DISCLAIMER: Excessive Folly usage can result in chafing and soreness at the contact sight. The views and opinions expressed in this folly are solely those of the pilot and do not reflect those of the unfortunately burdened airline. This Folly is sponsored by the letter Q.
Day 1:
It has rained for three days. Supposed to rain all day today. Roll out of bed with the sinking feeling that the day is scampering off with my enthusiasm ragdolled in its slobbery jaws before I even hit the shower
Despite my best efforts, preparations come together pretty nicely and I’m out the door 4 minutes early. I love it when a plan comes together.
Stow my bag in The Diabolus Apparatus. Left the sunroof in the vent position because I was afraid my windows would fog up and I still gots no defrost. It pees on me. Water dibbles out of the sunroof right on the man-mound. Not the first time dark slacks have saved me from sympathetic looks and uncomfortable discussions about adult under garments.
There are 2 Capt.s with almost identical names. Papa Midnight is rumored to be balls deep in the New York NY “Girls Gone (mostly) Naked” industry. Lore has it he owns several strip clubs. Can’t possibly be true because why the fuck would you do this job if you had that job? The other is a loafer-smooth Rat Pack alternate with margin trading investment advice and a Bing Crosby radio voice. I’m pulling for PM. Maybe I’ll get to find out if the stories are true.
Run to make the 0800 bus. Packed. Try to doze through the 20 minutes of bitching. In ops, read through the requisite notices from management and move on to the check in screen.
<<No event scheduled>>
NO! I did not! (Yes I did.) I don’t work today. I work tomorrow. Turn to the nearest pilot and say ‘I don’t work today. I work tomorrow.” She looks at me like I’m twirling in circles yelling “I’m a pilot! I’m a pilot! I’m a pilot!” and she’s enjoying it a little.
“You should probably keep that to yourself.”
Back on the bus. Empty. 2400 beepy seconds of fogged up windows to trudge through on my way home. Trying to spin up a sense of accomplishment to offset the oily sheen of idiocy.
Day 1 (Second down):
The Devil Car is cold. This is a new perspective on the suck. Discover the electric seat warmers are also inop. Not enjoying the cold even more than I was not enjoying the heat. More beeps. More rain. More fogged glass. Whoever said money can’t buy happiness has obviously never driven my car.
It takes 6 separate computers for me to check in, print my schedule and find my gate. 2 won’t log in. When I finally find one that lets me log in, I can’t “Check In From This Location” – A bullshit message that means you’re pretending to be at work and trying to check in on your phone. Next machine says the same thing.
The next 3 machines are attached to printers that are out of ink/paper/order and I can’t print my schedule. Takes another 3 tries to find a machine that will connect to the company website that tracks flights and gates. Fucking PC Load Letter!!
Papa Midnight wins the “Weekend with <<Pilot X>>” lottery. Lucky man. At the plane, he tells me that crew tracking has been paging me because I never checked in.
This airline runs like a Swiss watch
………. in a blender.
This day has all the makings of a leaky toasted shit sandwich. Depart out of and pass back through <<HOME>> with the weather down to 1/4 mile. (Guaranteed ground stops with holding sauce and a 2 for 1 special on diversions.) Fly to CUN where no one speaks English, we have no direct contact with operations and we have to clear customs when we get back.
If we actually do make it back to <<HOME>>, the weather in LGA is also forecast to suck (and blow). More ground stops and holding in the lubeless, elbow-deep manner that only the northeast can deliver. The only saving grace is that this poop smorgasbord is being served on day 1 (or 2 if you are pity-da-fool stupid like myself) instead of day 4.
We flit off for Mexico on time. We don’t carry rafts so we have to stay within 162nm of shore. Means we skip down thru FL, hop over Cuba and hang a right.
The arrival is queerly Mexican. The terrain looks like southern Florida, but not. The foliage is too dense, too dry, and bristling with grey sticks poking through the shrubs that give it a rough, old, “I dare you” look.
Papa Midnight picks up on it too. Pokes his finger over the glare shield and says, “How’d you like to be lost? Right there!” It doesn’t look too bad till we get lower and I realize the shrubs are a dense canopy of trees and the grey whiskers are even taller dead trees bleached ash grey by the sun. No. I wouldn’t like being lost there at all.
Cancun has an army. I count 26 people involved in our turn. (A <<HOME>> turn by comparison takes 5 sullen slow moving rampers. 3 to work and 2 to sit on the tug and make fun of them for working so hard.) This crew is out in force, but there’s not a whole lot of movement. More like an anthill. Stuff gets done but no one seems to be doing anything. Lots of vests. Lots of clipboards.
I have to wear a vest for the walk around. They are deadly serious about this. The glaring orangeness and reflective stripes only add to my authority and handsome power. Terminalites swoon. I assume this fashion accessory is compulsory because they all have to suffer through humiliation of safety vest-ness and are not about to let me skate on the experience just because I’m from out of town.
