Patti O'Shea's Blog

Adventures can happen in the oddest places at the oddest times. Yesterday I had one when I least expected it.

I was supposed to go to SET training yesterday, but a half an hour before it started, I was told to go to Part 145 Mod 1 training instead. I know, the names don’t mean anything to you, but it helps keep them straight as I talk. SET training was 45 minutes, Part 145 Mod 1 is 4 hours.

This changes also required me to mentally shift my schedule for the day. Not my favorite thing because I’m not a real fan of spur of the moment anything. I like time to plan, and although this is far cry from say, hopping on a plane and flying to Singapore, it’s still a disruption to my mental organization and I don’t like this. I always end up feeling frazzled as my mind tries to adjust to the new plan.

The Part 145 Mod 1 training is in a training room above Hangar 4. This is an area of the building that I’m unfamiliar with because I never go over there. Keep in mind that lining the hallways are rooms to clean airplane parts, shops that fix parts, boxes with parts, and all the other equipment needed to fix airplanes. When I say the training room is over hangar 4, I mean it is directly over hangar 4, so I’m in the maintenance operation area.

I’ll skip all the training stuff, including the fact that I nearly got bumped out of the room, and get to my inadvertent adventure.

We get a break and I seek out a restroom. I went down the hallway by the training room, but there’s just more training rooms. I go down the stairs and to my left. I find the men’s room, but that doesn’t help me. Someone finally points me the other direction and tells me it’s down by the garage door (remember, I’m in the hangars area.)

I thought I missed it. I walked and walked and walked and there are multiple “garage doors” all over this place. I was thinking I was going to have to ask someone for help, when I finally spotted it. Whew! It’s actually a fairly large bathroom with those round fountain type sinks like you sometimes see in grade schools. I wash and dry my hands, put some lotion on, and leave to head back to class.

I stop short just outside the door. This doesn’t look right. Which way do I go?

I study the area, trying to figure out which way to turn. This really looks unfamiliar. In fact, it doesn’t even look like a hallway, it looks like a hangar. How can I come in from the hallway, and when I leave, it’s a hangar?

The light bulb goes on. There must be two doors!

I turn around and go back in the bathroom. Sure enough, there are two doors. I go out the other one, the one I would have known to use if I’d 1) been paying attention when I walked in. That side of the bathroom was much different than the opposite side. 2) wasn’t completely directionally challenged. 3) wasn’t already feeling a bit frazzled about being late getting back to class because of how far the restroom was from the training room.

This time I am in the hallway, but I still have to figure out which way to go. Yes, I am that directionally challenged and the other items in the previous paragraph apply here, too. I chose left. I had a 50/50 shot and I was right! Woot!

Of course, I still needed help finding my way back to the main hallway after class, but that’s another story.