Aviation for Women is the flagship member publication of Women in Aviation International. Articles feature women who have made aviation history, professional development ideas, and current-topic articles.
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42 Aviation forWomen S E P T E M B E R / O C T O B E R 2 0 1 6 seems to be in the line of fire. (Luckily black is very forgiv- ing.) But while the necessary speed of our meals is not ter- ribly healthy, it is not nearly as popular of a topic as the food itself. Just what is it that we are eating anyway? For years now I have been obsessing about what I do or do not put into my mouth, with varying levels of success in terms of health, weight, and self-recrim- ination. While I am at home I am con- scientious about cooking healthfully, reading labels, and using plenty of veg- etables and whole grains. Once I am out on a trip, however, eating with any kind of awareness is a challenge of truly epic proportions. It is not unusual for me to eat breakfast twice and miss lunch, or judge when I can hit the crew room for a nap based on when I can eat. Every day the schedule is perused and assessed for eating opportunities. Which terminal will we be in and how long do we have between flights? Are they feeding us on this leg? I will even admit to being curious about whether I think more about food than an adolescent thinks about sex. That can't be good. The way I see it, there are several schools of thought about how I eat on the road. There is the Backpacker, the Scav- enger, and the Opportunist. Clearly, I am primarily an Op- portunist. Give me an opportunity to eat and I won't let you down! I am likely to have a snack or two in my bags, and def- initely some kind of Luna bar in case breakfast—heaven for- bid—is not either soon or free. If there is a free breakfast at the hotel I will happily give up 10 minutes of sleep to go eat faux eggs and canned fruit, and heaven forbid that I miss a manager's reception! Every now and then I resolve to improve my habits and start packing food again. Being a Backpacker is much more health- ful than being an Opportunist—lots more fruit and veggies, and a lot less airplane food. But then you get to play the logis- tics game of how to pack successfully. What is shelf-stable? Which hotels have a fridge and/or a microwave? Will I have to deal with eating all of my fruit before hitting customs? What can I pack that I will actually want to eat three days from now, assuming that it hasn't been squashed, spoiled, or otherwise lost my trust? When it works, Backpacking is great. You feel good about your choices and yourself. When your cockpit bud- dy is eating cheese ravioli you can be confident that your apples and nuts were a far healthier choice—even though the pasta smells really good and your apple looks like a mugging victim. The last possibility is to scavenge. This usually occurs when I have been way too busy to think about food, and have to make do with whatever I can find as time permits. This results in my weirdest food combinations (think beef jerky and gummy fruit snacks), and generally nothing healthy at all. If I didn't have the opportunity to buy a $9 turkey sand- wich in the terminal, I am left with the choice of whatever is left on the plane. Peanuts, pretzels, snack boxes. As snack box- es on planes often have the same salt content as your average deer lick, combating hunger with one of these is offset by the more or less instant bloat and regret. Scavenging is an option of last resort, but it is not as bad as it used to be. Luckily as the traveling public has gotten more health- conscious, the options available to crew members have defi- nitely improved. Regardless of how you personally describe your on-the-road eating habits, as the airlines respond to a greater demand for healthy food options we all do have a greater opportunity to make positive choices. Not that I always make those choices—salad can easily be followed by Cheez-Its. Gradually I am finding a balance be- tween planning my meals and packing them, and may soon even have to develop a fourth category of eating pattern: Sensible. Now if I could only avoid contaminating my tie… ✈ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Devan A. Norris, WAI 13890, is an avid observer of people, and has had many wonderful opportunities to both watch and inter- act with them in her current roles: as a first officer for a major airline on the 737, and as an apprentice air show air boss. She and her husband live in a fly-in community in Florida, where they are proud airplane parents of an L8 named Sylvia. M ore than once I have heard that a pilot in uniform could never starve. If all a pilot has is her necktie and some hot water, she could make a very substantial—if rather unpleasant— soup by soaking the tie. This idea would probably be less gross if there wasn't some truth to it. Many of us eat a ridiculous number of meals off of our laps and that darn tie always TAKEOFF TAKEOUT I N T H E P U S H D E V A N A . N O R R I S Snack boxes on planes often have the same salt content as your average deer lick.