Hello world!
Sunday, January 21st, 2007Well, here I am! This is my first official foray into the world of “blogging” (post-initial surge of the popularity of blogging, that is). As I divide my time just about equally between school and my office at the airport, I figured it’d be appropriate to start out on Flyblog. I’ve still not even as much as visited myspace.com, and I’m kind of proud of that; it seems to be getting people into trouble as of late. Ah, well. I’m full of flying stories, though, so you’ll get lots of those.
For those of you who don’t already “know” me, my name’s Jonathan. I’m a full-time college senior majoring in the non-aviation field of Economics, and I’m a CFI at my local airport. I’ve amassed about 350 hours or so of dual given and I’ve loved every single one of my flying hours (some more than others). I honestly haven’t a clue how much I’ll update this thing, but I’m going to try my best. Like so many people on this site and lurking out there in cyberspace, my ultimate dream is to be an airline pilot. I’ve always wanted to do it and it’s looking more possible by the day. I know the pay’s not what it used to be and neither is the glamour (let’s face it, those cool leather jackets just don’t do what they used to), but honestly that’s not why I’m in it. I love flying, and I love the logistics of moving people, not humans, and so the airlines are where I want to go.
I hope some of my airline-career-aspiring students will read this blog, as will any strangers that are thinking about it. I decided to write this blog to share my flying experiences with the world, and to provide reassurance and support to any self-doubters. I know a great deal of you are probably worried about “making it” as an aviator. Trust me–if I can do it, you can do it. I constantly worry about the Part 121 carrier job market in the next two years, scraping together enough multi time to get my application in the door, and cramming for the ATP written. I know that a lot of you have probably heard some very negative things said about the aviation industry, flying for a job, and just airline flying in general. I know firsthand how discouraging that talk can be–I was really affected by it (and a really, really flat learning plateau I hit during training for my commercial certificate), for sure, and just about took another path. It took the reassurance of several different professional pilots about how WONDERFUL they found the job to really get me going again. I’m eternally grateful to them, and I hope I can provide a little inspiration to anyone who may need it. I’m always available for an e-mail with any questions or comments; go easy on me, though, I’m new at this!