It's A (Freight) Dog's Life
Contributed by: Captain Cargo

Everyone seems to think a pilot leads some sort of glamorous lifestyle jetting round the world and seducing stewardesses in five star hotels, so I think it's about time I put the record straight. Perhaps long haul crews start out like this, but I doubt the novelty lasts - they're permanently jet-lagged. Commuter crews and no-frills airlines types do the same routes, week in and week out, working round tight slots and irritable passengers, with less fuel than they'd really like. As for me, I fly an aeroplane that's older than me, delivering parcels around Europe at night. No stewardesses, not much glamour - unless hanging around an office in Brussels or a portacabin in Cologne listening to a bunch of tired pilots talking rubbish about aeroplanes and drinking plastic coffee out of plastic cups in an effort to stay awake for the next sector is considered an exotic life-style. The aeroplane is dirty, noisy, and hardly ever gets around the routes for a week without breaking down somewhere. The money is good, but my ex-wife gets nearly half of it. Most of the people I work with are hard-core conservatives and think Jeffrey Archer should have won the Booker Prize. They mostly drink too much, always in Irish pubs, of which there is a mysterious profusion round Europe, and weekends away are spent trying to dispose of all their flight pay while amassing expensive hangovers.

Actually, weekends are usually alright; it's the weekdays that are the big problem - trying to sleep while the hotel is going about its normal daytime business, the maids looking for do not disturb signs so they can have a conversation outside the door. There's a guy with a hammer drill stalking me round Europe; he checks into the room next door and drills holes in the bathroom wall. Once in Shannon, Ireland, after a prolonged discussion of the weather outside my door, the housekeepers phoned me up to ask at what time I wouldn't mind being disturbed. I got out of bed, threw on my clothes and stormed down to reception. A guy with buck teeth and a complexion like pizza smiled insincerely at me.

"Can I help you, Sir?", he asked in his best catering school voice.

I threw the Do Not Disturb sign I had ripped from the doorknob on my way out of the room.

"I want a new one of these!" I demanded. "This one's broken." He looked with a puzzled expression at the sign, then saw the rip where I'd torn it from the doorknob, and suggested he could put some Sellotape on it, the expression on his face one of polite amusement.

"No!" I exclaimed, psychotic from lack of sleep ,"You don't understand! This one's broken! It doesn't work!"

He looked confused for a moment, and then smiled and offered me a free cup of coffee. Just to make sure I really was awake. He disappeared and came back with the Assistant Manager.

"What appears to be the problem, Sir", he asked in a broad Dublin accent.

"My Do Not Disturb sign is broken. I hung it on the door, but I keep getting disturbed by the maids."

He laughed nervously and assured me all would be quiet from now on. I'd got back to the room before I realised no-one had asked me my room number. The guy with the hammer drill had turned up. I gave up and went for a walk on the estuary.

Ah, the glamour. We love it really.

Back to Stories Index