first major crossroads, already?

TXaviator

TXaviator

Well-Known Member
okay soooo, first season of the mapping gig is up. option to return in the fall.

here's my decision:

im about 800TT/25ME

summer job, dj'ing is on the table... not great money, not bad. not enough to pay student loans really. go back to the mapping gig in the fall. live on the road some more, fly a beat up cessna back and forth all day. live the 'dream'.

OR

fulltime job at a medium/large company specializing in music content creation for retail, entertainment, dining, etc. getting paid to keep up with "whats cool" and develop music and visual branding. good money. **BENNIES** health/dental/expenses/etc. live in austin with friends, and a place i generally LOVE. potentially do this job a year, or two, or until whenever and the industry un-screws itself a bit. keep current flying for recreation/fun.

thoughts?

yes, im prepared for the typical "YOU UNGRATEFUL LITTLE JERK. YOU HAVE A FLYING JOB YOU HAVE TO PAY YOUR DUES BLAH BLAH"

im sure someone will even tell me to go be a CFI....

any serious thoughts or experiences are welcome :-)
 
I'm almost thinking you should do the full time gig. It sounds like that is better on all accounts (except for the fact you won't be flying full time).

It sounds like you don't want to, but you could try to fit in being a CFI on the nights/weekends. Not so much for the pay, but just to keep yourself current/build up a few hours. I would try to shoot for paying as little as possible.
 
Can you take "option B" and still compete in Akro?

That'd be a good compromise in my book...
 
TXaviator said:
fulltime job at a medium/large company specializing in music content creation for retail, entertainment, dining, etc. getting paid to keep up with "whats cool" and develop music and visual branding. good money. **BENNIES** health/dental/expenses/etc. live in austin with friends, and a place i generally LOVE. potentially do this job a year, or two, or until whenever and the industry un-screws itself a bit. keep current flying for recreation/fun.

thoughts?
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This.

Do this. For a number of reasons.

You know Austin, right? Your quality of life can be very good here in that kind of job, because the networking opportunities that come with it will amply support your flying habits AND your social life. Music-related marketing gigs are highly sought-after in this town, so I say grab it. I have a close friend who has probably the BEST nightlife-related marketing gig on earth, and he's in the perfect city for it. Yep, it's Austin.

One of the reasons I decided not to become a professional pilot is that I don't want the love of flying to ever become a job, because all jobs, no matter how cool, have a degree of drudgery. Once I wrapped my head around that notion as being the right thing for me, it actually made the downside of my actual job more tolerable, because I knew it was a means to an end to fund my real passions, which are flying and playing music.

Like you said, the industry is screwed up right now, so there's no reason why you can't actually enjoy your life, doing things you like and staying current. And with a full time gig, you will have options galore. Fly for fun, study for CFI, don't fly and take a trip to Big Bend with friends. Hop on a flight to NY to party. Buy yourself a new car. Doesn't matter what you do - but it does matter that you have options. Options = freedom.

Besides, I need a safety pilot down here because I gotta log some serious XC hood time. You've been nominated. We can talk about it later. :D
 
Take the music company gig and convince the boss that he can't live without a company plane. This time next year you're flying high in the company Pilatus.
 
TXaviator said:
okay soooo, first season of the mapping gig is up. option to return in the fall.

here's my decision:

im about 800TT/25ME

summer job, dj'ing is on the table... not great money, not bad. not enough to pay student loans really. go back to the mapping gig in the fall. live on the road some more, fly a beat up cessna back and forth all day. live the 'dream'.

OR

fulltime job at a medium/large company specializing in music content creation for retail, entertainment, dining, etc. getting paid to keep up with "whats cool" and develop music and visual branding. good money. **BENNIES** health/dental/expenses/etc. live in austin with friends, and a place i generally LOVE. potentially do this job a year, or two, or until whenever and the industry un-screws itself a bit. keep current flying for recreation/fun.

thoughts?

yes, im prepared for the typical "YOU UNGRATEFUL LITTLE JERK. YOU HAVE A FLYING JOB YOU HAVE TO PAY YOUR DUES BLAH BLAH"

im sure someone will even tell me to go be a CFI....

any serious thoughts or experiences are welcome :-)
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What sounds best to you? Me, I'd live vicariously. You're 26, not much older than me, screw having a real job, do something cool, DJ for a little while then go back to mapping. Just my $.02.
 
im actually surprised. i expected to hear everyone say "eat the s#!t sandwich and keep the flying job"

but... maybe everyone just wants another job opening?

@ppragman well... really i dont know which one is "better"...one is flying, but for pretty crappy QOL and marginally acceptable pay. the other is not flying, but one of my other passions (music, entertainment), and i wouldnt have to "live vicariously" since i could be partying whenever i wanted instead of eating that s#!t sandwich just to fly a clapped out cessna...

@killbilly & @polar .... well, if i was in austin and this job goes for my offer, i could actually probably 1) fly more acro with more disposable income and 2) be avail to fly safety pilot any time you want.... so....win win?

i just didnt think id be ready to consider "not flying for a living" so soon...

i still think you dudes are trying to snake my job :-p
 
SpiraMirabilis said:
How old are you? Do you have a family to support?
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26, single, no children, no ex wives.

plan to keep it that way.


i guess the only toss up here is that i pretty equally enjoy flying planes, and enjoy nightlife and entertainment industry.... not just 'getting F'ed up' but actually running nightclubs, business, and the back end stuff. its fun. and always challenging and never repetitive...
 
