job are really irritating.  I got my February schedule.  Every single day I requested off, I’m scheduled to work.  The schedule was released late too.  I thought the entire scheduling process was supposed to be done through a computer system, I’m not sure why there’s always delays and screw ups.  I tried to submit changes to the schedule, which should also be approved or denied pretty much instantly, but a full day later, my requests are still “being processed”.  In the meantime, the days I wanted off have gone from “green” to “red” on the reserve grid – meaning there aren’t enough people to cover those days.

January 7-8

Wow yesterday was crazy.  We took off from San Juan and flew to Santo Domingo, from there we went to FLL and from FLL to Kingston, Jamaica and back to FLL.  I think I found my new least favorite flight.  The people on the Kingston flight were not polite, kept pushing their flight attendant call buttons… we were running for the entire flight and the worst part is that people weren’t very nice about it.  “Give me an apple juice”, not “can I please have an apple juice”.  My F1 is the fastest person I’ve ever seen at serving drinks.  I was practically running and he was through with drinks and snacks before I finished beverage service.  On the way back, we decided to do start drink service later in the flight so that there would be less “ding ding” of the call button from people who wanted more of whatever.  That worked better, but we waited a little too long and had to run to finish in time.  Haha, can’t win.

We got into FLL at 9ish.  F1 and I had some drinks in our room while we got ready to go out for dinner.  We went down to the tiki bar at a sketchy hotel next door and ran into another flight crew.  The bar was already closing but we stayed and hung out with them.  You know a bar is sketchy when there’s a hot tub right next to it, prob swimming with all sorts of diseases.  Well the guys strip down to their boxers anyways and jumped into the hot tub.  I went back and changed into a swim suit and soon joined them.  There was a hot tub right outside the bar, the guys all skimmed down to their boxers and jumped into the hot tub.  We hung out in the hot tub till like 3am, ordered a pizza (“um, hi, do you deliver to the hot tub??”) and talked for hours on how to find more alcohol lol.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a solution to our ‘no alcohol’ problem, so completely sober, we decided to run down to the beach and jump in the water.  It was so much fun diving into the water and splashing around.  All of a sudden I see a white flash from the corner of my eye … the F/O goes running and diving in to the water butt naked (from a distance).  He says “come on guys, let’s skinny dip!”  Um, no thank you.  Lol we were all out until like 5am.  Did I mention it was like 50 degrees out and raining?  Haha what a crazy/fun night.  Was certainly tired today!

Our flight to Boston from DCA was only 50% full, it was so simple.  I get home from my 4 day trip and I realize I have a voicemail from work.  We got in at 5:30 and they want me to come back to the airport and do a 9pm flight to Newark and then stay the night in JFK.  I’m so exhausted, I can’t believe they freaking called me after a 4 day.  I called them back and told them I’ve had a glass of wine and can’t do the flight, so they’re giving me a No Show on my record.  I can’t believe after how much work I’ve been doing lately that they’d give me a No Show.  It’s a pretty big deal to get a no show.  I’m going to talk to my supervisor to see if there’s something we can do about it.  Because of the trip in Aruba, I’ve been working 12 days straight without being home to wash clothes.  I can't believe how much these airlines abuse their employees.  It's mind boggling.  

January 6

Wow today was rough.  We started out in Jax, but out plane was severely delayed from the winter storm so our 12pm flight didn’t leave until after 5pm.  We had JAX: SJU: SDQ: SJU and finished around 1:30am.

On the SDQ:SJU flight, we had a lady sitting in the front of the plane who was knocking on deaths door.  She kept moaning the whole flight, had bruises all over her, and had to sit on a pee pad.  When we got to SJU at 1:30am, the ground crew did not have a straight back wheel chair (the ones that fit down the aisles of the plane), so they were trying to carry the lady.  After about 20 minutes of them trying to figure out what to do, I grabbed the on board wheel chair to help get her off.  Apparently, it’s common for people to send almost dead relatives from SDQ to SJU because it’s cheaper to buy a plane ticket than to send them over once dead.  Still, I can’t believe she was traveling alone.

