I'm Too Tired to be Properly Disappointed (but I'm not too sleepy to justify my spending habits!)

In the face of a 13 hour work-day, three hours of sleep is just as useless as two.

No matter how tired I am, or what aids I've ingested (save Ambien, which I haven't had a prescription for in years, and quite frankly I'm scared to take alone on a layover) my body refuses to sleep before 1am, and the very latest I could possibly have slept was 4:30.

I figured since I was going to be exhausted anyway, better not to feel exhausted and fat. Thus I was up at three to workout.

The combination of exercise-induced endorphins and nourishment from the kind hotel breakfast mistress, who set out a few items for bleary eyed crews working before 5, had me feeling pretty good until about 10am.

We got out of Miami a few minutes early, and the passenger loads were mercifully light. As we approached storm-wracked Texas however, the ride got bumpier and bumpier.

The real turbulence hit when we landed in Houston and got out into the terminal.

The departure boards blinked with delays and cancellations. The lines at the service center wrapped back and forth like a pack of disgruntled Ramen noodles. Hurricane Dolly was getter revenge for being downgraded to "Tropical Storm" by backing up our entire route map.

We were among the luckier crews, and only delayed two hours.

Our plane, ironically enough, was late coming in from Washington DC, where I hoped to be headed tonight.

Once we got out of Houston, it was a quick 27 min flight to Austin (yet we still pulled out the barcart and did a full service). Then it was an even quicker turnaround, where we somehow managed to load up a full 737 and get out one minute before our scheduled wheels-up time, which if we had missed Air Traffic Control would have moved us to the end of the line.

By now I was running strictly on our mediocre coffee and a protien bar I bought yesterday.

We landed, waited for a gate, and eventually made it off by 6:25pm. I scurried to the board and saw that the 4:14 to Baltimore was delayed until 6:30. I was tempted to run for it, but I really wanted to go to my car and switch out my trip stuff for going home stuff and it looked like the 7:15 to Washington was on time.

So, waiting for the bus to employee lot I called scheduling to block in from my trip and be released to my days off.

I'm usually on hold for some time waiting to speak to a scheduler, but once you get through, he or she is usually pretty brisk. Today however, it was taking a suspiciously long time and an awful lot of computer key clicking to just let me go home.

Because they didn't.

They rolled my day off (yes that's legal), and I have an Orlando turn tomorrow.

So now, instead of Friday through Monday off, I've got Saturday through Tuesday. I'm supposed to be cohosting a Murder-Mystery party on Saturday, I'm not at all prepared, and now I'm not even sure I'll be in town until Saturday afternoon!

My trip tomorrow is scheduled to be over at 7:18. So that leaves me the (mostly likely delayed) 7:15 to DCA, an 8:30 to BWI and the questionable 9:30 to DCA on a little Regional Jets operated by our ezxpress carrier and that gets cancelled if someone sneezes too hard.

Still, I'm just glad I hadn't run for the Baltimore flight and got this news out on the runway.

So I made the best of being grounded for the night, and went for a bike ride.

According to my calculations, with gas averaging $4 a gallon, and my car getting about 21 miles per gallon in stop-and-go-then -stop local driving, to recoup my expenditure, I would need to bike instead of drive approximately 709 miles.

If you consider the defrayed wear and tear on the car and the cost of routine upkeep (and what better time to consider such costs than when justifying luxury spending), the necessary milage could even drop into the 690s.

On my layover, I had Googled the distances to my "Holy Trinity" (the bookstore, the gym and the grocery) as well as Peggy's house and Church, and discovered thatSunday alone I had biked, not driven, over 7 miles.

I think I'll keep a record of my driving diet for encouragement.

I also researched some alternative routes to the avoid the busy Garden State Parkway traffic circles and test rode them tonight to Target.

Riding at night convinced me I needed a headlight for safety. So I picked one up and then found a little bell that I thought would be good to avoid sneaking up on pedestrians. I also came across a handy stopwatch-like object that computes speed and trip distance, which I thought would be terribly useful to maintain my cycling journal and see how quickly I paid myself back for the cost of the bike.....which is now about $32 more than it was yesterday.

Oh well, I'm getting killer quads.....and that's priceless.

Benvinedo a Miami

If Cleveland is the setting for the wholesome family film about commercial aviation, then Miami is the cheesy, b-rate beach version.

This afternoon we circled a few times and nearly diverted because of thunderstorms on the runway. After a long wait on the tarmac and an even longer drive we made it to the hotel.

Independently owned, built in 1947 and apparently still clinging to it's teenage glory years, the sprawling complex now caters exclusively to airline crews, which only adds to the surreal accumulation of kitsch here.

