Monday
Sunday
I lost a pal...

Back up and running... pretty much
Friday
Windows 10- spawn of SATAN!
Sunday
NEWLY MINTED CAPTAIN
My captain’s upgrade bid opportunity
with Northwest Airlink came up in November 1995. That, however, was to be the
captain of Jetstream 3100, referred to in our pilot group with little affection
as the “Junkstream.” Those aircraft in our fleet were beat to hell and the trips
all sucked. No thanks, says me! My chance to bid captain on the Saab 340 that
I’d been flying since I started at the company came up the following spring.
Yet, my prime bid for vacation came out at the same time. Unwittingly, the
idiots at crew scheduling had approved my sweetheart choice of two weeks
back-to-back beginning on July 5th! If you were a pilot at a
regional airline in those days, that alone could trigger an orgasm. When I
showed it to the guys in the crashpad they all laughed, and then immediately
began a group scheme to preserve and protect my bid.
First off, I
needed to NOT bid for captain. Second I needed to not interact with scheduling
for any reason- just lay low and be a good boy. Additionally, no one outside of
our CID crashpad could know about this award. Finally, I had to sit tight and
watch a whole bunch of pilots that I was senior to go to captain ahead of me.
The result was that within four months I was the number 2 first officer in the
whole company and number 1 in MSP.
A funny trend
then took place. Tim Hughes, who was the senior captain at CID and the leader
in this conspiracy, had been bidding with me nearly all year. He was also an
IOE (Initial Operating Experience) check airman in the Saab. So, sometimes he
had to go and fly with newbee captains. When he did that, the company usually
stuck me with some newly minted captain out of the southern system. It was
sometimes fun but on one occasion I needed to drop the hammer on one of these
egos.
Tim and I
flew up to MSP on our first leg of the day then he had to split to do his IOE
dance. Our next scheduled leg was to Duluth, also known as “Scrub Dog.” It was
early May, and the weather had been unseasonably warm. But my look at the
weather that morning showed a quick moving cold front sweeping down out of
Canada. There was a lot of moisture in the air, and that spelled nasty for Scrub
Dog. I hadn’t met the new guy yet as he was not one of our northern pilots. He
was born and minted in MEM and the southern system. Worse yet was the fact that
the newly earned fourth stripe had really inflated this person’s ego.
I’d remained
in the cockpit finishing my paperwork when captain newly-minted stomped aboard.
He flopped into his seat, looked at me, scowled and said,
“Here’s my rules for first officers…”
Gee… no hand
shake… no hello? Gosh.
As he was
uttering the old worn out “Flaps up, gear up, shut up,” line I unbuckled,
nabbed my flight bag and got out of my seat. I’m not God’s gift to aviation,
and I had always been a really good guy to trip with. Sense of humor and clear
focus on the job and procedures- but at age 39, I was a good deal more mature
than nearly all of the other FOs and some of the captains at the company. Plus,
this was my second airline… I wasn’t gonna take that sort of crap from anyone.
“See ya’…” I said calmly.
“Where, ya’ goin’?” he said with a note
of surprise.
“I’m fatigued,” I replied, “thirty
seconds and I’m tired of your shit already.”
“Wait, wait…” he chirped, “ya’ don’t
have to be like…”
Now it was time to lay out some facts
for this new captain from the tropical southlands.
“You probably haven’t looked at the
weather up in Duluth, and there’s no way I’m flyin’ into that shit this morning
with the likes of you.”
“Hey, hey, “ he waved his printed
paperwork, “I just got off my flight in from Memphis and I have it right here.
Look… maybe we got off on the wrong foot.”
“Yeah, and it’s in your mouth. Now
you’ve got mine in yer’ ass.” I decided that maybe this guy was worth keeping
if I could deflate his head enough to allow for room in the cockpit. “Look at
your sonority number and look at mine. I’m nearly a full year ahead of you.
That means that I’ve been flying around in this shit up here for a long time.
