Two hours into the flight, as we prepared to open the flight deck door for a bathroom break, the passenger seated in 5A made his way to the front galley. The other Flight Attendant and I both informed the passenger to use the restroom in the back. He ignored our request twice. Finally, he turned back and headed to the aft. After the flight deck break was completed the passenger stopped me. He told me that he didn’t understand why he wasn’t allowed to the use the restroom in the front.

Find out what happened next on Flightster.

[Click here to Continue Reading]

It’s no secret that being a flight attendant comes with short layovers, little sleep, a lot of work, time zone changes, unruly passengers, long days, and scheduling snafus. But, do the positives of the job outweigh the negatives?

That’s the question I posed to the readers of Flightster.

The media has been covering my career steadily for the last few weeks and more and more people are starting to learn about what I do on a daily basis. Light is starting to shed on the fact that we really are on board the aircraft primarily for your safety and everything else comes second.

There still seems to be many folks though who claim “if you’re not happy with your job, then quit.” So, I put it on all the line.

Head over to Flightster and find out what my job is really like. What it means to become a flight attendant and live like one, then, you decide. Leave a comment there and tell me if you think the positives outweigh the negatives and, if you’re not a flight attendant; feel free to post any questions you may have about the career there. I’ll do my best to answer them as quickly as possible!

[Click here to read my post on Flightster]

I was standing at the boarding door waiting for the first batch of First Class passengers to arrive when I heard the sounds of a Mom yelling at her kids echo through the jet bridge. I braced myself for what I was about to witness and on walked four boys: 14, 11, 8 and 6 years old. Right behind them was their father lugging all of their bags onto the plane and behind him was their Mom, Andrea. The boys began to get settled in their first class seats (side note: I never flew in first class anywhere when I was younger, lucky them!) as Andrea and her husband began to put all of their carryons away.

I snuck into Andrea’s row to offer her a pre-departure beverage as she was still getting settled, and she said “Honestly, I can’t think right now. Have you tried to travel with four boys?” I laughed, and said “No, actually, I haven’t — I’ll come back in a bit.” Five minutes later, right after she about fell into her seat I went back over to her and said “Now that you have a moment to breathe.. Can I get you anything?” She looked right at me and said “Bobby, Mama needs a drink.” That it was, at this moment, I knew we were going to be friends. I laughed with her and asked her what she wanted.. And she wanted me to surprise her.. So I mixed a little champagne and cranberry juice to get her going.

Once we got in the air the task of meals and drinks for her kids was getting cumbersome. Her youngest didn’t like anything we were offering and her 8 year old was so upset that he wasn’t allowed to drink a Sprite that he refused to decide on a meal choice. Andrea apologized, ordered for everyone, and then ordered herself a glass of white wine. Right as I delivered it to her, I asked her to taste it first. Something I’ve learned while being a flight attendant: people have very different palates when it comes to wine. She didn’t like it. She handed it back to me and said “would you mind if I had the red wine instead?” “Of course not,” I responded. She quickly added, “you can finish the rest of it if you want.” I had to remind her that I was working and I could lose my job for drinking the rest of her white wine. She laughed and said she already considered me a friend and just wanted me to join the party.

After the meals were delivered and cleaned up Andrea asked me for Clamato juice. A product that we don’t have, don’t plan to have and I hope we never have. I’m not a fan of it. She was hoping for the juice so that I could recreate her favorite drink from her hometown of Vancouver (shocker, it seems only Canadians go for Clamato). I had her rattle off the ingredients and I did the best I could to make it minus the taste of clams. During this process Andrea and I were talking about their trip, they were flying to Disney for a long weekend with the kids and then asked if I had ever been to Vancouver. I told her that I hadn’t been but I’m planning to visit next year. Instantly, she whips out her Blackberry and asks for my number. I laughed and said “you’re not going to remember me in a year” and then all of her a sudden her silent-thus-far husband said “oh yes she will.” She sneered at him and said, “and I’ll take you out drinking and show you the best of Vancouver.. Now, what’s your number?” After I gave it to her, her husband said “you should take a picture of him and add it to the contact so you’ll remember who he is when he calls you in 12 months.” She said, “I don’t know how to do that” and without even looking at his phone, he was able to talk her through it and finished the tutorial by saying “see we should talk more” and she said, “Well that won‘t happen, I have Bobby now.”

