From frank@CS.Cornell.EDU Wed Jan 7 17:47:27 1998 Status: RO X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["4873" "Wed" "7" "January" "1998" "17:46:37" "-0500" "Frank Adelstein" "frank@cs.cornell.edu" nil "238" "East Hill Flying Club Cheese Shop" "^Resent-From:" nil nil "1" nil nil nil nil] nil) Received: from SIMON.CS.CORNELL.EDU by wheat.tc.cornell.edu with SMTP id AA01547 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for ); Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:47:21 -0500 Received: from cloyd.cs.cornell.edu (CLOYD.CS.CORNELL.EDU [128.84.227.15]) by simon.cs.cornell.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5/R-1.8) with ESMTP id RAA00871 for ; Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:47:20 -0500 (EST) Received: from rocky.cs.cornell.edu (ROCKY.CS.CORNELL.EDU [128.84.254.183]) by cloyd.cs.cornell.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5/M-1.9) with ESMTP id RAA16497 for ; Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:47:19 -0500 (EST) Received: (from frank@localhost) by rocky.cs.cornell.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5/C-1.2) id RAA07562 for frank@dri.cornell.edu; Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:47:16 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199801072246.RAA07557@rocky.cs.cornell.edu> Resent-From: Frank Adelstein Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:47:16 -0500 (EST) Resent-Message-Id: <199801072247.RAA07562@rocky.cs.cornell.edu> Resent-To: frank@DRI.cornell.edu From: Frank Adelstein To: Tom Fine , Mowgli Assor , Pierce Krouse , Lisa Henn , "David St. George" , "Linda S. Folley" , David Stern , Ron Babuka , frank@CS.Cornell.EDU Subject: East Hill Flying Club Cheese Shop Date: Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:46:37 -0500 (EST) (Inspired by the Monty Python skit and my conversation with Stick this morning. If I can't fly, then I sit in front of a computer and write odd little messages. This is the result.) ------------------------- "Good Morning." "Good morning, Sir. Welcome to the East Hill Flying Club Emporium." "Ah, thank you, my good man." "What can I do for you, Sir?" "Well, I was, uh, sitting in the public library at Cornell just now, skimming through "Rogue Herrys" by Hugh Walpole, and I suddenly came over all flighty." "Flighty, sir?" "'Slip the surly bounds of Earth, and danced the skies on laughter- silvered wings.'" "Huh?" "I want to FLY!" "Ah, fly." "In a nutshell. And I thought to myself, "a little soiree in a self-contained, internal combustion driven craft held aloft by pressure differentials created by the Bernoulli Principle of laminar flow of air across an airfoil will do the trick," so I curtailed my Walpoling activities, sallied forth, and infiltrated your place of purveyance to negotiate the vending of some Hobbs Time." "Come again?" "I want to FLY!" "Oh. I thought you were complaining about the Country/Western music." "Oh, heaven forbid: I am one who delights in all manifestations of the Terpsichorean muse!" "Sorry?" "That there's sure some purty tunes, a-hyup!" "So I can keep the tape on?" "Most certainly. Now then, a plane please, my good man." "Certainly, sir. What would you like?" "How about 6230Q, the Cessna 152." "I'm afraid it's still in its new engine break-in period. It should be flyable on Monday." "Oh, never mind. How about 3006V, the Cessna 150?" "I'm afraid it doesn't have any pitot heat in it." "Tish tish. No matter. Well, stout yeoman, 68148, the other 152 looks to be airworthy?" "Normally, sir, yes. Today the field is IFR, so you'd have to go with one of our IFR rated planes." "How about the 74655, the Grumman Tiger?" "A fine plane. Great IFR platform." "Fine. You mean to say it's not down for maintenance?" "Well...yes. It has no altimeter." "No altimeter? Could I legally fly in actual without an altimeter?" "No, sir." "You...do HAVE some planes, don't you?" "Of course, sir. This is a flying club, sir. We've got--" "No no... don't tell me. I'm keen to guess." "Fair enough." "Uhhhhh, Stick." "Yes?" "Ah, well, I'll take a simple stick and rudder plane." "Oh! I thought you were talking to me, sir. 'Stick,' that's my name." "66230, the Cessna Skyhawk." "Ah! We do have the Skyhawk, yes sir." "You do! Excellent." "Yes sir. The attitude indicator, it's..ah,....it's a bit wobbly." "Oh, I like it wobbly." "Well,.. It's very wobbly, actually, sir." "No matter. I like flying partial panel. Fetch hither the Hawk of the Sky!" "I...think it's a bit wobblier than you'll like it, sir." "I don't care how fucking wobbly it is. Hand it over with all speed." "Ooooooohhh.......! "What now?" "Folley's taken it." "Has he." "She, sir." "There is 747CF, the Mooney." "It's a high-performance/complex plane. I'm not checked out on it." "Well, the glideslope doesn't work on it anyway." "No glideslope. Might you have anything with GPS?" "No." "RNAV." "No." "Flight Director." "Um, not as such." "EFIS." "No." "INS." "No." "DME." "Not today, sir." "VOR." "We don't have much call for it around here sir." "Not much ca-- It's the single most popular instrument in the world!" "Not around here, sir." "And what IS the most popular instrument around here?" "ADF" "IS it." "Oh, yes, it's staggeringly popular in this manor, squire." "Is it." "It's our number one best seller of planes, sir." "I see. Uh...ADF, eh?" "Right, sir." "All right. Okay. 'Have you got any?' he asked, expecting the answer 'no.'" "I'll have a look, sir... ...nnnnnnnnno." "It's not much of a flying club, is it?" "Finest in the district!" "Explain the logic underlying that conclusion, please." "Well, it's so clean, sir!" "It's certainly uncontaminated by the exhaust fumes from running airplanes." "You haven't asked me about the Champ, sir." "Would it be worth it? "Could be...." "Have you-- SHUT THAT BLOODY HICK MUSIC OFF!" "Told you sir...." "Have you got a Champ." "Yes, but it's up on skis and all the snow has melted." "Figures. Predictable, really, I suppose. It was an act of purest optimism to have posed the question in the first place. Tell me:" "Yes sir?" "Have you in fact got any planes here that can fly at all." "Yes, sir." "Really?" "No. Not really, sir." "You haven't." "No sir. Not even a paper one. I was deliberately wasting your time, sir." "Well I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to shoot you." "Right-o, sir." "What a senseless waste of human life."