Of not much happening for weeks on end . . .

Oh gosh, so not much has happened over the last couple of weeks that has been particularly notable. 

Sunday 17th January: Bratislava (BTS) Dublin (DUB)

Monday 18th January: Milan Bergamo (BGY)

Wednesday 20th January: Dublin (DUB)

Thursday 21st January: Bratislava (BTS) Dublin (DUB)

                . . . . . . . Well this week of lates was generally uneventful, the most being that I saw a passenger on one of the Dublin flights that I'm pretty sure I know, and I'm pretty sure he knew me. But we were each giving the other the "You look familiar but I can place you out of context" look and I didn't want to ask him just in case he wasn't who I thought he was, and I turn out to look like an utter idiot. I also worked with the same guy (Francesco) every day that week. Insignificant you may say, but this is something that would NEVER happen in Stansted. I marvel at how close Bristol is still, it's so nice walking into the crew room and actually knowing most of the people in it. :D

                

. . . . . . . Here is the view from my office window on what I do believe was one of the Dublin flights (although to be fair it could of been taken from any one of the flights I did that week. 

So thus starts another week on earlies. After getting like not much sleep Sunday night I have to drag myself up and out of bed to do . . . 

Monday 25th January: Dublin (DUB) Belfast (BHD).

 . . . . I also found out that on this day one of the old Ryanair aircraft that Ethiopian airways was now using, crashed off the Lebanon coast, there were 80 people on board and no survivors have been found. Kinda makes you think really how much we take the safety for granted. Anything could happen all of a sudden really. Still, the chances are really slim and so I carry on flying without too much fear of my life. lol. 

Wednesday 27th January: Tenerife (TFS). Oh Tenerife, I was fully expecting to be delayed/diverted on this flight, but alas, finally I do a Tenerife flight where we actually land on time for one (Hurrah). However, I was quite amused on this flight by the passengers. To be precise, the ones who lost the watch. They were on my flight on Wednesday and wearing what looked like missing watch. Also they very obviously ignored me, turning away and sticking their nose in the air every time I asked them if they wanted anything. It made me chuckle. On the upside there were a few very nice passengers that had also been on my previous Tenerife flight who made the effort to talk to me and see how I was doing. Little things really do make your day. . . . . 

               . . . .  . . . . . For example, I was babysitting Lucas for an hour or so after said TFS flight, and I just asked him "Do you love me Lucas??" To which he replied with the following video . . . (I had to get him to repeat it so I could film it, it was too cute not to share. I can't believe he just came out with this. It really did make my night, he can be so cute at times (and such a rascal at others). 

Thursday saw me being on home standby and found me in the baking mood again (I had made homemade brownies on Tuesday), so whilst I was making cupcakes Lucas was making play dough pancakes. So whilst the cupcakes were in the oven, I went over and make a play dough gingerbread man and women, which we called Kiri and Lucas. I was then in high demand to make a Josh and so forth . . . . Here is our finished product.  So from left to right we have: Mom, Dad, Lucas, Kiri, Jake, Josh, Cheryl, James, and Laura. And we all had to hold hands because we're a family. I think we may make real pancakes for breakfast tomorrow, and when I'm off sometime next week, work on making real gingerbread men and women from scratch. We'll see how home-makey I feel next week. Either way Lucas and me will definitely make another pan of brownies just for Laura. 

After another night of tossing and turning and no sleep . . . . 

Friday 29th January: Alicante (ALC). And finally we come to the end of a week (and a month) and I can't believe how fast time is just flying by (no pun intended). It's crazy to think that I've been back from BYU for 9 months, that I've been actually flying as my job for 6, and that I've already been in BRS for 2. That just seems so crazy to me. How can time be going that fast??? Am I going to blink one day and suddenly be like 50? 

More snow = More delays.

Wednesday 13th January: Tenerife (TFS) . . . Via Faro. 

Seeing as it was the 13th of the month I should of known something would happen. This something (which caused all the problems) was the snow that fell overnight. As we were going to Tenerife yesterday, the night before our aircraft was loaded up with fuel to prepare for the long flight, however with all the snow that fell they hadn't been able to clear all the runway and as it's such a short runway, we basically had too much fuel in order to be able to take off on such a short runway. Problem number 1. 

We boarded anyway whilst waiting for a decision to be made about this slight problem, and after much waiting, the captain says that we either have to de-fuel or change aircraft. Problem number 2. To de-fuel you need to disembark and an empty fueler (which wasn't in Bristol) and to change aircraft you need a spare aircraft (which also wasn't in Bristol). We then have to wait a bit longer until the aircraft from Shannon landed so that we can kick off the Shannon crew and swop aircraft. 

So after a bit more waiting while we get de-iced etc, we are FINALLY up in the air at about 9:30 . . . 2 and a half hours after we were supposed to. 

Problem number 3. Because we can't take off with as much fuel as we need to get to Tenerife, we need to make a pit-stop in Faro Portugal. So once we topped up we got back up in the air and on our way we went. 

