by Joe Thomas
Fasten Your Seat Belts
And Eat Your Fucking Nuts
Joe Thomas
Copyright © 2016 Joe Thomas
All rights reserved.
Distributed by Smashwords
Book layout by www.ebooklaunch.com
I dedicate this book to my husband, Matt.
Without you, I’d be single!
This book is filled with a lot of inappropriate shit. You have been disclaimed.
Contents
Welcome Aboard Letter
The Flight Attendant Personality Guide
1. Fear Is Not An Option
2. Fat Boy|Skinny Airplane
3. The Bunk Bed Life
4. Reserve (Not For Me)
5. The Crazy Bacardi Lady
6. The Undercover Dick Pilot
7. I Hate Commuting
8. The F-Bomb
9. Divert To Harrisburg
10. When Flight Attendants Attack!
11. Inflight Boyfriends
12. Airline Passenger Insanity
13. Kids Are Assholes
14. Sandy: The Strange Artichoke Lady
15. Operation: Tomato Ass
16. Smoking Shenanigans
17. No Hustler For You
18. Bad Things Happen When You Fly Standby
19. With Love, From Mother Russia
20. Blow Job Confessions
Acknowledgements
About This So Called Author
Endnotes
Welcome Aboard Letter!
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome aboard.
If you are reading this, I have successfully finished this book. Thank Madonna, the Material Girl. Writing this book has been the hardest thing I have ever done and I am pleased that it is finally over.
Let me confess something before I say another word. You are bound to find out sooner or later in the pages that follow; I am an atheist. Which means I don’t believe in God. I also don’t believe in: Satan, cockrings, angels, The Tooth Fairy, Voldemort, cilantro, anal without lube, The Easter Bunny, and finally—make sure the kids have left the room—Santa Claus. A few of you probably just slammed this book shut or threw your iPad against the wall. Things only get worse from this point forward so man up. If I was writing a children’s book I would have called it, Fasten Your Car Seats & Stop Fucking Crying! With that said, I am not a soulless monster who believes in nothing. Oh, I believe. I believe in Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone. And that’s why I referred to her as The Material Girl. I don’t want to confuse anyone into thinking I was talking about Jesus’ mom. I refuse to thank a woman who goes around lying to everyone about being a virgin and then pops out a kid nine months later in a manger. Seriously? A manger? Get a fucking hotel room. It’s Bethlehem in the year 0, not Gaza in 2015. Personally, I feel way more comfortable thanking a woman who rolls around on the floor singing about being a virgin than one who knocks on stranger’s doors in the middle of the night demanding a place to stay professing to be a virgin.
The fact that you are reading this book means more to me than you can ever imagine. My nipples are rock solid. I’m seriously that fucking happy. Unless you downloaded it illegally. In that case I will hunt you down and demand $30.00. That shouldn’t be the actual price of this book. I hate to say it but if you paid that much you obviously know nothing about the value of money.
I never set out to write a book. The idea that it’s actually happened makes me laugh. Why? Because I can barely speak without stumbling over every other word. And I hate to admit it but I am easily distracted. A Catholic priest at an all-boy’s summer camp has an easier time focusing than I do. My husband is notorious for stopping me mid-sentence as I attempt to recant a story and politely remind me, “Use your words, Joe.” It’s true. Vocabulary and sentence structure are about as foreign to me as dicks are to lesbians.
Then why write a book? Why put myself out there for the world to judge? The answer is quite simple: I am an extrovert who loves to make people laugh. I enjoy telling stories and putting on stand up comedy routines for all my friends. If you’ve ever experienced one of my storytellings, you understand. I seek applause and approval at every turn. I’m the definition of a true attention whore. And let’s be honest, I am a gay man. If there’s one thing I’m more comfortable with than discrimination, it’s being judged. Gay men are judged every single time they place a dick in their mouth. Sadly, I am not judged as often as some of my gay friends. I thank marriage equality for that cockblock.
When I became a flight attendant I gave up my deepest passion, acting in community theatre. Did you think I was going to say something dirty? I bet you did. No worries. There’s enough cock and ball talk in this book to last you a few weeks. Community theatre was the equivalent to a drug addiction. The praise. The cheering. The behind the stage shenanigans. The drunken after parties at the local Chili’s. The articles written up in the newspaper in regards to my fabulous acting skills. The Best Lead Actor award I received for my portrayal of George Hay in Moon Over Buffalo. The thrill intoxicated me each time the curtain lifted. Unfortunately, taking on the role of full time flight attendant forced me to retire from acting on stage. Lucky for me, I still had the opportunity to stretch my acting muscle daily. The flight attendant role is truly the most challenging role I have ever encountered. Each and every time we step onto the airplane we are depicting a character. Seriously, I hate to disappoint you but we act the fuck out of that role. Enough dramatics that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences would struggle producing enough golden statuettes for all of us, and that’s even without nominating any black flight attendants. We are constantly acting through a rollercoaster of emotions. Bad mood? Still required to smile. Going through a divorce? Nobody cares. Your cat got squashed under a car 10 minutes before you left for the airport? Who gives a fuck? The fat bitch in 5C wants her third Diet Coke. You know, because she’s on a diet.
