DISCLAIMER: This folly does not meet DOT impact resistance guidelines. Not suitable for electrical or grease fires. WARNING: This folly contains tedious descriptions of flying and flying stuff. (Pilots should reference watch bezel E6B for technical corrections.)
Day 1:
Same trip as last week with a different day 1. Same Capt. Same morning. Get ready in the dark. Trip over sharp loud things on my way out the door. My car makes passive-aggressive overtures toward reconciliation. Moist anemic “gosh you’re excited Grampa” breath seethes out of the vents. Automotive equivalent of a weak side hand job. If I were common-law married to this thing, it would SO be getting tickets to Springer.
Plane’s on D9. Hop the train. Stand in line at Starbucks behind a very heavy set African-American woman doing things to a pair of spandex shorts that are expressly prohibited by the Geneva Convention.
Her fro is sticking straight out the back of her head a good 14 inches a-la Mercury. She doesn’t look terribly fleet of foot, maybe she’s strong in the water. Looks like she’s smuggling pairs of avocadoes behind each knee.
Her family is waiting for her. The mom (who’s got to be 70) is decked out head to toe in purple woodland camo complete with boonie hat. Only it’s a Nauru jacket (in purple camo) and long G-shorts down to her ankles (in purple camo). Defensive bright pink flip flops to distract predators from more vital areas. Smart.
A boy, maybe 4 and his mother come by. He’s yelling “BOP BOP BOP BOP!” and snaking back and forth through the retractable people maze trying to knock over the poles with his head. She doesn’t stop him right away. Doesn’t seem to notice right away. It sort of seeps in and she gives him a distracted little Jedi wave like, “You don’t want to act like an asshole.” Surprisingly, the boy calms somewhat. Impressive.
“I will not fail” is etched into the lines of her face. Not angry or impatient. Just tired. One foot in front of the other. The end is out there. Her will to endure is inspiring.
It inspires the single to never ever have kids. Inspires the toddler entwined to do a better job presenting good life choices when the teaching opportunity arrives for them. Inspires those of us spit out the far side of the Tasmanian Space Monkey phase to buy her a beer and tie the kid’s leash to a chair. Give him a spork. Pour some sugar in the carpet. Good for hours.
Takes me a while to get my coffee. Supposed to be iced. Hot instead. I get ice and do it myself. The boy is now screaming the same atonal short burst of anger over and over. A klaxon for the end of the world. His mom has made it across the hall to the bathroom.
The kid is completely horizontal. The last I see of him are 8 tiny fingers clinging to the promise of life against white tile.
See the Capt. on the plane. The kissey zits are almost gone. He recounts a Friday afternoon of beer and Best Buy. Bought an iPod touch. (I think he’s convinced I’m playing like the funnest game ever because writing these on my phone is just slightly faster than if I were whittling them.) He also bought a PS3 and a surround system. Slipped and spent 2 grand. No big deal.
The lead FA wants me. Tells me how cute I am. Asks if I’m married. Where I live. Rubs my back. Tells me all the cute guys are taken. Shows me pictures of her grandkids. They’re in high school now.
Still got it.
Fly to Chicago. On the jetway I make funny with a couple happy to be off the plane. I tell them to go double or nothing on the ride back to <<HOME>>.
“As long as we don’t have to sit near that boy again.”
‘What boy?’
“You didn’t hear him? He screamed the whole way. He spit on the man next to him.”
Yep. Same kid from the coffee line. I muss his hair and give him a “Hey slugger” as he comes by. Other passengers radiate low grade hostility. Look at me like I’ve drawn swastikas all over me. Maybe they’re backward. I can never remember which way they’re supposed to go.
Day 2:
Waking up at 0430 is an automatic process. My higher functions take a while to warm up. (Blinking in unison, the cognitive prowess to not drown in the shower, etc.) Maybe 4 neurons in my limbic brain strung in series are running the whole show. So if I don’t keep it simple, fuse goes pop, and they’ll find me sitting naked, spread-eagle in the bathroom trying to dig gum out of the bottom of the trash can.