Headed back to <<HOME>> we push on time and then get holding – As surprising as it is fun. Now, let the games begin!
Not a fun game – “Be Really Late and Get No Sleep!” – By Milton Bradley. (Ages 6 and up.) Our plane for LGA is still on the ground in BOS. Has to go through MCO before it comes to us. 3 and a half hours delayed. Eat Moe’s and fall asleep on the couch in the crew room. I’m not clear on who else is playing or what the rules are, but I am totally winning.
Day 2:
Up early and back on the plane. It’s cold in New York and I make a mental note to exclude the entire northeast from my winter bid preferences.
We have scheduled airport appreciation of 3:33 when we finally get back to <<HOME>>. Don’t even bother with ops. Head straight for the mystical E gates, where the seats are empty and Europeans are compelled to be near me.
Discover a faced-in square of about 8 seats a side. Probably the first class holding pen. There’s an anomalous single seat with table facing out toward the concourse. Happy <<Pilot X>>.
Been there 2 minutes when a blueberry (TSA Agent) drags an entire row of seats off axis so he can face 12 degrees out into the concourse. Literally throws himself into the middle seat and star-fishes into as much space as possible. The cell phone limb folds contentedly into place and noise comes out. Sounds like Charlie Brown’s teacher trapped in a well. He’s far enough away that ignoring him is only difficult.
My nest is almost complete when a Haitian-looking kid in the same color blue t-shirt as the TSAfish, makes like he’s headed into my square. Resplendent with a star-burst crop of new dreds and a seriously low-slung belt line that gives him an elongated torso like a Beatles Blue Meanie. Hesitates when he encounters the territorial friction I’m broadcasting. ‘No! Mine! My sandbox! Go play on the slide! My sandbox!’ He does a neat little spin move and climbs over the next row to watch TV.
The blueberry moves on after about 20 minutes. When I look up, the twitchy blue kid has relocated to the blueberry’s seat and is attacking a basket of French fries with avian intensity. Chewing aggressively. Head moving in quick sharp movements. Bright eyes glinting in the artificial light. Ever alert for condiments or the stray helpless napkin.
He leaves and a middle aged guy in jeans and the same color blue shirt as the blueberry and bird boy sits down in the exact same seat. Maybe it’s a dead drop for the color blind.
As I’m packing up to go, “spies like blue” is holding his laptop up to his ear like some Mad Magazine bit with a time machine, a laptop and a poor sap from the 70’s made retro-retard by trying to make a call on the “really big book-phone.” (See photo.)
On my way back to the gate, I fall in with a G.I. Probably 18. More zits than pubic hair. (I’m guessing. I mean, I don’t know. How would I know? That’s stupid. YOU’RE stupid!)
Home from training for a month. Was supposed to graduate TODAY, but the army got it in its head the kid has Mono. (Even though the test results were negative.) So after a month recuperating from the illness he doesn’t have, he gets to repeat basic training from the beginning. He is surprisingly cool with it.
Our new hotel in BOS gives us 50% off restaurant food. Happens to be a Japanese sushi/steakhouse. 32 pieces for $12. Delicious savings.
Day 3:
Early, dark and freaking cold. PM volunteers to do the walk around. I don’t argue.
Eat the free hotel fruit cup at cruise. Cantaloupe reminds me of breakfast with my grandfather when I was 8. Remember him mocking me because I couldn’t spell or define “monstrosity”. Mmmmmm cantaloupe. Now with more shame! Can’t think of any physiological reason why cantaloupe should always make my knees hurt, but there it is.
In MKE I go stand in the door to say ‘gbye’ and let the accolades for my incredible landing wash over me. M-FA Queerulon Jones says, “You have a little problem with your uniform?” I’m busy staring at his extra long and pointy Wicked Witch of the West shoes and trying to imagine how you’d walk anywhere without tripping over your own feet.
‘Sorry. What?’
“Your uniform.” He makes little zig-zagy motions using only his index finger. I check myself in the mirror on the inside of the cockpit door. No bears in the caves. No food on my face. Tie reasonably straight. No stains on my shirt.
‘What?’
The dexterous finger zigs down. There’s a big crushed strawberry plastered to my crotch. Maybe I should leave it. I mean it worked on him didn’t it?
Noticed on the way in that the A system hydraulic quantity is down to 69%. This is not normal. Capt. is pissed because he’s been trying to get MKE ops in the radio to give them a heads-up. (Turns out their radio was unplugged.)
Maintenance shows up. Left engine-driven hydraulic pump is leaking. Work on it for about an hour before they down the plane and swap us to the next inbound <<My Airplane>>.
Finally on our way to LAS, we fly right over my home town at 40,000 ft. I wonder if there’s another little boy me down there staring up at our contrail and wondering how the fuck you get from here to there.
