What To Say and When To Say It... Or Not

I've had young helicopter pilots introduce themselves to me and try to come off as big experts because they have a thousand hours or so of flight time.  I met one who claimed to know everything about the Bell 206.  I asked him how much flight time he had?  “About 2,000 hours,” he said, which I knew was a lie…okay, an “exaggeration.”  And, I pressed a little further, how much time of that is in the 206?  “About 50 hours.”  Hmm.

I let him talk on and on for a while.  I did not mention that of my 11,000 hours of flight time, over 7,000 hours have been spent flying the various models of the Bell 206.  Does this make me the most knowledgeable 206 expert in the whole universe?  Hardly.  But you could say that I’m “familiar” enough with the type.  And I was familiar enough with the ship to know that this young pilot to whom I was talking didn’t know shit about the Bell 206.

The point is, you never know who you’re talking to.  Especially in my current line of work, you never know who’s getting in the cab.  I re-learned this just yesterday.  A guy hopped in at the airport and asked to be taken to Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville Hotel out on Pensacola Beach (a $35.00 fare).  Sure thing!  Off we went. 

I usually ask my passengers what brings them to Pensacola?  This guy tersely said he had a meeting, but didn’t offer any details.  “Well, you sure picked the right place to stay!” I offered.  “The Margaritaville is one of the nicest hotels on the beach, *and* it has a great restaurant, Frank and Lola’s right inside.” 

In the first place, both statements are true.  There are good and not-so-good hotels out on the beach; Margaritaville and the Hilton are two of the best.  But I'd never want to insult anyone about their choice of hotel.  Making people feel bad about themselves is never a good idea.  

It turned out that my passenger was in charge of all Margaritaville facilities worldwide, the number two man under Jimmy Buffet himself.  Yikes!

Knowing when to keep your mouth shut is important, obviously, but knowing what to say and what not to say when you do open your mouth is equally important.  It's a lesson it took me a very long time to learn.

On Being Cheerful

When I was in high school I was hanging around with a guy named Lou Timolat who was a helicopter pilot/traffic reporter for a radio station in New York City.  He generously mentored me in the area of many things over many years.  I had a serious case of hero-worship, and perhaps I was the son he didn’t have.  Anyway, it worked out okay for both of us.

Lou owned two radio stations (an AM and an FM) in the small upstate New York town of Watkins Glen (pop. 2,500 at the time).  The AM was one of those small-town “day-time only” general-purpose radio stations with a format that changed during the day.  The FM was all-music, trying to compete with the big boys in Elmira and Corning and Binghamton.  Our FM format was “solid gold” during the day.  At night it switched over to what was called “progressive rock” at the time.

Since I aspired to be a traffic reporter, Lou thought it was a good idea that I work for his radio station to learn about broadcasting.  And so after graduating high school I did just that.

The staff at the two radio stations was mainly a bunch of inexperienced and enthusiastic young people like myself who were eager to learn about the business.  Someone procured a book entitled, “How To Be A Disk-Jockey” or some such.  Written by Marconi or one of his peers, I believe, it laid out the “rules” of broadcasting as of 1950 or so.  We all began sounding like the announcer for the old “Lone Ranger” radio series.

One of the pieces of advice in that book was to smile as you speak.  You don’t have to be fake about it – people can tell when you’re being insincere.  But it is amazing how the simple act of smiling affects how people hear you.  And remember what true communication is all about.  It’s not just what you say, but what people are hearing.  If your message comes across garbled, you might as well not transmit it at all.

I use this technique to this day.  When I talk to people on the phone, I make sure that I’m smiling.  I know they can hear it.  I believe that it helps getting people "on your side" when you need them to be.

Case in point:  Last year I was headed up on my annual pilgrimage to Washington State on American Airlines.  Our early-morning flight to Dallas got diverted into some airport in Mississippi due to weather.  We refueled and waited for the storms in Texas to clear.  By mid-afternoon when we eventually landed in Dallas, my connecting flight to Seattle had long left without me.

Settled into a comfy chair in the terminal, I called American’s reservation number to rebook my flight, steeling myself for the ordeal.  All around me harried, preoccupied-looking travelers hustled by, rushing from one gate to another.  Nobody looked like they were having any fun.