It never ends.
Becoming a flight attendant preoccupied me enough that I almost forgot how elated acting made me feel. I’d simply stand up in the airplane during each flight and imagine I was performing. The airline even provided us with a handy announcement script to follow verbatim. This tricked me into believing I was in front of an audience who actually paid to see me perform instead of an audience filled with rude motherfuckers who only paid to see how fast I could pour a cup of coffee during turbulence. As days turned into weeks, and eventually months, I noticed my creative muscle begin to wilt.
Ï fell into a depression. My husband Matt picked up on it quickly. A few months after I started the job we were eating dinner at the dining room table when he asked, “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“I miss the theatre. I didn’t realize how important it was to me.”
He responded before I took my next bite, “Why don’t you start blogging? You could write and be creative that way.”
“A blog? Really? I barely read any books, I don’t think I could write.”
“Of course you can. You can do anything you set your mind to. You do love to express yourself.”
“This is true. I love to Madonna myself.” I took a bite and finished it, “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”
He grabbed my arm from across the table, “Let me help you,” he smiled, “this will be good for you.”
And that’s how it all began.
It wasn’t all TMZ and Huffington Post popularity for my blog. Quite the opposite; it was tragic. Nobody read my shit. Nobody! During the early years, my blog was lucky enough to see 200 other human beings visit in a year. It got to the point where I’d place the laptop on the sofa next to the cats and open i
t up to a blog page just so another living creature looked at the site instead of me. Sad? Pathetic? I agree. But is it pathetic enough to get you to buy this book again? My bank account hopes so.
My blog, at that time given the name The Joe Show, was more of an online journal. I had no ads, no connections, no audience. Correction: I had an audience that consisted of Matt, his mother, and me. The three of us… and the cats. That was it, and I wrote my fucking ass off. I wrote every single day. I wrote about boring layovers in Milwaukee. I wrote about religion. I wrote about politics. I wrote about topics that I should have left to the professionals. I even wrote about roast beast.
I’m just making sure you were paying attention.
Why not give up? Why continue torturing my soul this way? All I had to do was quit social media and my life would get easier. Right? Wrong. Although I did think about giving it up on a weekly basis, I didn’t quit. I questioned myself as to why I continued this charade. What the hell was wrong with people? They’d watch drunk assholes on MTV but wouldn’t give my shit a second glance over. The bitterness struck me like spending an afternoon sucking on a big fat lemon.
I even bitched to Matt about it, “Why the hell won’t people visit my blog? This post about the DoubleTree beds is fucking hilarious. I don’t get it. And the cookies. Don’t people care about the warm fucking cookies?”
“Why did you start blogging? Who do you write for?”
He made me think for a brief second. He always does that, “I write for myself.”
“Then why are you getting upset? Just continue what you are doing. You love to write. You do it all the time. Just write for yourself.”
The best advice anyone has ever passed along to me. I’ll say this about my husband, he may not know how to drive but he sure can steer me in the right direction. Side note—when he reads that I will have hell to pay.
My readership drought lasted until I happened to write a blog post instructing passengers how to order a drink on the airplane. It was on that day that The Joe Show was reborn as Flight Attendant Joe. Once I straddled the flight attendant wave of writing, I rode it like a long, hard surfboard.
You thought I was going to say cock? You dirty bitches. This actually pleases me. You will do just fine for the remainder of this book.
After the post about ordering drinks went viral—it really did, I still can’t believe it—I wrote one on tips for carry on luggage and another one about flying standby on buddy passes. I created a section in the blog where I shared situations that occurred on my flights and called it Flight Attendant Stories. Once I collected enough flight attendant stories I decided it was time to write a book. Which brings us to this exact moment where I’m ready to share it with the world. If you end up loving this book, I love you for having a sense of humor. If you end up hating this book, you most likely have a redwood tree branch stuck up your ass so, honestly, I’m not too concerned about your opinion.
For legal reasons, most names, years, flight attendant bases, flight destinations, and some sexes have been altered to protect the privacy of all individuals involved in this book. These are true accounts of a flight attendant’s life and I have attempted to retell these stories to the best of my ability and memory. With that said, some may also be wine induced fantasies and/or dreams. At this point—who fucking knows.
Now please, place your tray tables and seat backs in the up and locked position. Stow all your carry on items under the seat in front of you and for the sake of every flight attendant on this insane planet… fasten your seat belts and eat your fucking nuts!
P.S. One more important thing before I forget. Anyone reading this book who happens to find themselves on a train with Amy Poehler or Tina Fey PLEASE drop this book in their lap. I don’t care which one you give it to first. I’m not picky. I worship them both equally. Here’s a tip: if they are traveling together, just throw it in the air and let them fight over it. Thanks in advance!
Sincerely,
Flight Attendant Joe
The Flight Attendant Personality Guide
The Passive-Aggressive: Doesn’t like the flight attendants, pilots, or passengers they are flying with but lies about their feelings. “I’m fine. Nothing’s wrong,” while hurling bags of nuts through the air at the lady sitting in the window seat.
