Stuff You Think About While Flying Alone

By Jeremiah Wainwright

I’m flying at 5,500 feet.

Think of it, a mile high. I’m even higher than Denver (the town, not the artist). I’m all alone, too.

I know there are people on the ground tracking my every move and if I veered suddenly toward a power plant or something else such as a military base, I’d have company. Of course, I’ve never seen an F-16 up close except at airshows ... nah, maybe not.

Surely there’d be paperwork and a visit from the friendly feds.

Oh look, down below, there are cows. I love cows. They’re delicious. Plus they never complain, even when you tip them over on dark nights.

They make hilarious TV commercials to “Eat mor chikin,” too. I love cows. And ducks. Ducks are hilarious.

Just their name is funny. Every try to hold up a liquor store with a duck?

They’d laugh you out of there. Same with a cow.

By now you’re probably wondering what all this has to do with the subject, which is flying. All I’m saying is, when you’re tooling along at an indicated 128 mph and not really talking to anybody, you have plenty of time to think about stuff.

Like, how come Irish pubs don’t have Mexican beer? Mexican bars have Irish beer. Seems only fair.

Or, how come you have to press one for English? What number do you press to get, say, Swahili? They never tell you.

I just figured out that at an average of $4.50 a gallon, I’m spending $45 an hour to bore holes in the sky. Wonder how much it cost to keep an F-16 airborne for an hour. More than $45, I’ll bet.

I read somewhere that it takes 118 man hours of maintenance for every hour an F-111 flies. Imagine that. My little Cherokee is so reliable she gets two hours of maintenance once a year (if you can call an oil and filter change maintenance) for the thousand hours I fly. Or maybe it’s 10, I forget and I can’t find my logbook.

Hey, there’s another airplane out there. Some sort of Cessna. He doesn’t see me. Hmmm. Looks like another sure kill for the terror of the skies, the “slightly lime green baron,” piloting his rocket-fast Piper through the skies with wild abandon.

Fearing nothing, able to pull up to 1.5 G’s without passing out, an aviator’s aviator, complete with leather jacket, scarf and big watch. (Had to give up the leather helmet and goggles; couldn’t stand the laughing and pointing at the fuel pit No respect for their elders.)

I’ll just sneak up behind him, center my pipper on his tail feathers and ... ohmigod, he’s turning left. Now what? Should I cut inside? I’m losing my situational awareness. He sees me, he’s waving.

Darn. Bet that never happened to the Red Baron.

Man, it’s hot in here. I thought it was supposed to get cooler when you went up. Wonder how high she would go if I just pointed her straight up.

Let’s see ... aaaaahhhhhggggg. Okay, make a note, don’t do that again. Now there’s all the crap from the back seat up here with me, too.

Hey, there’s my logbook, dated 1987. I should update it someday.

Hmmmm, wowowow. Ooohhhmmmm. Make a note, if you open your mouth just right you can make weird sounds when that little window on the left is open. I used to have a  doodad on that window that caused air to flow in but it sucked up a bird once and I never saw it again.

Birds, they should be made to follow the rules like the rest of us. Bet Sullenberger feels that way.

WHAT’S THAT!?

It’s huge, it looks like a hot air balloon and it’s right in my path. Omigod, it’s coming at me, which way do I turn, I’m gonna’ hit it. DAMN!, I hit it.

Kids shouldn’t be allowed to have helium balloons.

Man, this is boring. If I had a Pitts or a P-51 I could go barreling through the sky like a pinwheel, looping and rolling and pulling G’s and impressing the hell out of those people down there. Just a minute, I think I’m getting airsick. Where’s my bag?

I don’t have a bag. Pilots don’t get sick. It’s a rule, I heard. Only passengers get sick.

Maybe that’s why I never have any (passengers). Or, it could be my landings/arrivals.

One good one is luck, two good ones in a row are coincidence, three good ones in a row is a prevarication.

I read that. Now I have to look up prevarication; probably means expert. I’d better head back; don’t want to get caught in the dark.

Man I hated flying in the dark. Only thing keeping me from being an airline pilot.

That and I don’t understand instruments much. But flying in the dark is scary. Everything sounds funny, nothing is where you remembered it and you can’t see a damn thing.

Then, if by some miracle you actually find an airport, you have to land. Never an easy task to begin with but 100 times harder when you can’t see the runway. And who knows what all those colored lights mean?

Let’s see, I have both VORs tuned to my airport, my DVOR is giving me a heading, I have the GPS tuned to my airport’s identifier, there’s a river bed that runs next to it, and a freeway.

“Approach control, can I get a Ôpractice’ DF stear to my airport?” (Silence.) “Hey, wake up. I’m all alone up here.”

“This is the FBO, did you want gas?”

Oh yeah, radios. Something about frequencies. Oh wait, that might be it. Nope, that’s the race track. Over there, that looks like it. Close enough.

“Yo, this here is Piper 25 Bravo, y’all get out of the way cause I’m coming in on a practice emergency.” That should do it.

Let’s see, power back, flaps down, gear down. No wait, the gear is always down, right? Anything else? Maybe it’ll come to me.

Man, that runway is coming at me fast. Wish this thing had airbrakes.

Wonder why that windsock is pointing the same way I’m going? Do they usually do that? (Bump, bang, skip, bounce, bounce some more, skip, bump, bang, bounce ... ) Sheesh! I thought this runway was longer than that. Oh well, back to the house. Look, there’s the airport manager, jumping up and down and waving. Nice of him.

Must be something wrong with his hand, he’s only using one finger.

Nice guy, I’ll bet.

Think I’ll get gas later.