There are 10 holidays that NJA pays extra for and many don't mind getting them as work days. If I recall correctly, just about every 7 and 7 ends up with 5 of those holidays on and 5 of them off. Pilots definitely do bid onto different 7 and 7 lines to get days they want off and there are now 3 bid periods per year that give you the opportunity to make the change. There is no sliding on the 7 and 7, but there will be a paid time off program that starts this June I believe, though it will be easier to take them on the other 2 schedules since they won't break up your 7 and 7 to send you out more than once in the week- if the day you needed was day 4, you would have to request days 4 through 7 off and hope they can spare you on all of them. My guess is that quite a few pilots won't bother with the personal days- they will just call in sick like they always did if they need the day off since sick days cannot be rejected by the company like a personal day could.