[PilotMan]

Here I am, beginning the last trip of the year. It feels good that I stuck with this project. If anything, it shows me that I can undertake something that seems big and keep it up.

My time at home went by really, really fast. Just like any other weekend. I did some laundry, played a bunch of computer games with the kids and slept good in my own bed. I was supposed to take a 430p flight out of there to head back to Newark today, and just like Sunday when I came home, and like the 23rd coming here, it sucked. Full flights, few options, but I had my bases covered. I really had 3 flights to try if you include that I can take the cargo flight as a final backup. I didn't succeed at getting rid of the trip either.

The 430p flight was oversold, and overfull. I could tell by who was listed for standby on the trip that I wasn't going to get either of the jumpseats. The later flight was also oversold, but there wasn't any non-revs listed just yet. I thought about it and decided to not even show up to the earlier flight. I switched my flight to the later flight and enjoyed a couple extra hours at home. I figured that the pilot and flight attendant from the earlier flight would get on and that I'd have first shot on the second one. So when I showed up an hour early, and saw my friend, left over from the first flight, still there I was a little alarmed. He had gotten bumped off and didn't get on, so he already had 1 of the seats. I went to list at the gate and found that another pilot, who wasn't even listed on the flight, was already there and had listed for the other. FUCK!!!!

The flight was full, I wasn't going to get either jump seat. I didn't really want to get up at 230a for the cargo flight. I started making plans to walk over and try and get on the 830p flight to LGA if things didn't work out for me. I figured that if I didn't get on to EWR, or LGA I could call and just miss the trip. It wouldn't be all bad anyway. If I did get on to LGA I would have an adventure to write about. As it turned out, I would luck out in a big way.

As the flight was almost done boarding, it was still oversold, and a group of 8 was going to have to be split up. Half of them weren't going to get on, and they were all traveling together. They refused to be split up, so the company had to buy all of them off. While that was expensive for the company, it was great for me because it opened up 4 seats in the back, and I only needed 1. It was a huge break.

So I got to the crash pad kind of late, but it was way earlier than I would have been with any other plan. I'm the #3 guy here tonight. One of them is a massive snorer too. I get to be the last one up too. Tomorrow I'm off to the mountains, the cold of Jackson Hole and the end of a really good year.