They had you all set up to go into the worst of it today with me, but you gotta
pull that “my rules for FOs” bullshit on me. So now I’m gonna leave and they’ll
replace me with someone new who is sitting on reserve. Get it?”
That took the wind out of those sails
and we started to communicate. He offered to take the leg up to Scrub Dog and I
said I’d take the leg back to Minni. We made it in and out in unsettled weather
then on the climb out the shit hit us. I was flying and we started to get
thunder ice. I knew which way the stuff was moving and our normal route to the
southwest was just not gonna cut it. Then we hit a large area of turbulence
just as we contacted MSP approach there was a “woosh” as we ran through a brief
area of severe ice that turned to moderate. I called for the boots to
“continuous” and he asked about “bridging.” I told him that was myth and give
me “continuous” which he did, then the radar went pure red. Of course it wasn’t
heavy rain, it was the raydome iced over- which happened on the Saab sometimes.
Now it was a matter of just knowing the pattern of the storm’s movement. I
called ATC and told them about the icing and asked for a turn to about a 135
heading. He cleared me for that, plus “as needed” and asked to let him know
when we were in the clear. It only took about the longest five minutes or so in
that new captain’s career before we popped out of the shit. I had to ask him to
tell approach and they had some Northwest flights follow our lead. Captain ego
was pretty much puckered in his seat.
We came into Minni from the east and
landed just fine. I asked how he liked flying in the northern system?
“I ain’t never seen notnin’ like that
before?” he shook his head.
“Don’t worry,” I told him politely, “it
can get worse.”
We flew together for three more trips
before I hit my go-home day. He instantly mellowed out and was a darned good
pilot and well on his way to being a good captain. However, he did tell me that
he was bidding back into the southern system right away.
Oh… “and what about the vacation bid?” you
may ask. Well, that’s another story.
Get Wes' aviation spy thriller novel "Invisible Evil" HERE
Winning Bets
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My 1977 neoprene book bag. Not in bad shape after all these years. |
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I decided to make one just for this blog post.Yes, it flew... I still got it, eh. |
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Check out my Hat trick of best sellers HERE Or catch them on e-book ...Here! |
Saturday
Dinner with a Legend
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Former DOT Secretary and Congressman from California Norm Mineta (Right) who is a legend, and Me, the guy who has never done anything worthwhile (Left). |
The day before I got a text from my buddy, fellow ERAU alumnis and author Bob Brantner. He had spoken to me a few weeks earlier asking if I wanted to attend the annual Wright Memorial dinner with him and his dad, former DOT Secretary Norman Y. Mineta- who very much prefers to simply be called "Norm." It would be a "black-tie" event and the tickets were $250... each. Of course I could hand out a few business cards and deduct the ticket cost, but that term "black-tie" was like scratching a blackboard to me (for those of you who do not recall what a blackboard is, the reference used here indicates a very annoying noise that causes a shiver to run up your spine. - Advice from a boomer to the generation know-it-all, yet experienced nothing). My normal formal wardrobe involves jeans, sneakers and a CCM Hockey T-shirt. I suggest to Bob that I'd probably pass on the offer. On Thursday morning, however, he hit me with a text saying that his dad had bought six tickets to the event and two people had dropped out, so now I had a free seat and if need be, just a suit and tie would be fine. I said I'd have to contact Teresa and see what she had scheduled for Friday.
Texting my wife I outlined the situation. Now, she has been working as an FAA contractor at several different companies since 1990... she replied, "NORM! You GOTTA GO!!!" I responded that I did not have tux. She fired back, "It's Norm Mineta. RENT ONE!" Then a moment later she sent another message saying that I did to have a tux- "Look in your armour." I went to the armour and began sliding back the "good shirts," ties and dozen hockey jerseys all of which were waiting for countless years steeped in the atmosphere of cedar wood. There against the back wall was a single hanger with a plastic bag-draped item that had not been disturbed since New Years Eve 1999... it was my long forgotten tux that was older than both of our children.