Stuck in between a husband and a wife.. I left that conversation for a while and hid behind the galley curtain. I was talking to one of the other flight attendant’s while we ate our lunch about passengers joining the mile high club and I told her about this one instance where I had passengers actually ask for permission to use the back restroom to join. Just as I said that Andrea’s husband yelled out from row one, “hey Bobby..” I peeked out from behind the curtain and said “yessssss…” in a very playful tone — and he responded with “Andrea and I were wondering if you could watch the kids for a few.” I was confused.. And said, “sure, why?” thinking they may have family in the back they wanted to visit with. He then said “so we could go in the bathroom and join as well?” I laughed, mostly nervously knowing they heard my conversation, “is that okay?” he said. Andrea chimed in quickly, laughing, “who is he kidding? A few? Try 30 seconds! Can I have another double bloody mary? I‘m not moving.” He looked at me, smiled and said: “well, it was worth a shot.”

A few hours after landing, I received a text message from Andrea: “I know I asked you if you ever traveled with 4 boys. Now, Imagine being at Disneyland with 4 boys. This is going to require a lot of Mommy helpers and a few drinks. It was great meeting you, stay in touch! I wish you were beer [here].”

Let’s hope she did her research and knew before hand that they don’t serve alcohol at Mickey’s house. She’s going to find her sanity before she finds a drink.

I’ve written about it here before, flight attendant’s bid for their monthly schedules. Your preferences are inputted into a computer system and then in seniority order it assigns flight attendants to trips. Usually, if you bid for the same types of trips every month, you’ll end up working with a lot of the same people. However, most of the time you end up working with different people each month.

There are some airlines though that allow their flight attendants (and pilots) to “Buddy Bid.” Buddy bidding allows flight attendants to specify a preference in their monthly schedule bid such as “AWARD FLYING WITH EMPLOYEE #: XXXXX.” This tells the computer that you don’t really care where you fly, as long as you fly with that specific employee. It usually drops the more senior buddy down to the more junior buddy’s seniority and assigns the trips from there. The regional airline I worked at allowed us to do that, but my current one doesn’t.

Mr. Brad

But, there are ways around it. My current airline allows us to bid specific flight pairings. So, if you and your “buddy” bid for the same pairing there’s a chance that you may end up working together. You both just have to hope that no one in between the more senior buddy and the more junior one bids for the same trip. Bidding this way also takes some research and practice. Before I started buddy bidding I had my junior friend do a “test bid” (build his schedule for a month the same way I do) to see if he could hold the same type of trips I usually bid for. Luckily, he usually can hold Wednesday through Saturday flying.. Which is what I love to do.

For the most part, we end up with 1 or 2 trips a month together. I wouldn’t trade that for anything. Flying with your friends makes flying more fun and less of a job. But at the same time, it also spoils you.

My last four day trip was one of the trips awarded with my “buddy,” Brad. Brad and I have been friends for about 4 years now and though we’ve worked at the same airline for most of those 4 years.. We hardly ever flew together. But now, we make it a point to at least try to make it happen. In addition to Brad, I lucked out. The other flight attendant awarded the trip was Savannah, whom if you remember loved my PACKiT. Savannah and Brad had worked together before separate from myself, and the fact that we were all now on the same trip was something the three of looked forward too. We all liked working with each other in pairs, but we had never worked as a trio.

The four days went by quickly with layover in New York, Los Angeles and

Mr. Brad, Myself and Ms. Savannah

Seattle. We spent time on each layover just hanging out with each other, which is something I came to find out none of us really do any more. It seems we’ve all become “slam-clickers.” A “slam clicker” is now an industry term for a crewmember who doesn’t hang out with other crewmembers on layovers and lets their down “slam and click” closed behind them. But, since we were all flying together.. We never slam clicked on each other. We had a pretty long layover in New York and made the best of it out at a bar on Long Island.. And inhaled some decently tasting Thai food in Seattle. And, as for working the flights — we had a typical New York – LA flight with a few issues, but as the lead flight attendant on board I was never nervous or questioning how they handled situations because I already knew how they worked and what their personalities are like since we’re also friends outside of work. Additionally, we helped each other cope through the experience.

All said and done, buddy bidding is definitely something I’m going to continue to do. And, we’ve already made it known that the three of us want to continue to work together.. and have begun trading our trips around to make that happen for September. After working with your friends it’s a huge adjustment getting back into the groove of working with people you don’t know. Trying to figure out their work ethic and customer service style and coming up with a good ice breaker to ensure the three of us work together for the duration of our trip can sometimes be challenging. But for the most part it’s never a problem and I always get along with my co-workers. You can always judge how well liked someone is by looking in “open time” (a list of uncovered flying). If you’re in there a lot it can sometimes mean people don’t want to work with you.. But if you’re hardly ever in there, like myself, I like to believe it means you’re well liked or maybe it’s just that people can’t drop their trips with you because of “low staffing.” For now, I’ll believe the former part of that sentence.

