Your actions now may effect your opportunity later! Beware!

mrivc211

Well-Known Member
A point that Doug and other guys have brought up countless times in the past is the issue of being responsible at an early age. Despite not knowing what you want to do in life, someday, something that you did while you were growing up, may effect you 10 years down the line.

Specifically, drinking alcohol!
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I recently had an opportunity to experience this issue during a 4 day training class for the airline I work for. Before I left for the training, many people back at my station told me that its a boring 8 hour lecture and then you get to party the rest of the night with fellow classmates.

This was the trap that was to be set forth for me well in advance.

Upon arriving to SLC I was greeted to 10 degree weather
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and snow to my knees. When I left my departure point, it was a comfortable 85
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degrees. So I guess you could say going for a walk was out of the question.

Sure enough, after the first day of class was over, a bunch of the younger people in the class decided to go out for drinks and dinner. I decided for a quieter night and had lunch with a pleasant girl from Casper, South Dakota. It was interesting to meet someone that was so different.
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The second night I could not venture out in the cold so I made a trip to the local Wendy's and almost threw up the tasteless burger that I had bought. There went my Atkins diet and the 20 pounds I had lost!

Finally, the third and final night! After the class was over, once again the younger people in the class decided to go out. I thought, what the heck. How often am I in SLC anyways! So we went out and got a bite to eat, then decided to have a few drinks. Funny thing is in SLC, I guess you have to be part of the club/bar's membership in order to purchase alcohol. So we had to join for a modest $5. No problem, I'm used to paying a $20 cover charge in Orange County where I'm from. So in we went. I bought the first round of drinks. I usually can have about 3 drinks before I start to feel a buzz going.

All the mean while I never really thought of this as being a fine line of danger that lurk ahead!
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Well, the next round was decided to be a pitcher of beer split between four people. So there went one beer. Then came the dancing. Of course, all the pretty girls all of a sudden seem prettier, and they all want to dance and get frisky when the time is wrong. (Where were all these girls back in Orange County?)

So while this is all going on, a few more drinks are consumed. Soon I begin to realize that I'm having too much fun, and its mainly the alcohol making me have the fun.

I sit down, look at my watch! It's 11:30pm. How many drinks have I had? 4......maybe 5. I'm definetly got alcohol in my system, and enough to make me WANT to get up and dance. Thats saying I've had a little too much to drink.

So while I sit there and stare at the dance floor, I see the countless number of pilots on the news getting busted for drinking the night before their flights(and I'm not even flying for the company yet!) , and I think to myself, is this how I'm going to let it happen? Am I this weak? Don't you know what your getting yourself into?

And then it hit me! Like a brick wall. Get up, get out, and go back to the hotel room and go to sleep before you do something stupid and waste the past 4 years of your life and perhaps the next 35.

I then excused myself, and with great opposition retired for the night. The next morning i awoke feeling fine. I must have saved myself from partying too much. While sitting in the company van to go tot he last day of training, in came the people from last night. All looking hung over and wasted. And before I got in the van I noticed a man sitting in the back corner, by himself, minding his own business. It didn't occur to me that this van was for company employees only. I had thought that he was just hitching a ride or something.

Anyways, after a long ride to the training center, many of the previous nights escapades came blurting out with many bursts of laughter among the trainees. Some good, some bad. When we arrived at the training center, the man who was sitting in the back of the van walked into our training room and introduced himself as the instructor for that day. He also mentioned that he was the regional manager for all training and new hires.
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This wasn't exactly someone you wanted to give a bad impression too. As soon as he walked through the door, I knew who he was. I knew he had to have been someone that would come back and bite us in the rear.

Luckily for me, I had chosen to retire for the night.
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And in doing so, I saved the bad first impression of me that he would have had. Not to mention risking losing my job that I worked very hard to get. This was my ticket in the door job, the only way that I could open the back door and slip in.

In essence, it taught me a lesson. I'm sure most of you have heard it many times before. But most importantly, it showed me a little taste of what it can be like to be away from home and not have the ball and chain on my foot!

Be careful guys, you never know what your getting yourself into!
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Yup, good advice - I'd probably be one of the hung over guys in the back, gotta start working on cutting back before I get a flying job.
 
Fantastic real world advice, Omar.

And yes, that's exactly how some people get in trouble because when the alcohol-induced fun grows, judgement and common sense take a siesta.
 
Mrivc211, I may have missed it - who are you flying for? Feel free to PM me if you don't want to post it here.
 
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