They're getting worse. First it was flica. Now it's... banana chips. Yes, you read that right. The worst thing possible. And I just. Can't. Stop.
You should all be pleased that I had a terrible internet connection yesterday. I was going to write this huge rant about how stupid people are. I still think people are stupid, but am a little less steamed up about it. The headache I've had for almost 2 days now has kind of put a damper on any strong feelings I could have.
In keeping with the last two month's trend, our flight this morning was canceled. There's nothing quite like being woken up at 4:20am by a calling telling you to go back to bed. I'm not sure why it was canceled, but it meant we only did 2 flights today instead of 4. Not bad.
I'll tell you a few of the most outstandingly annoying things that happened yesterday. One lady told me that she wanted some cranapple - no ice and just a little (held up fingers to show about an inch). I poured her about that much and handed it to her. She looks at it, says it's too much, and hands it back. Are you kidding me??? I'm thinking, can you not just drink what you want of it and leave the rest?! So I pour about a quarter of an inch off and hand it back. Seriously... A few rows later I get to a couple. The man tells me what he wants, but the lady is sleeping. I ask if he knows if she wants anything. Tomato juice. And the lady, without moving her head (she's facing away from me sleeping) or opening her eyes says "tomato juice. No ice. No cup. Just the can." Call me crazy, but I think that's extremely rude. I can't stand when people can't bother to look at me while I'm serving them. It's not a whole lot to ask. I was trying to be understanding and thought that maybe she was sick or something. Then toward the end of the flight she wakes up and starts laughing and talking loudly. Not sick. Just rude. I'm also sick of people who don't ask if they can have something or say please. I give them a cookie and they say "one more". Excuse me? No please. No thankyou. And these are grown adults. There are so many more things that people do to drive me crazy. People are just thoughtless. They think they're the only ones on the plane and I have nothing better to do than wait on them hand and foot. And I'm the one who's concerned about getting people bent out of shape...
Today's people were much nicer and more polite. It would've been a great day minus the headache. Now I'm in the Hampton Inn in New Burn, NC. I've never been here and never heard of this place.
I'm finished complaining now.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Saturday, February 23, 2008
The good word from A-town
Asheville, of course.
Lying in this bed in the front room of my grandparents house takes me way back. I remember when I came to camp up here in NC and I was so miserable and homesick I cried the whole time. I missed my parents so much. Not that I don't still miss them when I'm gone, but I can at least be away from home for more than two weeks without crying the whole time. In retrospect I know that a lot of what I thought was homesickness was just one of the side affects of intense sleep deprivation from being in the "big girl dorm" where no one ever slept - but how was I supposed to know that then?
This week was a long week. I'm so happy to have four days off this weekend. I ended up getting a lot of extra flying in, which is great financially, but it wears you out. Yesterday we flew to Mexico and back. It was just over 7 hours of actual flight time. I enjoy going down there for the most part though. The people are usually nice and not demanding. Those flights also seem to be more interesting for one reason or another. On the way down we had to deport two men. I think it was a paperwork thing in customs and they weren't dangerous or anything. One of them got airsick twice, becoming the first grown man to puke on my flight. I don't think people really believe me when I tell them I feel their pain. We also had a 94 year old deaf lady who didn't speak English. I don't know who lets people like that fly alone. It would scare me so bad to send my mother/grandmother/aunt out on her own like that. She couldn't read or write, which we come across a lot on there, so we filled out her forms, for her. Then we found out she couldn't even write her name so we tried to put her fingerprint on there by writing on her finger and stamping it. Evidently this is a very common way of signing your name if you can't write. I scribbled on my fingers trying to find a pen that would work, but it was a lousy print. Hopefully she didn't have any problems getting through customs. It always surprises me when I'm handing out forms and have someone tell me they can't write. I don't know if it's just Mexico or that generation (most of them are older). I'm sure if we had to fill out forms on US flights I'd find out that a lot more people can't read. One man was really embarrassed about it and was explaining that he had moved back and forth between the US and Mexico a lot as a child and never got a chance. I felt bad for him and fortunate that it's such a given here that we read and write.