To parents: Play-dough should not be used by children on board an aircraft. It sticks to everything and gets everywhere. And no, I will not clean it up and, yes, I will be giving you a few cans of club soda and towels to do it yourself.

To parents: In the middle of the flight it’s not okay to come up to the front of the aircraft from coach and ask if Little Baby Matthew can see the pilot. No one can see the pilot in flight. Further, don’t get annoyed with me when I tell you “no” and say “let me guess there’s a charge for that too.” Yes, in fact there is a charge for that. A charge of breeching the flight deck in flight. It comes with numerous years in prison and a hefty fine. Though you will get something free…free pat-downs every time you fly for the rest of your life.

To coach passengers: It’s not okay to come to the first class to use the bathroom “because there’s a line in the back.” If everyone else in your cabin has to wait in line, you do too. You are not anymore important than they are and the rules still apply to you. To the back to the back to the back, back, back!

To read the rest of them, click here.

Steven Slater, a jetBlue Flight Attendant since 2008, did something flight attendant’s always dream about doing.. but never actually do. According to reports, Slater was dealing with a passenger who attempted to remove his luggage from the overhead bin before the aircraft was parked at the gate after arriving in New York. After getting into a tiff with the passenger over the issue the passenger reportedly cussed at Slater calling him a “mother—–r.”

Once the aircraft reached the gate, Slater lost it. He got on the public address system and said

To the passenger that called me a mother—–r, f–k you! That’s it. I’ve had it.

Slater then deployed the aircrafts emergency slide, grabbed two beers from the catering carts and slid down the slide to unemployment. Slater’s MySpace page reads: “chances are I am flying 35, 000 feet somewhere over the rainbow on my way to some semi-fabulous JetBlue Airways destination.” Well, as I write this, Steven Slater is sitting in a jail cell in New York City. But, I’d like to take this opportunity to say:

From one flight attendant to another, BRAVO! BRAVO Steven Slater!

I’m sure a lot of you are wondering why I support Steven in what he did. So, allow me to explain.

First, we’ve all thought about doing it. We’ve all had those moments where you just want to tell a passenger exactly whats on your mind, what you’re thinking and how you really feel. A lot of passengers have the mentality that the rules don’t apply to them and that most of the rules are just guidelines and don’t really need to be enforced. Further, that line of thinking creates a disrespect for the job of a flight attendant and the role they are actually on board to preform. Serving a coke, isn’t the role I’m talking about.

In this situation, Steven was protecting the passengers below the open overhead bin from falling luggage if the aircraft was to stop short of the gate or jolt in either direction. He was doing his job by telling the passenger to place his luggage back in the bin and close it. Granted, we don’t know for sure how it was said and what words were used but for the passenger to cuss at him, regardless, is unacceptable and disrespectful.

We deal with that situation and others on a daily basis. Some passengers take us asking them to turn their phone off or to push a bag under their seat personally. They get upset and frustrated.. and some talk back and create a mountain out of a mole hill. Not to mention, they’ve become upset at the flight attendant whose simply doing their job and following the rules. I will admit, like I’ve stated, the job of a flight attendant is based upon how you say things to the customer. Sometimes even saying what you have to as nicely as possible, as I always try to do, still sets the passenger off. But face it, if you took a verbal beating like flight attendants do, when doing their job everyday, you’d reach your breaking point as well.

I often wonder what (if any) my breaking point will be that’ll drive me to quit my job on the spot. I love my job, I really do. But at the same time, its one of the most respect-less and thankless jobs out there and we only get recognized when something fatal happens and a flight attendant saves the day.

Well, today that changed. Today, in my opinion, Steven Slater stood up for himself and flight attendants everywhere. He did what every flight attendant thinks about doing, but never does.

Not to mention, he also took beer with him down the slide, which in my opinion was a perfect homage to the flight attendant career. I wonder which situation jetBlue holds more severe.. popping the slide or stealing the alcohol. I’m just kidding.

In closing, Mr. Slater you are my hero. You did, what I could and would never do. I applaud you for standing up for yourself, realizing that you had reached the point of “not having fun anymore,” and doing so – the best way a flight attendant knows how to. I hope you can find solitude in your new career, whatever that may be because it’s evident you won’t be working for an airline again.

Slaters MySpace page stated: “The last few years have seen me grounded, doing the daily grind, ’9 to ’5-, “real job” thing and hating most of it.” I have a feeling he’s going to have to get used to it. His wings have been clipped, but not forgotten.

