I was working the third flight of our day and was really tired. It was a long day, and I hadn't slept well the night before. I still had some adrenalyn going and thought I was fairly functional.
A passenger asked about his connection. He was worried that he'd miss his next flight.
I double-checked the departure time of his connecting flight. We were getting in on time and he had almost two hours to make his flight. He still seemed nervous.
I checked the gate we were arriving into and the gate his connection was leaving from. They weren't far apart. He was still worried.
I noted our arrival gate on the map of DFW in the back of our inflight magazine, and drew an arrow to where that was on the map. I wrote down his departing gate and drew an arrow on the map. Then explained he could either walk, or take the Skylink train around the airport. I was pretty proud of myself for getting through all of these steps and was thinking the coffee was still working pretty well.
A woman in front of the man said in an exasperated voice: "There's a time change in Dallas!!"
Oh, right. I see where she's coming from. This happens a lot. People are thinking they have no time to connect but don't realize the time change going westward (in the U.S, of course) buys them some extra time.
So I said: "Oh, right, thank you.", to the woman, then explained to the man that it was an hour earlier in Dallas so he had more time than he realized.
I looked at my watch and told him the time.
The woman said (Very Loudly and Very Angrily): "That's the wrong time!!!!"
I was confused. I looked at my watch. I looked at my phone. I looked back at my watch. I looked at my phone. I looked back at my watch....you get the idea.
I absolutely could not figure out what time it was. My phone wasn't connected to the internet so I knew it was still on east coast time...but my watch wasn't the standard one hour earlier. I could not seem to process what was going on.
The woman said the time REALLY LOUDLY, and acted like I was trying to give this guy misinformation. She was all aggravation and heavy sighs and told me 'You need to get your information right.'
I finally realized that I'd changed my watch when we were in Portland for personal travel the weekend before this trip. This explained the bigger-than-seemed-right difference between the phone time and what my watch said. "Yeah...sorry. I was in Portland and changed my watch.", I tried to explain to the man. (And to the butt-insky woman.)
He smiled. She gave an annoyed snort.
I couldn't really blame her. (Okay...I did seriously blame her, but probably shouldn't have.)
It's often hard to tell the difference between sleep deprivation and symptoms of a serious concussion. I've learned this over and over, both from observing tired passengers and from my own personal research on the subject.
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I try not to schedule anything social on days I've worked, but life will
I remember this one couple that Michael really wanted to get to know. We'd been trying to work out a time to get together but they could only get together on a day I was coming in from a long trip.
I agreed I'd go...but really shouldn't have.
I didn't say anything about having worked since long before the sun came up that day...and the two days previous and was exhausted, but really should have.
I should just own up to the fact that I am barely able to stand upright. It would probably save me looking like a complete idiot. But I tend to think it will put a damper on things. People feel bad for me, or feel like they need to make an early night of it. (Yes, please, oh please!) Anyway, I usually say nothing about being tired.
This couple really wanted to talk about politics. That's not something I want to discuss with strangers anyhow, but I gamely tried to add my two cents worth. Unfortunately, I think I momentarily fell asleep mid-sentence and couldn't remember for the life of me what I'd been about to say. My brain just went: "Poof! I'm out of here." The couple said nothing, but as the evening wore on it seemed pretty clear they thought I was the slobbering mental-patient-wife that poor Michael had to endure. (lol/ugh)
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| A man napping? Or a facepalm move from the dumb things he did in his tired state? Hard to say. |
Sadly, more than once, I've realized that I was rude to people I actually like.
Turns out that being alert is helpful in social situations. You need some brainpower to realize you're hitting a nerve with a conversation, to pick up on subtle social cues, or think to introduce people who don't know each other.
Usually it's not until I've had a good night's sleep that I realize what I missed in the moment.
I should probably keep an 'Out To Lunch' sign handy to hang around my neck for just such emergencies.
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