The Whore: Has three kids with three different fathers and brags about it on the jumpseat. Lives for hook ups while on layovers and thinks it’s an honor to be grabbed like a six pack by random strangers at the local biker bar.
The Straight Guy: Really?
The Old Bitch: This lady worked the inaugural Pan Am Clipper flight in 1934 and requires a wheelchair to complete her security checks. Sadly, the bitch won’t fucking retire and allow anyone to move up a spot in seniority.
The Sweet Guy: Always willing to lend a hand—and a mouth—when a passenger or pilot requires his service.
The Cougar: You might fuck her but not without copious amounts of alcohol. She likes hanging out at the hotel bar with the young first officers and refuses to buy her own drinks. Rumor has it that having sex with her is like throwing a suitcase in the cargo hold of an airplane.
The Ex-Cop: Starts all conversations with, "I got this. I was a cop." Unfortunately, nobody gives a damn.
The Fattie: Can't fasten their jumpseat harness during take offs and landings but has no problem stuffing their face silly with leftover first class meals.
The Wimp: Is afraid of any type of confrontation. A toddler strapped in a car seat would win a boxing match with this guy.
The Unkept One: Ring around the collar is the last thing this guy should worry about. His shirt’s wrinkled, hair disheveled, and has stained pants but stands in the back galley complaining that the material the airline uses for the flight attendant uniforms makes him look “messy”.
The Slightly By The Book: She walks throughout the airplane correcting everyone else. Where they should put this, when they should do that, and all while explaining to anyone who will listen why she’s the best flight attendant in the Milky Way. Then she turns around and does whatever the fuck she wants.
The Pilot's Wife: She's hot, skinny, sexy, and you want to stab her in the labia with a hot poker.
The Anti-Airline: Hates everything about the airline. The airline gave him a $1,000 bonus and he complained about paying the taxes on it.
The Christian: Preaches about God to you, the other flight attendants, and the pilots—but that’s never enough. Once the safety demonstration is completed, this Christian psycho is on the interphone preaching to the passengers like she’s Mike Huckabee.
The Biological Clock: This chick demands to hold every newborn on the flight, even if the mother or gay dad doesn’t require assistance. TSA checks her bags upon leaving the airport for undead babies and/or fertilized eggs harvested from a sleeping passenger’s uterus. She’s been known to pump air from her breast into bottles for the hell of it.
The Cat Lady: She’s got more pictures of pussy on her phone than a butch lesbian.
The Blogger: Reminds you in the crew briefing that they have a blog and if you act stupid—you'll surely end up a guest star on it.
The Transgender: Wears the female flight attendant uniform but has an Adam’s apple the size of a lemon. When she sits down on the jumpseat you don’t know if she’s got big balls or if she’s smuggling prepackaged sandwiches off the flight.
The Flaming Homosexual: This queen’s fire could light up the night sky. The planet Jupiter can see him from 365 million miles away. He prances around the airplane to the point where passengers hit their call bells questioning why they smell smoke.
The Reporter: Reminds you constantly about the other flight attendants they have reported throughout the years. The first time they say, “I had to report her…” you jot down their flight attendant number and avoid them for the rest of your career.
The Drama Queen: This flight attendant wants to divert for any possible reason, no matter how ridiculous. The passenger in 11A has
a headache and she starts prepping the airplane for an emergency landing.
The Bisexual Nuyorican: During the flight he talks to you about his wife and beautiful children. He even shows you pictures. When you land at JFK he offers you a ride home and then—SURPRISE—he pulls out his uncut dick and offers it up to you like a cheese blintz in the airport food court.
The Couple: Not always love at 38,000 feet. These two met at the airline and they do everything together. They live together, fly together, and constantly fight on the airplane together. You pray they get terminated together.
The Future Pilot: This guy is training to become a pilot and wants everyone to know about it. He tells his fellow flight attendants, the gate agents, the pilots, the passengers, the van driver, the hotel front desk clerk, and even wakes up the sleeping homeless guy outside the hotel to tell him. That’s all fine. The annoying part is when he tries explaining to you a play-by-play of what he thinks the pilots are doing in the flight deck during the entire flight.
The Alcoholic: This flight attendant has gone through drug rehab more times than Lindsey Lohan. While working a flight they get randomly tested for alcohol and it comes back positive. The last thing you hear them yelling as security walks them out is, “No! I’m sober. I had ribs last night. It was the Jim Beam Barbecue Sauce.”
The Thief: Carries two suitcases when they fly. One for their clothes—one for stolen goods to sell on Craigslist.
The New Hire: This newbie has been with the airline for 20 minutes and is already complaining about their schedule. TWENTY FUCKING MINUTES!
The Ex-Management: Follows all the rules perfectly for the first week they are back on the airplane—after that that they don't give two fucks what happens.
The Comedian: Patiently awaits the day that an employee from human resources meets their flight and removes them from duty for telling one too many dick jokes on the airplane.
The Announcer: You can't keep this flight attendant off the interphone. They have confused the front galley of the airplane for a Saturday Night Live stage. Sadly, they are not funny and you wish you could eject them down the emergency evacuation slide into shark infested waters.
