Oh my darlin’, oh my darlin’, oh my daaarlin’ Clementine

Except Clementine's in my stomach. I'm on my fourth one today. They're practically my favorite orange. The facts that they're easily peelable, the size of a golf ball, and ever so tasty make me want to eat them all the time. And also the fact that I bought a whole bag of them on Sunday and am realizing if I don't eat them all they'll go bad. I've also eaten almost a whole box of strawberries and a plum today. I seriously overestimated my fruit consumption, but am determined not to let it go to waste.

I'm in Rochester, NY and it is just as exciting as I hoped and dreamed it would be. We got here an hour late because of weather in Atlanta and had 4 babies on the plane, of which no less than 3 were screaming at any given time. Add that to the fact that my fellow flight attendant's fuse was getting a little low and you can imagine how much fun my last 3 hours have been. A man asked me if we had any antihistamines or nasal spray cause the lady next to him had a cold. I told him all we have is pain killers. Then he asked the other flight attendant who gave the same response. Then the man persisted in asking if either of us had any personally. I suppose if I had had some tylenol cold I would've shared it, but nasal spray? I think not. I should've lent her my tissue that I just blew my nose in.

I was wondering why I was feeling loopy and why the room seemed bizarre and just remembered I took my last ambian hoping it would send me into a deep and dreamless sleep until the morning. That last sentence took a lot of effort and back spacing. Good night all!

Because I don’t want to pack

I don't want to pack. I have to pack for two separate trips and it's overwhelming to the point of not doing anything at all. I did just have the brilliant realization that I don't have to fit it all in my suitcase for the next four days, which helps a little bit, but not enough. I'm doing a four day tomorrow, then going immediately to Maine to go rafting, and then hopefully after that going to Martha's Vineyard to say hello to Joy.

Today I did a dayline. I had some really stupid people on my flights. I had a lady get on and ask me where 12A was. I said "It's row 12", and I pointed to the number over row 1. She then proceeded to go through the cabin and stop and look at each row number as she went past. I don't know if she thought we were going to sneak 12 in after 6 or mix the numbers up for kicks or what. Then another lady got on. I was already unimpressed by the vast amount of fast food that her family was dragging on board with them, so when she said "Is row 10 in the front?" I couldn't even dignify it with a response. Once again, we in the civilized world number things for a reason. And in our civilized world counting typically begins at 1 and proceeds upwards IN ORDER. When I went through the cabin I got to her and she was holding her seatbelt and repeating over and over that she didn't know how to work it. Once again, for all of you people who laugh when we do the demos, some people can't seem to figure it out. They check their brains in their bags. They were also smelly people. Not the "I don't wear deoderant" kind of smelly. Just the "I don't shower or wash my hair regularly". Can you tell I had an amazing day? I had four different sets of smelly people today. One was plain old BO smelly, one group of 4 was curry smelly, and the other two were the generally unwashed kind. It's very sad to me to see/smell that.

I did have some friendly people, but my first round trip was to Nashville and very short so I really only had half the customer interraction. I had a man start talking to me while I was serving. He said he liked my name and had wanted to name is daughter Grace or Constance(????) but his wife vetoed it. Then he asked me when my birthday was. He said his wife is in to birthdays and star signs. He said he could usually guess when people's birthdays were, but evidently he still didn't peg me as an Aquarius. He also told me that guys that were born in late September were good matches for me. Funny that I know several born then and am not a good match with any. I told him he was out of his mind and his wife should stop wasting her time on that crap... Not really :-P Then there was the creepy starer in 1D. One of the first lessons in Man School needs to be that looking is flattering but staring is just gross and creepy.

I started reading the first Harry Potter today. I figure 10 years later (or whatever it is) I should get with the times. So far so good.


Currently reading : Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Book 1) By J.K. Rowling

the start of a new week

Tomorrow is the beginning of another week of flying. Unlike my easy three day week last week, I'll actually be flying 5 days this one. Imagine that - working every day of the week! Sometimes I envy people who go home to their own beds every night and have nice normal lives. Sometimes I pity people who sleep in their own beds every night and have nice normal lives.

This weekend was way too short. It was nice being off during the day on Friday, which isn't my norm, but I worked at the amphitheater for some play that night, and did a dinner catering last night. The catering was ridiculous. It was for some lady's 60th birthday party and her daughter, who had organized it, was sooo demanding. I almost snapped when she started telling me how to serve sodas... If there's anything I know something about, it's serving sodas (unfortunately).

My brakes have decided to leave me. I've been meaning to get them fixed for a long time, but it's hard to negotiate leaving my car somewhere for long enough to get them fixed. I'm taking it in while I'm away on Tuesday, but all weekend I had to get chauffered around. It was kind of nice cause I don't like driving sometimes and cause then I got to spend time with whoever was driving me around. J did the honors yesterday and took me to my haircut. Then we went to Jersey's pool for the afternoon. Today the parents did the honors and we went to check out a potential house. We aren't sure about how much work the house would need, but I'd almost get it for the land around it. It reminds me of our Roscoe Rd house (property-wise) which was the most beautiful area we've lived in. Who knows if anything will come of it, but it's interesting.

Tonight I did laundry, made my room walkable, and watched True Life about these two girls who are compulsive shoppers. It made me feel much better about my money problems. Nothing like looking at people whose lives are disasters to feel better about yourself. That's all for now. I'm going to try to rise and shine and get stuff done before work in the morning.

if only work was always like this

I love doing three day trips. It was crazy and wonderful to realize yesterday, on day two, that today was the last day of the trip.

We just got back from Nassau. It was a nice overnight and instead of avoiding it like I've done before, I think I'll try to go back. I usually don't do international overnights if they're less than 14 hours or so (Nassau is 11), but since the airport is small and customs is a joke I think I can deal with it. The hotel is actually a Wyndham Resort and is really nice. My crew and I sat on beach chairs on the beach last night for an hour or so and just enjoyed being near sand and water. I'd love to see more of the area. The water was beautiful and we came in as the sun was going down which made it to die for :-P. I love the blackness of the people and how everyone is so relaxed and friendly.

The night before we were in Key West where the people aren't as much black as they are ridiculously tan. The locals all seem to have their brains fried, and you can see every imaginable (and some you'd rather not imagine) type of person. Three of us went out and about and had a jolly good time. For once, it was below 1000 degrees and the humidity was only 97% instead of the usual 125% person. I am evidently a beast because I sweat so much (thank you, Captain).

My prime disappointment with this trip has been that at both hotels, which are known for their king beds, I got full or queen. I know this may seem silly, but I love those beds so much. I feel towards king sized beds like I feel toward showers - a kind of unusual degree of love and enjoyment :-P. There's just something fabulous about knowing I can lie in any direction and still be completely on the bed. Oh well... Maybe next time.

If anything else amusing has happened in the last few days, I don't really remember. I have another 2.5 hours to entertain myself before I do one more round trip to Burlington, VT - then home!

On top of spaghetti, all covered with cheese, I lost my poor meatball, when somebody sneezed.

The advertisement at the top of my myspace page just now said "Music lessons= happiness". It made me laugh. Let me tell you, when I took music lessons they brought me more stress and tears than very many other things.

Tomorrow is my Monday. The thing that makes me happy though is that my trip this week is only 3 days. It also makes me happy that I'll be in Key West tomorrow night and Nassau Wednesday night. I don't know what it is but three day trips seem so much shorter than four days. I almost feel like I don't need to pack anything (but I am anyway).

Today was a fun day off. I got to have lunch with J before he went to work. It's hard to beat Chick-fil-a and a good looking man. But then I hung out with Michal and Mama the rest of the afternoon. I also went to the library and checked out the first Harry Potter book. I haven't read any of them and feel so behind the times. Michal had her second lesson learning to drive a manual car. She is doing quite well, though sometimes it makes me laugh a little to realize I'm teaching my baby sister to drive. She is already driving an automatic around which is strange enough. Then we did some shopping which just wore me out. I ran over a snake on the way home, thinking it was a piece of tire, and it made me feel bad and gross.

There has been lots of other stuff going on but I haven't felt like writing. I'm trying to do a better job of keeping up with my friends and family. I realized the other day how little I know about most of my friend's (and some of my family's) lives right now and it really bothers me.

I ran yesterday and intend to do so at least several more times this week. I also talked to my bosses today about some money issues and got more that I thought might be owed me so is another thing going well. It seems like life is a constant struggle for balance. If you are doing well work and money-wise, it seems you neglect relationships. It's hard to do all the good things you want all at the same time. I focus on eating well and exercising for a while, and then I fall completely off the wagon. I am good about calling people and writing and then I get distracted for months. I wonder why we're that way? Now I'm going to focus on getting a good night's sleep so I can be refreshed when I get to Key West tomorrow.

flying hiiiiigh

I'm sitting in Atlanta. We just got back from Montreal and have a 3 hour break before we go to Burlinton, VT for the night. I'm happy cause that's one of my favorite overnights. I wish we were spending 17 hours there instead of in Providence, RI tomorrow night. Someone is sitting a few chairs down from me in the lounge snoring. It amuses me. I should be sleeping because I am le tired, but alas, I am not.

Last night in Montreal I started week 8. This week is a 28 minute run in between two 5 minute walks. I ran four times last week, and am determined to run at least 3 times this week. I have set a weight goal for the end of the month. I'm excited to reach it.

Monday night I went with Jamie to the Dave Matthews concert at Lakewood. It was my first DMB concert. I was impressed by several things. First was obviously the band. It's nice to see a group where all of the musicians are so talented and work so well together. I'm sure this is part of why DMB is so popular. It seems most of the time you have one or two people who have the talent and keep things going, but they are all amazing. Second, I was amazed by how much weed people were smoking. I seriously thought I was going to get stoned just standing there breathing. Third was the crowd. It seemed like Jamie and I were the chaperones for a frat party. I haven't seen that many drunk/stoned children in a long time. Everyone was very enthusiastic though. We stood for at least 3 solid hours. The place was packed. We had a great time. I have to thank Susan for not being able to stay in Atlanta all weekend and thereby making it possible for me to be Jamie's stand-in date :-).