Anywhere among the mass produced oil paintings circa 1966, the resin statues of mermaids or the shaggy potted palms you'll spot clusters of a few ladies, one or two fabulous gay men and two gray-haired guys exchanging stories over drinks and chips.

At any given moment the lobby could swell with crews in exotic and colorful uniforms chattering away in a variety of languages, and, thanks to the time change, usually ready for a drink.

It may not be our most glamorous layover, but it certainly is the most bizarre.

In all fairness the accommodations aren't uncomfortable, the workout room is decent, we're right on the beach, and there is (if you are luckier than we, and don't have to check out before 5am) an expansive free breakfast. So I won't complain.

When we first got in it was too humid and gross to do anything other than nap. After the heat of the day had passed, I ventured out. Unfortunately, the promised hotel bikes were out of commission, so I took to the strip on foot.

For about a mile I wandered past a questionable assortment of souvenir shops, liquor stores, well-known franchises that still sported the dated version of their company logo and hit-or-miss dollar stores, all housed in shades of dirty pink and turquoise, embellished with neon signage.

In one of these I found an utterly irresistible deal on bagged Starbucks coffee and squashed specimens of my favorite protein bars (they'll be squashed in my suitcase by the time I need emergency sustenance anyway!) and splurged.

As is too often the case, my eyes were bigger than my suitcase, and I now dread lugging my additional cargo through security....and the imminent teasing from my crew.

As I hinted above, tomorrow is going start early and fly us hard. But if all goes well, we'll get in early enough for me to catch an evening flight to Washington or Baltimore, and I can start my four day weekend at home as soon as possible.

This is Huge.

I HAVE A LINE!!!!

I don't know how or why it happened, but for the month of August at least, I am a lineholder.

I know where I am going and when I will be there. Scheduling cannot call me whenever they want, and (with the cooperation of Air Traffic Control and the weather, of course) I have control over my life!

I've been riding around Rahway for the last hour trying to think of an extreme, amusing, yet appropriate metaphor, but I'm at a complete loss.

Making the jump from reserve flight attendant to lineholder is the extreme metaphor one would use to amsuingly describe some colossal life transformation.

Or at least one could use, if one understood the full illustrative value of such a scenario.

Right now that's my only problem. While I'm still in blissful shock over my good fortune (and still trying to decode the cryptic mess pictured above), I just don't feel that family and friends are fully grasping my joy.

Although I believe they are truly happy for me, civlilans can't entirely empathize, and I don't want to be too euphoric around my flight attendant friends because they are still on reserve.

While my mother congratulated me, the overarching gist of her comments were, "How does this effect the trip we were planning."

So, tonight I'll just send out happy vibes over the internet and go to sleep dreaming of trip trades.

Of course I better get to that dreaming part pretty soon. As for tonight, scheduling still owns me....and they've got me early tomorrow morning.

The Adventrure Rides on........

Well, my stint as a Cleveland reserve turned into a four-day paid vacation.

It's funny how I quickly fell into a nice routine.

In the morning, wake up and bike over to the bookstore for coffee a read (gotta love a magazine selection that includes Hobby Farms, with glamour shots of pigs and produce), a quick stop at the market for munchies, then off to the airport to chill out in the crew room for four hours.

Each day I was scheduled to deadhead back to EWR, and each day when I called to be released, I felt like I had just anted up in some high-stakes poker game:

I'm here, I'm in. What you got?
Computer keys clicking.
"We're going to need you stay one more night."
JACKPOT!

So back to the hotel for a nice evening bike ride through the park.

I got myself one of those demographic-gathering, key chain-clogging cards for the local grocery store and started sitting in the front seat of the hotel shuttle so the driver and I could catch up better between airport runs.

And actually, I did hit the jackpot, because the whole adventure was pretty profitable. As an Airport Alert I watched movies from the random selection of VHS tapes under the crew room TV (the Truman Show, High Fidelity) and got four hours of pay for four hours of "work". What a concept! Plus, since I was technically away from my base, I was still getting non-taxable per diem and someone else cleaned my room every day!

The only stressful event was when I realized that I had only one knitting project packed...and that I had lost the last page of the pattern! Tragedy was averted when I discovered a Pat Catan's (the Ohio equivalent of Jo-Ann's or AC Moore) on my last night's ride and slipped in at closing to grab a big skein of cotton yarn to keep my fingers busy.

Eventually I did have to fly, so Friday I worked three legs, had a short overnight in Boston and was back in Jersey by 9:30am Saturday.

Since I had some free time, I decided to spend a couple hundred dollars.........

I bought a bike!

