Nothing Beats the Real Thing- by ISTP

[. ._]

Every Sudbury moon-crater pothole shook the Paseo and its contents. Me, my Future Shop plastic bag, and a brand new copy of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004. Big Daddy 103.9FM blared Gino Vanelli into my excited psyche.

Such a beautiful day in a city surrounded by man-planted birch.

I flashed back to my youth. On a day like this a few decades ago, mom would say, “GET OUT OF MY SIGHT, ISTP! Go outside, and get the stink blown off ya!”

Perhaps this is why I would be rebellious today, and lock myself in my apartment to stare at a nineteen inch LCD screen. No one tells ISTP what to do. Like Pee Wee Herman, I’m a loner- a rebel.

I patted the plastic bag. “That’s OK, Simmy, we’ll get ya to your new home. There’s a Pentium 4 that I’m sure you’d like to meet.”

I had heard about this Microsoft Flight Simulator thing back in College. Guys would brag about flying to Europe on the weekend, or doing an inverted loop around the Golden Gate Bridge in an Extra 300S. Pretty fancy flying, if you ask me. What I couldn’t figure out is how a steering wheel, rudder pedals, and power quadrant could fit in a package as big as a Kraft Dinner box.

I entered my humble apartment building to the screams of my alcoholic neighbour’s crazy Franco-Ontarian boyfriend. “You’re a fucking whore! That’s it. I’ve had enough, hostie! Always the same meme chose. I’m outta here, you slut!”

Same as ever. They’ve been breaking up weekly ever since I moved in. Andre is actually a pretty nice guy when he’s not yelling. He drives an F-150 and does drywall and painting under the table to avoid his childrens’ support payments. My alcoholic neighbour is one lucky gal.

In the confines of my one bedroom basement flat, I inspected the opened Microsoft Flight Simulator box. There were no rudder pedals in it, or steering wheel. Only 4 shiny plastic mini-Frisbees. Once again, I was disappointed. What the heck do mini-Frisbees have to do with flying? I threw them around my apartment a bit, but without anyone to catch them, it wasn’t much fun.

I missed the flight simulators of Sault College with their square clouds, and attractive rendition of the Soos' International Bridge that you could fly right through without crashing.

With flight on the brain, I thought, “Well ISTP, looks like you gotta go flying for real. Get out to Azilda, and fly off Whitewater Lake, man.”

I snatched my always fully packed flight bag, and bounded out the door.

I yelled “CLEAR!” out the Paseo’s driver side window as part of the Toyota start up procedure.

The car started, and I noticed Andre was in his white pick-up smoking a funny smelling thin cigarette. He yelled to me, “Hey ISTP! Bye! I just dumped that fucking whore! You won’t be seeing me around here any more. Salut!” I had heard this before.

“OK Andre! See ya next week!”

I tooled out to SUDB RY AVIATIO. I had fun flying there before with Olaf Bjornsson, so I figured I’d fly with him again.


The town of Azilda is a wonderful little French Catholic town complete with churches, chip wagons, kids driving ATVs down the main street with no helmets and fat women smoking outside dumpy hotels. It has two Beavers, a 185, and two Cessna 172s and other privately owned planes.


Whitewater Lake’s water was no longer white; rather the brilliant mid-daylight sparkled off its partially glassy surface.

In the distance, INCO’s Superstack’s smoke snuck skyward, its wisps almost perfectly vertical. Usually the stream of airborne effluent travels horizontally. The Stack’s engineers did a great job of living up to the civil engineering motto- “Dilution is the solution to pollution.” Unfortunately, Sudbury kind of pisses off the Swedes with its dilution process, but the Superstack sparked the re-greening of the former black, acid stained rock in the city’s environs. As the trees grow back with great effort, so too do people return to this Northern Ontario city.

With a healthy strut, my ample belly and thickly bespectacled gob entered SUDB RY AVIATIO. I was looking for Olaf. I found him cowering under the office area desk.

“Hi Olaf! It’s me, remember? ISTP!”

He responded after a deep breath as he emerged from under the desk. “How could I forget? Your flying sent me to St. Thomas for a padded wall vacation for the last six weeks. Uh, in a way, uh I want to go flying with you. I’ve been reading a lot of Dr. Phil books, and uh, my therapist says I should fly with you to confront my fear of flying with crappy pilots. It’s also a requirement from my pilot doctor to get my CAT I medical back without a ‘no crappy student/pilot’ restriction.”

I was looking out the window as he spoke. A spider was shitting its way down to the ground- rappelling from the eaves. Ahh… spring.

Olaf continued, “ISTP, even though Transport Canada has told every FTU in Canada that under no circumstances are you allowed to fly. I need my life back... I have nightmares, you know.”

“Huh?” Apparently, Olaf was talking. I guess I didn’t hear what he was saying. No biggy.

