Something old is new again at 35,000 feet. Yes, we are serving beverages again on the airplane. We started our new beverage service on April 14th. Oh it’s still the old carts we drag down the aisle. But, what is inside is new to everyone. So new in fact, we have had glitches every day to get the catering right. I confess…No two beverage services have been the same for me. Which isn’t good since everything should be uniform. If variety is the spice of life, well things have been quite spicy for my fellow Skytresses and Skyters these past few weeks.

April 14th was the first day our airline started catering the airplanes in -house. For years we have been using a contracted catering company. Eventually, it will be easier for my airline to be in control of the catering system. Eventually. I confess…Right now things are a wee bit out of control. My airline likes to talk about the hiccups and glitches that are happening. Fortunately, Skytresses and Skyters are hiccup and glitches magicians.

The first day of our new beverage service my crew and I were deadheading to Chicago. We all thought it was a wee bit odd that the working crew was handing out cans of soda without any plastic glasses. Actually, we thought it was a wee bit gross. Skytresses and Skyters don’t drink directly out of the cans on the airplane. Oh, we will drink directly out of cans at other places…just not on the airplane. On our flight to Chicago, the Skytresses only took out one beverage cart. Another Skytress handed out snacks from a different cart. When we deplaned and started walking to the hotel shuttle pick up area, my crew and I talked about the service. Our ultimate conclusion was the crew was just trying to make the service work. The next day when we were faced with a hodgepodge of supplies, we ABSOLUTELY knew the crew was trying to make the beverage service work. I confess…At first we were frustrated we didn’t have the correct supplies boarded on our airplanes for the new service. Eventually, though, we just laughed about it.

Unlike our service prior to COVID-19, we are currently only offering a small selection of beverages. We are serving single-size cans of soda and juices. This way we don’t have to serve multiple drinks out of one can. This helps us have less touch points. It also keeps us moving in the aisle so we are not near the passengers as they remove their face coverings to eat and drink. Everyone is aware of how cumbersome the face masks can be to understand one another. Thus, our company designed a big beverage display card so the passengers can clearly see what we have to offer. The idea behind the cards is that the passengers can point to the card and we can clearly understand what they want to drink. Ummm..the problem with the cards….the passengers like to grab them or they like to point directly onto the card. Which isn’t the best thing when our company is working so hard to eliminate touch points. Yes, it slightly defeats the purpose of the cards. I confess…We quickly learned not to use the cards. Instead, we ask the passengers what they would like to drink. It’s old school. But, it works. New school that doesn’t work so well…..all the cans are either red, green or silver. Yes, the cans look alike. Unfortunately, the contents are completely different. I confess, ….It’s a wee bit aggravating that all the cans look similar. I must, also, confess,…..If a passenger asks for an alcoholic beverage I tell them the price before I press any buttons on my sales app. The alcohol prices have gone up. I’m pretty sure some airline tickets may be cheaper than the new prices of the in-flight alcohol.

Here is a major confession. We are supposed to wear our plastic gloves when we are conducting our beverage service. I wore my gloves for one trip and then stop wearing them. What!? I know. Please don’t tell anyone at The Mayo Clinic. I stopped wearing them after I observed my fellow Skytresses and Skyters not wearing them. Yes. I am a conformist when it comes to certain things. Thankfully, I have had my vaccinations shots. I confess….I got frustrated with trying to separate my cocktail napkins while wearing my gloves. Especially, when I had to wear a pair of gloves that are too big for the Jolly Green Giant, himself. I lost count of the number of passengers who grabbed my gloves as I handed them their napkin and snacks. It was awkward for the passengers and for me. I confess…I also hated the feeling of the gloves when they got wet from the water bottles. Unfortunately, we have Old Faithful water bottles right now. The water inside is filled up to the bottle cap. Yep, we quickly learned to pour out some water in bottles before we put them on the beverage carts. If we don’t, when we go to pour a glass of water, the water shoots out like Old Faithful is erupting. Just like watching Old Faithful erupt in Yellowstone,….watching the water bottles erupt while you’re in the aisle is quite the spectacle. Unfortunately, when my plastic gloves got wet from the water eruption, they stuck to my hands like a wet Hefty bag clinging to my body on a hot summer day. Egads!! I know….I shouldn’t have confessed this last image to you all.

