Blogvember.

November is drawing to a close, and with it, my personal blog-a-day challenge.

I failed, in that I did not actually blog every day.
I succeeded, in that at the end of November, I will have 30 posts.

I'm happy with this outcome. It's definitely an improvement over last year's late start and 20 posts. Maybe that means next year I'll do even better, and the year after that, I can attempt NaNoWriMo! ..... Maybe.


Now December is literally hours away. There's snow coating the world, Christmas is in the air, lights and decorations are multiplying. I love the holiday season. So much so that, just maybe, I'll continue to blog during it.

Monday, Monday

It's been dark and dreary and rainy all day. Apparently when it's dark outside, I sleep until 1:30. And then eat breakfast at 4. That doesn't seem healthy.

I don't have much to blog about today, having slept through most of it. I did do some more shopping (why? why?!) (OH, have I told you all the great things I got on black Friday?! Oh man.), and then I went to see Morning Glory with Jess, and then we got ice cream. Because there's no better time to eat ice cream than on a cold, rainy day in late November.

I've known for many months now that Eric's birthday is in early December, having spent it with him last year. But today I realized his birthday is... this weekend. I suppose it's time to figure out what I'm getting him. (You're getting a card. I know how much you love cards.)

How can I be tired? Perhaps I should eat some lunch.

Is it seriously still November?

Now that Thanksgiving is over, I feel like November is, too. But it's not. So I must keep blogging on.

I studied abroad in college, during the 2004-5 school year. A hodgepodge group of 45 of us spent nine months in Birmingham, England. We ate questionable food (British cooking + cafeteria fare = extra bad), we traveled, we drank. And then we came back to the States, and we pretty much divided up. When there's 45 people in a crowd, they are not all going to be friends. The different groups that we formed abroad stayed friends with each other once we were all back home, and each group pretty much lost touch with everyone else.

Today, we had a reunion. It was held at an awesome little Irish pub in Minneapolis. About half of us showed up. It was... interesting. Two of our professors drove down from Duluth to say hi, which was awesome, and weird. There was a definite splitting up of different groups, which did not surprise our side of the room at all. The Irish breakfast and fish and chips were good, though, as was the conversation. I don't feel like I've missed a lot not seeing these people for five years, but it was fun to get together and catch up and reminisce a little bit.

Then I went to Harry Potter 7 with my parents and sister. It was my third time seeing it in the past nine days. I.. I think that might be too many. It is a long, long movie. Fantastic, but long. I think I will have to wait a couple of weeks before I attempt to sit through it again.

Maybe if I start now, I can get through all seven books by the next time I go see it.

That sounds like a title to me.

It's my third day off in a row today, and I can't even tell you how delightful that feels.

After shopping yesterday, I took my GPS for a drive to visit my dear friend Erin, whom I hadn't seen in far, far too long. She and her boyfriend have an awesome house down in Rochester, full of animals and instruments and other neat things. I sat down at a full drum set and beat on it for a few minutes, which was most certainly way more fun for me than the people that could hear me. We shopped, we ate, we watched movies, we drank. Today we went to a Festival of Trees, which is a display of like a hundred trees, each decorated with a theme. Let me tell you, there are some way more creative tree-decorators than me out there, and some toppers more awesome than I could have imagined.

It was nice way to spend a day and a half. Rochester is way closer than I always think, and I got to blast my country playlist all the way down and back, AND I got to spend time with an awesome lady I missed very much.

Tonight, I have discovered the most amazing drink: Baileys (well, Carolans) and milk on ice. It tastes like CANDY.

Please excuse me now, I need a refill, and I'm ignoring the sweet man who just kicked my ass at Carcassonne.

Ohhhh, Black Friday.

My gps is awesome. And huge. And so pretty. So are all my new sweaters and dvds and tv seasons. Wooo black Friday!

Wait, are you supposed to shop for OTHER people on black Friday? Hm.

On the Target and Kohl's receipts (the only two places Pam and I went), they show you how much money you saved on that transaction. I saved more money than I spent today.

As we were coming through the front door this morning, we did a quick add up of all the money we spent, between the two of us and a bunch of stuff for Pam's work. Then we almost had heart attacks.

After Target and before Kohl's, we stopped at Panera for breakfast. The espresso machine wasn't warmed up yet, and they were about ten minutes out from making breakfast sandwiches. Luckily, Pam brought cards. She beat me in a spectacular upset in our first game, shouted for joy, and scared the crap out of the cashier. Said cashier later brought us two free cookies, for being awesome.

