Once every so often a young person(s) will squeeze into the flight deck during pre-boarding for a peek. Most of them will gaze with a fixed stare others you can see their eyes rolling all around and you realize that they are overwhelmed by the myriad of switches and dials and not really absorbing anything. Like a deer in headlights they can’t focus at all but I know it makes the trip more memorable for them to at least to have stepped into another world for a moment. I try to break their unease by exchanging a few simple pleasantries (although the standing warped humor/joke is — with my best Captn. Over voice — “So Johnny, have you ever been in a Turkish Sauna before?”). Never mind.

Approaching an airfield inrange we pickup and transcribe a recorded message which describes current weather and field conditions. Important info like wind direction and velocity, temperature, cloud cover and visibility. Lately these broadcasts read like a book. They get longer over time with useless trivia like “Caution! Bird Activity in the vicinity of the airport”. BTW, what exactly is ‘bird activity’? Can’t they just say BIRDS? Further, why do they need to tell me this and what could I do if I saw one? Swerve?

No secret that on the anniversary of 9/11 that many people are not buying advance seats on flights. In response most carriers are cutting back on these flights to match demand. Spirit Airlines however, in a brillian move, announced all seats *free* that day! This is classy PR and not as costly as you might think. You see, those who ‘buy’ these free tickets will likely also purchase a return ticket back home. (so it is really only a half price fare sale) Spirit, with an estimated layout of 500,000 for this promo, has achieved some serious bang for their buck in media exposure and good will. Will the traditional players take notice and jump all over this marketing idea? Until now they’ve been trying to downplay the gloomy black day. Staying indoors and sulking. Spirit has the right idea with the ‘thumb your nose’ — ‘in your face’ celebration. Cheers!

A long day and this late hour found my crew and I curbside waiting for the Club Dbbl Tree to come and fetch us. We were tired and now also irritated that we were being made to wait. Several calls to the front desk eventually got to the truth of the matter and as it happens the van driver had “picked-up and transported the wrong airline crew”. I have heard all of the usual excuses and fake explanations why the ride isn’t here yet. I thought that this one was a new (somewhat creative variation) but sure enough the van rolls up and out piles a crew with all of their gear, frustrated and embarrassed. The poor driver (a Romanian immagree) has worked himself into an exasperated state. In halting and broken English he trys to vent. Usually when a person trys to unload you just say “oh puuleez — I don’t want to hear about it”. But this guy was somehow entertaining with alot of arm waving and how if he had been “…in his homeland he would fight the guy…” Evidently in the miscommunication there had been some finger pointing direction of blame. As we neared our hotel, I thought we might make light of this and have some fun too. I exclaimed from the back seat, “say! this isn’t the downtown location where we stay ?!!”. The FA picked up on it and added, “this doesn’t look like the place we stayed laaaast time?!!” There was some knee slapping and haaarr harrr and the tension was broken. I explained to him that we have folks get on the wrong flight too. In order to NOT feel like an idiot — someone else has to take the hit.

S’man has the flying bug and the flight sim on the pc just doesn’t satisfy. It’s been 10 years since I flewin a light plane. I will have to bone up on the P.O.H. and get checked out if I am to be the hero.

Midway Airlines shut down today. Again. Their Sept. 11 government bailout money has been spent. What’s next?

They want to hook up with US Airways and operate as an express regional for them. US Airways is some alliance partner. They just applied for and looks like they will get a government loan for 900 million. All they gotta do is stay out of Chapter 11 until the money arrives. Meanwhile they are bleeding 1 million per day. They recognize and publicly admit that something has to change and they can’t keep going like this.

Keeping this in mind, Midway has to find (re)startup capital and secure long term leases for a fleet of expensive regional jets and (re)convince a workforce that has been *had* twice already to stick around and of course promise any customers that their tickets will be good on travel day and line up the usual vendors who have been burned already and… If I was a lender I would have to say to this opportunity: don’t walk but RUN away!

Nothing to do with and not the same as the ‘doghouse’, I’m in the bunkhouse tonight. I keep a bedroll there and usually find a space to claim. There are 14 others that share (lucky not all at the sametime). If the pattern is full I will end up downstairs with the laundry machines and those who snore.

Tattoo dude, wearing a sleeveless-collarless top (the better to show off the shoulder to elbow body art), is on a ‘health kick’. This was made painfully known to everyone at close range as he unsealed a tunafish pouch within the confines of an airline cabin. Ouuweee! That is rasty stuff. Upscale cat food. The smell rates right there with over-ripe banana peels left in a closed up car. Once I had a guy sitting next to me on a plane pop the top off a can of Dinty Moores beef hash, and then ate it raw and at room temp. The ultimate selfishness is a passenger within the close confines who feels that now is as good a time as any to whip out the nail polish remover and go at it. To add injury to insult, Tattoo dude decides to chase his stinky mayonnaise batch with a red apple. A squirt of fluid hit me at first juicy bite. I could have been disgusted but was more impressed by the fact that jaws met apple from across the aisle and one row forward. Now that was a good shot!

We taxied by and there in the back row of the GA ramp spied one of the spiffy new CRJ 700s. We speculated that it was a factory demonstrator on a sales call and sure enough this was the appearance. The lumbering 767 preceeding us probably oblivious, failed to notice the economic significance. The marketplace will rule. The camel’s nose is under the tent.

The screeners decided to look in my bag this time. The x-ray operator didn’t like that I stuffed my running shoes with my battery alarm and old spice roll-on stick. ‘Hey! I pack for 4 days’ with my leather carry on, including last nights pasta w/sauce mustgo – a ham n’ cheese sandwich – 2 bottles of aquafinna and an autoweek mag. Efficient space (including inside the Gel GT 2020s gets used) ‘Have a chair’, the bag checker was not impressed with my admission deciding to have me peel my other shoes as well. No sense feeling violated. Submit, co-operate, graduate. These TSA guys won’t tell you what or how to pack. They are like post office workers and say nothing that could be construed as opinion, politics, or religion. Ever tried to have a conversation with your mailman? But I got the hint anyway. Thanks for the tip.