I can see the entirety of my first long solo cross country as a student pilot, from Boulder to Cheyenne to Scotts Bluff and back to Boulder. Like looking at the wagon trails from orbit. Can’t imagine how I could have possibly gotten lost. But I did. Twice.
In Vegas, battle flaccidity in the gym for a bit. The Charlotte race is on afterward. Meet Capt. Midnight over at the Hard Rock for dinner. The legends are true! He used to own a bunch of strip clubs and bars in New York, Florida, Texas, Arizona, Greece, Italy and Russia. Now he only owns a few and provides management and services for the rest.
On top of that he does training for, and deliveries of every airplane Boeing makes. All over the world. A man in demand by practically every global carrier and anyone who can scare up the duckets for a new 7 series Boeing. Bastard will probably get to fly the 787 when it leaves the barn.
Has a side job with some sort of trades union in NYC doing setup for conventions. His cousin gets out on parole in 2012 for a murder conviction as a mob hit man working with “The Iceman” in the late 80’s. Want to ask him what Tony Soprano is like in real life, but chicken out.
He doesn’t have a man cave, he has a man house about 20 minutes from where he lives. Solely for parties. No debt. Everything paid for in cash. He buys dinner, and that somehow validates everything.
Day 4: !@!#$@**
Fucking drafted!
Supposed to fly one leg back and be done. Home by 1530. Crew tracking meets the plane. Pretty much the only way they can nab us. Guys have been known to change into civvies in the cockpit and blend out with the pax to avoid being drafted. Now I sit for two and a half hours. Deadhead to BWI and fly back. Gets me home around 2200.
It’s an affront unique to aviation. Every job has overtime and “yeahh I’m also gonna need you to come in on Sunday too.” This is different.
They keep a stable of junior guys on “reserve.” Reserves have no lives. They are cannon fodder into the breech of making the imperfect work perfectly. 5 days a week. “On call” for 16 hours a day. It is only slightly more fun than taking out your own spleen with a fork.
Nadius and The Hampster are Scheduling’s bitches. We all do it when we start. We all do it again when we upgrade to Captain. Nad and the Ham at least get to take it out on their FO’s.
Point is: There are guys for this. Or, there are supposed to be. The fact that they’re calling me means they:
a: Fucked up and understaffed bitches (during the slow season).
b: Fucked up and mis-allocated bitches so now they’re bitch negative.
c: Don’t want to use the bitches for fear of going bitch negative at a later time.
Any way you slice it, they’re bitchless and I’m pretty.
I’m by the window for the deadhead. A skinny-with-paunch middle-aged red-head husband stows his bag in the overhead in a snit with his wife calling the audible. He sits in the middle, giving off bitchy “How dare the world” vibes which I easily spot because my own ‘how dare the world’ vibes are jangling from the interference.
Dockers, red pinstripe shirt. College of Attendance Baseball hat. Round glasses that really have to be called spectacles. Prissy. Bird lips and freckles.
“Going home?” – comes across as, “Why the fuck is an “employee” sitting on this plane when there are passengers stranded in the terminal?”
‘No. Deadhead up and fly it back.’
“Oh. I see.”
He immediately takes off his shoes. When allowed, he pulls out his laptop. The magazine he was reading slides off the back of the tray table and lands on my legs. I pick it up and hand it to him. He stares at it for a second like I’m trying to hand him the latest Watchtower. He takes it from me and without looking smacks his sleeping wife in the face in a failed “take this I’m busy” handoff. When she doesn’t take it, he finally looks over, realizes he’ trying to jam The New Yorker up his wife’s nose, and puts it back on the table. It slides off again and lands on my legs.
His bitchy elbows somehow manage to occupy both center arm rests and then some. I’m jammed up against the bulkhead and he’s still rubbing up against me with every keystroke.
It. Is. Really. Starting. To. Piss. Me. Off.
I concentrate very hard on just how un-employed I’ll be if I put this douchebag’s head through the back of the seat.
Maybe it’s time for a change anyway. Maybe I could be a farmer. Farm some stuff. Travel town to town and do farmy things for people with “The Man” hot on my tail like David Banner. I have my own shovel.
Riding in the back always gives me a new appreciation of the restraint of the flying public. This SUCKS. This is not the fantasy of flight. This is squeezing your eyes shut in your happy place until the bad man is done.
Maybe Mudvayne isn’t helping.
In BWI I discover this is not the plane I take back to <<HOME>>. On my way to the gate I pass Princess Hushpuppies and his wife. They get real quiet. I hear something like “…..told you.” If ever there was a man more in desperate need of a solid bitch slapping……
My new Capt. is already in the plane when I get there. His name almost makes this shitcicle tasty. He’s about the same size. Same sideburns and he’s wearing cowboy boots.
‘Hey. I’m <<Pilot X>>
“Hey. Jim. Jim West.”
And he’s a farmer in his spare time.
– end of line.