I need another nap. Or to get my eighth wind. I've had a lot of winds today.

Happy (actual) Thanksgiving!

We had a wonderful day here at the Hendel household. Lots of food, desserts, turkey coloring, ad rifling. I made a game plan for tomorrow (getting a GPS, yo!), my parents met Eric's parents, and most of all there was much, much laughter.

I love Thanksgiving.



Coloring is serious business.


Finished!


My giNORmous plate of food.


Cousins!

Happy (almost) Thanksgiving!

I had another prisoner on a flight today! Only this one was handcuffed, and his accompanying guard was armed. I'm glad my jumpseat isn't in the back on the plane I was on today.

I got my schedule for next month, and it's highspeeds! This is both good and bad.

Bad:
I work Christmas Eve night into Christmas morning.
I work Christmas night into the next day.
I work New Year's Eve into New Year's Day.
I have to drive to and from work every day instead of driving there and parking for 4 days.

Good:
I will be home SO MUCH.
I don't have to be on call.
I have SO MUCH TIME OFF.
I won't get a jarring, unexpected 4am wake-up call.
I can still probably go to most of my normal Christmas things, just not for as long.
I have so much time off it makes me want to jump for joy.

Overall, I am very, very pleased. I'd much rather have highspeeds with some terrible days on than another month of unknown reserve periods.

(Highspeeds are a whole different kind of line, where you leave home in the evening, spend a short night [five to eight hours on the ground] somewhere, and fly back very early in the morning. They are also called "CDOs" are you are considered "on-duty" all night - Continuous Duty Overnights. I love them, because I've realized that I HAVE to take a nap as soon as I get home in the morning for a couple of hours, and as long as I do that, everything is fine. Also, even a working day seems like a day off on highspeeds, since it's just nights and mornings and I'll be home every day.)

Did I mention how much time I'm going to have off? I can't even walk in my room right now, it's a problem. A problem that I will have time to fix, in December!

Now, it's time to fix a different problem: sleep deprivation.

Passengers

Yesterday, for the first time in my two-year career, I had a prisoner on my plane. Prisoners have to sit in the back row. Luckily for me, my jumpseat on the 900 is, you guessed it, in the back row. He had two guards with him. He was very happy to get a glass of water when I went through the cabin. Exciting.

Today, I had two women on my plane who just looked... well, trashy. They were loud and stupid (which I know, because they were so loud), and they clearly wanted everyone's attention on them. They were traveling with an infant. They had on Jerry Springer t-shirts. They were a delight to have on board, mostly because I couldn't stop giggling about the whole situation. They were ridiculous. The best part was when we saw them waiting at the gate for their connecting flight... to Kentucky. Yeah, seemed about right.

I am so tired I think I could sleep forever.

That's how I roll.

I had two deadheads this morning, one on a very small plane, and one on a very large plane. I put my four-wheeled bag onto the luggage cart to be planeside checked in Knoxville. When I picked my bag up in Atlanta, it only had three wheels. Damnit.

The good news is my new bag rolls so smooth it's like I packed nothing but air.

The bad news is after I hurriedly looked at the bags, bought a bag, switched the contents of my luggage from one bag to the other, and all but ran to the gate for my next flight, we got mired in a two and a half hour delay.

The other good news is that, despite multiple delays, gate changes, and lacking an aircraft for hours, I got a very sweet compliment letter handed to me from one of my first class passengers.

So, win overall, I guess?

Now I just have to figure out how to properly Tetris all my crap into my new bag.

Ice ice baby

I was on call yesterday, but by 4.30 I was still sitting at home uncalled, so I decided to go with my sister to a concert. Rocket Club (a country band whose big hit is One Thing Beautiful) was playing at the Cabooze in Minneapolis. My sister, her boss, and a friend of theirs were on the list at the door, because they know the main singer, Chris Hawkey. Lucky for me, they were all on the list with a plus one, so Pam got me in free, too. We sat in a special reserved seating area and everything!

The concert was fantastic. They have great songs, musicians, and singers, and so much energy it's unbelievable. Chris came over to say a quick hi before we left, so I got to meet him, and he warned us, "Be careful, it's really icy out there."

Every car in the lot was covered in ice. The ground was like a skating rink. And it was still precipitating.