Back in the saddle

I'm back at work after six wonderful days off. I'm still exhausted and am looking forward to the wonderful hotel room in Key West this evening. I got home from Buenos Aires about 5:30 Sunday morning. I went home and went to sleep and was so tired and asleep that even in my dreams I was tired and couldn't move. I got up and had lunch with the parents but was feeling pretty lousy. I was coughing and my whole body hurt. Not sure how much of the aching was due to spending 10 hours on a plane. That night I had my usual fever breaking dreams and woke up with wet sheets from all the sweat - so I'm assuming whatever I had went away then. I'm still kind of achy, but not nearly as bad.

Yesterday I hung out at the pool with J. The weather lately has been amazing and almost makes you forget how brutal Atlanta can be. After that we went running, shopping and cooked supper. It was a really nice evening and we got to sit on his balcony and watch the reflection of the sunset off the buildings in Buckhead. Such a beautiful night.

When I travel I have the problem of not writing during the trip, and when I get home it's so much to write about that I never do. I did that with Puerto Vallarta, but don't want it to happen this time, so I'll try to write about it in bits and pieces.

My first impression of Buenos Aires was from the back of a taxi. I feared that I would die before we ever reached the city. Roya and I arrived in Buenos Aires around 7:30am. We'd had a nice flight (both in Business) and were ready to take on the world. Her friend, Alfredo, met us at the airport and we got in the cab to go to the hotel. Because of the traffic it made a 30 minute ride almost twice that long. I spent a lot of the trip looking down or anywhere except at what was in front of us. In Argentina there is total disregard for the lines on the road. Everyone is weaving back and forth. If you pull up at a light where there are three lanes, but there's room to squeeze in between two of the cars, they'll make four lanes. The driver would come up behind and between semis like they wouldn't squish us completely flat if we got in their way. Roya tried to video it but it was so stop and go and unpredictable that it was difficult. I'm glad to say that we survived, but I think that it was the most scared I've ever been in a car in my life.

It must’ve been love, but it’s over now

I said that I would write from Buenos Aires so here it is. I'm packing to leave. It's been an amazing trip. We haven't stopped going since we got here. I'm exhausted, but have had the time of my life. I'll write all about it either on the 10hour flight home that I hopefully make tonight, or when I recover from my sleep deprivation.

You got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em

If you ever have a friend who really wants to have a child and you don't think they're ready make them watch episode after episode of John and Kate + 8. I know it's children in excess, but just watching it stresses me out. It's like having a daycare 24/7 and not getting paid for it. It also seems to me that John and Kate can't stand each other. Good birth control in my opinion.

Today I'm in Grand Rapids. Last night was Augusta. Yes, it's as thrilling as it sounds. I'm back on the 50 which hasn't been terrible, but I'm realizing that I work better when I have someone else to work with. I've been really tired, which hasn't helped me be a super fun fantastic flight attendant. Tomorrow I have five legs. Then I go to my car, dump my work clothes, get my play clothes, and fly to Buenos Aires. Right now I'm still too busy and tired and anxious about getting both Roya and I in first class to be excited. Okay, maybe I am a little bit.

This past week was a whirlwind. I worked a lot, had recurrent training, saw lots of out of town friends, had a real date, and worked some more. Adri and Mo were in town from MA so we went to the laser show at Stone Mountain. I might just be a big party pooper, but I think it's kind of cheesy. I don't like cartoons either though, so that might be part of the problem. It was still lots of good fun seeing everyone and the weather was perfect for being out under the sky. Jamie and Susan also both wandered in from their respective hick states to add to the festiviti. We crashed Adri's house on Friday night and had a 1477 and apartment family gathering.

I had a passenger yesterday who has flown over 2 million miles on Delta since the early 90s. He told me he's been in planes that have been struck by lightning 3 times. I was shocked and amazed. Shocked cause I've known people who've been struck once, but never three times. Amazed cause I have been curious what happens and obviously he wasn't damaged or killed.

Today I ran again. I was really on a roll for a while there. Then the running got harder and the weather got hotter. I've really flaked out. Now I finally finished week 6. It's only taken me a month. It was a 5 minute warm up with a 25 minute run. That's the longest I've run, without stopping, in a long time. Maybe ever. I ran super slow, but I finished it, and now I can at least move on to week 7.

My goal now is to be asleep by 8 or so. Now What Not To Wear is on so I'm not going insane. I'm going to work on a budget - finally. I think that realistically I can have my debt paid off by the beginning of December. Now that the end is in sight it makes me more motivated to do it (hence the microwave meal I just ate).

Hopefully next time I write it will be from about 5000 miles away.

Oh yeah, the concert I worked Saturday night was Kenny Rogers. There were some ladies there who had been to over 1000 KR concerts! It was really sad. I can't imagine who has nothing better to do with their lives than go to his concerts. It was extremely cheesy and his super hot wife came up on the stage with his twin 3 year old boys and they sang some rap song... I can't believe people paid lots of money for that. After the amazing pre-concert that Jamie and Jonathan put on Kenny just didn't impress me :-).

The rest of the story

I know I already blogged once today, but I'm much more awake now. I just got home from having dinner with some of my buddies. It was a good time. It's nice that the older we get, the more open we're able to be with each other. I often dream about what it would be like to be able to be completely honest with everyone about everything. I'm not talking about telling someone their pants really do make them look fat. I mean being able to tell anyone anything about myself and not be worried about what they think. In thinking about this I realize that I probably would have to draw the line somewhere. Some things I don't tell people because I'm ashamed, and if I stopped being ashamed of anything then I feel that would be bad. But other things are good to tell. If for no other reason than for someone to learn from and have a good laugh at my stupid mistakes.

That being said, it was nice to be able to tell my parents something terrible and stupid I did and them not banish me from their house :-D.

I will now tell the drug test story. If you're offended by stupidity, alcohol, drugs, or vomiting you might not want to read it. I would like to preface this by saying that throughout my college years, and especially while I was living in Europe, I was constantly exposed to weed. People offered it to me but I was never interested. It might've been because alcohol was still a new thing to me and enough for me to deal with. It might've been that I'd been raised to think that drug use is not a good way to spend your time or money. That it's not good to let something control your mind. I also saw that all my friends that smoked were dreadfully dull when stoned. All those reasons made me never interested. That is, until one night about 3 years ago when I was sitting around being bored and stupid and drinking and someone offered me a joint. I took it but just took one puff on it, and as Bill Clinton claimed, I don't think I even inhaled. I didn't feel anything spectacular, and that was the end of it. Or so I thought.

During this time I had applied for a job at my current airline. Things began moving at an unexpected pace and within 5 days of my first interview I was going for my second one. After the second interview they gave me some paperwork and told me to go for a drug test. Everyone had already told me that once they drug test you it means you have the job. Then they'd always joke and say "Unless you fail the drug test (thigh slap. ha ha.)" I didn't think I had anything to worry about since it was about a week and a half earlier, but I called said weed provider just to confirm. I was then informed that it can stay in your system for up to 30 days. This is the part where my day starts to get really terrible. Anger, panic, worry, and tears all ascend on me like the plague.

The next person I call is Adri. If she doesn't know an answer, she can find it. I also call Jamie, who at this point I was still only on phone internet basis with (look how far we've come :-D). He's another answer finder. He also works in the same type of field where clean drug tests are a good thing. Between the two of them I'm directed to GNC where I purchase one of those detox drinks. (Side note here: doing stupid things is expensive.) It's about a gallon and grape flavored. I've also purchased a big bottle of OJ and cranberry juice - items also said cleanse one's system.

[Just so you know, as I write this I question why I'm actually telling anyone what an idiot I am. But it's been a while and now at least I can laugh at my own stupid mistakes. I think so anyway...]

I begin drinking these different concoctions. The detox bottle said you have to pee at least 3 times before you take the test. I'm still in my interview finest and am now trying to figure out how I'm going to drink all this and then kill enough time for it to pass through me. It's not as easy as it seems. I went to the thriftstore down the road and wandered for a while and peed some. I was feeling terrible physically. I was feeling terribly mentally cause I was so worried about passing the test and so ashamed of myself for doing something so stupid. My stomach finally took over and decided that enough was enough and my really expensive detox drink, as well as what seemed like gallons of OJ and CJ came back up. I can't imagine what someone would've thought as the lady in the business clothes pukes in the thriftstore parking lot in the early afternoon. I must've been a sight to see :-P.

The puking helped me realize that the nonsense had gone on long enough and I better just take the test. As we can see, I passed and now that is all just a distant, silly memory.

I would say that the moral of the story is not to smoke weed. If for no other reason than because you never know when you'll have a major job interview and need to be drug tested. And if you do, the grape flavored drinks are absolutely disgusting. I also learned that my stomach cannot hold several gallons of liquid and evidently my organs cannot process fluids as quickly as I drink them.

This may be shocking and appalling to some of you. Some may not be surprised. I hope at least you're amused, and can take comfort in the fact that I suffered for and have learned from my mistakes. :-P

I will amend this by saying that Jamie and I were actually real life friends at this point. He reminded me of this because shortly thereafter when I was doing my first trip I went to his house at 6am cause I didn't have a suitcase and used his. it's hard to keep up with how long this joy ride of a friendship has been going on :-).

My eyelids should diet. They’re so heavy...

I just got home from doing a nap. I should probably take a nap since I only slept 5 hours, but I haven't managed to get to that point yet.

I had a productive, busy, hard working weekend, but it was nice. I worked at the amphitheater Fri and Sat and saw some people from the previous concerts. I really like working there and I like the people I serve. It also helps that most of them are really generous. Some lady tipped me for taking her beer bottle up to the bar and popping the lid off of it. I was worried cause when I got in the car Saturday night I counted my money and thought I had lost a twenty. I checked around in the car and even drove back to see if if was where I had parked, but it was gone. Then yesterday when I got in the car to leave my parent's house it was sitting right next to my seat... It made me happy. I hate losing money.

