In which Aviatrix tries to pry enough excitement for a proper blog entry out of her day.
The unexpected highlight of the day is a piercing fire alarm, complete with strobe lights, to give an un-ignorable warning to deaf as well as hearing hotel guests. I get dressed (lazy pilot still in her skivvies at noon), pick up my purse, containing my pilot licence and wallet, and walk down the stairs with my hands clamped over my ears. I come out in the hotel lobby where the clerks are trying to silence the alarm while holding their hands over their ears. "It's not real," one of them hastens to assure me. It doesn't matter, the noise and light show is. The alarm ceases shortly after I get outside, but I take the opportunity to go across the street for lunch.
I'm scheduled to fly at one-thirty, and I do, but it's a short flight, only 0.9 air time, through a gauntlet of storm clouds, and then I'm released for the day. I chock the aircraft and put the electrical cords away in the nose, confident that we won't need to plug the engines in any more overnight. That's probably guaranteed to make it snow.
Laundry (I didn't do it yesterday when I was supposed to) takes up a couple of hours and the rest of the day goes wherever it is that days go when you're in a northern hotel with a computer and a TV. They have satellite or cable or something so I'm not constrained to just CBC and the Aboriginal People's Television Network. I end up watching a movie on atpn anyway. Or maybe I hit the wrong channel. The schedule channel said it was showing an episode of "Making da Vinci," which I hadn't heard of, but it sounded like a Mythbusters/Junkyard Wars sort of show where they try to build the things in Leonardo da Vinci's drawings. What came on was the last half hour of an American movie about soldiers liberating Kuwait while cracking wise, chewing gum and kicking ass all over Iraq in the first Gulf War. They commandeer Sadaam Hussein's fleet of limousines, enlist the help of locals, and teach them how to fight for what they believe in. Or something. They liberated a whole bunch of women who had been prisoners in Sadaam's stronghold, and gave each of them a gold bar from his cache. Iraqi people (or perhaps they were Kuwaiti) are depicted as extremely strong in this movie, because despite their implied deprivation as prisoners, the women were each able to lift a sizable gold brick with a single outstretched arm, and conceal it carefully in a scarf for the trek to the border. One of the extras at least put on a tight "ugh this is heavy" face as she accepted her gold brick.
The cushion smells like artificial springtime now. I leave it and the aircraft keys at the desk for the am pilot, because I forgot to give it to her before her bedtime, and she'll be gone before I wake up.
8 comments:
Movie sounds like "Three Kings"
Amazing that you could sit through one hour of "Three Kings" and not identify George Clooney :-)
Uh oh! Aviatrix forgot to replace her summary idea title with the actual one... sounds like the thrill of a remote northern post is wearing off juuust a little. (If a place with a chain motel can be said to be remote.)
Perhaps trading shifts would help. Actually being able to fly in the early AM instead of aborting due to TStorms in the afternoon ( or, worse, dark evening ) would be more fun.
We're entering a more typical July weather pattern down here. The humidity jumped up, and I'm facing another week of 'chance of showers and thunderstorms, mostly cloudy" forecast. Oh well. We enjoyed the cool, crisp Canadian airmass for a while. Why aren't you, still? :)
My work partner and I both prefer the mornings, and I suggested we flip a coin. She pleaded for te mornings because she needs more time for her ATP licence and she knows the afternoons get killed by clouds. I relented. I hardly need to worry about time in my logbook anymore. She offered to trade mid month, after she was sure she'd make her required number of hours, but trading shifts is like jumping time zones. Every time you do it, it's hard on the body, so I try not to do it too much. I told her we'd switch over next rotation.
And I recognize the name George Clooney, but he's not someone I'd know to look at. Was he one of the soldiers or one of the locals?
He's the one in the middle.
He must not be your type. Or, like my fave, Harrison Ford, maybe he's just a little too old for you.
Yep, that's the movie. You guys identifying movies that I have caught part of is one of the themes of this blog, isn't it?
In the United Kingdom it doesn't matter that everyone KNOWS that it was a false alarm! Everyone must stay outside in the rain until the fire-brigade has arrived and confirmed all rooms empty (even if that means smashing in the doors of locked rooms) and has officially declared "No Fire"!
Bloody daft, but that is where excessive attention to "Health and Safety" can get you.
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