Actually, it was only $109 at Target, plus taxes and a snappy little lock chain, and it was worth every penny! I am now the proud owner of a red and white Schwinn Legacy Cruiser. It looks as cute as it sounds, and I look even riding it (wait until I get a little basket!).

Seriously though, riding around Ohio, I realized that most of the places I go in NJ on a regular basis are all within a few miles and it really is possible to bike around.

So yesterday I pedalled to church, over to the Barnes and Noble for coffee and knitting, to my Bally's for a (probably unnecessary) workout and to Peggy's house where we met up for Colleen's farewell BBQ. From there we took the train and walked to the park, so I didn't use my car the entire day!

It really was a perfect summer Sunday.

I got to spend some time with God, good friends, and the more scenic parts of New Jersey. I felt good about the environment and my health, gorged myself on rip watermelon and made it home before the thunderstorm.

Content, but completely exhausted I plopped down on my couch only to hear my phone singing the signature ring for Crew Scheduling.

Since it was my day off, I didn't have to answer, but I knew that it probably meant a "courtesy call" because I would have a VERY early check in the next day.

Cautiously, I answered, and my fears were confirmed: 6:20am report time for a 14 hour duty day. Yuck.

The scheduler apologized and added, "But you have a long downtown layover the next day."
"Oh yeah? Where?"
Computer keys clicking.....

"Cleveland, Ohio."

Do Paralell Universes Use Three-Letter Airport Codes?

Occasionally, while going about my daily business I'll pause and realize that I am thousands of miles away from home, or that just a few hours earlier I had entirely different plans.

Sometimes it makes me laugh, sometimes it frustrates me, but what really surprises me is how unsurprising it is to find myself in such situations.

I guess that's why yesterday's adventures so deeply affected me. I felt like I had not only traveled across state lines, but right through to some other state of mind.

I'll call it Ohio.

Scheduling called me on Monday, just as I was wrapping up a wonderful, if exhausting, four days at home in Annapolis filled with the places, people and activities of my pre-airline life. I was to sit airport alert at 5:30 the next morning.

Somehow I made it to EWR on time and settled into my preferred Airport Alert position: earplugs, eye mask, by body supported in the uneven curves of the Lazy Boy filled in by airplane-issue pillows scrounged from the other couches. Just as I began to drift off the phone rang and my name was called. I was to be deadheaded to CLE (our smallest base) to sit airport alert there.

Now, I slept pretty hard on the deadhead flight (the flight attendant had to physically shake me awake when be landed), but wouldn't I have noticed if we slipped through some time-space continuum?

I sleepily stumbled down the CLE crew room and while I certainly recognized it as our crew room: the same institutional furniture, the same bank of dated computers, their screens glowing with the login page of our company network; everything seemed smaller, cleaner brighter. Like the set for a Disney movie about flight attendants.

Four hours later another girl and I were released to the hotel and on our way out of the crew room we spotted a flier for the "Employee Appreciation Ice Cream Social". They were literately giving away Ben and Jerry's just for working in Cleveland!

En route to the Holiday Inn the driver gave us a detailed summary of all the local amenities and suggested that we borrow bikes and head over to the trails down the streets.

After a solid nap I did just that, and soon found myself on the banks of the Rocky River, legs tingling from the leisurely three-mile ride, borrowed bike leaning against a lovely stone wall. Around me families with fathers picnicked and fished, pets and wildlife frolicked*, and ahead to my right a blissful young couple giggled as they staged kisses for their engagement announcement photos (and snuck real ones between shots).

Later in the evening, completely satisfied from my day and filled with the desire to share my delight with the online world, I biked over the the Border's bookstore to polish off my blog entry.

Journal and decaf coffee in hand (and knitting stashed in the bag under my arm), I decided to take a quick peek at the knitting books before putting pencil to paper. As I turned the corner the shelves parted to reveal a group of women happily knitting away in the comfy chairs by the window.

I stood speechless.

Of course that only lasted a few seconds, and I instantly made four new friends and a standing date to knit any Tuesday I was in town.

We knit, chatted and admired each other's work. Occasionally I would just shake my head in wonder at my day and the other ladies would laugh at how stunned I was by my good fortune. The apparent ringleader of this group (whose husband happened to be a pilot and who she couldn't wait to tell about this flying stranger) commented, "You should buy a lotto ticket before you leave town!"

This morning I woke up to the urgent ring of the hotel phone and the scheduler informed me that I was needed back to for another round of Airport Alert. She also mentioned that they just needed one reserve to stay the night, so she gave me option to stay in Clevland another night or go back to Newark.

Stay another night?!?! I'm ready to put in my transfer!


____________
* I apologize for the gratuitous use of the term "frolic", but the animals mentioned were in fact illustrating the exact defination of the word.