We walked about three steps and Pam's boss fell (turns out cowboy boots have ZERO traction), conveniently running right into Pam's legs, who fell on top of her. I hadn't realized how slippery it was until they were both suddenly on the ground, because I happened to be wearing rubber shoes; lucky me. Pam got up, but her boss couldn't get a grip on the ice with her boots. A nice man saw her struggling (and saw Pam and I making no effort to help, because we already knew we'd just end up on the ground, too), walked confidently over to give her a hand, and promptly ended up on his ass.

It took about ten minutes for me, Pam, and my defrosters to clean the ice off my car. Our twenty-minute drive back to Pam's house took us over an hour. Traffic was STOPPED getting on to 394. There was a semi stopped in the middle lane. As we were passing on the left, we saw a mini van on the right slide right into the back corner of the truck. What do you do when that happens? What can you do? You're just stuck.

The exit for Pam's apartment is a sharp turn that I take slow even in the best of conditions. Last night I took it at about three miles per hour. A car came up next to me at the stoplight; fine, no big deal, we'll take the turn slowly and be fine. The other car let me take the lead, so I turned slooowly, slooooowly, up the hill.... and got stuck. I started sliding backwards, so I hit the brakes. Luckily there was enough room for the other car to get past me, which it managed just fine. I started backing down the hill so I could try again. Nothing. Back up more. No going forward, just sliding. More cars showed up at the light, so I backed all the way out of the way and put my hazards on. They left, I kept backing up. A car came up behind me, so i let it pass. It got to the top of the hill that was my nemesis, stopped, and the guy got out, walked back, and asked if he could help us at all. Sweet offer, but how the hell do you push a car when there's no traction to be had? We thanked him, sent him on his way, and kept trying.

Eventually I backed up enough to be able to get into the left lane, which seemed the better choice, as all the cars in that lane were getting through fine. I managed to start moving forward at a crawl. I told Pam the light better turn green, because I was going through it regardless. It turned green, no other cars showed up, and I made it up the hill and finally let out my breath.

I decided I was never leaving the house again.

(Of course, I got a call this afternoon for a flight this evening. But the roads seem to be much better, so I'm sure I'll be fine.)

When we finally got parked last night, we had to go up an icy flight of stairs; we felt like mountaineers, holding on to the railings for dear life. We had hot chocolate and toast when we came in to try to calm down. My hands were shaking, and my arms hurt from gripping the steering wheel.

I guess it's winter now.

Milestone!

I hit the 100 post mark (for real this time) and didn't even realize it! But here's the best part: my 100th post was on Harry Potter movie day. I think that's the best possible post it could have been, even if I had planned one.

Fall.

I hate fall. I think it is the ugliest of the seasons. It’s schizophrenic in terms of weather; one day it’s 62, the next day I’m scraping frost off my windshield. On top of that, I’m not yet in the mindset for cold weather, so even 62 seems SO MUCH COLDER than it really is. It gets dark early, I have to go back to school (WAIT no not anymore! YES!), and my social life takes a hit. People just aren’t as willing to go out at 8 o’clock when it’s already so dark outside (myself included, let's be honest). The trees are pretty for about a second, and then everything just looks brown and dead and sad and dirty.

I think I'm in the minority with this opinion.

In early October, I decided to take advantage of a nice day and go for a walk at my park. I brought my camera, because I always bring my camera everywhere. That day, my camera helped me find the beauty in fall. I realized why people love it so much, with the crisp weather, clear skies, and rainbow of colors. And I do love sweaters.






















As it turns out, I kind of love early fall. I love when things are still mostly green, the sky is brilliant blue, and a few trees are starting to change. I love a single maple leaf, green and red and orange and yellow all in one, like a miniature representation of the whole season. I love putting on a sweater for the first time and having a reason to pull out my exceptionally large collection of scarves. I love mittens.


A month later, though, and I am SO OVER IT. Everything is brown and dead and it's fucking COLD outside, and I don't even want to leave my house EVER and it gets dark so freaking early and the only place I can stay warm is in the shower or in front of my little space heater.

But I do love watching my breath.



I can't help it. I have to find the good in everything. It's my curse.

Seriously, OMG

It's 5:17 in the morning and I should be sleeping, but I have to tell you how much I loved Harry Potter. I laughed, I cried, I almost literally jumped out of my seat (my legs ended up folded up to my chin suddenly and without permission, even though I KNEW IT WAS COMING AUGH). I can't wait to go see it again.