I confess, too, that I had to keep taking my gloves off in the aisle to tap on my sales app. Oh I could have kept them on….only the flight would have been over long before I got my phone to accept my password while wearing my gloves. My Skytress phone refused to accept the number 8 with my Jolly Green Giant gloves on. I confess…I tried to nonchalantly take my thumb out of my glove to hit the numbers on my phone. But, something very interesting happens when you are wearing gloves while serving from the beverage cart. Passengers become fixated on them. No matter how discreet I tried to be, the passengers would see me slip my thumb out of the glove….and then slip it back inside the glove after I tapped on my sales app. No, I wasn’t fooling anyone. This was another reason I stopped wearing my plastic gloves. Don’t worry. I wash and sanitize my hands thoroughly when I get back to the galley. Yes, I confess….I don’t like the gloves. However, I also don’t like germs. So, I always wash my hands for two rounds of the “Happy Birthday” song like it states on the sticker on the lavatory mirror. I confess,….I actually sing the song when I wash my hands. I sing my name, too!

There are several other things we are supposed to do while working from the beverage cart. We are supposed to keep the ice scoop out of the bag of ice. Yep, we are supposed to place the ice scoop on top of the cart in a plastic glass between serving drinks. We can, also, keep the scoop in a plastic glass in the ice drawer….as long as it is outside the bag of ice. I tried putting the ice scoop in the plastic cup for one flight. Then, I confess,….I gave up and threw the scoop in the ice drawer like I have been doing for years. I quickly discovered I was not the only Skytress or Skyter to revert back to our old serving ways.

We are also supposed to ask the passengers if they would like ice or no ice with their beverages. Remember,….our airline wants us to have less touch points. So, if the passenger doesn’t want ice, I touch less things on the cart. I believe I only asked passengers on one flight if they would like ice or no ice. Yep, the rest of my flights I gave them their can of soda or can of juice with a plastic glass of ice. I confess…It was just easier and more efficient. Usually passengers tell me if they don’t want ice. I found out my fellow Skytresses and Skyters beat me to this old way of serving. Hey, I try to be a rules follower. I confess…I just can’t follow all the new serving procedures. After all, some new procedures were created by teams from The Mayo Clinic. I’m pretty sure some people on the team have never conducted a beverage service in-flight before. Don’t worry. I promise to never tell someone from The Mayo Clinic how to perform surgery. This is called even-steven in my book.

I confess… I’m still trying to learn the new mileage standards for the in-flight beverage service. The service standard for my flight to and from Atlanta has changed. I confess…I actually had to look up the serving parameters the other day when I got home to St. Louis. I’ve had crews serve cans of soda and juice on previous flights from St. Louis to Atlanta. Then on my flight home the other day the crew was setting up for our express service. This service consists of only coffee, tea or water. I confess…. I actually thought the crew was conducting the wrong service. Unfortunately, I had to sit on the Skytress jumpseat in order to get home. As I sat on the jumpseat, I could see the Skytresses didn’t have any ice in the beverage carts. I could also see they only had a hodgepodge of snacks for their round trip. Sadly, I thought they were just trying to be magicians and make the service work by offering the express service. I confess…As I watched them pull out every cart and every carrier looking for supplies, I was grateful I wasn’t working the flight.

I know my company is working extremely hard to get things flowing smoothly again for us all. They are listening to feedback from the Skytresses and Skyters. They even have people from different departments coming together to help support the new catering system. I confess….we have the best employees at my airline. Everyone works extremely hard every day to make our airline the best one in the air.

On May 1st we discontinued blocking the middle seats on the airplane. Yep, the middle seats will be filled with passengers again. Inevitably the overhead bins will be full with luggage, too. Much to everyone’s disappointment, we will have to go back to checking bags again. Oh, it’s definitely going to be a rude awakening for some passengers that have been flying with us for months now. They have gotten used to the middle seats being empty and the overhead bins having plenty of room for their baggage. I confess…So have I. It’s going to very different when I go to work on Tuesday. I confess…I’m not sure I’m ready for these new changes. But, I know I will adapt. After all, I am a Skytress magician!

