The holidays may be “The most wonderful time of the year”, but bundle up.  Remember the thought of dark, and cold, misery, as you pull into Minneapolis, Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, and Buffalo.

This is the time of year that you can either be happy or sad at the length of your Flight Attendant Career. The longer you have been on the job, the better chance you will be laying over in Miami, Honolulu, or Phoenix.

Pack for the worst. I am lucky to say that I have been one of those sunshine boys. However, every once in a while you may have to go through Cleveland to get to Miami, and that is where the fun can start.

Weather delays, mechanicals and timing out, can turn your day at the beach to misery. We once timed out in Detroit, and all I had packed was a change of a bathing suit, flip flops, shorts and a tee shirt.

Timing-out occurs when contractually you can’t work any more hours in that day. Timing out happens after a combination of a long day with maintenance issues, weather delays, or both.

I learned to always pack the jeans and a sweater. There is nothing goofier than having to wear your uniform pants and a tee shirt every time you leave your room.

In addition to this bit of advice, always pack something to change into, even when you work a turn.

A turn is when you start your day and end your day at the same place. If you end up cancelled on the wrong side of the turn, it is even worse to not have a change of anything.

Winter is a good time to be in Flight Attendant School.  The chances are that, you probably won’t get caught with your pants………….. being the wrong kind.

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The holidays are usually full of happiness and excitement. Our passengers are going home, or on vacation, and are usually pretty excited about it. The holidays can also bring out the worst in people, so have patience as you work these next few weeks.

Most other times of the year our airplanes are filled with a variety of passengers. Led by the business traveler, we also see our vacation traveler heading for paradise.

The holidays fill our airplanes with families ready to enjoy a good old family get together. Usually, these travelers are in good spirits.

The airplane may get a little more noisy. We will see an increase of small and large children come on board. One of my favorite announcements this time of year is, “In case of a sudden drop in pressure, an oxygen mask will drop. Please place the mask on your face first. If you are traveling with a small child, or someone acting like a small child please put their mask on next.”

The passengers are usually in good spirits, and are even willing to share some of their goodies.

However, this is also a tough time of year for some people. Deaths, divorce, and even job layoffs have them in a tough emotional place.

I have seen fathers that were transporting their little boys back to mom for the holiday having a wonderful playful time. After the dust had settled these poor guys would be in near tears and silent on the way back home, without their boys.

I have had a man tell me about this being the first Christmas without his wife. He told me how she passed away, and how he is just trying to keep busy and make it through the darn holidays.

In Flight Attendant School we learn that it is always best for us to leave our emotional and personal baggage at the gate. This challenge does not become any easier after a few years into your Flight Attendant Career. All I can suggest is to try a little harder to work with the passengers this time of year. The last thing you want is to upset anyone who is already broken-hearted.

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Becoming a Flight Attendant is not for everyone. Most people recognize that flying, travel, people, and the grind of travel may not be their cup of tea.

However, some people do not realize that a Flight Attendant Career is not a good choice for them and they somehow slip through the cracks.

Before you can get into the airlines Flight Attendant School you go through a series of interviews. Your background is thoroughly checked, with strict criteria to be met. Once you have successfully completed the process, you are invited to join the Training Program.

I have flown with many people.  Most of these people were good matches to the criteria needed to be a Flight Attendant. However, a few of my fellow crew mates were lacking some of the gifts it took to survive in this career.

Mark is a good friend of mine. He is a funny guy and real easy going. Many years ago Mark and I were working together. Mark had a passenger that had a bad leg come aboard, and he sat this passenger over the wing in the emergency exit row. The guy wanted the extra leg room. The FAA really doesn’t want people in emergency rows that are not able to perform the emergency tasks.

The guy seated in the row was a real pain.  He complained throughout the flight; he wanted everything from headsets to booze for nothing.

At one point this guy had his bad foot propped up on the emergency door.  He rang his call button and asked Mark for some more pillows to prop his leg.

Mark looked at the guy and stated,” Buddy this isn’t a hospital, deal with it”.

The guy wrote a letter; Mark got in trouble, and now works on the ramp.

Dave is a guy that is about six feet four inches. He is the kind of guy that if you looked at his girlfriend, he may kill you.

Dave was working a flight from St Louis. It was the dead of winter and there was snow on the ground.

This prissy passenger, with a real expensive carry-on bag shouts in his direction, “Stewardess please stow my bag”.

Remember that song, “You don’t mess around with Jim?” Well, that’s how it is with Dave. Dave smiled and took the lady’s bag. He proceeded to the back galley, opened the lest aft door, and chucked the bag, into a snow bank.

Dave now has a successful business as a landscaper.

The Flight Attendant Career is not made for everybody.