I got my phone replaced a couple weeks ago because the camera on mine had broken and it was still under warranty. Since then I have discovered the key to making my battery last. It seems my phone works much better when it isn't full of pictures. Now instead of barely lasting a day, the battery lasts several days. It's amazing.

Father's day was really nice. My mama, Michal, and I made a big salad with all the good stuff on it that my daddy loves. It was so good. Then we sat around and talked all afternoon. I told them the real story behind my ASA drug test. Now, three years later, it's funny. I'll write about it when I'm not so tired. I figure since my parents know then it doesn't matter who else knows. Church was also really good. There is hardly a Sunday that I leave there without feeling like I learned something and/or was challenged.

I have recurrent training this week so I'll be home every single night. It's weird. Tomorrow I work really late and already have stuff going on most nights, but it's still kind of nice to not be on the road.

Lying in bed just like Brian Wilson did

I don't know any songs about Providence. But I am lying in bed, evidently just like Brian Wilson did - though I'm not sure if he was lying in bed with his laptop.

Yesterday was a day that makes you glad you work for an airline, and makes you hate working for an airline. I spent the first part of the day lounging in Albany, NY. I ran, which made me feel good, but wasn't easy since it's been about a week. The weather in Georgia has been ridiculous for being outdoors. It was cooler in NY but not as much cooler as I would've liked. The change of scenery is nice though. We got back to Atlanta around 7 and were supposed to have a 2.5 hour break. Our plane was late and there was terrible weather surrounding the airport, so long story short, we left the gate about 1:15 late, then took off about 2 hours later. We were in good company though with about 30 other planes hanging out on the runways trying to leave as well. We finally made it to Providence at 2:30am. Hotel around 3:15am.

I've been realizing more and more lately what a role we flight attendants have in making passengers happy or miserable. I knew this before, but after flying with angry people two weeks in a row and now happy people two weeks in a row, it's reinforced. The last few days I've flown with a lady with a crazy deep Texas accent and a British guy. Both have an amazing sense of humor and people always leave the planes happy - even if it's 2:30am. We actually had a fun time on the flight. My crew is great and it makes all the difference in the world. I also seem to be sending off some kind of vibe cause all the old men are really loving me lately :-P.

Last night on my flight I had a lady that I've known since I was born but probably haven't seen in 15 years (Marianne Dias). She was on her way up to visit her daughter, Jenny, who gave me my first short haircut when I was little. I didn't recognize her (I'm not normally on the lookout for long lost friends at 11pm), but she gave me a note cause she wasn't sure it was me. I also met a girl yesterday who is on her way down to Rio for the summer. She said she was planning on going to Buenos Aires at some point so I told her when I'd be there and she might meet us there. These are two examples of why my job is great.

I'll be in Providence until tomorrow morning. I have recurrent next week and have some homework to do before then so that's probably what I'll be doing. And watching the food network. I kinda like these days of forced relaxation.

PS. Since I didn't blog yesterday on the day of, I will wish my wonderful older sister Christine a happy birthday month.

Giant steps are what you take walking on the moon

Considering the amount of sleep I've gotten in the last few days I'm ridiculously tired. It's thundering outside. Hopefully it will rain and cool things down. The heat might have something to do with how tired I am. I also ate a bunch of pizza and icecream a while ago. Talk about falling off the wagon - I've been eating junk, spending money, and not exercising. It's amazing how easy it is to lose concentration on your goals.

I went to the foot doctor today and found out that genetics suck and I get to have surgery on my foot some time this year. Joy has already had it so I'm not concerned about the actual surgery at all. The problem is that, due to the nature of my job, I'll have to take 6-8 weeks off of work. I was pretty sure it was going to happen but now that it has been confirmed I can start figuring the rest out. I'm hoping to do it around the end of the year so I'll be in recuperation over the holidays. This will also give me time to prepare for it physically and financially. Good times. I'm not worried about it though. God has always taken care of me in the past and I know He will continue to do so in the future. It's kind of exciting to me to think about having that much time off work. I just need to find a side job that I can do while sitting or save a lot of money now.

I ran across a good friend from Europe on facebook last night and it's made me remember so many things. I don't usually miss things, but there were a lot of good times had with this person while I was in Madrid. It's hard not to feel a little pain in my heart when I think of it and how it is now so long ago.

I'm waiting for my laundry and trying to think what I should be doing to get ready for my trip tomorrow. And trying to stay awake. Knowing me, I'll be really sleepy until it's actually time to go to sleep. Then I'll be wide awake.

Lazy Sunday evening

This is the second night in a row I have been doing nothing at my own house. It's pretty cool. I forgot what it was like. I was supposed to cater yesterday but I pulled something in my shoulder Friday, aggravated it working Friday night, and woke up yesterday with a really sore neck and shoulder. I decided that recuperation was a necessity. After I got my hair done yesterday I came home and sat in front of the tv with my laptop and some Publix sushi. It was awesome. Then I fell asleep on the couch around 5:30, woke up at 9:30 enough to move to my bed, and stayed there til this morning. Once again, it was awesome.

Today was an equally leisurely day. It's too hot to do anything that isn't leisurely. It's so hot, I sweat while I'm showering. I did strenuous things like go to church, eat lunch with my parents and Michal, load music on Michal's ipod, go to Starbucks with Isabella, and wander around Ross and Target. I found the perfect shade of hot pink nail polish. Well it better be perfect since I spent 15 minutes deciding.

I've also decided that I am doomed to be a boring dresser. The only interesting pieces of clothing I own were passed down to me by someone else (Amie or Molly). I try to get things that are interesting or unusual but always end up with the same old solid color things like white tank tops.

I guess a boring wardrobe suits me since I seem to be limited to super comfortable, super boring footwear. I wore shoes with one inch heels Friday night and my foot still hurts. It made me realize that the only shoes I wear anymore are my Teva and Clarks flip flops, Clarks work shoes, and running shoes. I have an appointment tomorrow with the foot doctor to see if I'm doomed to have the same surgery that Joy had the pleasure of experiencing.

I think I'll go to sleep now so I can stop feeling like I should be cleaning my room.

From the Inn by the Bay

I'm in Portland, ME again. Second time in a week. I love this town. I love the old buildings and houses. I love that it's near the water. Today is rainy and cool. I've been watching seagulls out my window. I love that there are people out walking everywhere. I think the closeness of this area is something I really like about it. I went running this morning. I ran down Spring St. past a lot of restaurants and shops. I feel like I'm part of the life happening around here, even though I'm just running through. Again, I managed to plan (or not plan) my run so on the last 2 minutes of my first 10 minute run I was headed up a huge hill. I had to walk to the top, but did the whole second 10 minute run. I thought about turning around so I could keep running, but once I got to the top of the hill I was glad I didn't. There was a park at the top that looked out over the bay. I could see the boats and islands. The rainyness of the day seems to make everything greener and brighter. There are also a lot of flowers blooming up here which looks and smells wonderful. Once I got to the top of the hill I found a trail that went down to the edge of the water so I could run along and look at all the boats. This type of life, small city on the water, is so different than any that I've lived. I'm still surprised by how many homeless people there are here. After I ran Shane picked me up and we had lunch with Amy. I'm so thankful I was able to swap my trip and be up here.

I'll probably write more during my 3 hour break in Atlanta.

Nobody cries, there’s only butterflies... hahaha

Sometimes it feels like I'm never going to get a chance to slow down and relax. It's silly cause I will. I know I will. I should be able to tomorrow afternoon when I'm in Portland. But right now all I can think about is getting up early for work for the next 5 days, doing 18 flights, and then catering two days after that. My room is once again barely walkable and I can't be bothered to do anything about it. The main thing is I'm really tired. Once I get a good night's rest tonight I'll realize it isn't all so overwhelming.

I got to spend a very lovely day with Peter and Michal. We drove (or sat in Atl traffic) up to Lenox and wandered around and shopped and looked at all the strange people. Then we went to Krispy Kreme and had some doughnuts hot off the.. doughnut maker? We also made a stop at the Stewart Avenue thrift store and then looked for hookers on the way home. We didn't see any. I guess it was too early. It was good fun with half the Holby litter. Since we spent about half the day in the car I was able to get caught up on all my pop music, since that's all Peter will allow me to listen to in MY car :-P. I feel so educated now.

Last night I catered a backyard party for some people on the south side of Ptc. Their house, yard, and pool were amazing in a very unpretentious way. After we set up the food and I sweated off about 5 lb in the blazing heat, we sat in the kitchen and watched them hang out for about 3 hours. Then we packed our stuff back up and left. They were very nice and we both got tipped almost what we made for the whole evening last night. All for doing nothing. Sometimes the catering is a lot of work, but then you have nights last night that are easy and relaxed and lucrative and it all evens out.

I'm going to sleep since I haven't even packed my bag and have to be at work in 11 hours. I know the first part of this sounds complainy but I'm really quite happy and blessed. I'm just a little tired, by my own doing, right now. Tomorrow I'll be in Portland for the whole day and it's going to be beautiful.

Something good this way comes

I'm sitting here in the lounge in ATL, eating my high sodium, non-refrigerated, microwave meal (don't be jealous) wishing I was going home instead of going to DC. We don't even get to spend a decent amount of time there. We just finished our third leg of the day. I've been very cheerful these last few days (trying to compensate for my other FA who is a bit testy at times), but it's running out. I've gotten some good swaps for next month and I'm quite pleased about that. I hate that I missed most of Joy's time in town, and am afraid I'll miss Peter's as well. Joy headed off to Martha's Vineyard for the summer today.

I ran this morning, which was a good way to start the day. Syracuse is a far cry from Tallahassee. It was kind of cold when we got there last night but this morning when the Sun was out it was perfect. I ran through some neighborhoods that looked like a combination of New England and the 70s. They all had beautiful little lawns and flowers everywhere. The first street I ran down was Patricia Drive :-D. I even saw a few fighter planes taking off while I was running.

I'm off to find my plane and head up to DC. Maybe someone amazing will be on my flight (besides me of course :-P).