After a delicious salmon dinner this evening, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy, we had finally got the wireless connection set up and had a crash course on computers here at the grandparents house. It's fun to open people up to what computers have to offer. I'm proud of my grandparents cause they're willing to learn and try all these crazy new technological things.
Lying in this bed in the front room of my grandparents house takes me way back. I remember when I came to camp up here in NC and I was so miserable and homesick I cried the whole time. I missed my parents so much. Not that I don't still miss them when I'm gone, but I can at least be away from home for more than two weeks without crying the whole time. In retrospect I know that a lot of what I thought was homesickness was just one of the side affects of intense sleep deprivation from being in the "big girl dorm" where no one ever slept - but how was I supposed to know that then?
This week was a long week. I'm so happy to have four days off this weekend. I ended up getting a lot of extra flying in, which is great financially, but it wears you out. Yesterday we flew to Mexico and back. It was just over 7 hours of actual flight time. I enjoy going down there for the most part though. The people are usually nice and not demanding. Those flights also seem to be more interesting for one reason or another. On the way down we had to deport two men. I think it was a paperwork thing in customs and they weren't dangerous or anything. One of them got airsick twice, becoming the first grown man to puke on my flight. I don't think people really believe me when I tell them I feel their pain. We also had a 94 year old deaf lady who didn't speak English. I don't know who lets people like that fly alone. It would scare me so bad to send my mother/grandmother/aunt out on her own like that. She couldn't read or write, which we come across a lot on there, so we filled out her forms, for her. Then we found out she couldn't even write her name so we tried to put her fingerprint on there by writing on her finger and stamping it. Evidently this is a very common way of signing your name if you can't write. I scribbled on my fingers trying to find a pen that would work, but it was a lousy print. Hopefully she didn't have any problems getting through customs. It always surprises me when I'm handing out forms and have someone tell me they can't write. I don't know if it's just Mexico or that generation (most of them are older). I'm sure if we had to fill out forms on US flights I'd find out that a lot more people can't read. One man was really embarrassed about it and was explaining that he had moved back and forth between the US and Mexico a lot as a child and never got a chance. I felt bad for him and fortunate that it's such a given here that we read and write.
After a delicious salmon dinner this evening, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy, we had finally got the wireless connection set up and had a crash course on computers here at the grandparents house. It's fun to open people up to what computers have to offer. I'm proud of my grandparents cause they're willing to learn and try all these crazy new technological things.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Another day, another dollar fifty.
I'm once again being paid $1.50 to enjoy the airport. And this time without the fabulous conversation of my favorite older sister Christine :-D. She's instructing me on how to make hummus since I love it and it's not the cheapest thing to buy. I have to find a food processor first though.
My life seems uneventful these days. I started my trip on Monday and in keeping with the trend that's been going for the last month and a half I had something canceled. Unfortunately it was my 18 hour Key West overnight - the entire reason I got this trip. So they sent us home and added a Cozumel round trip the next morning. At least I made money off that one. Flying down to Cozumel made me want to take a week off, take my backpack, and just go wander around down there on the beach. Last night we were in Baton Rouge for a short night and had dinner with my friend Cooper. We had red beans and rice and boudin balls. I'd never had boudin balls before and they were so good. It seems like the cajun version of hushpuppies, but with rice, bits of meat, and more seasoning. Tonight (after a combined 5.5 hours of airport appr. time) we end up in the oh-so-exotic Maconga. And for those of you with a brain, that's Macon, GA.
I had a passenger this morning ask me about my job. How long I had been here, how much I made, etc... I told him this wasn't a job you do for the money. He said he only worked for the money. So he started telling me about his job. He makes $12/hr and is gone 6-8 weeks at a time so his wife can stay at home and he can buy a Harley... I wasn't impressed. I think if I was doing a job "for the money" I would expect a little more than that. Then on the flip side, another lady told me she doesn't believe in car payments. After a few questions I found out that what she does believe in is being with a man who makes enough money to pay cash for cars. It's funny how people have such different ideas and perspectives on money.