Of course the first question was... does it still fit? Pulling it out, the pants, jacket and shirt amazingly still fit. In fact the pants were slightly large. Examining the jacket closely I found one small moth hole on the sleeve so tiny that no one would notice. Next I dug out the shoes... the damned things fit too! My only issue was that the shirt collar was too small to button. The tie would hide that. I was in business and I quickly texted Bob and told him to count me in.
Friday morning I decided to get a start by putting some badly needed polish on the shoes. Opening the can I found what had once been the polish was now dried up and cracked, looking very much like a lunar sample that had just been re-opened after a half century. Additionally I found that I did not have a plain white T-shirt! Every shirt that I had was garnished with some sort of block writing or insane image. It was sure bet that people looking at the front of my tux shirt would be able to read "WKRP in Cincinnati" in red letters right through it! It struck me that I was a long way from my days as a corporate pilot where the shoes were shined and the ties were ironed. Thus it was a dash to Walmart. Now... just try to find a package with one, size L mens crew neck T-shirt, in that place. All that was on the shelf was the packages of 8 or 6 and most were size 3XL... which I guess was the hottest seller at Walmart along with the wife-beater shirt because they had plenty of them. Finally, after strolling around a bit and digging up to my elbows I found a pack of two! The shoe polish was easy, but as I picked up the can I heard one of the other shoppers mumble, "What the hell do ya' use that for?" Apparently our wardrobe normality was similar.
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To get a signed and personalized copy click HERE To get an e-book click HERE |
That afternoon with freshly polished shoes I donned my tux which felt happy to finally be out of the armour. Yet I considered that I'd be way more comfortable in my hockey gear, but had hope that I may somehow blend in with the black-tie crowd. Teresa was, as always, working from home on Friday as I stepped out of our room and into the living room to show her how I looked and with the hope that she'd catch any glaring errors. Of course since she was working from home, I was pretty much invisible. I cleared my throat to get her attention. She looked over, smiled slightly and twinkled her fingers to indicate either "good bye," or "get lost" I'm never sure which.
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To get a signed/personalized copy click HERE to get the e-book click HERE |
Driving to meet the rest of the party I stopped at a red light and the guy next to me looked over as if to say, "humph... a waiter." Then navigating to Norm's house, my amazing Google navigation gave me a last moment wrong turn and I found myself in the driveway of a dilapidated country house with two disabled rusting pickup trucks and a mountain of trash in the year. The rusting screen door had a hand-scrolled sign hanging on it that read "BEWAR OF DOG."
I knew that Norm was a down to earth sort of guy, but that could not be his house. A quick call to Bob got me turned back in the right direction and soon I joined the Mineta team. In the gang, which was led by Norm Mineta, were Bob, who was directing activities, plus Patrick McCarthy, Kaylee Downen-Pizzonia, and Don Knight.
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The Mineta gang (L to R) Norm Mineta, Patrick McCarthy, Kaylee Downen-Pizzonia, Bob Brantner, Don Knight, Me. |
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The great Mark Usciak and some other guy... ummm... me. |


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If you'd like an autographed personalized copy click HERE For an e-book click HERE |
Unlike my friends Bob and Mark, who often attend black-tie events, for me, the Polack kid from the wrong side of the Saginaw River, such is extremely rare. I have to thank Bob and especially Norm for this chance for me to mingle among aviation's elite. As I repacked my tux this evening I told my wife I would need a new shirt for it. She just smiled and said, "Whenever you get invited to another tux event, we'll get you a new shirt," we were both certain it'll not be anytime soon.
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Ummm... yeah... these are my books... so far anyhow. Click HERE |
Wednesday
Dedicated to a very special guy
Sunday
KLYDE AND TYPOS
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Yes... that pen rest is sitting on a hockey puck. Those pen holders are always too light weight, so I glued mine to a puck. Works great. |

