Superpilot is not trying to 'big himself up', or 'bang on about what a legend' he is. He was just illustrating the very valid point that most other reasonably paid jobs are more stressful and demand a lot more time at work that that of an airline pilot.
As a full-time low-cost airline pilot I'm amazed at how little time I spend at work. When I read posts of pilots complaining about the amount of work they do and the stress I can only imagine they haven't had a proper job in their life.
And redsnail, usually the PAX arrive at the airport about an hour before the crew for a specific flight - at least in airline operations. And you can't compare having to keep up with manual changes, notices to crew, write ASRs etc with the amount of real work that most jobs carry into their home life.
Back on topic. I've only been doing the job for just over a year and I'm sure there's every possibility that my outlook will change. At the moment, however, I love it and can't believe how lucky I am. I have a ridiculous amount of days (and afternoons) off. The flight time limitations just don;t allow to do as mush work as other jobs. I get excited about going to work. Sometimes as I get up at 3.30AM I feel like a kid on Xmas morning (seriously!). Despite the current climate I'm optimistic about the future, different fleets, routes and one day becoming a Captain (admittedly stress levels may rise then). When I'm not doing the fun bits of the job (take off and approach) I'm getting paid for drinking coffee, admiring the view and doing the crosswords (yes, and monitoring systems blah blah).
The vast majority of the old buggers I fly with love it. To quote one recently "Nothing gives me a bigger hard-on than going to work" and another "It's a job like no other really - wouldn't change it for the world." Not to mention all the retired BA Captains on huge pensions that have joined my airline, not always for the reason that they have several ex-wives to support! My father did 35 years at BA and loved it till the end (admittedly things have changed since then).
The money is pretty good, especially considering the time spent at work. Personally I wouldn't go back to a City/IT job if it paid 10 times as much.
Of course there are some negative sides to the job - I won't dwell on those too much as they're already covered in this thread and to be honest they're not a big issue to me.
I'm not saying for a moment that the more negative posts in this thread should be ignored. Indeed they are very valid points written by intelligent people with real advice and insight to give and should be heeded. I'm not denying their accuracy at all. I just think it would be a real shame if people who really would be suited to the job jacked it in because of the skewed (in my opinion) slant of this thread.