In the comments section of that post a woman named Melissa from “PACKiT” left a comment saying:

You have to check out these new lunch bags from a company called PackIt. The lunch bags are lined with gel. They fold up compactly and you store them in the freezer. when they are frozen you can pack them with anything Yogurt, fresh foods, even sushi!! because they keep food cold for up to 10 hours! The perfect bag for flying!!

The perfect bag for flying? Who better than a flight attendant to put the PACKit cooler to the test?

I contacted Melissa and she graciously sent me a PACKiT. I’ll cut to the chase and say, I’m never flying without it. Period.

Skeptical, I traveled my last four day trip with both my eBag and my PACKiT. In the PACKiT I placed frozen Chicken Tortilla Soup, string cheese, Turkey Chili and a small container of salad. I commuted from Phoenix to San Francisco and ate the salad when I arrived there. Shockingly, the soup was still frozen solid. I flew from San Francisco to New York went to sleep, and the next day on the way to Los Angeles I decided to make the soup. I took it out of the PACKiT and it was STILL partially frozen. This is the first time, in a very long time, that anything frozen I’ve traveled with has stayed frozen for so long!

Needless to say, when I offered my crew some of the soup they were shocked at how well it kept in the PACKiT. Hell, even the trip I’m on right now, one of the Flight Attendants, Savannah, is amazed at how well it works.

For those Flight Attendant’s who currently have an eBag, the PACKiT is agreat companion. I packed my PACKiT with all of my cold/frozen food, and then placed it inside the eBag. I then put my room temperature snacks and food along side of it. It works perfectly. The PACKiT keeps your frozen food frozen and because you’re putting it in the eBag you still have room for additional food and supplies.

For Flight Attendant’s that don’t currently have a cooler and are looking to get one, the PACKiT is great for 2-3 day trips. It’s big enough to fit yogurt, veggies, fruit, and small containers of salad and food and not so large that you feel like you’re lugging an extra bag around with you.

In the end, if you can’t tell, I love it! And no, I’m not being paid to say that! I won’t work another 4 day without it.

For more information you can visit: PACKiT.com

On my last Boston flight I encountered a woman traveling with her adult daughter (or maybe it was a great grandmother and her great grand daughter). When they first boarded I helped the older woman to her seat, put her bags in the overhead bin, asked if she needed anything to drink and the whole time she was very polite. But, once we took off.. Grandma got angry.

Shortly after take-off I went around to take drink and meal orders. I read my options loud enough so that the older woman could hear me but also so that her daughter could too, in case she needed to make the selection for her. After I read the options I had available the older woman quickly said “I don’t like any of those, keep going.” Unfortunately for her, I had already read her all of the options I had available in first class. So, without a flinch I described the meals we had in the main cabin as if they were additional first class options. She again declared “keep going.” Well, now she’s out of luck.. That’s all I have. I glanced over to her daughter as if to say “that’s it, make up your mind.” We finally decided on the Turkey sandwich and a cup of tea.

I went back to her row to deliver her tea when she stopped me and said “you need to help me with my foot rest. My high heels aren’t touching it and my knees are bent.” So as anyone would, I felt bad for her and wanted to help her get as comfortable as possible. So I knelt down and started to adjust her seat. I extended her foot rest. This way she can lay her legs out straight with her high heels on the foot rest. Just as the seat started to adjust she yelled at me: “stop! That’s not what I asked for!” “Okay,” I said. So I tried a different approach. This time.. Lowering the leg rest so that her knees wouldn’t be bent. “I said no. No, no, no. That’s not what I want.” So, then I explained to her that those were the only two ways I could adjust the seat to ensure her knees weren’t bent. She looked at me and said “I said I want my high heels on the foot rest.” So I said “I’m trying my best to accommodate you but every time I adjust the seat you say that I’m doing it wrong.” I then pointed out how the controls on the seat work and said “since I can’t do it right, please feel free to adjust the seat to your liking on your own.” At that moment the daughter looked over and apologized and mouthed “thank you.”

When the meals were finished cooking I started to deliver them. When I approached the older woman with her turkey sandwich she pointed across the aisle at the lasagna. She asked “is that a soft boiled egg?” What she was looking at was a piece of fresh mozzarella cheese that was melted on top of the pasta. I said, “no ma’am that’s cheese.” She replied with “oh so you have soft boiled eggs and cheese and you didn’t offer that to me.” I quickly said, “no, they’re eating the lasagna that I offered you.. What you think is a soft boiled egg is actually melted cheese.” She turned to her daughter and said “he’s starting to get on my nerves.” Ha! Excuse me? I’m getting on YOUR nerves? I’ve gone above and beyond trying to make her happy, and like a good flight attendant, not let her see my frustration with her requests. Chocking the conversation up to her old age, I took a deep breath and moved on.

