Mysteries of the Universe

My report time this morning was 5:20 am. I got to work at 5:15. Take off eventually happened at 9:29.

Most of that delay was weather. But while we were waiting for the weather other excitement occurred. Mystery One occurred when we couldn't find the keys to the nose baggage door, but didn't allow that to cause a delay, just stole a set from maintenance. They weren't in yet, and it's not really theft if you send e-mail to say you've done it.. I also couldn't find a funnel, to add oil, but that's not a mystery. People keep throwing out my funnels because i make them out of old oil bottles. Mystery Two is that my Swiss army knife, which I would have used to improvise a new funnel, seems to have gone missing last time I had to check it on the airlines. I hope it's just in the bottom of a bag somewhere. I poured the oil carefully down the dipstick, didn't spill any. Mystery Three was the location of the back-up emergency checklist. It's just a company thing that we have an extra, and not mandated in any of our manuals or regulations, so we resolved to find it later, and started engines without it.

Mystery Four is why the airport was so strangely deserted, and we got to take off with no waiting. This was 9:30 in the morning, not the originally planned 6:20.

We landed at a different airport than was filed in the flight plan, which seemed to confuse the FSS specialist whom I called to close the plan. "That's what we do," I said in a tone that implied I was saying something helpful. Maybe it was because the airport we landed at was in more or less the opposite direction from the filed one. But that is what we do. It was 29 degrees on the ground, and potable water was not available at the airport. None of that is mysterious.

The second flight went well. I called a tower controller to cut through a control zone that hadn't been on the original plan. He assigned me a squawk code and cleared me through quite efficiently. Another aircraft called up right behind us to go sightseeing in the control zone. "Not without a code!" said the controller sternly. The pilot ummed for a bit and then asked if the controller could assign him a code. The controller did. So why did I get one automatically, but the guy behind me had to beg? That is a mystery. I think I'm up to five.

Mystery six is how we landed at home base six p.m. but I didn't get out of the damn office until eight. Does it really take two hours to disembark, get fuelled, tow the airplane in, do the paperwork, send a couple of e-mails, check that the lights are off and the doors locked, set the alarm and leave? I guess there was answering the phone--a call from the bank for someone who went home hours ago. At 7:30 pm? I think someone at the bank got time zones mixed up.

On the way home I decided I wanted Mexican food, but knew there wasn't much in the fridge. Looking for a grocery store to get cilantro and tomatoes I found a Mexican cafe I didn't know existed. I ordered beans and rice for take out. I get it home and they are GREEN beans. Is that a mystery?