In customs, I was almost arrested.  It was a scene like something from Meet the Fockers.  Totally weird.  Usually, customs lets the crew go through first because they know we come through so often.  In San Juan, the crew shares the line with the wheelchairs and the wheelchair ‘pusher guy’ literally ran to beat us to the line.  Something was wrong with getting the lady through customs, because we stood there for what felt like eternity.  Our entire plane of 100 people made it through customs and our crew of 4 was still standing in line.  So I decided to jump on the end of the passenger line.  Everyone else makes it through customs and I’m finally at the front when the customs agent says “are you crew?”, well yes I am.  And then proceeds to scream at me “get back in the crew line!  Passengers come first!”

“Sir, there is no one else here but us!”

“Get back in the crew line!  You think you’re important but here, the passengers come first!”

I look behind me and around me, then back at him “There is no one else here but us!  There are no passengers!”

He keeps screaming at me and I’m getting increasingly irritated until my Captain says, “don’t play his games, just come back over in line with us.”  So I did.

As so as I walked back into the crew line, the same Jerk customs agent starts calling us from the crew line!!  Are you kidding?!  And guess who’s line I have to walk through?  The jerks.  He starts going off on me again and I keep giving it back to him, until eventually I’m able to make myself shut up.  I was so frustrated.

So it’s 2am and we’re standing outside the airport, exhausted and pissed off.  The hotel shuttle isn’t there and is going to be like another 30 minutes to arrive.  Our Captain grabs a cab instead and we finally head off to the hotel.  What a long, miserable day.  Now 8 hours of rest and we’re back at it tomorrow.  Ugh.

January 5

I’m on for another 6 day block.  Boy is this killing me.  It was great having all those days home at the beginning of December, but this is brutal. 

I was assigned another 3 day trip today.  Layovers in JAX, SJU, and FLL, reporting at 3:20.

Still in the aftermath of the storm, the first two legs of our trip (BOS: DCA, DCA: BOS) were cancelled, but they didn’t tell us until we showed up at the gate.  As soon as we saw the sign “Cancelled”, the F1 said “turn around and walk away quickly”.  Apparently, passengers get really really nasty about that stuff.

We worked one leg to Jacksonville.  The F1 is great. He’s probably my favorite person to work with so far.  We wanted to be good influences on each other, so we went to work out at like 11pm when we got to the hotel.  Afterwards, we balanced it out by grabbing drinks and chilling in the “executive suite” room of our hotel talking till 1am.  The working out at night wasn’t the best idea because we were both so wired, but finding time to work out is tough in this job.

January 4 - Back to Boston

After a lovely crepe breakfast with my F1 and F3, we headed back to Boston today.  So here’s the weird part with scheduling.  Yesterday, they called my hotel room and said “can you work the flight back to Boston today, it’d leave at 2pm”. 

Me:  “yes, I don’t mind working, but I’m not legal to fly until 9pm tonight, so we will need to leave after then”.

Scheduling:  “oh ok, I see that on your schedule now.  Never mind, continue with the previous plan”  (there was no previous plan besides me relaxing in Aruba”.

Me:  “We have a plane and a full crew here.  I’m more than happy to work the flight back tomorrow morning?”

Scheduling:  “We are well aware of the situation, we’ll let you know if anything changes.”

Ok, so here’s what scheduling ends up telling us to do:

Both pilots fly back to JFK on the 3rd

The F1 flies back to JFK on the 3rd

Tomorrow, I deadhead back to Boston on the 4th

Tomorrow, the F3 works the flight back to Boston on the 4th

2 Flight attendants are deadheaded down to Aruba from JFK to work the flight back to Boston on the 4th

Those 2 flight attendants will then be deadheaded back to JFK

Does this make sense?  We have a full crew – 2 pilots, 3 flight attendants and an airplane.  By the third day, we are all legal and willing to work, but for some reason they decided not to let us.  Weird if you ask me.

What we actually did:

Both pilots refused to go to JFK on the 3rd.  Instead they remained in Aruba and flew the plane back on the 4th, because we would've had no pilots otherwise.  The F1 stayed in Aruba and caught a different flight back to his home town (on a different carrier), the F3 worked the flight, and we bumped a passenger off the flight so I could comfortable sit while the JFK flight attendants worked the flight.  

I got back to Boston at 5pm on January 4.

January 3 - Day 2 in Aruba

Ouch, I was hurting a little bit.  The 3 of us crew members agreed to meet down in the lobby in the morning and take the boat over to the hotels private island.  Gorgeous day outside!  Too bad my head hurt.