For the next few hours every time I walked past her she “sneered” in my direction. Making a disgusted look on her face and looking away. Finally, she attempted to use the restroom but she needed some assistance. I instantly jumped up from my jumpseat and went over to lend my arm for support as she walked over to the restroom. Then, I finally saw it, a smile.

As a first class flight attendant I really do strive to make my passengers happy. They are the passengers paying the most on board and they deserve the extra attention and treatment. However, there is a fine line between extra attention and overkill with ridiculous requests that in the end, still won’t make the passenger happy.

The next morning I had much of the same. I had only one passenger in first class. It was a very early morning flight too, so I thought it would be easy. Not so much. When he boarded I instantly asked him if he wanted anything to drink and he asked for coffee. Unfortunatly, we didn’t have our APU running (auxiliary power unit) running, which powers our coffee makers, so I wasn’t able to fulfil his order. He then just asked for a bottle of water. Fine. We get in the air, and I walk over to him and say “how about that coffee now?” he accepted, wanted it black — and I also offered him breakfast. A bowl of fruit with yogurt and a muffin. He accepted that as well. I went into the main cabin to help 0ut while he was eating.. I came back five minutes later to check on him and he had finished the fruit and yogurt. Since I had so many empty seats and meals for all of them, I asked if he wanted more.. he responded with “actually, the fruit was rancid, and the yogurt was disguising.” I didn’t know what to say. I was shocked. He ate all of it! I just said “oh.. well.. I’m sorry.. how about more coffee?” He asked who makes the coffee we brew, I told him, he said it was the worst coffee he had ever had.. but “refill it.” Umm.. what? If it’s that bad.. why do you want more? He was just being difficult.

Speaking of difficult.. I worked an early morning short flight a few days earlier and had asked a first class passenger if he wanted a drink — he asked for a mimosa, and was shocked when I said “sure.” He was surprised we have champagne. As he took the first sip of mimosa, he made a face as if he had just bit into a lemon.. “this isn’t champagne.. what is this?” I told him that it was actually a sparkling wine… he said “Yeah, I can tell.. I’ll just take a coffee.” Okay — fine. I delivered the coffee and then offered him the muffin.. he asked for the “protein meal,” I smiled a bit.. and said “this is all we have for the short flights.. and we don’t have specials meals on board.” He complained that he “expected more from your airline,” I apologized for his bad experience.. and told him if I could do anything to make it better.. to let me know.. he said “it’s beyond that now.”

Really? Sparking wine and a muffin ruined your first class experience on a 45 minute flight? If you’re that particular in what you eat.. bring your own food.

I guess one of the first things your learn when you work in a customer service job is there are times that no matter how hard you try or how much you care, you can’t please everyone.

I made the mistake of bidding a trip which had me working a flight from New York City to Orange County, California. I say it’s a “mistake” because in one metal tube we combined the “I want it now” of New York with the “I want it my way” of The O.C. When these different cultures combine, it creates a flight attendant’s worst nightmare.

The second we started boarding I knew we were in for it.

[Click here to Continue Reading]

Sorry for the lack of an update in the past week. I’ve been working quite a lot and though I haven’t been updating the blog I have been writing some blogs that will start showing up this afternoon. I’ve some pretty interesting stories for you. I promise. I think my streak of ‘strange passengers’ is back!

In the meantime, I received an email from LuLu.com (the publisher of my book) that apparently they slipped up and my book was delayed hitting various search engines. Because of that they put my book on sale for the duration of the summer. So, if you were holding out to get a copy of my book — now’s the time! You can head over to LuLu.com and purchase a copy of the book for 15% off until August 15, 2010 by entering the coupon code BEACHREAD305 at check out. You can click here to get a copy! (And accept my thanks!)

Additionally, for you other traveler bloggers out there.. here’s some news. As a lot of you know I was very lucky and privileged to be hired by Flightster.com as a travel blogger. Well, they’re looking to hire another blogger and created a contest to do so. Quick details: they pay writers $75-$100 per post, they are aiming to create a top notch travel blog, writing for Flightster will offer you great exposure. For all of the details on how to enter (and you will want to enter) click here.

Okay then. Its 2:12am California time as I put this post together and I’m actually awake getting ready to fly from Boston to Los Angeles. My friends are headed to bed and I’m headed to work! Like I said, stay tuned this afternoon for a real update on here.. and check out Flightster every Tuesday for my updates over there.

Have a great day everyone!