"You know, you snore pretty bad. I haven't had enough rest to make it through the day,
even if I didn't have to work, which is not the case as I am due to check into
flight operations in an hour and a half." she said. "But at least
I'll be getting away from you, you noisy guy, and now with that said,
(snicker)...how’s a cup of coffee sound?"
"Yeah, thanks." I said as I started to sit up in bed but felt
as though I'd been hit on both sides of my head by two baseball bats
simultaneously, as I fell back onto the pillow, which actually felt like
concrete. "Wow, what in heck did I
drink to get this screwed up again?" I asked, my
eyes closed to shut out the blinding light of day.
"You possibly won't believe
it, but you were the absolute life of the party...right up to around ten thirty
at which time you chose to pass out cold. Too bad, too, as you really are a
good tap dancer, you know. Everybody thought so." She said. "Tap dancer?"
I asked, my voice indicating my surprise. "You mean to tell me you didn't
know you could tap dance.? Come on now!" She said
with a genuine tone of disbelief to her voice, but when I opened my eyes she
saw in them the truth of the matter. "Hell, sweetheart, I can't dance at
all, never could, honest...scouts honor." I said in all honesty.
"Well sorry to disagree, Houlihan, baby, but you
not only can tap dance, you can do it on a small coffee table, and get this,
from table to table." She said and then left the room to get me a cup of
coffee. "Everyone in the lounge were thoroughly impressed with your talents at
dancing." She said with a laugh as she handed me the coffee cup.
***********************
Though "Aviator" is at
the very bottom of the list, it is in correct order in relationship to it's value in comparison to the other nine prerequisites
required of this uniquely complicated job. I am quite aware that any uninformed
observer would find this fact difficult to believe. However, with each successive trip I learned
that flying the airplane was more like "frosting on the cake" as compared
with the other nine elements. Any single one of these could be considered the
delineating specialty of one individual's professional expertise. Pulling all
of these needs from under ones hat would not have been impossible had Orville
managed to locate Clark Kent
and con him into taking on the job. As it was I felt reasonably qualified in
only four out of the ten requirements, so with 60% of the required equation
missing the logical conclusion to point of failure was simply a factor of
"time" I realized now. In my
state of frustration and anger over having to deal with another miserable
example of a man without scruples, Aleppo's airport commandant, I gave the guy
his ransom money in travelers checks, and in my haste to be done with the
transaction and out of there, I forgot to put my signature on them. He had
wanted green backs but when he saw the boldly printed words, "American
Express" printed on the checks he conceded to accept them in payment
without another word. By the time we had completed our pre-taxi checklist and
were already moving toward the departure end of the runway for takeoff a
troubling thought flashed through my brain; I hadn't signed those damned
travelers checks. In mulling this over for a few seconds I decided to keep
going. Surely he'd forge my signature or
his banker would, so there wasn't really a problem, I rationalized. After performing our pre-takeoff checklist and receiving clearance
from the tower to taxi into position for takeoff I proceded
to do so. Once in position to go the tower cleared us and we immediately
applied maximum power and started accelerating quite rapidly along the roller
coaster runway. The plane was reasonably light with no cabin load though we did
have sixty six thousand pounds of fuel aboard. Cresting hill number two Gunther, serving as first officer, called out, "Tad,
there's a jeep heading out toward the runway on that mid-field taxiway! Do you
see it?" "Yeah, I see him. It's the commandants
jeep I think." I said. "Looks like he's going to
cross the fucking runway, Tad." Gunther said, heavy concern hanging on his
words. "Give me an airspeed reading!" I called out loudly. "One hundred five." Gunther
answered immediately. "If the bastard stops on the runway we're going to
use flaps to hop over him, so be ready to give me thirty degrees if I call for
flaps! You got that, Gunther?"
I asked and he answered with a "roger". As we accelerated down hill number two I
noticed the airspeed needle moving toward 115 and realized then we'd probably
need that boost from the flaps by the time we climbed to the crest of hill
three. Then, hurdling toward the crest of the hill Gunther
yelled out, "That fucker’s parked in the middle of the fucking runway,
Tad. Airspeed 112 and falling!" He yelled
excitedly. “We're OK Gunther, just be ready with
flaps the instant I call for em', OK!?" I said
in a tone without the fear I was feeling. We were about two hundred feet from
the jeep when I yelled, "flaps thirty
degrees!" There, parked right in the middle of the runway, standing up in
his jeep and facing us with his arms straight up, as if commanding us to stop
instantly, was that nutty bugger. As the flaps were extending I pulled back on
the control column and the old bird lifted nice and gracefully up and over the
frantically waving commandant of Aleppo
aerodrome, Syria. "I wonder if we blew that crazy fucker
out of his goddamned jeep, Tad?" Gunther asked, still indicating his high state of
excitement. "I don't know, Gunther, and I'm not going to circle back around to find
out, but I do hope we never have to come back to this place...or anywhere in Syria,
for that matter. They've got Russian MIG fighters in their Air Force, and we
may end up on their hit list before this incident is over." I said as I
lowered the nose of the old girl and raced for the Medi
