Debriefing. Sometimes, it's a requirement.

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This last trip was the first time in a long time that I’ve been brave enough to hang out with my crewmembers off the plane. My airline recently has had a spurt of flight attendants ‘writing up’ fellow flight attendants for stupid reasons so you never know who you can trust. Part of me thinks training is telling them to do it, the other makes me think that they just want to move up in seniority. I’m very weary of who I can hang out with. It is work afterall.

Anyway, my last trip was with a friend of mine, we buddy bid the trip, and the 3rd was another senior FA – coupled with a Captain who has the same mentality on how things are going at the company and is SO easy going  – means it was time for a debriefing. You know, the kind where the whole crew gets together to talk shit about the day… not the kind where you remove the Captains briefs.

It’s kind of funny when you’re with a crew you know you can hang out with and have fun with how much you can’t wait to get to the layover city just to bitch about what happened during the day.  I also think it benefits the pilots because it gives them a true idea of what we put up with on a daily basis, I like watching their facial reactions to our stories. A lot of our layover hotels have crewrooms that only airline crew can enter. They usually have couches, a tv, fridge, microwave and a computer. It makes for a perfect meeting place to relax. It gets to be more fun when more crewmembers show up as they arrive at the hotel. It’s a good way to de-stress.

We we sitting in the Los Angeles crewroom drinking beer (that the captain bought! I love that!) and laughing SO MUCH while telling stupid passenger stories and 2 junior crew that I haven’t met yet walk in. They knew one of my other FAs so I knew they were with our company. They have a seat and one of them, drinking out of a coffee cup–something that wasn’t coffee–proclaims that she’s getting divorced. Out of the blue. She wasn’t even in our conversation but just spit it out. Like lost puppys, we all look at her and tilt our heads. She goes on. “Yeah, we’re getting divorced.” My first officer, pretending to be interested, which was hard since he had alcohol in him says: “well obviously it just didnt happen out of no where, you had to know it was coming.” — Now he did it. He provoked more information on this story no one cares about. But then, out of no where, Debbie Downer came one of the funniest things of the night:

Well, of course. It all happened on our 1st wedding anniversary,I’m the type of girl that tells it like it is and tells my guy exactly what I want. I showed him a photo of this Tiffany’s necklace I wanted for our anniversary, and guess what? I didn’t get it. Not only did I not get the necklace, I got nothing. Not a thing. So I filed for divorce. Can you believe that?

Okay, now, we have an issue. She thinks we’re on her side. Are you KIDDING ME!? You’re upset because you didnt get a necklace which probably cost a minimum of $1000. If I was your man, and you told me what gift to get you, without my asking, I wouldn’t have gotten you anything either. She was so serious in thinking that she was in the right  and failed to realize that all of us thought she was crazy. She was looking for sympathy but got none. She filed for divorce over not receiving jewelery. Amazing. No wonder why the divorce rate is 50%. I wonder though if she really filed for it, or if that was her 1 year anniversary present from her husband, and she’s too embarrassed to say it.

After they left, I needed another beer. The conversation continues on and we’re talking about a TV Show I’ll be on thats coming up soon. It was filmed while I was working onboard one of my flights. I was telling this story about how it came about and what happened but for some reason I couldn’t remember the name of the first officer who was on the TV Show crew. Then, my current first officer says “thats because I was in the flight deck the whole time setting up the avionics for the flight while everyone else including the captain was infront of the camera” — I think, I turned white. I’m flying with the same guy who I flew with then and hadn’t a clue who he was, nor did I remember ever flying with him. The next thing out of my mouth was: “OH YEA! I remember now… yeah, yeah..you were on reserve.”

Lie. Total lie. But it worked for the moment. Once he turned his head I mouthed to the Captain “I don’t remember him at all.” He just laughed and handed me yet another beer and said “I think you’ll need this.” Now THAT my friends is good CRM.

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