Nothing but clouds in the Little Rock sky

I feel like a slacker. It's 12:23 local and I've done nothing with my day. Of course, I was still in the airport 12 hours ago. We got to here 2 hours late because of maintenance. It's hard to keep that in mind and remember that I'm not such a slacker, I just have a weird schedule. I was hoping to get up and run this morning since I haven't since last week, but it looks like it's been raining anyway.

This weekend was very full and fun. Peter got here on Friday. I got to see all of my younger siblings a few times. Michal turned 15. Went to a Braves game. Catered a wedding. Went out in Atlanta. Had good food in the Highlands and at the parents house.

I just left and had lunch with my crew. It was a pizza buffet which my stomach almost instantly hated. Good times. The captain paid though so I guess I shouldn't complain too much. My crew is pretty nice, but it seems like half the things I say they just kind of look at me. It's crazy that by the time I start my work day today most people will be home from their work days already.

I'm going to spend the rest of my time watching them deny my swaps in open time. I did manage to trade a 4 day for a 3 day, which gives me an extra day off next month, but there's still much more swapping to be done.

My life, and consequently my blog, is boring today.

Madder than mad

Today feels like one big freaking train wreck.

It started off with me oversleeping. I set my alarm for 8:45. This would give me time to clean around the house, run, get ready for work, maybe do some laundry, and not be rushed. I think largely because of the Benadryl I took last night for allergies, I absolutely could not wake up until almost 11. I still had 3 hours before I had to leave. Around 12:35, after cleaning my room for a while, I got dressed to go run. I slacked this weekend and have been feeling bad about that. At that point I saw my old work shoes sitting on my bed. This is when I realized my good work shoes, that I left at Jersey's house a week and a half ago, were still at her house. The old shoes hurt my feet too much to wear another week. So I had to drive all the way into Ptc to get her apartment key. Then I drove 5 minutes back toward me to her apartment, got the shoes, drove 5 minutes the other way to return the key, then drove 15 minutes back home. By now I have just about an hour before I have to leave for work. I haven't showered or packed. Thankfully I cooked food last night to take with me so that was all ready. Plus I had poppyseed chicken left over from last night to take. Yum... I survived the morning drama and made it to work but without accomplishing anything else at all. Disappointing.

I got to work and had an uneventful flight to Milwaukee. On the way back we ended up holding for about 35 minutes due to severe weather passing through Atlanta. On approach we got to see an amazing lightning display. I don't think passengers enjoyed it.

The next flight should've been pretty simple. It was 36 minutes in flight. You board, take off, cruise for a few minutes, and land. But no... Everyone was mad cause they had had really rough flights into Atlanta. Of course I made the weather so you should be mad at me for it. Then it took us almost twice as long to taxi out as it did to fly down here (and that's after we cut in line). It was really bumpy so we couldn't get up the whole way and everyone wanted everything. Oh well... We were less than an hour late, which is good considering how many planes are probably still taxiing in Atlanta. I sat next to a nice lady from Portland, OR who gave me her address and phone number and told me to come visit her.

All's well that ends well right? Wrong. We finally make it to the hotel after a ridiculously long van ride. My FO brought her boyfriend and she's sitting on his lap next to me since there isn't an extra seat. My flight attendant has a bad attitude cause he thinks that everyone is against him cause he's black. Maybe they are. I'm obviously not very sensitive to that sort of thing. He also assumes cause we're both flight attendants that I'm going to be on his side when he gripes to me about things...

We finally get to the hotel. I sign all of us in and go to my room at the far end of the hall on the fourth floor. The key doesn't work. I go downstairs and get two more. They don't work either. Finally I get another room and it's on a different floor from my crew and a handicap room. Whatever. I don't care at this point. By the way, the hotel looks like a nice one, but it doesn't seem to have air conditioning. Neither did the taxi ride over. Just windows all the way down as we drove 48 mph down the interstate.

I put my stuff in the room and go down to the other end of the hall to get some ice to put my food on since they "ran out" of rooms with a frig or microwave. This also bugs me since we're going to be here for 2 nights. I don't want to have to buy all my food. I get to the ice machine and there isn't any ice in it. Arg. So I go back up to the floor I was .. down to the end of that hall and finally get some ice. I was going to take the trash can and just fill it with ice, but there was trash in it. Isn't that a pretty obvious thing to clean when you clean a room? I finally get some ice and open my lunch bag to get my food out. This is when I realize I LEFT MY FOOD ON THE PLANE. I'm sooo mad. My poppy seed chicken. My jambalaya. My sugar snap peas that I purposely only ate a few of them so I could have them for the rest of the trip. And I'm sure the cleaning crew tonight will throw it all away. I'm heartbroken. So now I have a big bag of ice for a Diet Coke. It better be ice cold when I drink it tomorrow.

After that I come sit at the desk to write a blog about how mad I am. (At least the internet works.) I sit down in the chair and put my foot up again my leg and realize there's gross sticky stuff all over my heel and now on the inside of my pajama pants. The look and smell makes me think the inside of a fig newton (I guess that would be a fig). How the crap did I get fig on my heel? I'm so over this place and I've only been here an hour.

On top of all this, allergies have been killing me. I've been rubbing my eyes until they're sore, and then I rub them more. When I rub them my contacts get lost in the far regions of my eyeballs. Then I find them and they fall out and all my make up is gone. My throat itches. My ears itch. My nose itches. I'd pick my nose in public if it would help.

Hopefully tomorrow is better. Hopefully the sun will come out and I can go to the pool or something. I'm finished with my rant.

Sweet Caroline oh-oh-oh

I know that many of you spend your days wondering what us Holbees do when we gather together. You may think we discuss literature and poetry - twas brilig in the slithey toves. You may think we discuss travel and the world - our brother lives in China. Or you may think we discuss religion and politics. I hate to disappoint you, but all we are is one big mutual admiration society. I tell Joy how pretty she is. She tells Michal what a good athlete she is. She tells my mama what a good cook she is. She tells my dad how smart he is. And on and on it goes. Some would think it'd get tiresome always hearing how wonderful you are, but it really doesn't. It's actually quite lovely. Then I start thinking about all the friends I have and am blown away by the fact that I have not a single terrible person in my life :-D. I love it.

I didn't blog last week, but it was mostly due to the fact that I had lousy or no internet on my trip. Then I spent a whirlwind weekend in Louisville for Joshua and Brittany's wedding and visiting Jamie. I got home last night and haven't slowed down since.

The first day of my trip was spent in Oklahoma City. It was surprisingly hot. I did day 2 of week 5. This is the first week where all three days of running aren't the same program. Day 2 was two 8-minute runs, which is the longest I've gone so far. On Wednesday I was privileged to see Amy and Shane in Portland. It was the most beautiful day I've had up there. I usually bring bad weather with me. They've moved us to a hotel that is downtown near the port so there are plenty of places you can walk to which is really nice. The next day I was in Montreal. The weather up there was also beautiful. I was exhausted from staying up too late with the Whites so all I had the energy for was a run. I wasn't sure I could make it because it was day 3, which is a 20-minute run, but I survived. It helped that the sidewalks were busy so I couldn't really run that fast. It's good mentally to keep extending the time. I'll work on speed later. I went to sleep at 7:30pm that night :-P.

I got off work on Friday, after doing 5 legs that included a Louisville round trip, just in time to get my violin and my weekend clothes from my car and rush over to the gate, to wait and hope I got on the flight. It was delayed forever cause of maintenance but TanJoe and I finally made it on. Once we got there Jamie took us to Louisville's finest where we heard a really awesome band play a really fun variety of music. I did a crossword on Tuesday that was themed songs named for women. One of them was "Sweet Caroline" so after hearing that song play in my head for a week it was great to hear it live. The rest of the weekend continued in that vein. The wedding was lovely and I was thrilled to find out that I had not forgotten how to play the violin.

I got back yesterday in time to go up to Buckhead for my cousin's graduation party, come back down here for dinner with some friends, and crash. Today was shopping and cooking and picking up Joy who is back from Spain and seeing the rest of the family. Hopefully I'll write some blogs coming up that aren't just about what I've been doing. We'll see. For now, I must sleep.

let's go fly a kite, up to the highest height.

It seems like these weekends are gone before they start. Here it is, another Monday. Another week of work about to start. I am fortunate that my work week doesn't start until tomorrow, but mine ended on Saturday, so I guess we're even.

I catered a wedding Saturday night. We thought we were going to get blown away by the tornados that were coming through. Then we thought we were going to get washed away by the rain. But everyone survived. It poured until about 10 minutes before the wedding started and only sprinkled a little after that. (It was outdoors and the reception was under a tent.) Nearly every wedding I attend confirms my desire to either not have a wedding or to have a highly unusual wedding. I hate all the frou-frouness. I hate the exorbitant amount of money spent on a day that usually becomes more stress than fun. I've also decided that cutting the cake is the most pointless tradition. I hate cutting cake on my birthday, so if I ever get married, I'm not cutting the cake. Someone else can do it.... When we got there, they asked us if we could put all the sodas and waters in a fishing boat that was propped up on sawhorses. They should've gotten the groom's cake from the first wedding we catered. It had a guy in a fishing boat on top of it.

I just got back from my first run of week 5. I was a little nervous since it was 3 5-minute runs and I struggled on the 5-minute runs last week, but it went pretty well. I'm fortunate because the weather that came through this weekend brought a nice cool breeze so I wasn't suffering from anything besides running. I love this time of year. The sky is that beautiful bright blue, and everywhere I go I can smell honeysuckles and other wild flowers growing. It's amazing that God made plants that smell that good just grow wild for our smelling pleasure.

I feel like I have a lot to do today. It's my last day of freedom and I need to squeeze as much as possible in it. But now it's already 1pm and I haven't really done anything.