There are many people that are not fans of Friday the 13th. They consider it an unlucky day. Not me. I rather like Friday the 13th. It is usually a very lucky day for me. This past Tuesday the 13th, on the other hand, was not a lucky day at all for me. It was more like other people’s Friday the 13th. Even the lucky penny I found couldn’t reverse the bad luck. Fortunately, my bad luck is your good luck. Yes, brace yourself. Here comes a Rerouted Skytress story….complete with a few reroutes!

Tuesday the 13th reared it ugly head early in the morning. I was heading to the airport at 445am. There was no rain in the forecast. Yet, as I pulled out of the subdivision there it was. Thankfully, the rain wasn’t too bad. It was just bad enough to mess up my hair for the day……..My day that lasted over 24 hours.

I arrived in Atlanta without any issues. Other than my crazy rain hair, that is. I signed in for my trip and went to the room to get my obligatory temperature check. I passed with flying colors. Well, I’m not really sure if there were colors. Especially colors that were flying. But, I didn’t have a temperature. And that was the important thing. No sooner did I sit down in the crew lounge when my phone rang. I knew immediately it was an Atlanta number. More specifically, it was an airline company number. The pleasant gal on the other end identified herself to me. She explained she was from the airline Covid-19 team. As pleasant as she was, I knew what she was about to tell me wasn’t going to be so pleasant. She informed me that someone I may have been in contact with was exhibiting COVID-like symptoms. My stomach did a flip. Then it did a flop. The kind lady then informed me that I was not in prolonged contact with the person. However, I would still need to self-monitor for 14 days. She then stated she would email me information that I may or may not need….. so, I didn’t need to write anything down. I laughed….. because I was already writing things down. I informed the pleasant lady that I had already received my two COVID vaccinations. I wasn’t sure if I was trying to be more positive for her or me by stating this information. I hope she felt better, because I didn’t. No, a very bizarre thing happened instead. I hung up with the woman and started to experience all the COVID -19 symptoms. Well, sort of. Yes, I could still taste and smell. I knew I didn’t have a fever minutes prior to the phone call. Now, I was certain I was feverish with at least 105 degree temperature. Of course, at that moment, I couldn’t remember all the symptoms of COVID. But, I was quite sure I now had them all. Worse yet, I was convinced I would have to quarantine in a hotel at the Atlanta airport for two weeks. Fortunately, I pulled myself together and came to my senses. And just like that the COVID-19 symptoms all went away. Then I received a text from my sister informing me a lady from the airline COVID-19 team had called my house looking for me. My sister’s text brought back the bad memory of my recent phone call. The text did more than that, actually. Amazingly, before I could text my sister back to let her know I spoke with the company team member, ….all of my COVID-19 symptoms came rushing back.

I was once again COVID- free when I had to go brief for my trip. Well, that is, unless being a complete ding-a-ling is a COVID-19 symptom. If this is the case….then I was still exhibiting COVID symptoms. Earlier when I got to the crew lounge I looked up my briefing table number. I wrote the briefing number on my flight rotation. I even circled the number. My crew and I were to brief at table 4. Promptly at briefing time, I went to table 3 and patiently waited for my crew. They never came. I heard two Skytresses at the table next to mine talking about their trip. They were going to the same places as me. Unlike me, however, they were sitting at table 4. Ugh! Tuesday the 13th was definitely making itself known and making me look like an idiot at the same time. After I realized my blunder, I briefed with my crew at briefing table 4 and off we went to fly our easy trip. Did I say “our easy trip”? Yes, I did. Unfortunately, Tuesday the 13th heard me say it, too.

Our flight to New Orleans was bumpy. So bumpy we barely had time to throw our snack bags at the passengers before the Captain had us take our jumpseats. I sat on my Skytress jumpseat and counted the minutes until we were to land in New Orleans. The minutes were quickly adding up. I realized we were taking an awful, awful, awful long time getting to New Orleans. Of course, there was a perfectly good reason why it was taking us so long to get to New Orleans. It was Tuesday the 13th! There were severe thunderstorms storms in The Big Easy. We weren’t going to land in New Orleans. No, we were being diverted to Pensacola.