So early morning shows get the same ritual treatment every time. Clean up the night before. Throw all my trash away so I can see any evidence I shouldn’t leave behind. Lay out socks shirt and underwear so I can find them by grope. Set my phone for a wakeup 45 minutes from the van. Get a hotel backup for 40 minutes from the van.
Tie is in my hat. Show time is written on the key. Do not disturb sign is hanging inside on the privacy latch to remind me not to forget my food in the fridge. Tip dollars for the van driver are in the right front pants pocket. If I had mittens, they would be safety-pinned to my sleeves. This methodology applies well to flying. The more you do it the same, the more it should stick out when you fuck up.
At the plane, the windshield is bug covered. <<My Airplane>> has escape windows. Ropes pull out of the ceiling. The idea is you’d rappel down the side. Never mind the 500 degree heated probes on both sides of the plane, or the fact that once you swing out, you’re trying to rappel down a hot dog 20 feet off the ground, or that we have never practiced this maneuver. What could possibly go wrong?
The window is great for cleaning the front windshield though. Kids get a kick out if this. I pop the window and haul myself out. Sit on the sill. Dump water on the windshield and wipe it clean with C-folds. Wave to a couple kids in the terminal. They jump up and down and point.
Capt. decides to clean his as well. Takes a different tack. Pops his window. Reaches out and around and splashes the windshield with club soda. Turns on his wiper. Sprays all over my clean side. Doesn’t clean shit. Nice work.
Aloft, FA calls up and says someone got sick in back. I tell the Capt. his flying sucks and is making people puke. We both look at the autopilot.
After landing, in the terminal bathroom, a kid comes in. His abrupt stop as he stares in wonder, sparks in my peripheral vision. “Oooohhhhh Auto Soap!” “Hey Russell! Dad, DAD! Come look! Auto soap! Auto soap. Auto soap Auto soap Auto soap!” I zip up and back out slowly without making eye contact.
The Capt.’s friend picks us up again in SAN. They have big plans. The lack of invitation saves me from my “I gave up hookers for Arbor Day” speech.
Go across the street to the mall to shop for my son’s 4th birthday. Got him a 22lb. bulk lot of Legos off eBay. Need a side dish. Buy more Legos. The target sells surf boards and Danica Patrick toys. Feels like a foreign country.
Day 3:
See the Capt. in the lobby. He mumbles a lot, but I get something about Tijuana, tacos, split open toe, washing the wound with salt (??) Girls in the afternoon, tequila shots, yadda yadda yadda. It’s only cute when I do it. I recount my mall experience with such eloquence and verve I can tell he’s jealous.
We take the van to the airport. The driver says “Damn it’s good to get out of that place for a few minutes…….Yeah…” And nothing else. After 5 seconds of silence, the topic is over-ripe so I decide to hold onto the shit I was going to give and get back to my current job, staring out the window. Trying to get it all done before we get to the airport.
Stop at La Salsa for an infant-sized burrito. At the plane, the inbound crew is still hanging around. Starboard engine burned 7 quarts of oil. Oil is dripping from the bottom of the nacelle and spreading in a shiny pool on the ramp.
This is when not being a Captain really pays off. I don’t have to coordinate with SOC or MX Control or call dispatch. I go look because I’m curious and then settle in for some not giving a fuck until more information comes in.
MX shows up about a half hour later. They open all the cowlings. A crowd gathers at the widows. They can’t find the leak. Want us to run it. A Continental 737 ingested a mechanic about 3 years ago doing the same thing. Sure. Why not.
We get clearance from ground. Start it up. Idles for about 10 minutes. Bigger crowd at the window. I open my window and lean out to watch. The guy with the headset looks up at me, points at the engine and makes swirly motions with his hands. He shrugs. I wonder if the faces in the window are as reassured by this as I am. Shut it off.