A man got on the plane the other day with Samantha tattooed on his neck - with a line through it. I couldn't help but laugh and ask him about it. He said he'd made it really obvious that he was with her when he put her name on his neck so now he wanted to make it really obvious that he wasn't with her anymore. It amused me.
I'm going to eat my wasabi peas and wait some more.
PS. The $12/hr guy also says that you can go to a bar and get sloshed and get on your motorcycle and be fine in an hour because of the air in your face. It gets the air in your system which sobers you up evidently... Someone needs to tell the cops that so they can stop worrying about drunk cyclist. Jamie pointed out that with that logic you could get drunk, then drive with your head out the window and be fine in an hour. I didn't want to burst that guy's bubble by pointing out that even if this were true, you have to survive that first hour of driving before you sober up.
My life seems uneventful these days. I started my trip on Monday and in keeping with the trend that's been going for the last month and a half I had something canceled. Unfortunately it was my 18 hour Key West overnight - the entire reason I got this trip. So they sent us home and added a Cozumel round trip the next morning. At least I made money off that one. Flying down to Cozumel made me want to take a week off, take my backpack, and just go wander around down there on the beach. Last night we were in Baton Rouge for a short night and had dinner with my friend Cooper. We had red beans and rice and boudin balls. I'd never had boudin balls before and they were so good. It seems like the cajun version of hushpuppies, but with rice, bits of meat, and more seasoning. Tonight (after a combined 5.5 hours of airport appr. time) we end up in the oh-so-exotic Maconga. And for those of you with a brain, that's Macon, GA.
I had a passenger this morning ask me about my job. How long I had been here, how much I made, etc... I told him this wasn't a job you do for the money. He said he only worked for the money. So he started telling me about his job. He makes $12/hr and is gone 6-8 weeks at a time so his wife can stay at home and he can buy a Harley... I wasn't impressed. I think if I was doing a job "for the money" I would expect a little more than that. Then on the flip side, another lady told me she doesn't believe in car payments. After a few questions I found out that what she does believe in is being with a man who makes enough money to pay cash for cars. It's funny how people have such different ideas and perspectives on money.
A man got on the plane the other day with Samantha tattooed on his neck - with a line through it. I couldn't help but laugh and ask him about it. He said he'd made it really obvious that he was with her when he put her name on his neck so now he wanted to make it really obvious that he wasn't with her anymore. It amused me.
I'm going to eat my wasabi peas and wait some more.
PS. The $12/hr guy also says that you can go to a bar and get sloshed and get on your motorcycle and be fine in an hour because of the air in your face. It gets the air in your system which sobers you up evidently... Someone needs to tell the cops that so they can stop worrying about drunk cyclist. Jamie pointed out that with that logic you could get drunk, then drive with your head out the window and be fine in an hour. I didn't want to burst that guy's bubble by pointing out that even if this were true, you have to survive that first hour of driving before you sober up.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Coming up with a subject is the hardest part of writing for me.