The bad news for me was that all of the flights for the rest of the day were over-full, and I’d have to go the next day.  I was not a happy camper as you can imagine.  Instead of getting angry, I took a deep breath and bit my lip while the nice woman on the other end of the line in American’s call center in Tucson, Arizona searched for a way of getting me northwestbound.  But things were not looking good.

"And how’s your weather today?” I asked during a pause.

“Oh, it’s beautiful here!” she chirped, perhaps forgetting for that instant that my weather certainly wasn't "beautiful."  In fact, it was still pretty horrible.  It made me wonder why American Airlines chose Dallas, Texas as their headquarters/hub in the first place.

“Well I’ll bet you’re getting a ton of calls from angry people in Texas!” I said with a laugh.

“Oh yes,” she admitted wryly.

I vowed to not be one of them.  “Well ma’am, if there’s any way you can help me out, I’d really appreciate it.”  I said it like I meant it, because I really did.

There was a pause and I could hear a clacking of computer keys in the background.  She sighed.  Another pause and some more key clacking.  Another sigh.  “It’s just not letting me do this,” she said grimly, frustration in her voice.

I figured I was sunk.  My one-day reunion with Mikey would be ruined.  But I didn’t say anything…not a peep…no word of complaint or even the slightest hint that my travel plans were damn well important and that I had to be in Seattle TONIGHT, by God!  Which is what I was thinking, you know.  But nope, for once I just kept my big mouth shut, which is unusual for me.

“These flights are all locked out,” she grumbled.  Finally something must have dawned on her. “Wait a minute, I've got an idea…” she said with a  kind of Lucy Ricardoesque tone to her voice.  I felt a little like Ethel Mertz, and I laughed to myself because I refer everything...and I mean everything to old TV shows.  There was some more key clacking.  “Aha!” she said triumphantly, “I got a seat for you!  She sounded pleased with herself.  I certainly was!  In the end, I made it to Seattle and Mikey picked me up and we had a great ride over the Cascades to Brewster in the middle of the night.

Now, I don’t know if all of American’s reservation agents are as helpful to stranded customers as she.  I would hope so.  And maybe this woman would’ve gone the extra mile for me or anyone else anyway, no matter how pissed-off and unpleasant they or I sounded over the phone.  Maybe my being nice had nothing to do with it.  But I like to think otherwise.

Smiling over the phone.  It’s a small thing, no?  My overall philosophy in dealing with people is, “Be cheerful.”  It is probably the basis of any success I have in interpersonal relationships and these random connections we make with other people during the course of our lives. 

Just be cheerful, dammit.

Writing A Book? Not me, no!

People often suggest that I write a book.  They think I know stuff or something that should be shared.  I disagree.  Not only has my career been pretty unremarkable, but I’m not really that good a writer.  And that is no false modesty.  I know how to string words together…but I’m not so good at the imagery; I’m just not that creative.  I'm okay with the mechanics of writing.  I could be a pretty decent book editor.

On the other hand, my friend, poet and fellow cabdriver, Terry – he is actually writing a book!  It’s a fun process to watch.

Terry is an incredible guy.  He’s about my age and twice divorced.  Like me, he should exercise more and has already spent decades pursuing a career in his field – in his case the automotive service industry.  When cutbacks forced him out he bought a taxi.  Now he’s his own boss, and loves it.  So we have a lot in common.  He is also a very spiritual, church-going man whose faith and convictions are strong.  He takes the Bible a little too literally for me, but that’s a small quibble, I suppose. 

Terry’s book is tentatively titled, “Broken Earth.”  It is a historical novel set at the very end of The Civil War, using real places and events.  A Yankee, Thomas who is an emissary of President Lincoln meets up with John, a Confederate soldier left for dead under a pile of bodies after a vicious battle – one of the last of the war. 

The two young men who normally would be enemies for reasons they did not fully comprehend meet up and hit it off.  They form an unlikely alliance as Thomas heads north to deliver a message to the president.  They arrive in Washington D.C. on April 14, 1865 and check-in to the National Hotel where they bump into an actor named John Booth who happens to be appearing in a play later that night.  Booth gives them two tickets…

Terry has written over 100 pages so far.  He has expanded the story greatly in the manner of his literary heroes, Louis L’amour and Larry McMurtry.  Obviously, Terry loves those old west sagas.  And when I read his words they reflect the same style of writing, with the same level of character development and scene-setting as the established pros.  I’m interested to see where the story will go.  Terry hints that his characters will cross paths with Evangeline, she of Longfellow’s famous poem.