I got to see more of my family this weekend than I have in a long time. My mama got back from visiting Joy in Spain and Israel was in town at the end of a business trip. On Saturday night after I catered we (Jamie, Jersey, Adam, Israel, and me) decided we wanted to do something. Anything. Since I'm sick of the options down here in PTC and it was kind of late to go up to Atlanta we decided to go to what used to be B52s by the airport. It's a fairly decent place to go grab a bite, hang out, have a drink, watch people. We got there and noticed something was different. For one, there was a huge number of very white, European looking/dressing people there. For two, they weren't playing any hip hop and three, there were lots of white people dancing. Then they started playing music with unitelligible lyrics. Not unusual except remember, they weren't playing rap or hip hop. The more unintelligible the words were, the more the white people jumped around and danced. I finally went over to the dj to ask what the name of the song was. He started talking to me but I couldn't understand anything. Then he asked what language I spoke. English. Asked where I lived. Atlanta. Why? Umm... cause I'm from here. Turns out he, along with about 80% of the other people there and the owner of the place, was Czech, and they were playing Czech music. Oooohhhh... It's all so clear now. It was really fun though. I felt like I was back in Prague or some other eastern European nation. We had a good, interesting time. I have to say that it was far more than I hoped and dreamed for that night :-).

Yesterday, even though it was mother's day, my mama wanted to celebrate Israel's birthday (a month and a half late). I was happy cause what she made was better than what I would've thought of, and I've been wanting a real, home-cooked meal for a long time. I'll have to cook for her next week. We spent the day in the yard kicking a soccer ball, throwing a frisbee, and trying to fly a kite (since it was so windy). We never got the kite above our heads. It was kind of difficult when the wind couldn't decide which way it wanted to go.

I need to go shower and get on with my day. I just re-read this, and it's pretty disjointed, but I had a lot to say. Sorry. Hope everyone's Monday is wonderful.

remembering in Toronto

On this day four years ago I was riding in a bus from Split, Croatia to Sarajevo, Bosnia. I was with Raechel and we had just gotten back from spending a few days on the idyllic island of Hvar. I was beginning my journey through many foreign places. We rode down the Croatian coast for long while watching the waves crash below. Seeing the patterns the wind made on the water. Enjoying the beauty of it all. As we left the coast and began to make our way inland we started singing all the disney songs we could think of to distract me from the impending motion sickness that had plagued me on every method of transportation for the last week or so. We traveled through beautiful green mountains. I had no idea what to expect when I went to Bosnia and was very surprised by how lush everything was. We stopped at a restaurant perched above a valley and I used my first eastern toilet. It was pink ceramic and I realized it was not intended for women who wear pants. As we went further into Bosnia we began to see evidence of war. Raechel told me the stories behind many of the remains. It was a very interesting day that began in wealthy, beautiful, cosmopolitan, coastal Split, Croatia and ended in a war-scarred, graffitied, but still beautiful in its bowl of mountains Sarajevo, Bosnia.

Today I had no such exciting journeys. I spent another day in Toronto. They put us in a different hotel. It's really nice. I wouldn't mind having an apartment like this hotel. I ran again today. It was much better than yesterday. I'm spoiled up here by the cool breeze that is constantly blowing on me. This hotel is also in an area that is much nicer to run in.

I've spent most of the day updating a blogspot blog I have. It's the same as this one, but I just wanted to have a back up should something ever happen to this one. I also want it to be accessible to non-myspacers.

I'm not sure what it is about Canadian men, but within a few hours last night I had three of them give me their contact information. None of them were particularly interesting, but I really respect the fact that they aren't afraid of making the first move. That is a current peeve I have with most men I come across. Though I'm perfectly capable, I refuse to take the first step. I want a man who is man enough to do that. I may be single forever.

My mama should be back home by now. I'm excited to hear how her trip went. Israel will also be there when I get back tonight. Good times. I've been reminded a lot lately how fortunate I am to still have both my parents and all my siblings. I think I take it for granted that people's parents die when they're old, but I've come across more and more people who have lost theirs early in life. I hope this reminds me not to take the time I have with loved ones for granted.

As fantastic as Canadia is, I'm ready to blow this joint and be home.

Not much happening in Toronto

I'm a little bit frustrated. I'm in week 4 of this running thing. In the past weeks the first run of the new week was hard and the rest were significantly easier. This week the first run was really hard. Now I finished the third run of the week, but don't feel ready to go on to the next week. I still feel like it's too hard. Maybe I'm a big wuss. This week was 3 and 5 minute intervals. It's kind of embarrassing to tell runners that it's hard for me to run for 5 minutes straight, but it is. It probably doesn't help that I haven't run every other day like I should be. Maybe cause I'm giving myself too much space in between. I'll do better. Running in Toronto isn't as inspiring as Wilmington either. The temperature is nice, but I'm running through a very industrial area. Sometimes there aren't sidewalks and it smells bad. I'm quite the complainer.

Today I slept longer than I have in months and months. I don't normally like sleep past 10:30 or so. I just feel like I'm wasting my day. Today I slept until 1:20. I can't even remember most of the dreams I dreamed. The last one I had before I woke up involved a tall military guy who was wearing short shorts and first appeared to have no arms but was pretending. I was working at some bar type place. I think Michal was there. It was kind of strange and confusing. And oddly humorous. I wish I could remember the others.

Yesterday was the long day of our trip. We had a lot of sitting around time which makes the day go by really slowly. We did a Pittsburg round trip during the afternoon and came to Toronto for the night. I've just discovered that an old college friend, Neil, lives about 30 minutes from here and works right around the corner. I need to find a way of keeping up with where I know people. I hate spending a long time somewhere, bored out of my mind, and finding out the next day or week that I knew someone there.

It's time to head back to Atlanta and then turn around and come back. I wish I could just leave all my stuff in the hotel. My bags are really heavy this trip for some reason. Knowing my luck though, if I left it here we'd get our flight canceled or something.

I hate the way my teeth feel when I wake up

I've been trying to avoid the "this is what I had for lunch" kind of blogs and evidently other than what I eat, my life isn't very interesting lately. Come to think of it, I haven't really been eating anything interesting lately. How sad.

I'm in Melbourne, FL. It would be great except I have to leave in an hour. Our hotel very nice and is right on the beach so I can hear the waves right now. I can also hear the loud roar of the ac equipment right outside my room and it's interfering with my wave noise. There's a funny sign on the desk in here. It says "If smoking occurs during your stay..." It makes me a little curious to know how smoking can occur. I thought you had to intentionally make something like that happen?

Today we fly back to Atlanta, wait around a couple hours, do a round trip to Pittsburg, wait around a few more hours, and go to Toronto for a long time. I'd much rather we spend a long time here, but I guess that would be too much fun. It's hard to be at work when the weather is so beautiful and I'm missing out on it. But when the weather is bad it makes working more difficult.

hi ho, hi ho

It's Sunday again. I can't necessarily remember the last Sunday. This week has been very, very full, and very long. I did a nap Friday night. Then I catered yesterday from 3-11. We're catering the concerts at The Fred in PTC. This weekend is Huey Lewis and the News. I'm about to head back over there for another concert today. I should be cooking some food since my cereal probably won't tide me over for the day, but I have a headache and don't feel like it. The concert last night was pretty fun. It's hard work, but it's sometimes nice to work with people who are having a good time. It's kind of like doing flights that take people on vacation. They're always in a good mood and it's nice to be a little part of their good time. I need to go get ready and find some food. I am not working at all tomorrow and it makes me so happy. I complain about working - who wouldn't rather be sitting at home or with friends and family - but it doesn't feel good to know that every time I work I'm getting closer to be debt free. That's what I tell myself anyway.

such a, such a busy day.

Today is one of those days when I would give nearly anything to not have to go to work. I have to go to Providence tonight for a short few hours on the ground and then come back in the morning. I'm glad because the alternative was two miserable days of work, but I'd still rather be staying at home.

I had one of the most productive days I've had in a very long time. I had two cherry coke zeros and it makes me wonder if they're the magic motivation I've been looking for all these years. Not sure, but they did the trick today.

Yesterday after work I picked Michal up from school. My mama left to visit Joy in Spain yesterday. I'm really excited that she is going. I hope she likes it as much as I did. Since she was gone I got Michal and played mama for the night and morning. I have a feeling it was nothing like actually being a mother. We met Amie at La Hacienda for supper which was lovely. Michal practiced her amazing Spanish and Amie made everyone laugh with her terrible Spanish. I just sat and smiled and said gracias. Next we went home and said hello to the padre before he went to work. For the rest of the evening I entertained Michal with my air guitaring while she did homework. This morning I made sure I got her to school on time so she wouldn't get kicked out of school (like I dreamed she had for being late). We had a lovely evening and morning. In case no one has noticed, I have the coolest siblings in the world.

After that it was the perfect time to go home and clean and organize my bathroom. And then clean my room. And move my bed. And move it again. And pay bills. And go to the bank. And find out my catering work schedule for the next few weeks. And clear junk out of my car. And hang curtains. And wash all my towels and bedding. And swap all my trips this month. My caffeine buzz is wearing off just in time to start getting ready for work. It's a beautiful day. Hopefully it will mean good flying (though I'd prefer no flying). The perfume I bought off ebay (for nearly half price) arrived today. It smells soooo good. It's Coco Mademoiselle by Chanel. (Is that right Peter?) So now I can smell like a dream while I go to work.

I dread the thought of working 6 or 7 days a week for the next forever, but after getting my refunds and doing some calculations, paying off my debt is within sight. It's really encouraging and makes me want to do the extra work and saving to get it done.

Enough productivity for now. I'm going to go shower. I think I'll get some ice cream cake and eat it while I'm in there :-D.

back in Charlie West

I survived my 5 leg day today. It was actually not bad at all. The fact that I slept at least 8 hours last night probably was a huge factor. I'm glad I did. Tomorrow, for the first time in what seems like forever, I can get up whenever I want. I don't have to be at the airport til 1:25pm. Then it's just one leg home. Woo hoo!