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It will take you years to figure out all of the tricks of the trade of your new Flight Attendant Career. In fact, just when you thought you knew it all, you’ll find out you knew nothing at all. Today’s lesson is freeing yourself up for the holidays.

Once you have graduated Flight Attendant School, you will become mercy of the Crew Scheduling Department. In those first months or even years, there is not much you can do with scheduling off on holidays.

You may get lucky and be on call, and not get called out.  However, reserves work on the holidays. The flying business is all about seniority, and the newbies are lucky to get the last bit of turkey on the Thanksgiving plate.

Once you have done some time, and have passed your probation period  you may have some flexibility with your schedule. That’s where you will have some options.

Option one:  Pay someone to work your trip. You will be amazed how much money can buy. I have seen and been part of trips that have paid up to $500.00 just for a Flight Attendant to have the holiday off. If you are lucky enough to have the holiday off, you will have the opportunity to make some long green.

Option two:  The Company hates this, but save your sick days for the holidays. Most airlines have a point system, or simply give you so many sick days. If you save the sick days, and go to your doctor, during your holiday blue flu, there is not much that can be done to you from big brother. I suggest that you don’t make a yearly pattern out of this exercise;  it may possibly bite you in the end.

Option three:  Have your vacation fall on the holidays. Good luck to anyone with less than twenty years in.

Option four:  Get pregnant or go on short term disability weeks before the holiday. I know people that have planned foot operations and gall bladder removals just to be home for Christmas.

Option five:  Bid your schedule where Christmas, New Years, etc… fall off. This is a scientific and mathematical equation, but if you’re good, and lucky it works.

Option six:  See options two, and four, they are your best bets.

Happy Holidays!

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Flight Attendant School has been completed. You are ready to begin your Flight Attendant Career and just when you thought the worst was over you are handed an identity crisis.

Young, old, male, female, straight, or gay, we have gotten used to being called Flight Attendants.

It won’t take long before a passenger that is still stranded in the 70’s refers to you as Stewardess.  It doesn’t matter to them if you are male or female.

Oh Miss is another calling card used to get your attention. O’ Miss is usually followed by the unforgivable touching of the Flight Attendant. There was a saying that went something like this, “You can call me Ray, you can call me Jay, you can call me Sonny, and you can call me Mooney, but you don’t have to call me Johnson.”  In our Flight Attendant world we will hear all kinds of nicknames, but don’t ever grab our person. This is grounds for immediate ejection.

Over time I have kept a list of names that I have heard my crew mates and myself called. I will list some of these below, if you can think of anything else please feel free to share.

Flight Attendant Nicknames: Cart Tart, Galley Hag, O’Miss, Pilot Nanny, Coffee Jockey, Wagon Dragon, Biscuit Chucker, Sandwich Mechanic, Stewardess, and my favorite, Hostitute.

Whatever you may be called, always remember this, when they need an emergency way out of that burning bird, they will refer to you as the Flight Attendant.

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Once you have graduated Flight Attendant School and your Flight Attendant Career has begun San Diego to Phoenix to Atlanta to Phoenix will resemble a day at the office for you. Sometimes the trips you work in those first months will be sweeter, but if you go to work thinking San Diego to Phoenix to Atlanta to Phoenix, everything else will be gravy.

Your first few days as a reserve will be exciting, and possibly exhausting. Once you have completed the San Diego to Phoenix to Atlanta legs, your body will want to be done. However you have to still return to Phoenix and it starts to feel like a “Ground Hog Day” from hell.

Everyone reacts differently, but there is a good chance that you will sleep walk through the Atlanta to Phoenix leg. This service will feel like a sleep walker with total recall of their last walk. When you sit down it will take longer to get up. When you arrive in Phoenix you can’t feel ecstatic, because it is hard to feel anything at all.

The bus ride to your car is a continuance of the trip. When you leave the bus your legs will feel like you were riding on the Titanic for about twenty hours before it finally sank.

You may not remember how you made it home. You probably will brush your teeth and worry about the shower tomorrow.

When you wake up the next day you may feel like you partied too hard and need a Bloody Mary to ease the pain.

The only thing that may get bloody is you. The phone rings and it is crew scheduling telling you that you have been assigned to go from Phoenix to Atlanta to Phoenix to San Diego, and you need to be at the airport in three hours.

Welcome to your new Flight Attendant Career.

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Duct Tape to an airplane can be compared to the importance of white on rice, as a Flight Attendant my recommendation is to not, “leave home without it”.

In the old days, duct tape could have been the reason delays were shorter. Tray table repairs, compartment repairs,  galley repairs, you name it, and a roll of duct tape would save the day.

In today’s environment almost all challenges to the airplane call for the mechanics to board the airplane.

If you are parked in one of your base cities, there can be a long wait for the mechanics to arrive. Once the mechanics arrive they go through their set of procedures that either have them fixing the problem or delaying the fix until later. If you are not in a base city, God Bless you. I have grown grey hair waiting for another airline mechanic to show.

