Ohhh.. allright then
I was new, and thus on reserve (meaning I was a 'spare' and called up in emergencies) usually kept pretty busy... but my second month at work I probably got 5 flights the whole month
Training aside... I was new, and out of practice... so my demos (demonstration of safety equipment) were kind of.. umm.. frightening.
On New Years Eve.. I got called for a way delayed flight at 10 pm.. about a minute before the end of my 12 hour shift of waiting in the airport. So off I rush to the plane.. go through my speech and a slightly akward demo in a hurry... and off we went for a half hour skip over to the NJ Newark airport. They were little regional jets, 50 seaters, btw. So everyone gets off... Ooops, turns out there was another extremely delayed flight (due to this one and others throughout the day) with passengers that had been stranded in the airport for way too many hours, it was winter and blizzard-ie... so we got ordered to take that flight as well. On come these passengers... a good many of them a little unsteady on their feet.. turns out they had been 'comped' some beverages in the airport for a goodly portion of the night. Some were really grumpy. Most were... well... in a very boisturous mood.
So everyone gets settled.. I go through closing the overhead bins and trying ever so nicely to explain why all of those bags (bags of protest) needed to be stowed under the seat and such.. we start to roll out towards the taxi way.. I still haven't give my speech.. but no worries, I had time...
There I am, halfway down the aisle, briefing my emergency exit row.. and one of the pilots decided to stomp on the breaks.. so I catch myself half fallen over on a seat and a poor passengers shoulder
Plane advances forward and halts once again, before I'm even halfway up.. and some peoples were snickering..
So the phone light turns on.. I head up to the front and answer it... Captain say we have a maintinece issue and were not moving from that spot. OK... well here we are in the middle of the Taxi-way. I explain to the passengers what is going on.. to considerable mumbling of course... and have to just sit my booty in my seat until we know whats happening. Then came the calls for drinks...
Some 20 minutes later, I get another call...planes not moving in it's state.. we need to be towed back to the gate.. and we have to wait on it.. because, guess what? It's down for maitinence.
I asked the Captain then (his call) If he'd like me to serve drinks or something... He says yep.. comp them anything they like (alcohol). So I set about serving drinks.. I get another call.. to open the door so maitinence can come on and speak to the captain. OK.. I open that door, and brrrrr all the winds of the north and snow from a blizzard is coming in.. so I had to leave it open for a while.
The passengers and I were freezing our bums off.. I was refilling their drinks quite frequently... which some were incredibly delighted with
2 hours later.. New Years Eve Midnight passed by an hour ago... ground crew finally get their stuff together and get us towed back to the gate. Of course.. In that time I had to keep quite a few passengers from waltzing off the plane with dire warnings.. full of FAA rules they were not, at that moment, able to understand the logic of.. They were not happy!
So finally at the gate.. we get all the passengers deplaned. The pilots and I get off too.. there was no point being on. And there we are.. at 2 am, all sitting in the empty airport with only a few lights on
Now see, I have a profound sense of the rediculous. I get giggly when things are rediculous, no matter how much I'm suffering.. LOL
There was nothing to do in that airport besides stare at eachother. The groundcrew, the passengers, all of us, should have been at home or asleep in our beds hours ago.. and here theres nothing to do but look at the snow fall out the windows.
Captain was MAD.. because headquarters should have released us hours ago to hotel rooms... but no.. they didn't want to pay for the passengers hotels.. and didn't want to leave them in the airport New Years Eve... So there we were.
They finally completed their plan... robbed another of the same jet of a part to fix our jet... why they couldn't have just released that same exact jet to us
Then back on the plane we march. Everybody settles back down.. get their things arranged and I close the cabin door.
So I stand up front... Start my announcement. They were paying an unusual amount of attention to me. I think everyone was just that bored. And maybe we had already bonded
"Insert the buckle into the receptacle, and pull the strap away from you to tighten" There I am.. with seatbelt parts in hand... trying to insert the buckle into the receptacle, and it wouldn't go in!! (I now realize it was frozen or something) but there I am.. the flight attendant who can't buckle the seatbelt..
and here it comes...
I giggle...
You've never heard me giggle when I'm trying very hard not to. I sound like a hihena... and it kinda bursts out right when I can't hold it anymore.
Chuckle.. goes some fellow on the back...
and then everybody is laughing!
It was so contagious...
I started giggling again.. much the same sound...
and now almost every last person is in hysterics
But wait!
I've got the whole rest of my announcement to get through!
So I do my best to sober up... take up the announcement where I left off.. and now I've got the oxygen mask in hand...
Always have trouble with the elastic straps on the demo ones because different flight attendants tie them up in different kinds of knots.. and I had never gotten to undoing it earlier... so in realising that.. I decided I would never get through the announcement in time if I made everyone laugh again by stoping to untie it....
so I held up the mask... and said
"Place the mask over your nose and mouth, secure it with the elastic strap behind your head".. while pretending to secure an imaginary elastic band behind my head...
laughter... more laughter... everyone was laughing!
So I giggled again
Snorted...
More laughter...
Oh geeze....
I finally got to the point where I'm pointing out the emergency exits.. the floor lighting.. and I go to the middle of the cabin to point out the exits there and the signs... and this old feller started pointing too!
Then half the passengers were pointing to each other.. saying "Oooh the exits.. the lights... see?" and stuff like that.
It really was just the mood on the plane.. we were all sooo amused.. and even if *I* was the one being laughed at, I couldn't stop laughing with them.
Finally, I finished the announcement and sat in my seat and off we went to our destination.
We got in at 3:30 am...
And if you can believe it... headquarters messed up so thoroughly that we, the pilots and I, were stuck at the airport until 4:30 am, waiting on a cab that never came.. and the captain kept calling to ask after... waiting in the snow in front of the airport that is... and we finally got into the hotel at 5:00 am.
Stupid airline.
But I have another funny story.
I'll tell you later....
. A modest fib or two is often needed.. but take care... and not anything they could find out differently. I usually save my fibs for those really akward questions I cannot for the life of me remember the answer to... those not even pertinent to the job (why do they ask them?).. but less is more on that count.