Today I had a guy ask me for vitamin water. He was completely serious. I wanted to laugh. I had another guy who decided that a flight would be a good time to break his year old nephew's habit of sucking his thumb. I was thinking, hmmm... there's one thing that is guaranteed to make this child happy for the next hour, and you're repeatedly taking it away from him and making him scream. Good job genius. Thankfully he stopped after 20 minutes or so, otherwise I would've had to have an intervention. Sometimes when people are waiting to get off the plane I ask them where they're going, just to make small talk. A man coming in on the 6am from Wilmington yesterday said he was going to the north pole. I thought he was joking. Then he listed all the flights it was going to take for him to get there. After he left Anchorage I kind of lost him. He said he'd get there at 2am. I wonder what time zone(s) the north pole has? I wish I had gotten to talk to him more, cause that is definitely one of the most interesting destinations I've come across yet.

After we went for tacos in Wilmington the other night my pilots decided they wanted to get cigars. I wasn't really interested because my once experience with cigars led me to believe that their wonderful smell is deceiving, but I went along for the walk anyway. We went to this little cigar shop and started talking to the guy that works in there. They both picked out cigars and offered me one, but I still wasn't interested. Then the sales guy, who has been describing all the different cigars and explaining why they taste a certain way, where they're grown, etc... shows me this chocolate cigar. It smelled so good and he said it tasted just as good. It also had a coffee flavor somewhere in it. So we got them and walked along the river and smoked our cigars. Now I'm addicted to cigars and am planning on having my room turned into a humidor. That's a lie. But I did enjoy it. There are certain things in life that if enough sane people are crazy about I'm willing to try it at least once. So I had my chocolate cigar and it was very good. And my FO had the brilliant idea of making me look like a gangster so he lay down on the riverwalk and I acted like I was kicking him and we took a picture. And I was getting paid $1.50/hour. Good times :-)

I think I'm going to continue my fabulous trend of sleeping on this side of midnight.

pre-nap rant

My first gripe is that after I finished work today I had to travel into the dark labrynth that is the bottom of the far end of C Concourse to take a random drug and alcohol test. Good thing I've been laying off the crack. I was annoyed cause I was supposed to be on the bus going to my car before noon. I was also annoyed because whoever invented the idea of peeing in a cup for any sort of purpose had to be a man. Maybe I'm retarded, but I think I speak for most women when I say that it isn't easy for us to pee in cups. They need to think of a new way to do it. I'm not a fan.

My second gripe is the way you can hang on to a piece of paper for months and months, and when you finally need it it's nowhere to be found. I had an ad for a place where you could get massages for cheap. Some therapy place in PTC. I've been keeping it hoping one day I'd have enough money to get one. The last few days I've been having pain in my neck from a tight muscle and figured a massage would be a good thing to spend part of my tax refund/rebate money on. Now I can't find the number anywhere. It doesn't help that my room is barely walkable. It still makes me mad.

I'm also irked becuase it was in the 50s (if not colder) in Altanta this morning. Wtf? It's almost May. Let's get with the program here.

That's all for now. I'm going to nap before Michal's soccer game.

PS. Happy birthday Charity :-D!

People never cease to amuse/amaze me

My mood is definitely on the up and up since yesterday. I think if I could spend at least one overnight every week in a place like Wilmington, I would like my job a lot more. I run when I'm here because I feel like I'm wasting this beautiful place if I don't. It was nice today cause it's overcast, cool and windy so even when I was getting hot and tired the breeze would cool me down. The river is dark and choppy and high, but I still like it.

Work was okay today. I got up too early and was really tired. Our day started off with a unhealthy plane that had to go back to the plane hospital. This immediately put our entire day over an hour behind. Add ridiculous air traffic and long taxi lines to that and you've got a lot of happy people. Thankfully no one was really terrible though.

There are several things I've noticed lately that either amuse or annoy me about people (depending on the day). Some people like to watch you when you're pouring their drink. Some watch like they've never seen a drink poured before. That amuses me. Others watch like they're waiting for you to screw up. That annoys me. Sometimes I'm pouring and it makes me laugh to realize that at least four pairs of eyes are glued to my hands. Watching soda fizz is just a little more exciting than watching paint dry. Then they say something like "you got that just right" when it fizzes just to the top but never over. Then I remind them I'm a professional. You pour several thousand of these and you'll get it right every time too :-P. I also get amused by the drinks people ask me for. It seems they think we're a flying convenience store. Grape juice, pineapple juice, sweet tea, root bear, diet Dr. Pepper... Sure, sure... Let me get it out of my own private stash. Or when the wife asks for Diet COKE and the husband says "do you have Pepsi in there?" Maybe I'm overthinking this, but Coke and Pepsi are huge competitors. You can't carry both on one tiny plane. Maybe this is the jerk in me coming out.

When people are late they do silly things as well. Today on the way back into Atlanta from Gulfport a couple stopped me as I was going through the aisle and showed me their itinerary. They were concerned that they were going to have to rush to their next flight, which left at 1225. I looked at my watch and it was 1225 and we were still cruising. I pointed out the current time, of 1225, and they still said "well do you think we'll make it?" Yeah... no problem. Then when we're taxiing in they always insist on reaching up and opening the overhead bins and getting their stuff out while still seated. I'm like, you're halfway back in the plane. By the time everyone gets out of your way you could've gotten your bag out 15 times... People, people, people.

I had another first time flyer today. She was about my age and was traveling with three other adults. She asked the man next to her several times how to buckle her seatbelt. (Enough time passed for me to walk through the cabin twice before she got it.) She buckled it backwards. And people laugh when I do the demos.

On a non-work note. Last night I had a really good time eating with some of the girls. It's funny how when most of us are down we tend to avoid our family and friends, when in reality, they're the ones who are going to make us feel better. They have a tomato and mozzarella salad at Longhorn that was really good. (Though when they first brought it out it was drowing in dressing, even though it was supposed to be "drizzled with balsamic vinegar". I tried to eat it but it was too soppy and told the girl. She was like, our manager actually fixed it wrong, but I was seeing if you minded it that way. I'll get you another... So the girl brought me the wrong salad, knowing it was wrong, and hoped I didn't care... Nice.) When we stopped in Gulfport my captain bought me some red beans and rice. It was really, really good and made me feel a lot better. I've been really fortunate to fly with generous pilots lately. I never ever expect anyone to buy my food, but sometimes they (especially captains) do. I've been fortunate to fly with captains like that a lot lately. I'm very grateful.

Now I'm going to check out these $1 black bean tacos that are supposed to be amazing here. I love Wilmington.

I’ve been too tired to write anything this week

I'm tired. More tired than is normal. I'm not sure why. I don't know if it's the gray, gloomy weather. It might be the continual pollen in the air. It could be my body deciding to wreak havoc on itself. It could be the fact that last night was the first night in a long time that I got a decent amount of sleep. I don't feel like a got any time off this weekend either and from 4/22 to 5/08 I will be working 14 of 17 days. I probably shouldn't think of it that way for my sanity's sake, but I just did. Whenever I had time to write anything this week I was either too tired to write or couldn't think of anything to write. I also haven't run since Tuesday, which sucks. Hopefully once I get more sleep I'll feel like the happier version of me and be back at my normal things again.
I got my hair cut yesterday which makes me happy. I didn't realize how shaggy it had gotten, but now it's short and manageable, and I love it.

Last night I catered, which was good. I wasn't originally scheduled this weekend, but they called me Friday afternoon cause someone fractured their wrist. We catered a dinner for a fly in club. I noticed that almost everyone had pins on with names, planes, tail numbers, and cities on them. Turns out, it's a group of old people (lots of retired pilots) who now have enough money to own their own planes, and evidently nothing better to do with their time and money than fly around the south east once a month touring, drinking, and hanging out with other such people. Some of them were really nice and I was advised by one lady to not marry young (no worry of that). Others were plain old rude snobs.

This morning I went to church and saw another really good message. It's amazing how practical nearly every message I see there is. This one was Andy Stanley interviewing the author of a book "For Women Only" which I'd never heard of before. I've read a lot of books about the way men are versus the way women are so I'd heard some of the stuff before, but there's always something new to learn or a different way to view things. It was really interesting.

After that I rode over to Michal's school with the fam for the science project awards program. Out of 110 projects in the high school, Michal, a lowly freshman, got honorable mention. I'm really proud of her :-).

Tonight some of us are meeting for dinner in Newnan to celebrate Charity's upcoming birthday. I'm going to get ready for work so I don't have to worry about it when I get back.

somewhere in middle America

I know everyone is jealous of me for being in Omaha. I'm practically jealous of myself. I really don't have a problem with this place. I have a king size bed, microwave, frig, B&B Works toiletries. Plus mid-westerners are the nicest people (besides southerners). Granted, they don't fit on RJs very well, but they're very nice about it. Especially when the AC on the plane isn't working properly and we are all sweating our.. things off. But we made it here. Was pretty uneventful. I got to read some more of The Titan's Curse, which is the third book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. It rocks my face off. Pretty surprising for a book aimed at pre-teens.

Today my first round trip was to Panama City. A Delta captain and a lady got on last and sat in the front seats. The lady was smiling constantly. I finally asked her why she was so happy, assuming she was going on vacation or something. Her answer was that she was blessed by the Lord and she was married to that wonderful man. I was shocked. That's just not an answer I get very often. Later I asked her how long they had been married. (I like to talk to people that seem to be happily married. I figure, I'd like to be happily married someday so maybe they can give me some tips.) I was surprised to hear that they were both 50 or so and had only been married 2 years. Neither had every been married before and had both given up on ever getting married. It was really interesting. I'm glad I asked her cause I was about to assume that she was medicated (still could've been I guess).