Also, it was a great night in general, with lots of good food (green curry, pumpkin pasties, cauldron cakes, butterbeer), good friends (including Adam, who flew in from Florida for the occasion!!), and awesome/ridiculous costume-watching at the theater.

I am struck by the urge to re-read all seven books as soon as possible. I love everything about these stories.

HARRY POTTER OMG

I CAN'T BLOG RIGHT NOW IT'S HARRY POTTER TIME

Pet peeve / Confessions

Pet Peeve:
I hate when people don't clean off their cars after a large amount of snow has fallen. A medium amount, even. I clean off every window, the entire roof. Not every snowflake, certainly, but I don't leave inches of piled snow on top to blow around once I get on the highway, worsening visibility for everyone around me. I think the owners of snow-ful cars are lazy and inconsiderate.

Confessions:
During my recent day of driving around while it was snowing profusely, I watched a van behind me come up a little too fast while I was slowing down, suddenly realize it was going too fast and slam on the brakes, at which point the mountain of snow on its roof went cascading down onto its windshield, at which point the driver panicked and slammed even harder on the brakes, making even more snow cascade down. I felt a smug satisfaction and thought, "See? That's what you get for not taking two minutes to clean off your damn car."

I often run late (often, sure, or all the time ever), and though I do brush off my car and scrape off the ice as necessary, I leave my driveway with a fogged-up windshield far more often than I should. I'm talking, I hunch over to see out of the right part of it, figuring the best/fastest way to clear it is to drive and get my air warmed up and moving instead of waiting ages for it to clear while I idle. I judge myself for doing this.

Sleepy in Kansas City.

It is 6:43, and I am about to go to bed. For the night.

Last night was game night. Fun was had, snacks were consumed and shared, I kicked ass at Carcassonne TWICE. I got home sometime around midnight and, thinking I was safe from being called to work today, stayed up and interneted for a bit. I think I went to bed around one or so.

Of course, scheduling calls me at six this morning with a trip.

I take it as a sign that I wasn't supposed to go shopping. I had some city cash for NY&C that expired today, and while I do need some long-sleeved shirts and sweaters, I do not need to spend money. So instead I'm making some.

I am unsure, however, if I am making sense, or being in any way coherent or interesting. So, to bed!

Alas, down pillows. I hate down pillows. But I do love down blankets, especially after a long, cold day on an airplane.

Topics.

Snow: Most mornings before I get out of bed, I check my email, facebook, and twitter on my phone. It helps me keep my eyes open between snoozes and convince myself it's time to get up. Yesterday, my facebook feed was full of "OMG SNOW!" I was like, come on guys, we live in Minnesota, you've never seen snow before? I know it's been a few months, but really.

And then I got out of bed and opened the blinds. And I was like, "OMG SNOW!"

Usually the first snow of the year is a dusting that melts within the day. It's a slow, gentle re-introduction to winter. This year, the first snow of the season was this:


OMG SNOW.

And then I spent the day driving around, running errands. The good news is I'm now adjusted to driving in snow, even fresh, thick, and unplowed. The bad news is, I was unprepared for the day...

Inappropriate footwear: I got called in to work on Friday for a quick Duluth turn. I got dressed, slipped on my flats, and headed out the door. I realized I should probably grab a jacket, assuming I wouldn't come home after work but probably go to Jess or Eric's place. Thank goodness the closest coat was a long winter jacket and not the spring coat I was thinking of grabbing.

After work I went to Eric's and ended up spending the night; his is the window I discovered the OMG SNOW from. I had clothes to wear, a winter coat, gloves.... and flats. Somewhere between six and 12 inches of heavy, thick, wet snow (perfect for snowballs!), and I had flats. DOOM.

I left Eric's and headed to Jess's, with whom I spent the day driving around town (part of the excessive errand running was to find me a pair of cheap winter boots; alas, to no avail!), slushing through parking lots, and generally getting my feet soaking wet. My shoes are rubber (they're crocs, actually, which is weird), so they weren't getting ruined, and they stayed pretty warm, but by the time we ended up back at Jess's house, my feet were sopping. It didn't stop at my feet, though...