We hung out all morning on the island.  It’s weird how our passengers recognized us everywhere, even out of uniform.  “You were our flight attendants!!”

The flamingos were crazy.

I fell asleep in a hammock.

The Captain wanted to have a meeting in the hotel lobby at 2pm, so around 1 we went to wait for the boat shuttle back to the hotel.

The F1 and I were sitting on the edge of the dock, taking pictures, when a fishing boat drove by.  I watched as the 2 guys in the boat turned their heads completely around to look at me.  Then the boat slowed down, they turn around and start heading towards the dock.  What are they doing?

“Hey do you want a ride instead of waiting for the shuttle?”

I looked at the F1 and F3…. “Sure, as long as you take my 2 friends too!”

The waves were pretty crazy, they almost hit the dock multiple times.  Def wasn’t easy to pick us up.  When I said “thanks for the ride” they responded “of course, how could we not stop for 2 beautiful ladies… uh, and a dude”.  LOL

Turns out these guys work on the giant yacht that we saw sitting in the harbor.  Wow!  I really wanted to go with them on the yacht but we had the stupid meeting. 

Our Captain was crazy about getting home.  He was calling and calling Scheduling, then emailing everyone under the sun to find out when and how we were gonna get home.  Come on guy, shut up.  The F1 was eager to get home because he was supposed to go on vacation and the F3 wanted to get home to her little boy.  Me, on the other hand, I was very content staying put. 

The F3 asked me earlier in the day not to drink in case they scheduled me to work the flight back, but I realized about 1pm that it was my day off and I wasn’t legal to fly anyways… so I ordered a drink.  A few minutes after I put in my order, the 4pm flight that they were supposed to take got cancelled!!  Everyone was staying in Aruba for another night!

The 3 of us flight attendants drank a little, then went clothes shopping for some island appropriate clothing and souvenirs.  We headed back to the hotel to get dressed for dinner.  The F3 let me borrow a dress because I didn’t find anything shopping.

Dinner was amazing!  And dessert was even better.

At the end of the night, we were all tired and just went back to our rooms for a few drinks and then headed to bed.

January 2 - Snow Storm Hurcules

I was called exactly at 3am today.  Aruba turn.  There’s a big snow storm about to hit the NE, so I decided to pack a suitcase to bring with me, just in case.  I was running late to the airport, so when I got a call from a supervisor to tell me “just so you know, our Aruba flights leave from a different terminal”, I was able to say “OH, I’m already in the crew lounge, I’ll have to travel over there.”

When I eventually got to the gate, turns out our plane is running really late by about an hour.  The plane had come in as a red eye from an international destination to Terminal C.  After everyone exits the plane, it has to be cleaned and searched by customs or something and then is taxied over to Terminal E.  It was late arriving from the redeye and hence, late leaving for Aruba.

I loved the two people I was flying with.  The F1 and I worked together just after Thanksgiving, he has a lot of seniority in our base and the F3 is also really senior.  The flight was fun and we kept hoping the return flight would be cancelled once we landed.  Unfortunately, when we got to the ground, the Captain informed us that we would be returning to Boston… just in time for the snow storm.  Great.  The entire plane of passengers felt horrible for us.

Well… when the gate agent opened the door, she informed us we were cancelled!!!  The F1 was so excited he ran out of the plane and picked up the gate agent in a giant bear hug!  The passengers all clapped for us and we smiled and jumped for joy as we said good-bye to everyone.  Yippee!  Free stay in Aruba!!

On the way out of the airport, we bought bottles of alcohol and headed to the hotel.

What an amazing hotel we stay at too!  My room was amazing and had it’s own balcony.  So glad I brought some clothes with me!  We all ran upstairs and then met back down by the pool to commence drinking!  It was so beautiful.  Our Captain came down too, but boy what a grump.  He was so pissed to be stuck in Aruba and wanted to get back to Boston pretty badly.

This was my 6^th day of flying, so according to FAA regulations, I cannot fly a 7^th day.  Looks like I’m gonna be stuck in Aruba for at least 2 nights! 

The rest of the day we just drank around the pool, then up in my room on the balcony and then went to the other side of the hotel and hung out some more.  Mmm… coconut rum and pineapple juice is amazing.

View from the pool deck

We brought our booze down in coffee cups lol.  Classy

Pool side

Sunset was beautiful