I'm sitting here at Amie's house watching her talk about cleaning - I mean watching Amie clean. I think I live out of my car these days. It's okay though.I finished my trip right on schedule last night. It was a decent trip. My captain was kind of "special". I'll leave it at that. I can give you details later but this is public so I'll be nice. After I went to Newport News it was on to San Antonio. I was disappointed cause no one wanted to go out that night but the other flight attendant and I went out the next morning. We walked down to the riverwalk, which wasn't anything like I expected it to be. The part that we walked along is more like a canal than a river. The river is lined with restaurants and shops and feels very European. The weather was windy and warm and the sun was out. It was really a beautiful day to be walking around. A lot of the shops were opening as we walked through and people would be shouting across the river to each other (in a friendly way). This is another one of those cities where it's easy to feel like you're in a different country. We came across a place where there was kind of an amphitheater and it was set up for a wedding. It was Thursday, but it was also Valentine's Day. Cheesy. (Side note: If I ever get married it won't be on V'day, my birthday, Christmas or New Years.) We decided to have lunch at a Mexican restaurant. Our table was right next to the river and there were a lot of little boats going by. Most were tour boats but one was a wedding party complete with a mariachi (sp?) band - trumpet, violin, guitars and all. It was really festive though and everyone was clapping and waving at them. When we got to the airport there were some people with Ambassador buttons on handing out yellow roses to all the ladies. It made me really happy. Happy Valentine's Day from the state of Texas :-). It was a really nice layover and I'll add it to my list of places I try to go.
The rest of the trip was fairly uneventful. I had a lot of airport appreciation time thanks to the amazing schedulers at my amazing airline. Yesterday I had a child on my flight who screamed the whole time unless I was squatting next to her and letting her play with my id badges. I don't know about anyone else but I'm getting too old to squat in the aisle of an airplane for long periods of time. She was quiet though which made everyone else happy. I felt like I did my good deed for the day. People thanked me when they got off the plane :-P.I'm only home for two days this weekend so I'm going to try to make the most of it.
Maybe I'll watch Amie clean some more.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Rain comes pourin down, fallin from blue skies...
After spending so much time lately in places where their precipitation of choice is snow, it's a little strange to see it raining outside. I'm here in Newport News. I've never been here before. I just had to look at a guide book to find out where it is. Last week I spent two nights in Burlington, VT watching the snow fall. It was really beautiful and peaceful. After a quick stop in Key West where I chased the sun around the pool I ended up back in the snow.
Saturday morning I flew up to Portland to go snowboarding with Amy, Shane, and Adri. I was really apprehensive about spending one day doing a sport I've never done before with people who have done it a lot, but ended up having an awesome time. Four days later I can still feel the pain in my muscles a little, but it's a wonderful pain. We went for the night session and got to Shawnee Peak around 4:30. After getting bundled up and strapped in to my boots they started trying to teach me. I would have felt a little embarrassed about how much time I spent flat on my back but there were a lot of other people who seemed to be having an equally difficult time remaining upright. The most frustrating thing for me was getting back on my feet. I'm not sure if it's just cause I'm really out of shape, but there were times when I absolutely could not stand up facing down the mountain. It's much easier to roll on your stomach and get up that way but if I start going down the mountain backwards I'm much more likely to fall again. Which means I'm going to have to go through the whole process again soon. I did end up going down the mountain quite a few times and the last two times I was actually on my feet for a long time. The conditions were perfect as well. The glittery snowflakes that were falling the whole time were the cherry on top for the awesome time we had.
Monday I made a trip to Chattanooga for yet another hair color. They didn't cover up the platinum but added a lot of lowlights. I think I like it. I also think I need to get back to a more normal color for a while. Not sure though.
Yesterday I woke up pretty late and I was preparing to start rushing around so I could get ready for my trip. I didn't have to leave home til one but had a lot to do. Then I noticed there was a voicemail from scheduling. Turns out my first round trip to Cleveland had been canceled and I didn't have to be at work until 7:26 that night. I love it when that happens. Not that I don't love working... And not that I want anyone's flight to be canceled... The weather up there was terrible so we couldn't have made it anyway.
Now I have another 3 hours here in NN. Not sure what I'm going to do since it's raining. I'm sure I'll manage. I feel so content lately it's almost scary. Joy met a lady who is looking for writers so I wrote and sent her a couple of things. I haven't heard anything yet but it's been great for me to be writing more and thinking in that mode.