They can’t find the leak because it’s not leaking anymore. Fill it up. 18 quarts. Tell us to keep an eye on it.
—?—
The engine is using 8X as much oil as normal and is leaking out the bottom. You can’t find the leak so let’s just fill ‘er up, fly 1800 miles and see what happens? I love this plan. Here, hold my beer a sec.
We load up and push for MKE. FA wants to come up somewhere over Colorado. Tells us the Lead FA is an idiot. Apparently the lead was disappointed she couldn’t sit up front for the arrival into San Diego. She really wanted to see the bridge. – The Golden Gate Bridge-. Capt. tops that with a tale of once telling the back end that the flight from the east coast to DEN was over-water. This is a 5 minute addition to the boarding PA on how to evacuate in the ocean. They did the whole thing.
The right engine is still leaking oil. About 2 quarts an hour by my stick. Everything else looks normal. Just losing oil. We debate the merits of giving SOC time to prepare a solution, or just telling them when we get there.
If we spring it on them in MKE, we might get re-crewed. Get home earlier, but likely we’ll have to deadhead to New York tomorrow and complete the rotation. Or worse, a complete crew on the hook for 36 hours with nothing to do. Decide that presenting for scheduling is likely to result in a “no means yes” mandatory ass raping. Send an ACARS message to SOC so they can get ready to do that voodoo they don’t do so well.
We lose a total of 7 quarts. When we park, I poke my head out. Oil is spreading wet on the Tarmac. They down the plane. We wait an hour and a half for a replacement.
At the hotel in New York, the Capt. and I embed in the gazebo by the pool. I learn a bit more. He is in fact younger than me. He was married only once. For 6 months.
A cute blonde FA and her friend join us. They tell FA stories. We tell pilot stories. What fun. About 0100 we decide the prudent thing to do is go to Joey’s Place. The van takes us. No Jack. Disappointed. Brought my camera this time. By 0230 food is becoming a necessary precaution. Nothing is open except the Buccaneer Diner. We call the van. The diner also has a bar. The waitress recommends 4 PMFs (Purple Mother Fuckers).
There has never been a more aptly named drink. Tastes like grape cough syrup, motor oil and Everclear. We eat a lot. I can’t finish my Mother Fucker. One of the FAs calls me a pussy and shoots it back. Van gets us back to the hotel by 0400.
Day 4:
Wake up around 1100. Don’t leave till 1700. Steven Segal is in the gym again. Inbound is late so we don’t leave for the airport until 1745. When we get to the airport, the plane’s not due in till 1845.
Oh LaGuardia, let me count the ways you suck. It is overcast. Not raining or storming. Just clouds. The inbound flight had to hold for 40 minutes. There are almost 50 planes waiting to take off when we push. Takes us 15 minutes just to exit the ramp. Takes another hour to get to the runway.
The taxiways are asphalt (fittingly antique for the first commercial airport in America) so the plane sinks into the hot tar every time we stop. 40% power on one engine won’t move the plane, so we have to gun it. (We don’t start #2 until just before reaching the runway to save gas. Even on 1 engine, we burn about 75 gallons an hour for taxi.) Every plane is shaking every other plane trying to get going. Controller land arrivals on the crossing runway and with the bad weather spacing restrictions, takeoffs happen half as often as normal.
The Whitestone departure procedure off runway 13 is a pain in the ass. At 400 feet, turn right to heading 180. At 2.5 miles from the airport, turn left heading 040 do not exceed 210 knots until you roll out on that heading. Climb to 5000. Don’t exceed 250 knots until 11000′. Fly north (the wrong way) to Canada. Turning south takes almost 15 minutes. Step climbs a thousand feet at a time for 25 minutes until we are almost over DC.
Our Jet Blue jumpseater has apparently eaten a dead cat’s ass before joining us. I offer him gum, usually a fairly subtle and innocuous way to hint that maybe your breath is malodorous death. “Oh no thanks.” A stinky cherry to top the shit-sundae that is always LGA on day 4.
– end of line.