When the announcement was made for the passengers to deplane in Pensacola, I knew we were entering a pickle stage. When I walked to the front of the plane I realized how bad the pickle was. A severe thunderstorm was hanging over New Orleans. And it wasn’t moving. I was informed by our Captain that their legal duty day limitations were fast approaching. Our pilots were going to time out. They would have to stay in Pensacola to layover. My crew and the passengers were not going to stay in Pensacola. We were going to have to wait for new pilots to deadhead in to Pensacola to fly us to New Orleans. Tuesday the 13th was being relentless. Our cell phones started ringing off the hooks. Oh, boy. The Rerouted Skytress was being rerouted. Reroutes were coming in fast. First we were going to have a long 30-hour Portland, Maine layover. I could instantly tell the Portland layover wasn’t going to be feasible. The computer had us landing in New Orleans hours before our new pilots were to arrive in Pensacola to take us there. When the computer figured out the flight times didn’t match up….we got another reroute. We were going to have a long 30-hour Chicago layover. Thanks to another Tuesday the 13th reroute, we were going to get home 6 hours later than our original scheduled release time on Thursday. This was not good for the commuters on my crew. Unfortunately, I was one of them.

We sat on the airplane for 8 hours watching our 30-hour Chicago layover change multiple times. We were no longer going to Chicago. We were now going to have a long domicile layover in Atlanta and deadhead to Chicago the next day. We would eventually fly the rest of the rerouted trip. Finally, we got word that our new pilots were on their final approach into Pensacola. Of course, the agents wanted to re-board the passengers before the pilots landed. The agents wanted us to be ready to depart as soon as the new pilots arrived on our aircraft. So, of course, we boarded the passengers back onto the airplane. Now, did I mention it was Tuesday the 13th? You guessed it. We waited on the aircraft with all our passengers as the pilots circled Pensacola. Over an hour later we finally pushed back from the gate with our new pilots to go to New Orleans. We pushed back from the gate. We didn’t take off. No that would only happen if it was Friday the 13th. We sat on the tarmac in Pensacola and we waited some more. All the while, our Atlanta domicile layover was getting shorter and shorter.

We were a highly motivated crew when we finally arrived in New Orleans. Our pilots in New Orleans had been waiting at the airport the whole time we were in Pensacola. They were as anxious to get back to Atlanta as we were. We were now scheduled to arrive in Atlanta at 2am. Because it was still Tuesday the 13th in New Orleans….we got a new arrival gate in Atlanta. We would now be parking at a gate on the international concourse. Unfortunately, we all knew the trains to baggage claim would no longer be running that late at night. We, along with our passengers, would have to walk over a mile to get to baggage claim and to the hotel shuttles. Fortunately, the Captain called Atlanta and pleaded for a better arrival gate. I found a lucky penny from Heaven in the gatehouse area while the plane was being fogged. These two things in tandem managed a miracle before we boarded one Atlanta bound passenger. Yes, we were granted our wish for a better gate. Our new arrival gate would be close to baggage claim and the hotel shuttles. Finally, we boarded our plane to head to Atlanta. We pushed back from the gate. And you guessed it….we waited. Our weight and balance numbers needed to be rectified. I kept receiving updated messages on my Skytress phone. Our arrival time in Atlanta kept getting pushed back. We eventually landed in Atlanta at 230am. My crew and I had briefed the day before at 1130am. We were plumb tuckered out. We just wanted to get to our hotel and go to sleep. My Skytress In-Charge called the hotel to make sure the hotel shuttle was still operating. It was. Unfortunately, the hotel shuttle driver was on his break. He couldn’t pick us up until 315am. We were exasperated. Our Skytress In-Charge called the hotel back and requested they pay for our cab ride to the hotel instead. Fortunately, there was still some luck in the lucky penny I found. The hotel manager agreed to pay for our cab. At 330am I walked into my hotel room. That’s when I noticed I had sat on chocolate in the cab on the way to the hotel. It was all over my Skytress uniform pants. I shook my head in disbelief. It was another dose of bad luck….complements of Tuesday the 13th.