Day 2. Again.


by Berck

Well, they cleared our drug tests a little more expeditiously than last time, so we were able to get started around 9am this morning. The long shuttle ride is annoying, but as long as I manage to sneak by without a roommate, I can tolerate the accommodations.

It looks like we’ll have the same instructor. The class is pretty much the same as before, with slight changes because of the slightly different aircraft and technically different airline. I’m excited about flying the brand new CRJ-900’s, which are well equipped since Delta bought them, not Mesa. The class is going to be a week shorter, and it looks like simulator training should be right after ground training, because they’re going to need us in JFK. They’ve got 4 CRJ’s, and are supposed to be getting 1 or 2 a month for the rest of the year. It looks like there’s been quite a few cancellations recently on the basis of Mesa not having enough pilots, at least in the United and US Airways systems. This may result in management feeling the squeeze enough to get a union contract through quickly that’s good enough to keep pilots from leaving. We’ll see.

Anyway, it looks like lunch break is over, so it’s back to class for another few hours.

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Mexican Gyros!


by Berck

Todd’s school is right down the street, so he came by and we walked around this area of Mesa, which I’ve come to call Little Mexico. We walked into the sleaziest, cheapest looking taqueria on the block. The two proprietors were the only people in there. There was some meat product rotating on an autodoner in the window. Todd ordered a burrito and two carne asada tacos. The woman at the register nodded, but continued playing with receipts and money. The guy in an apron walked off, but returned a few moments later and returned to stand at the counter. I could only read about half the menu since they’d propped various things in front of it. “What is best?” I asked. The guy shrugged and pointed at the woman counting. I repeated the question, and she said, “Al Pastor,” and returned to her rummaging. After about 5 minutes of Todd and I standing there, Todd ordered again. “Dos tacos al pastor, y dos tacos carne asada,” he tried. “Si, si!” and the guy started carving at the meat product. The woman at the register muttered, and continued playing with receipts and $1 bills. I ordered dos tacos al pastor as well, and asked for a Coca. I didn’t see any in the glass case, but thought maybe I’d try. He produced a can of Diet Coke. I asked for aqua, he shrugged and pointed in the general vicinity of a doorway into the neighboring establishment, an ice cream shop. Two people, who appeared to be customers, sat at a table. No one was in there. I stood there for awhile, the guy in the apron walked in, walked around, and walked back. I gave up and sat down with Todd and ate two amazing tacos al pastor, with some great salsa and fresh taco makings at a little salad bar.

After that, we wandered into the Mexican grocery store, which is just as Mexican as the Chinese place was next to the other hotel. I bought a Boing! drink, which was like orange soda, but not carbonated. Todd got some weird looking Mexican candy (even if the Mexicans aren’t as advanced in candy technology as the Asians) and an Arizona Sweet Tea. We perused a music store, with Todd finally purchasing a couple of mandolin strings. Then we went for a short, aimless drive with the top down because the weather was so amazingly nice. We came back, picked up Todd’s car, and drove into Phoenix and ate Greek gyros with his girlfriend. Actually, I got a souvlaki pita, I think their real gyros were probably better, but it was good. The Greek place was showing scantily clad Arab women in Arabic music videos on some strange TV channel, with phone numbers to call in and vote for every middle eastern country. Todd and I decided the whole thing was very strange, and Todd said he was waiting for a bearded guy to jump in the screen and blow them up for being indecently exposed.

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Day 1. Again.


by Berck

I rode the mesa shuttle half an hour to the new training center down at Williams Gateway Airport where the new training center is this morning. I shouldn’t have been surprised that the initial conversation with the training department went something like this…

“What are you guys here for?”

“Uhm. We were hoping you could tell us.”

It seems that we’re going to go through initial training again, but this time it’s a bit different. It’ll be Freedom Airlines training, specifically on the CRJ-900. This is good, because the CRJ-900 is a little simpler than the 200, which which is what we were going to do our checkride in.

This is a brand-new thing, something they’ve never done before. Previously, Freedom CRJ folks have gone through Mesa training, then some sort of differences training. Unfortunately it’s going to be the same instructor we had last time. Not that he’s a bad guy, just that it would have been nice to have a fresh perspective.

Today, they didn’t have much for us to do. They gave us another drug test, then has us full out all kinds of paperwork we’d already filled out. It turns out they’re running another background check on us. I can’t wait until they have the same disastrous difficulty with the National Driver Register, and I have to get my driving record from two states again.

Then they sent us home. Sort of. The shuttle took about an hour to show up to take us back, but it’s not like we had much of anything else to do in Phoenix.

It looks like I’ll be here 5 weeks. 3 weeks of ground school, then cockpit systems integration, an oral exam, and simulator training. And then I’ll go fly in New York. Woohoo.

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In Phoenix again


by Berck

Or, more correctly, Mesa, AZ. I’m headed to class in just a few minutes, and so I hope I know more about what’s going on soon. The drive down was uneventful and not unpleasant. I made it in 11.5 hours including stops. I was surprised to see the amount of snow on the ground even in Arizona–also surprised that it was reasonably mountainous terrain the whole way. I’m supposed to have a roommate this time around, but he hasn’t showed up yet.

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