If you're planning on getting out of the flying until it picks up, 800 hours may leave you in the same position when you're trying to get back in.
 
TXaviator said:
im actually surprised. i expected to hear everyone say "eat the s#!t sandwich and keep the flying job"

but... maybe everyone just wants another job opening?

@ppragman well... really i dont know which one is "better"...one is flying, but for pretty crappy QOL and marginally acceptable pay. the other is not flying, but one of my other passions (music, entertainment), and i wouldnt have to "live vicariously" since i could be partying whenever i wanted instead of eating that s#!t sandwich just to fly a clapped out cessna...

@killbilly & @polar .... well, if i was in austin and this job goes for my offer, i could actually probably 1) fly more acro with more disposable income and 2) be avail to fly safety pilot any time you want.... so....win win?

i just didnt think id be ready to consider "not flying for a living" so soon...

i still think you dudes are trying to snake my job :-p
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If I had another passion that would allow me money, a good quality of life and enough disposable income to fly on the side......well, I'd be all up on it. who knows, you might be the dude with the new Extra or Sukohi or whatever the "it" machine is that everyone envies.

I flew a big Embraer jet down to SAT one day as we were punching holes in the sky prior to certification. Since we weren't a scheduled operation, we parked on the FBO's ramp. I was down talking to the line guy, and a Christian Eagle taxied by. The lineguy said "I'll bet he wishes he was flying this thing". To which I replied, "Ain't that funny.... I wish I was flying that..."
 
TXaviator said:
fulltime job at a medium/large company specializing in music content creation for retail, entertainment, dining, etc. getting paid to keep up with "whats cool" and develop music and visual branding. good money. **BENNIES** health/dental/expenses/etc. live in austin with friends, and a place i generally LOVE. potentially do this job a year, or two, or until whenever and the industry un-screws itself a bit. keep current flying for recreation/fun.
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Do that.

im sure someone will even tell me to go be a CFI....
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And do that. If you can instruct a little on the side and have 135 mins when the industry turns around you can jump back into it and get a decent job. Not only that, but you will not have to jump at the first crappy offer you get. You will be in a position to wait until you get a good offer.

Alex.
 
so, i had a pretty similar situational conundrum...

end of last year i was on a 135 flight, last one of the day, full boat of five and two stops away from four days off. landed at my first stop with three roofers and two contractors and customs enforcement is there to pick up my noticably new to the area roofer passengers... they see the "man" waiting for me to taxi up to the terminal and ask me to "keep going, man!" to which i replied "sorry guys, you know i cant do that... so, after about 100th of a second to think about it, i decided to park in the T tie downs a couple of hundred feet away, considering it was definitely in the best interest of my passengers and being on-demand i am supposed to park where the customer wants to get off, wherever that may be... long story short, my company canned me. now, Ive got about enough time to move to a twin and while i was fired i definitely didn't break any law or reg (or written policy) but im out a job and pretty pissed. so i decided to go with another passion for a little while, went an got my cfi and now with everything pretty much back to normal in my life, living where i love it, decent job and a great summer coming up... but im packin it all up and heading to AK for some real flying. In the end for me there just isnt a substitute for being in the air, the adventure and exitement of it is just too awesome, but im also pretty used to being a transient pilot kind of guy and its what i want, no matter the money(for now.)
I hope this helps a little bit, My advice is if you really think that you will be content on the ground most of the time then do it, you can always fly on the weekend, but it just wasnt cutting it for me, not that i had a job on the ground that i liked as much as you are talking about option b.
 
I'm a sucker for flying, even if its "beat up old cessna's" doing aerial mapping...

Although, why not take the marketing job, do some instructing or aerobatics on the weekends, and ride out the crappy economy? You can always quit when a better flying job comes up, right?

Me personally, Id do the summer DJ gig and go back to the mapping job lol
 
Thanks for the perspectives and experiences everyone! Still have some time before I have to make a decision... Oh and while I completely understand the reasoning for saying I should get my cfi that's just not something I am going to do and I would be doing a student a real disservice if I had to teach them....
 
TXaviator said:
Thanks for the perspectives and experiences everyone! Still have some time before I have to make a decision... Oh and while I completely understand the reasoning for saying I should get my cfi that's just not something I am going to do and I would be doing a student a real disservice if I had to teach them....
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i say give the other job a whirl. you are only 26 and if you don't like it in a few years flying will still be there, even in old beat up cessnas. you may end up really liking it, or absolutely hating it (because it is more of a hobby or something), but you won't know unless you try. and i would think if you have the opportunity now, why not? you may regret not doing it someday. good luck
 
BuickCFI said:
i say give the other job a whirl. you are only 26 and if you don't like it in a few years flying will still be there, even in old beat up cessnas. you may end up really liking it, or absolutely hating it (because it is more of a hobby or something), but you won't know unless you try. and i would think if you have the opportunity now, why not? you may regret not doing it someday. good luck
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well right, i guess its just hard to consider walking away from a job flying, when i put so much time effort and frustration into getting a job flying. :-)

if flying jobs werent so hard to come by, i dont think id nearly have the dilemma about walking away from it. ya know?
 
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