Terry has most of this already planned-out.  When he talks to me about the direction the book will take it is as if the characters are real people; he knows them that well.  And indeed, to him they are alive.

That’s the difference between Terry and me.  I can write about inanimate objects like helicopters, airplanes, cars and motorcycles.  I could write a pretty decent technical manual!  But I’m just not that good with people – either in person or in print, real or imagined.  I’m not that good at capturing moods, creating characters and their dialogue, and describing scenes that are easily visualized.  Those abilities are the mark of a real writer.  And Terry seems to have the knack, that gift of communication that transcends time and language.  I admit that I’m more than a little envious. 

Terry thinks I’ve “got a book” in me and constantly urges me to start writing it – just start!  But honest to God I don’t think I do.  I have no story burning inside of me waiting to be told.  They say that if you sat a monkey down at a typewriter for an infinite amount of time he’d eventually come up with “War and Peace.”  And those are the same odds as me writing a whole book.  I’m better at little blogposts and magazine articles.

I call myself a raconteur but I’m not, not really.  Not compared to guys like Terry, and Hal, and “other” Bob, and Debby who are really good writers who see things from a writer’s point of view and can easily translate that into words.  Me, I’m just a damn monkey flinging feces at a blank page in the misguided hope it results in something Tolstoyish.  I may never be him, just as I may never be Eric Clapton no matter how long I play and practice my guitar.  And I’m okay with that.

I will let you know how Terry’s book turns out.

The Brotherhood of the Weed

I don’t smoke.  Not cigarettes and not weed.  The idea of lighting something on fire and then sucking the byproduct into your lungs seems so…I don’t know…insane.

If you do not smoke weed and you are friends with someone who does, you will find that your friendship with them is limited.  Because no matter how close you think you are, you’ll always be an outsider.

Potheads gravitate to other potheads.  Getting high is an important way of socializing.  Guys get together to hang out and smoke.  It’s a bonding ritual that brings guys much closer than they might otherwise get.

Full disclosure: I used to smoke weed, back in the day.  But not anymore.  And by “back in the day” I mean when I was in high school which was forty-five years ago.  But I knew that my future was in aviation, so by my senior year I had sworn off all drugs with the exception of alcohol of which I partook aplenty!

Nowadays, smoking weed is becoming more socially acceptable.  The states of Washington and Colorado have decriminalized personal use and allow it to be sold openly in sanctioned stores.  Other states will surely follow.  But back in 1970 pot was totally illegal, and there was more of a stigma associated with smoking pot than there is now.

Let me add here: Do I think weed is harmless?  Oh hell no, of course not.  I can run down the long list of negatives, just as you can.  Just as with alcohol.  But as I opined in this post, I think weed is far less harmful to society than alcohol.  And if you’re going to allow the use of one intoxicant, it might as well be the less harmful one.  Yes, yes, I know that in a perfect world people would not have a need for any intoxicants.  But I don’t live in that perfect world and neither do you.  People drink.  People smoke.  Get over it.

I remember back when I was a teenager.  We smokers would get together in some clandestine place to get high.  It was like being a member of a secret club.  Those who did not smoke were shut out.  If you weren’t part of the in-crowd (i.e. a smoker) you didn’t belong, simple as that.  We didn’t want non-smokers around because they were “buzz-kills.”  And they might rat us out.  The fear of arrest was strong.  As I got older I came to really dislike “clique-y” things like that.  I don’t like them in flying or motorcycling or any activity.  But you find them all over.

Many adult potheads still act the same as when they were teenagers.  They prefer to get high when they’re not doing anything else, and in general they prefer to be in the company of other potheads.  They go off together to get high and do things while they’re getting high.  Non-smokers need not apply.  They don’t want us around.

Gee, Bob, jealous much?  It does sound that way, doesn’t it?  And in a way, yeah, I guess I am.  But maybe “insulted” is a better word.  Because I want friendships to be about people, not a particular activity.  Now me, I don’t have friends that I only hang out with when and because I’m drinking.  If I hang out with someone it’s because I enjoy their company; and hopefully they enjoy mine.  And I don’t exclude people who don’t drink.