“Nightmares of our…” He paused and swallowed hard, then squeaked out, “circuits.”

A J3 Cub did a smooth as silk landing outside, then boated its way towards one of the five docks, so slowly as to say, “Oh ya, that’s right. I’m smooth, brother! I’m SO smooth, in fact, that I’ll taxi like a loafing turtle getting a shell tan- just to let any witnesses catch their breath.” Putt, putt, putt.

“Istp… ISTP!”

“Huh? What?”

“I asked you three times already! Do you want to go flying with me?”

“Yeah, sure Olaf. Let’s DO IT!” I said, with an accompanying Tony Robbins Power Clap.

Olaf waited a bit, then, as he steadied himself against the wall with his left palm, his trembling right hand fumbled, and finally attained a set of nondescript Cessna keys from a nail on the wall.

As we strolled out to C-FQEH, I could smell the fresh worm poop of spring. Or whatever that spring smell is. I liked it so much, in fact, that it prompted me to have an erection. I covered it with my headset just like I used to do with my binder wandering the September halls of Sault College. It subsided as we stepped onto the floating dock. Whew! You’d think with age, a man’s dink would cease thinking for itself. I guess not.

“Hey Olaf! Gimme the keys, man!”

He relinquished them.

“Now let’s take this splooshie bird up there! UP, UP and AWAY!”

I might have been wrong, but I’m sure Olaf’s eyes were welling up. Hard to tell with his shades on.

We climbed in, and he did some checklist stuff. Whatever that is. As I cranked over the 172, Olaf slapped my hand away from the full throttle, and yanked it back to idle. I’m surprised the plane started. I had never started a plane without the “full throttle, let’s rock, let’s rock today” technique.

It’s almost as if Olaf’s face mutated into a steely, chiseled jaw Slavic visage. Kinda creepy.

After that, he asserted from the right seat, all the power of an overbearing Captain. He hit me here and there, open and closed fisted. He used language I’d never even heard even on a CB and growled snorted, and muscled his way over everything I tried to do.

By the end of the "runup" thingamajig, I thought. “Hey what the heck, maybe I’ll just be a passenger today. I’m good enough. I really don’t need the practice. Six months of not flying on floats isn’t enough to get rusty, and anyways, I DO have five (5) solo takeoffs and landings under my belt.”

So I watched Olaf do some takeoffs and landings for an hour. By the end, he had an enormous grin on his face.

We docked and he bounded out of the plane, jumping up and down, screaming at the top of his lungs up to a waiting Devin Kensington (the new Chief Flight instructor at SUDB RY AVIATIO).

“I did it, Devin! I did it! My rehab is complete, and I can get my CAT I medical back with no restrictions! I DID IT!”

Devin shook Olaf’s hand, and said, “I knew you could buddy! We’ll get ya checked out on the Beaver this afternoon.”

I didn’t know what the big deal was. Olaf always did do weird things after I flew with him, though. Come to think of it, any instructor I’d ever flown with did weird things after I’d flown with them. Maybe that’s what it takes to be an instructor- you have to be off your rocker.

Olaf was talking a mile a minute to Devin, so I didn’t feel like interrupting. I just sauntered back to the Paseo thinking that even though I was only really a passenger today, flying is always fun. It’s a great thing to do if you gotta go outside, and get the stink blown off ya.

[hazatude]

GOLD

[Mitch Cronin]

Always love your stories ISTP! Yer Mom was right to kick you outta the house on days like these... "get the stink blown off ya" that's a good line... I like it... think I'll throw it at my son from time to time.

Cheers,

Mitch

[Blakey]

I feel like I'm back reading about Down East International! And you're still working in a machine shop? Next time you write something like this, send a copy to the Star. I'm sure they'd love to print it; you have a knack for this.

[mellow_pilot]

Inspiring as always

[niss]

ISTP.....thank you so much..........I have been waiting here in my office for the past 87.5 hours waiting for another story......

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU


Lets go flying sometime.

[Bush League]

ISTP touched me in my special spot.

[. ._]

Thanks for the kind words, folks. I appreciate them!

I'll gladly go flyin' with ya niss! Or anyone blasting through Sudbury, for that matter. You can always pm me. A couple of weeks notice would be best, and only on weekends, because I'm a non-flying worker bee Mon to Fri..

Now if I could only scam a PBY flight with Cat Driver... Wouldn't THAT make a story!

-istp

[CAL]

is that Olaf from FEX?

[. ._]

All names have been changed to protect the innocent. I don't know anyone named Olaf.

-istp

[CAL]

good idea...oops
Nice writing by the way...

[Blakey]

ISTP,

Did you ever ask the Chief Pilot how long he's been working there? He taught my dad to fly! Ask him how many hours he has as well; and it's almost all on floats off that lake!