Delaying is the key word, because that is what your passengers and crew are now experiencing.

In Flight Attendant School we learn how one delay can mess up a bunch of flights. If your aircraft is traveling from Phoenix to Chicago, and you suffer a thirty-five minute delay, the captain may have the chance to make that up. However, if you have a long delay, the aircraft that you are on will carry that delay throughout the day. This will make many flights late, and cause misconnects to other cities.

The main pain it causes is to the passengers, potentially they may not get where they were supposed to, on time or at all. This phenomenon causes us much pain.

Having duct tape is like having Ibuprofen. It may not heal the big problem, but it sure easies the pain for the small aches and pains.

If you want to have a long Flight Attendant Career, never try to fix things yourself. That style of management went out a long time ago.

As in everything we do, inform the Captain that you are packing duct tape. You will be surprised on how many times he smiles and fixes the challenge.

This process is called “Monkey Back Management”. You took the monkey off of your back, and gave it to the captain.

Within the next six minutes you may be leaving the gate, on time, with just a little less tape.

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After we graduate from Flight Attendant School we are informed of what Base City we will be working from.

In the early days of our Flight Attendant Career we usually have a limited choice of where our new home will be.

With large airlines such as, American, United, and Delta, you could end up almost anywhere. Dallas, Boston, Miami, Chicago, San Francisco, and Atlanta are some of the places you may land at.

Airlines such as US Air, Frontier, Southwest, and Alaska Airlines, may have you starting your Flight Attendant Career in Seattle, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Dallas, and Denver.

The key is to be prepared. You may not know where you are going, but pack light, and be ready to move. Sometimes you may only have a day or so after your graduation from Flight Attendant School before you start on your first assignment.

Finding a place to live is your most important agenda item. Make many friends in the classroom, one or more of these people may be your first roommates.

The dust will settle, and in a month or two you will have the important things you need to survive in line.

Cherish the chaos, it makes for great stories in time.

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Not to be confused with the “Candy Man”, the Van Man does have the ability to sweeten up your layover.

We count on these people every overnight. They pick us up, they take us to places, they give us directions, they give us tips, and they bring us back to work, they are the Van Drivers.

I have found that you want to keep them happy. As helpful as they can be, if unhappy, the van driver can make your day misery.

The last thing that a Flight Crew desires at the end of a work day is a late arriving van. By the time we get to our final resting place we are either ready to hit the sack or party. A late van arrival will put the beginning and ending tone to our plans.

Keep that driver happy. Learn their names. Develop a relationship with them where they can remember your name.

I always call the van driver as soon as the aircraft blocks in. This gives them a heads up that we are here. If the call goes right to the van driver I ask him how he’s doing, and tell him who is calling. Hopefully, they will remember me from an earlier trip.

Unless we are on reserve, our schedules for the month seem to repeat themselves. In our Flight Attendant Career we know that everything is built around seniority. You will find that with that seniority we will fly to our favorite places, and stay at the better layover spots more often than not. This will allow us to build a relationship with our van driver.

Treat them well, tip them well. They don’t go over this concept in Flight Attendant School. It is probably something we learned in kindergarten. Treat people like you want to be treated.

The result will be a landing that has someone knowing you at your homes away from home. Someone who is on time, and someone that will steer you to the right places. That someone can “Make your sun rise, and sprinkle it with dew cover it with chocolate and a miracle or two” it’s the van man, it’s the van man who can.

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There is a song which has lyrics that go something like this, “there were long ones, short ones, brown ones, crazy ones”. Welcome to your work place, welcome to your co-workers.

In our Flight Attendant Career we will encounter a complete mix of people and personalities each day at work.  This process begins in Flight Attendant School.

For the most part I enjoy the experiences of meeting this diverse group of people.

The first time I flew with an all gay crew was a real trip. I met my crew, it was a four day trip, and I started thinking that this was gonna be a killer four days.

I hate all male crews. Only a couple of things can happen. One is, all of us are crazy, and we put our lives and Flight Attendant Career on the line. Or two, I’m always wondering if the passengers are thinking I’m the husband, and the other two guys are my wives. Not a good scenario does either of them make.

I have a no fly list. My no fly list consist of all of my buddies that I have had the fortune to have a great time with. We have laughed till we cried, we have made all of the non sanctioned announcements, and we have drank a wee bit too much. My life and career became in danger with this group. Technically we were out of bounds enough for an immediate career ejection. These people are my best friends, but we are our own worst enemies.

My new buddies and I board the aircraft. You would think that I would be the leery one, but my new crew mates were really giving me the once over. I think I passed the test. They discovered that I was not going to be stupid, and the three of us got along fine.

We joked and worked together just like any crew. We ended up getting along very well for the four days.

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