I had at least one really friendly person on every flight today and it made all the difference in the world.

these dreams we dream

This morning I had another weird dream. I was supposed to do a dayline. I was going to deadhead (ride) somewhere, then pick up a plane in Anchorage (cause that's normal), and fly back. I was waiting for the bus to get a ride into the airport and for some reason I was changing my pants when the first bus pulled up. I was embarrassed at being naked from the waist down and pulled my shirt down to cover myself. I decided I'd finish changing and get on the next bus cause it was right behind that one. Then that one left me. I was supposed to be flying with J that day so I tried to call him so he could duty me in. He wouldn't answer so I called scheduling. The usual guy, Tom, answers. I told him I was trying to get in touch with my captain, but tried not to let on that I was late. Somehow I'm on the plane after that and it's a mainline flight. It was weird cause there were only a few people on it, the door to the cockpit was open, and there was only one pilot. I was like that's weird cause at our airline you have to have two pilots all the time. Then somehow I was home again and Amie was supposed to be in a wedding. She had been waiting for her ride for a long time so I said we should just go there on our own. But we ended up walking a really long way. Then Chris Isaak starting singing "Baby did a bad, bad thing" (my ringtone - he wasn't at the wedding)and I realized my mother was calling me so I had to wake up.

I just did the second run in week three. My face is doing the half and half thing and I'm really tired. I need to go get ready for work so I don't have to change my pants in the parkng lot and miss the bus and be late.

I dream of Jeannie

I just woke up a while ago and was having the weirdest dream. We were back at Heritage and doing some kind of variety show. The whole school was in the gym watching and who knows who else. The only difference was, I was the only one doing the entertaining, and I had nothing planned. No one was allowed to help me either. I tried making up stuff for a while. I did something that had to do with being a fat opera singer and was stuffing cushions in my dress, tupperware-esque bowls in my chest for voluptiousness, and a mattress around my waist... Finally after that I got so mad about them expecting me to do this all on my own for an hour and make it entertaining that I just walked off the stage and swore to never speak to the organizer again...

And I didn't even eat anything before I went to sleep last night.

erranding, eating, running, visiting, and much more

I have nothing particularly fascinating to report today. I had a lovely past two days. I did a lot which makes me happy, and it also makes me happy that I'm off tomorrow as well. I guess that's the nice thing about catering after I get off work on Friday - I have 3 full days off, plus Tuesday morning.

Yesterday J decided erranding in PTC was more exciting than erranding in Atlanta so he ventured down to pick me up. As we left my house we noticed his tire was flat. After driving up to Union City where he bought it, they told him they didn't have that tire and sent him to PTC. Down there they discovered it was just a nail and patched it. There goes half the afternoon. In the meantime we did have a nice burrito or two at Moe's and enjoyed the beautiful spring weather. We also contributed to the American economy and I got a lovely pair of Clarks flip flops. I'm in love already. Now that I have my brown Tevas and now the black Clarks, I shouldn't have to wear regular shoes anymore.

While at the Avenue we ran into Tracey, the wife of one of J's classmates, Cameron, that we're both friends with. She was with her mother-in-law who had just arrived from South Africa and they invited us over to eat. We had a lovely dinner complete with a game of croquet (I beat J) and some jumping on the trampoline with the munchkins (thankfully before dinner). We got to talk about SA a lot. It was nice to remember some of the amazing things I saw down there. I'd really love to go back (Adri - make a plan!)

This morning I got the day off to a good start by starting week 3 of my "running" program. Still not running a whole lot, but it's baby steps and manageable and I feel like I'm making progress.
Then I went to church and heard a great message. It was about landmines (figurative for all you smarty pants out there) that can destroy relationships, ways to avoid them, and what to do when they happen. The moral of the story was, if you approach a situation where someone has been hurt first you can't just skip past it. It has to be dealt with. And the way to deal with it, regardless of who is at fault, is with gentleness, humility, and forgiveness. It was a lot about marriages but I could think of a lot of situations in my friendships that could benefit from practicing this. It's amazing how many relationships aren't growing to their full potential because of harsh words, pride, and unforgiveness. I like when I go to church and remember what they talked about later that day :-P. We'll be doing really well if I can remember it later this week.

After church I went to lunch with some of the singles group from my church. I met a lot of people, but got to have quality conversation with a girl that I found I have at least a few things in common with.

From there I picked up Michal and we drove to the parents. And when I say we, I literally mean it. I drove to the neighborhood and then gave Michal her first lesson in driving a stick shift. She did a really good job. It's scary to think that my baby sister will be getting her learner's next month. Not scary cause she won't be a good driver. Scary cause she's the baby and she'll be old enough to drive soon. I sound like an old person talking about how kids grow up so fast. Maybe I am.

After the driving lesson we went over to the house where my parents' small group meets. They were grilling and all the family members were invited. It was nice to meet the people my parents are getting to know.

In case these two days weren't long enough already, I came home and put together a shelf to go over/behind my toilet that was made up of about 97 little tubes and screws. I'm my own hero sometimes :-D.

During all this excitement I got to talk to my two most far flung siblings. Such a busy, busy day... I also got my first paycheck from catering. It was a good thing cause it cost me nearly $40 to fill up my car today. That's a record for me.

That's enough for now. I'm going to read and go to sleep or something equally exciting.

Above us only sky

It's Saturday morning. I'm still in bed and it feels fabulous. Today is the first day since Monday that I haven't gotten up around 4am. If any of you are mad at me cause you called and I didn't call back, it's because the majority of my day happened before noon every day. It was ridiculous. By the time I would get to the hotel I was too tired to think, and had to go to sleep around 8 every night to get a decent amount of sleep.

In spite of the ridiculously early mornings I had a really good trip. My crew was really fun, which made work much more pleasant, and it was really nice to have someone you could talk to over supper (even if supper was at 4pm :-P).

My love for cities with rivers in them was confirmed twice this week. Our first overnight was in Fayetteville, NC and all I saw of that place was the inside of my room. The next day we were in Charleston, WV. Our hotel is right along the river. It was one of those really beautiful spring days where you can't imagine not getting outside. I ran along the river, up by the street so I could see the town on the way out, and down by the river on the way back. There was a nice breeze blowing, daffodils and other wildflowers growing on the riverbank, trees blooming everywhere, and that perfect spring time blue sky. It's so much easier to run when you have something interesting and beautiful to look at. After that we went and had some of the best Mexican I've had in a long time.

The next night we were in Wilmington, NC. If you've never been there, I definitely recommend it. They have some of the most beautiful old historic homes I've ever seen. Evidently they're having an airshow this weekend, so when I went out to run I got to watch the river and the town PLUS fighter planes flying around practicing. Talk about combining things I love :-D. Later we went to Fat Tony's and had their scrumptious pizza and hung out for a long time enjoying the weather and people watching.

I finally got home from work yesterday about two. I was able to squeeze in a nap (so I didn't lose it or kill anyone) and then go cater til 10pm last night. The nice thing about that job was that we catered a dinner at the school at the end of my street. They had kids who helped us with all the serving which made it so much easier, and once it was over I was home in about 90 seconds.
Now it's Saturday and I'm a free woman. I'm going to go make the most of it.

the weekend recap

I saw a smart car on Highway 74 tonight. I actually started laughing out loud. It made me really happy. It just looked so itty bitty on the big road with all the big trees and big cars. I've seen them a million times before, but it was always in the context of a city with small streets and crowded spaces so they never looked quite so small.

I played one of J's new friend's wii the other day for the first time ever. I'd never even seen one before. My shoulder still hurts. I think I may have damaged it. We were playing tennis and I was determined to win. Evidently, even if that meant breaking my shoulder.

I did my taxes today. I usually don't wait this long, but I had gotten an expense report from work and the thought of trying to figure out how to use it was overwhelming me to procrastination. But it was worth it because I'm going to get over twice as much back by using the expense report. It makes me le happy.

I just realized that all my paragraphs so far have started with I. I don't really care. It is my blog after all.

I started week 2 of the couch to 5k (www.c25k.com) training program. It's nice to do something that isn't overwhelming, but has a definite end and good result in sight.

Saturday was my first day catering for the Sun Dried. We did a pretty big wedding up in Buckhead. It was pretty good. There was a buffet so there wasn't any serving involved. Pretty much just bused tables for 4 hours. It's mindless, easy work and pays alright. I work again Friday night.

I've been realizing lately that the second bane to my existence is body hair removal. For all of us who like instant gratification, it works. You shave and it feels nice (assuming you get a good shave). But for all the trouble you go to, the goodness of it is very short lived. Stupid overproductive hair follicles. I hate how much time it takes. I hate that you have to do it so often. I hate how much razors and stuff costs. I just hate it. But I also hate body hair. And unfortunately I can't afford permanant hair removal. I just can't win.

I have to get up for work tomorrow morning at 4:45, and I'm at home. I'm not a fan, but I'll be finished by 1:15 on Friday so I guess that's good. I'm headed to Fayetteville, NC, Charleston, WV, and Wilmington, NC.

I got to see the parents and Mook twice this weekend (and eat my mama's fabulous food twice). It was lovely. Everything she cooks tastes so good and healthy. Lots of veggies and flavor. Yesterday we had Italian chicken and pasta with Chinese veggies and we ate it with chopsticks :-D. Today was something that she said translated literally to pasta and beans, but it reminded me of minestrone soup. Such a nice change from the processed, heavy crap I eat on the road (or at my own house). Israel just arrived in the US today. He's been gadding about Australia, China, and now Spain for the last month or so. Poor thing... He should be here about a month for work.

I also got to spend time with Amie and some new friends I've made through her yesterday. I suppose that's enough for now. I do tend to blather on endlessly. I've gotten some really nice messages lately about my writing. They are much appreciated. Very, very much. It encourages me to write more, even when I don't feel like it, or should be sleeping since I have to go to work :-D.

My exciting job

I’m in Springfield, MO and just ate some of the best bbq ever. Unfortunately I think I got my second wind as well. In a little while I’m going to try the method I use on babies when they won’t sleep - dark room, lights out, no distractions... See how that works.

Just as I expected last night, I hated myself this morning at 4:10. I think my ambien was still in effect through my first flight and the coffee did nothing for me. I honestly don’t remember anything about this morning. When I got back to Atlanta around 7:20 I was so tired I went to the lounge and sat down. I talked to a friend for a while, and then closed my eyes. The next thing I knew scheduling was calling me wondering why I wasn’t on my plane. Oh crap. Then of course my flight is all the way at the end of D Concourse, and I’m in the lounge under C. Thankfully we only had 22 passengers and my pilots were nice and had put all my stuff away so we closed up close to time, but I was really stressed out for a while there.