Saturday morning I flew up to Portland to go snowboarding with Amy, Shane, and Adri. I was really apprehensive about spending one day doing a sport I've never done before with people who have done it a lot, but ended up having an awesome time. Four days later I can still feel the pain in my muscles a little, but it's a wonderful pain. We went for the night session and got to Shawnee Peak around 4:30. After getting bundled up and strapped in to my boots they started trying to teach me. I would have felt a little embarrassed about how much time I spent flat on my back but there were a lot of other people who seemed to be having an equally difficult time remaining upright. The most frustrating thing for me was getting back on my feet. I'm not sure if it's just cause I'm really out of shape, but there were times when I absolutely could not stand up facing down the mountain. It's much easier to roll on your stomach and get up that way but if I start going down the mountain backwards I'm much more likely to fall again. Which means I'm going to have to go through the whole process again soon. I did end up going down the mountain quite a few times and the last two times I was actually on my feet for a long time. The conditions were perfect as well. The glittery snowflakes that were falling the whole time were the cherry on top for the awesome time we had.
Monday I made a trip to Chattanooga for yet another hair color. They didn't cover up the platinum but added a lot of lowlights. I think I like it. I also think I need to get back to a more normal color for a while. Not sure though.
Yesterday I woke up pretty late and I was preparing to start rushing around so I could get ready for my trip. I didn't have to leave home til one but had a lot to do. Then I noticed there was a voicemail from scheduling. Turns out my first round trip to Cleveland had been canceled and I didn't have to be at work until 7:26 that night. I love it when that happens. Not that I don't love working... And not that I want anyone's flight to be canceled... The weather up there was terrible so we couldn't have made it anyway.
Now I have another 3 hours here in NN. Not sure what I'm going to do since it's raining. I'm sure I'll manage. I feel so content lately it's almost scary. Joy met a lady who is looking for writers so I wrote and sent her a couple of things. I haven't heard anything yet but it's been great for me to be writing more and thinking in that mode.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
un-lazy Saturday morning
It's so nice to be home on the weekends this month. Because of holidays and vacation the last several months have been crazy with my schedule and I'm really happy to have it settle down - at least for this month. It seems that my Flica addiction has paid off and I'm almost perfectly content with my schedule. I have two Key West overnights that I'm really looking forward to. I'll also be in Burlinton, VT for a day and a half this week. I hope that I love it as much in the winter as I did in the summer. I need to do some research so I can do something besides sit in my hotel room.
My trip Thursday and Friday was really frustrating. The fact that it was my fifth and sixth days of work and that I was exhausted didn't help. I did a Providence round trip and remembered why I try to avoid that part of the country. I wish I could just yank these people's headphones out of their ears and say "It's rude to talk to someone with earphones in." Is it so difficult to give me your full attention for 30 seconds so I can SERVE you?
It's all better now. I'm home. I cleaned my room a whole lot this week. It looks pretty decent. Now I'm cleaning out the half bath that is mine. I seem to have a lot of toiletries and it needs to be gone through and organized. I don't know how I accumulate so much. Actually I do - I have a hard time getting rid of something that is perfectly good. I need to realize that my sanity is more important than hanging onto some body wash or something just cause I paid money for it at some point. Whenever I get frustrated enough though I just start trashing it all, which is kind of where I am right now. I guess I should get back to it.
My trip Thursday and Friday was really frustrating. The fact that it was my fifth and sixth days of work and that I was exhausted didn't help. I did a Providence round trip and remembered why I try to avoid that part of the country. I wish I could just yank these people's headphones out of their ears and say "It's rude to talk to someone with earphones in." Is it so difficult to give me your full attention for 30 seconds so I can SERVE you?
It's all better now. I'm home. I cleaned my room a whole lot this week. It looks pretty decent. Now I'm cleaning out the half bath that is mine. I seem to have a lot of toiletries and it needs to be gone through and organized. I don't know how I accumulate so much. Actually I do - I have a hard time getting rid of something that is perfectly good. I need to realize that my sanity is more important than hanging onto some body wash or something just cause I paid money for it at some point. Whenever I get frustrated enough though I just start trashing it all, which is kind of where I am right now. I guess I should get back to it.
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