I fly commercially about four or fives times a year and always used to try to get on the j/s at some point in the flight, if only just to stretch the ol' legs and have a chin wag with the flight crew.
In the j/s world, a polite note to the Captain accompanied by a photocopy of a flying club airside pass when boarding almost always did the trick.
The most accomodating was a BMed crew on an A320 flight to BEY who invited me up to the FD for take-off and landing, and a Virgin 744 crew who indulged me for landing at EWR.
I must single out one particular visit on a KLM 767 to BEY though. I don't know what was going on up there before I arrived but it seemed to me that the two guys hated each other. They both looked really p*ssed off and were avoiding eye contact. I quickly realised that all wasn't well and after having my few attempts at intelligent conversation rebuffed with half-hearted one word replies I returned to my seat.
But this was an isolated incident. I've been travelling on airliners for years and without exception have encountered people on the FD who seem more than happy to have someone with them who is interested in them, the aircraft and this whole aviating business.
I found that there were few pilots who didn't delight in showing off their big shiny jet and its toys to a lowly PPL. Many of us had our first experience of the pointy end of aviation in the j/s and thankfully most pilots are glad to oblige.
It's small fry after the murder of thousands of innocent civilians, the cost of billions to the world economy and the thousands of job losses to the aviation industry but Osama and his buddies are also resposible for now isolating pilots in the FD, where before 9/11 the diversion of a visting FA, interested pax or wannabe may have passed the time.