But every serious pothead I know always acts as if they have someplace else to be when we’re together.  They’re always checking their watch, trying to calculate when was the last time they got high or how long until they’ll be able to get with their other friends and light up.  When you’re with a pothead, you always feel like you’re intruding on their little world, a world you’re not part of.  It’s weird.  And it’s hurtful. 

They will of course deny it.  They will insist it’s not true.  But they’ll squirm as they say the words, knowing how unconvincing they’re sounding (maybe they’re trying to convince themselves?).  But it is true. 

I mentioned all of this to a friend of mine recently, a married guy in his 40’s who does not smoke cigarettes or weed and who hardly drinks.  I brought it up because I was feeling hurt at the time, snubbed by someone I thought was a good friend.  I bounced these ideas off him to see if I was just in one of my pissy, little-girl moods.  To my surprise he said that not only had he noticed it, he agreed whole-heartedly. 

A little surprised, I mentioned it to some of my other non-pot-smoking friends.  Indeed, they too related similar stories about being excluded from certain group activities because everyone else in the group smoked weed.  They too had felt slighted by people they considered friends.  So it wasn't just me.

As a non-pot-smoker I’m just not a member of The Brotherhood of the Weed. 

And I guess I never will be.

From Air-Taxi Driver To Ground Taxi Driver

You might think that driving a taxi would be something of a let-down or come-down after a career flying helicopters.  After all, flying for a living seems so glamorous and exciting!  But at the end of the day (and at the end of a career) getting paid to fly is no more glamorous than doing anything else.  It is just a job.  A fun job, to be sure – but there are a whole lot of other considerations too.  

For instance there is always that risk of death.  We pilots don’t like to speak about it.  But it’s there.  Prior to each take-off we must pledge to ourselves that we’ll do our best to avoid making any dumb/fatal mistakes.  But yet every year many pilots do just that.  I know that I am not immune.  Luckily the mistakes that I have made so far haven't resulted in any crashes.  That’s not to say I haven't come very, very close. 

I truly hated my last flying job.  I worked for a rich entrepreneur who bought a helicopter to get around in his local business world.  But he also used it personally as well, and I became a sort of glorified chauffeur.  The pay was…okay, but just “okay”…for Pensacola, Florida but it was not by any means on a par with what pilots of similar experience in similar jobs flying similar equipment were getting elsewhere.  He felt that he was paying me a king’s ransom for doing very little though. 

And so he dreamed up non-flying “stuff” to do when I wasn’t needed to fly the helicopter.  Thirty years as a professional pilot and I was tasked with waxing his boat,  going grocery shopping for his hunting camp and running general errands.  Yeaaahhhh.  It was messing with my self-respect.

Neither were the perks all that great.  I had no health insurance coverage while I worked for him.  It would unreasonably raise the total premium that he paid for the whole company, he said.  So he gave me his word and handshake that he’d cover any medical expenses limited to injuries that happened on the job.  He thought that was pretty generous.

The kicker came when I had a minor motorcycle accident in which I broke my left arm.  The Boss had never liked the fact that I rode motorcycles, and he’d made it abundantly clear.  Right after the accident he called me up and told me he couldn’t have his only pilot taking these kinds of risks.  He threatened that if I didn’t sell the motorcycle he would have to “…make other plans.”  That’s when I quit.  Who needs that kind of crap?

So now I only fly part-time, doing that cherry-drying thing up in Washington State in the summertime.  That gig almost pays enough to carry me through the whole year, but I need something to keep me occupied for the other nine months.  Here at home, employers aren’t really keen on hiring some old guy who says he can’t work summers.  So I drive a taxi.  And it’s great.  I make my own schedule and don’t answer to anyone now.  The pay isn't quite what I was making as a pilot, but the demands on me are far fewer.  And I like myself a whole lot more.

Ironically, thirty-plus years of taking people from here and dropping them off there in helicopters has prepared me well for this line of work.  Not so ironically, I enjoy it immensely.

More TV Commercial Fun - 2014

Regular readers of this irregularly published blog know that I love television...

...Commercials.