My pants habits: I've had this habit of wearing flats during the winter for years now. I just love flats. Generally, given the choice of my shoe closet, I would have chosen boots for a day like yesterday. But on a day with no snow in the forecast, and all the previous snow shoveled out of the way, why not wear flats for a day? Days that seem okay for non-boots can quickly turn into boot-necessary days, though.

I lived alone one year during college, and developed a habit. I would say a bad habit, but I see nothing bad about it, myself. I would come home from class with my feet and half my pant legs soaking wet, and as soon as I closed the door, I would take off my pants. Sometimes I would put on different pants; more often I would just wrap up in a blanket sans pants. Flats make the pant situation even worse, with no boots to tuck pants into, and no height to keep pants from dragging through the melty slush. (WHAT?! What do you mean melty isn't a word? Damn you and your red squiggle! Firefox, we are in a fight.)

Yesterday I had buckets of wet snow and flats. By the time we got back to Jess's, I also had very, very wet pants. Naturally, I wanted to take them off. It's apparently considered inappropriate to walk around someone else's house pantsless, though. Luckily, I am an ever-prepared flight attendant, and I had a pair of pajama pants (well, knee-length shorts) in my trunk. They were the same shade of orange as my sweater. They looked especially great with my black thigh-high socks.

Cylons: I've recently (finally) started watching Battlestar Galactica. I... I kind of love it. What's especially funny, though, is that I've been watching it with Jess, her youngest brother (who's 15, I think?), and her dad. We watched three episodes yesterday after running errands. We watched all of it that was on the netflix disc, so her dad hooked his computer up to the tv so we could watch the next episode on instant. We're... pretty nerdy. Also, while watching BSG, Jess and I were knitting furiously. She made a set of wrist warmers. I am a significantly slower knitter than she is (though I am pretty speedy for being new, if I do say so myself), but I accomplished this:


It's double-knit, so the pattern is the same on the back, but in opposite colors. Like so,



See that weird white thing in the upper left corner of the picture? That's my best friend space heater.

My fingers hurt.

Guys, I am really good at knitting. I may not be as fast as Jess (yet), but I can make patterns, and I can double-knit, and my stitches are really even. Now I just have to learn to make something that's not a scarf. Hm.

Coming tomorrow: snow, cylons, my pants habits, inappropriate footwear, and more!

Watch out, y'all.

Between staying in Dallas last night, flying with a Memphis crew for two days, and watching the CMAs, my drawl is in full force today.

Reserve

I'm on reserve this month. Now, I can't complain too much, because I bid to be on reserve instead of getting a line like normal. But... it's different. Interesting.

Pilots have specific reserve periods: am reserve, pm reserve, and high speed reserve. They are only contactable during certain times each day. Flight attendants are, apparently, not so important, so we are contactable 24 hours a day when we are on reserve.

I still have so many days off every month, so I know which days I'm at risk of being called and which days I'm free to go about my business, but on the on days, they could call me anytime from 4am to midnight. It makes life a bit difficult.

One of the requirements of my job is that I do not drink within 12 hours of starting a shift. Since we're on call 24 hours a day on reserve, this means that I can only drink before noon on a day off right before a reserve day. (I say they can call at 4am because Crew Scheduling is usually closed between midnight and 4. If there are delays or cancellations of some sort of shenanigans, though, they could technically call me at 1 in the morning. It's just not very likely. But it does mean that since I go on call at midnight, I do have to stop drinking at noon.) I generally am not up before noon. This means that I generally don't drink much when I'm on reserve.

I am on call Monday through Friday this week. I did not get called Monday or Tuesday; it was like having a couple of extra days off, with the only difference being I was checking my phone obsessively. Wait, scratch that; I'm pretty sure I do that anyway. This morning, though, I got a call at 10.30 saying they needed me at the airport at 12.15 for a flight to Dallas.

Here's the best part: the flight to DFW was my only flight today. We got in just before 4, and we don't work again until 5.35 in the morning. My overnight was scheduled at 13 hours and 26 minutes. That means there was one hour and 26 minutes available for drinking.

Now, I feel I should note that I am not actually a big drinker, not as much as this post makes it sound like I am. But when you are on reserve and you literally don't even have the OPTION of cracking open a beer, well, that's when you want one more than you've ever wanted one before.

So this afternoon I got into Dallas, changed clothes, and came back downstairs to have a couple of beers and some food with one of the pilots.

Ironic, that I had to wait until I was at work in order to have a drink.