The next to flights to Jacksonville, NC were tough. I’ve noticed that I tend to munch when I’m bored or tired. Since I realized this I’ve been trying to stop, but since I was really tired and always feeling like I needed energy it was hard not to. Plus none of my passengers were very exciting or talkative. After that flight I had about an hour and half until my next one and my mood was failing fast. I should’ve called someone to cheer me up but was too tired. I finally prayed that I would have an interesting passenger to make the flight up here bearable. I definitely got what I asked for.

The first passengers of interest were a couple with a very cute, white, fluffy "service dog." I was trying to figure out if they’d just taken their dog and put a vest on it so they could take it everywhere for free. I finally asked what sort of service the dog did. She said she has brain seizures and the dog can detect them. I was surprised to learn that they didn’t get the dog for that purpose. When it was about 8 months old it would start behaving strangely and over time they realized that it was acting like that because it could tell she was going to have a seizure. Since then it has been trained to hone this sense/skill. I thought that was either really fascinating or an amazing lie.

The next interesting person was the lady who came up the ramp looking at everything like she’d never seen it before and didn’t know what to do. Then she got on the plane and found out she’d never been on one before (and evidently didn’t watch tv or anything) and was scared to death. She was fortunately seated near two really funny couples who kept her entertained the whole flight with pictures from their vacation and stories and explanations about all the shakes and sounds of the plane. Having dealt with a lot of scared passengers I tried to help her and make her less scared and by the end of the flight she was taking pictures out the window and had sworn off Greyhound. It was so funny though cause the whole middle and front of the plane was in on it and people would ask how she was. When she cried during take off they passed it on to me. When she put her jacket over her head someone let me know. She refused to eat cause her family said she would puke, and she refused to drink anything cause her family said she’d have to pee and didn’t want to use the lav. She rides Harleys all the time, but thinks planes are dangerous... It was amusing.

The people sitting around her were a whole other story. One used to play for the Cardinals, Mets, and Phillies. His wife was trying to set me up with their 41 year old, "loaded" son. When I said he was too old the other said she had a son. Between them they were determined to take me home.

Then there were two ladies and a man sitting in front of them. I squatted down in front of the cart so I could hear one of the ladies talk and the other, probably around my mother’s age, started petting my arm. She asked if I shaved my arms and said that all the young kids she works with do. I told her I didn’t (because it’s her business) and said that sometimes I did to exfoliate them cause I have bumps on my arms. She starts sharing about someone she knows’ arms - all the while petting my arm. The other lady laughed and explained that she was a very tactile person (I see that). If she wasn’t so nice I might’ve cared, but it just cracked me up. She said she has a habit of touching before thinking or asking whenever she sees something interesting. She also hugged me when she got off the plane and patted our captain’s cheek.
Between all of these people, and some other people who got in the conversation just to see what was going on, it was a very busy flight. I think about half the plane was nervous flyers so I’d make announcements to let everyone know how many more minutes of torture they had. It made a day that started out pretty lousy end up being pretty fun. Even if they hadn’t been humorous and amusing in their different ways, just the fact that these people talked to me constantly made me really happy and made me pleased to serve them.

PS. I also finished the USA Today crossword today. All by myself. Woo hoo!

past my bedtime

I hate when I wear glasses and drink hot stuff my glasses get all fogged up.

I hate that I can’t go to bed when I need to. Actually, not can’t - won’t. I have to be in the shower in less than 8 hours getting ready for work. I hate that too.

I like that two separate people told me today I look like Princess Di. The second person was a lady and her old husband following her said no, he thought I was prettier. It’s not the comparison to Di that I like, it’s just being told I’m pretty. Especially when I don’t feel like it.

I hate that my ipod is frozen up. I still did my walk/run anyway, but it was much harder having to time it all myself. Plus it worries me what’s wrong with it.

I hate feeling melancholy for no reason, or no good reason.

I love this hotel in Ft. Wayne. It’s another renovated Hilton. They have the idividual brew (big) coffee mugs which I really like.

I hate that sometimes this ambien knocks me out and other times it doesn’t seem to do anything.

I love that I’ve finished the first week of the www.c25k.com training plan. I tried to figure out what percentage of it that was, but the answer didn’t look right.

I hate that the good looking guy that talked to me for a second downstairs is married. They all are married or unavailable it seems.

I don’t like that I still don’t have any clarity about my blog topics from last night (or nigit).

I’m going to hate tomorrow more if I don’t stop this nonsense.

Today was a nice day, by the way. I like people in the midwest. They’re very friendly, appreciative, complimentary, and polite... I could handle that more often.

I’d love watching a very happily married couple on my last flight. They’d been married long enough to have children in their 40s and were still laughing and talking like they were young and in love. He would tease her and make up names for things we were flying over. She would believe him, realize it was a joke, and say how he was sooo bad. There was physical affection as well as obvious mutual respect and enjoyment in each other. It gives me hope for the future.

the packing avoider

I’m going to be honest - I don’t feel like getting up at 6:30am and going on a trip. It’s true. I can’t deny it. And since I don’t want to go to work, I don’t really want to pack for work. Packing blows. I could get up early and do it, but since I’m going to stay up late, be tired, and hit the snooze button a million times anyway, I might as well pack now.

Or maybe I’ll just write a blog.

Another weekend has come and gone. This one was particularly nice since it was 4 days long. Still not long enough, in my opinion, but more than normal jobbers get.

The Pollard’s grandfather died on Saturday morning so I went to the funeral today. It was sad cause I’ve grown up with him and Granny Pollard being as much in my life as my grandparents and I know how close they were to their family. He had a good life though, and was suffering a lot at the end, so I know he was happy to go be with Granny and the Lord. Still, I’m not a fan of funerals.

Tonight was community group from church. It was nice to go, but I also feel weird cause I haven’t been in such a long time and don’t really know anyone. They’ve been meeting for at least two months now so seem to know each other pretty well. It’s discouraging cause I feel like I have to choose between working to pay off debt (a good thing) and going to this group (a good thing). I guess I’ll figure it out one of these days (along with the rest of life).

I’ve had interesting discussions with my landpeople this weekend. They were encouraging me to start playing again (instead of catering or some other somewhat menial job). They think we should go back to our original name - the String Lovelies - which I previously despised, but for years now have not been able to replace. I kind of feel like it’s our destiny (though I don’t really believe in that word) to be called that. Everything else we come up with seems really stale and bland. I know it’s kind of cheesy, but I think the fact that it has personality, and indicates that we are something other than a group of middle aged, ugly musicians, could be a good selling point. Any thoughts?

I must go pack.

If you try real hard you just might find you get what you need

It’s so nice to be off work for the weekend. I’m lounging in my room listening to radio free lunch about bad girls. I love this show.

I got to work Wednesday, and lo and behold my planner was in my mailbox. I don’t know why God is so good to me sometimes. It made me really happy. It was a good thing because nothing else that happened for the next 2 days went my way at all. I changed my trip at the last minute so I could fly with one of my friends. This meant I had to duty in about 5 hours earlier. Then at an even later minute, their schedule got changed. Oh well. Then I got to work and did my first round trip. We were delayed cause of fog in FL so when I got back I found out that they had switched me to a completely different trip. I ended up going to Montreal for the night, and then because of them changing me and then our plane being sick (that’s for you Adri), I got off 5 hours later yesterday. And contrary to what my passengers thought, I only get paid $1.50/hr for being that late. The redeeming factor was that we only had two passengers on our flight back from Nassau yesterday cause they had all switched over to a different flight that was leaving on time. And I had to get up at 3:45 yesterday morning to get to the airport and through customs in time for our 6am flight. Did I mention how glad I am to be off work?

I got called by the Sundried Tomato lady and she’s already given me 3 or 4 dates that I’ll be working. I’m really happy about that. First one is on the 12th.

I’m pleased that the 5th Holby child ventured out of the United States yesterday :-D. Peter walked across the border to Mexico (don’t worry, he came back). It made me happy to hear that.

I can’t remember anything interesting that happened on my last trip. I was so tired it was taking all my energy to stay awake. When I got switched to my other trip I flew with a crazy flight attendant. She was really nice but possibly a little ADD. She would make "beep beep honk honk" noises while going down the aisle with the cart. I was embarrassed. There’s a fine line between being an amusing and an annoying flight attendant.

(trying to be) leaving on a jetplane

I feel lost and confused without my planner. I’m hoping that when I get back to the airport today someone will have put it in my box, but I’m trying to accept that it’s probably gone.

Today has been a monumentaly unproductive day so far. Last night, because of one decision by our company which seemed to become a comedy of errors, our flight left Atlanta at 1:20am instead of 9:40pm. We got to the hotel around 3am and I decided I was going to sleep as long as my body would allow me. I woke up around 11 because someone was hammering in the room next to me, but managed to forge on through for nearly two more hours of sleep. Now I have another 3 hours here in the hotel, know I should be doing something besides surfing, but can’t be bothered to do anything else.

Yesterday we flew to Belize and back. It may sound exciting, but it’s really just a long way. Then we rushed through customs, rushed through a microwave meal, and rushed back over to the plane we brought in from Belize, only to find out they had switched us to a different plane. After a few minutes of musical planes we discovered that our new plane was broken. Fantastic, I know. This at least gave us all time to take a nap in our dark, broken plane. My captain even started snoring. It amused me a little. When I woke up and saw that every other plane around us had left, I wasn’t amused anymore. When it was finally fixed we were able to start the plane up and board passengers. This is when my captain discovered that the plane had been fueled to go to Oklahoma City, instead of Dayton. We had way too much gas and all the fuel trucks had already been topped off for the night. They finally heard on the radio some other plane begging for fuel, so they sent the fuel truck over to give them fuel, thereby making space for our extra 3000lb we had. Once the fuel truck came back they couldn’t get the truck to take the fuel off. Skip ahead 45 minutes (it’s nearly 1am now) and the fuel supervisor comes out and probably flips the "defuel" switch and we were very shortly on our way. The joys of travel are neverending.