So thus lies all the problems, and luckily most of the passengers were really understanding about the whole delay (I think because they could actually SEE the snow). But there was this one particular passenger that was soooo rude to us. You would think that with all the time we were sat with these passengers on our aircraft, she would of said something sooner, but no . . . half hour before landing in Tenerife, she pipes up saying that her husband had taken off his really expensive watch and left it on the original aircraft (why you would take off your watch on an aircraft I really do not know). She then expected us to ring around trying to find said watch. After trying to explain that if said watch had been found it was most likely found in either Bristol or Shannon and that she should contact those airports, and no we don't have the number for each airport (really, do I look like a phone directory??), and no we won't know if a Ryanair crew handed it in. She started raising her voice and exclaiming that it was all OUR fault that they lost the watch as we had to change aircraft (yes I took the watch off his wrist and purposefully lost it), and that surely we could find out if another crew had found a watch as there would be a record of it (nope), and what if we had found £1000 cash on the floor (really the most we find is hats, jackets, and the odd game-boy game). So she ended up taking our names and saying she'll report us (obviously when she gets back to England in 2 weeks because she doesn't have internet connection in Tenerife (otherwise she could find the airports numbers)). 

But what made me chuckle was when I was outside directing the passengers to the bus (it's still nice and hot in Tenerife), her and her husband were obviously going to great lengths not to look at me, and her husband even walked around her to make sure he wasn't walking close to me. It made me laugh!!

Man I do hate rude passengers and I really hope she is not on my flight when I do Tenerife in 2 weeks time. 

So yeah, after a speedy turnaround in Tenerife and thankfully no more problems, we get back into Bristol just before 7pm. 

Oh what a long long day!!!

Where I've been to this week.

Sunday 10 January: Alicante (AL C), Knock (NOC)

Monday 11 January: Beziers (BZR)

Of precious moments, snow fun, and delayed flights!!

Wednesday 6th January: Milan Bergamo (BGY)

So for starters, just something

 that I found so adorable, on Tuesday Lucas enticed me and Laura to play a game of hide and seek with him. He was quite insistent that we 

stop what we were doing in order to play. It was quite adorable really. Here are a couple of pictures of his favorite hiding places. 

Yesterday we woke up to a blanket of snow, Josh and Jake 

woke me up with their shouts of glee of not having to go to

 school . . . and Lucas woke me up wanting my Lucky Charms. As we were struggling to get the car off the drive anyway we got out all our snow gear and walked Lucas to Nursery, whilst

 having some snow fun along the way. It was such a beautiful scene with all the snow, and one I haven't seen

 in England, it was definitely a Provo image in my mind and made me a little bit homesick for BYU. 

So due to all the wonderful snow that we received yesterday, Bristol Airport

 

was closed until like 3. All the morning flights were cancelled and Easyjet just didn't fly at all. So I wasn't having to report until like 3:20. Just as we're reporting the Knock crew finally take off after 2 hours of de-icing and being in total 3 hours late. Anyways, just as we finish our briefing, we find

 out that Knock have taken our aircraft and there are no spare aircraft until they get back. So we camp out in the crew room with the airport standbys and wait for them to come back with our plane. 

So then we find out that Knock we're diverted to Cork and then had a technical problem and are now not due to land until 7ish. So we continue to wait.

 Then just as they are about to land into Bristol . . . they can't, the runway is too icy and they are diverted to Birmingham. Urg. Frustrating or what. So in the end after more waiting, we find that we are kicking the Dublin crew off their aircraft (Dublin was closed and there was another plane going there anyway), we wait a bit longer for them to get all the passengers off and eventually we get onto a plane. So we board the aircraft and guess what . . . more waiting as the plane is de-iced. We eventually take off about half an hour after we were supposed to be back in Bristol. Luckily, no more problems occur (I don't think I could of taken it) and we eventually land at 2am, meaning that I don't get home until 3:30. What an eventful day. I think the question is "Why do I always get delayed on my Day 5??" 

Oh and just for Nadine, this is on the road on the way to the airport, the picture doesn't do it justice but it was stunning. 

The funny thing that happened on the ground.

Monday 4th January: Malaga (AGP) 

So todays funny story didn't happen at 38,000 feet, instead it happened right on the ground. So for a few weeks now I have been meaning to change my wiper blades, I have even brought said new wiper blades (they are currently sat in my room). Everyday on my way to work it frustrates me that my wiper blades make my windscreen all smeary instead of clean and shiny. Today I left for work at 10 . . . I scrapped about 10 layers of ice from my windscreen, got in my car, 2 minutes down the road and the I realized that my screen-wash is frozen, and thus my windscreen is now smeary once more. 

There is a point to this story. 

After work I go back to my car and once again have to scrape ice . . . I also check to see if my screen-wash has defrosted yet (it hasn't) so I find a bottle of water that I have in my car (which is half frozen too) and decide to clean my windscreen with it . . . It freezes instantly. And thus continues the scraping of ice. The guy from the airport fire department that was in the car next to me found it amusing at least. 

The wiper blades will be changed tomorrow. 

The start of the new year!!

As this is the start of the new year I decided to create some goals . . . One of which, is to improve my journalling skills. Since most of my life now is work, I decided to share all the wonderfully funny, strange, gross, annoying, and disturbing things that happen at 38,000 feet in the air, along with other interesting tid-bits that occur in my life - hence, creating a type of Journal. 

Last year saw me make some major decisions within my life, one being that I was going to drop out of BYU and instead move back to England and become Cabin Crew. This was a really hard decision as I left a lot of fantastic friends and a great life in the states to move back without any guarantee of a job. Luckily, I managed to start training with Ryanair after a month of being home and then started working straight away from London Stansted airport. 

The end of the last year saw a move from Stansted airport over to my local Bristol airport. Anyone who knows me will know that I was thrilled with the move, and am now back with my family and amongst the YSA in the Bristol stake once more. I'm really enjoying being in Bristol base right now, we don't fly to as many places as Stansted, but there is a really amazingly friendly atmosphere among the crew, and I am having a lot of fun.