I'm constantly on the lookout for the various ways manufacturers have of grabbing our attention and getting us interested in their product. One of my favorite ad campaigns was Mazda's "Zoom-Zoom" series which they used forever. Even in one of their recent commmercials (which is awesome and uses the song "Safe and Sound" by Capital Cities), right at the very end as the Mazda logo comes up you see...ever so briefly...the words "Zoom-Zoom" materialize and then shoot offscreen to the right- a "callback" to their earlier ads.  It happens so fast that it's easy to miss. I like that. 

Zoom-Zoom, Mazda, I'm impressed!

And of course I love the "Most Interesting Man In The World" campaign for Dos Equis beer.  There's even a new version of the commercial.  I love that they keep coming up with new angles on this guy!

In the latest spot, along with the hilarious narration we see the tuxedo-clad MIMITW arriving at a swanky dinner party via dogsled.  Then they cut to archival TV news footage of a much-younger MIMITW saving a fireman from a burning building.  In his other hand is a goldfish bowl (still full of water) which he casually hands to the displaced tenant.  Back to present-day, from his seat in the stands of an operating room theater he advises the surgeon on which scalpel to use.  Finally, switching again back to archival footage we see him diving for pearls - of course he brings up an entire necklace!

I imagine that the producers of this campaign must have a grand time thinking up new things for TMIMITW to do.  It must be incredibly fun working on that team.

And then we come to those ads for Progressive Insurance.  You know, the ones with that perky, "Flo" character.  Say what you will about the ads (and a lot of people dislike them), but the unique campaign just works.  Even the people who don't like the spots remember them and the name of the insurance company.

Over the years, "Flo," played by acress/comedienne Stephanie Courtney has found herself in various situations.  In the new series of spots that began airing around Thanksgiving we got to meet her extremely, uhh, quirky family.  There is her crazy mom Diane ("No dear, we say 'creative,' not crazy, right?"), her mean sister Janice (who has a fashion blog and who is always on her phone), and her brother Todd (who has a child but whose wife is always mysteriously "on vacation").  There is also Flo's nutcase dad Richard, and her grandfather.  All of the parts are brilliantly played by Ms. Courtney.

In this hilarious two-minute spot, we are treated to Flo's family as they get ready to eat Thanksgiving dinner.  Mom has decided to do "Thanksgiving Tapas," meaning that all food is cubed and served on toothpicks (yes, even the Jello).  As preparations go on in the kitchen, Todd walks in and snidely says, "Can we please just go sit in front of the TV and eat like a normal family?"  In the living room, Grandpa is not impressed with the tiny portion of food on his plate.  "What is this, the Great Depression?" he barks before yelling, "Nurse!"  Flo corrects him, "Grandpa, I'm not a nurse."

The beauty of this ad campaign is that they don't beat you up over the head with the product info.  The producers just assume that we're already familiar with Flo and Progressive Insurance.  So while their logo is always visible (especially on Flo's uniform) it is not prominent in any of the spots.

Commercial ad campaigns like the three mentioned above are what keep me watching TV.  I can't wait to see what the ad agencies come up with for the Super Bowl!

Our Skeptical Society

We’ve become a cynical, skeptical, suspicious culture. We question everything now; we believe little of what we are told, especially if it’s being told by someone in government. Some people actually believe nothing, assuming that every official spokesperson is only engaging in cover-your-ass double-speak in which the Truth is twisted, mangled and camouflaged to the point that it is unrecognizable.

Why is this? I suppose we could trace it back to the suspicions of what the government knew about the impending attack in 1941 by the Japanese on Pearl Harbor that got us (finally!) into World War II. Lingering questions remain: Did President Roosevelt have intelligence that such an attack was planned and he just let it happen? That’s a horrible thought.

Or maybe it’s the result of the revelation about the vastly exaggerated if not fabricated Gulf of Tonkin Incident that got us fully involved in the Viet Nam War. This was the supposed attack on U.S. warships by the “North Vietnamese Navy.” We know now that President Johnson basically lied to the American people and Congress so that he could ramp up the war. And so the country went right along into that unwinnable fiasco. Hey, we seem to love war! (We’ve been denied, and as a nation we seem to want another “good, clear, decisive win” like WWII was. And apparently we won’t stop until we get one!)

Or maybe it was the whole “9/11” thing that got us into this never-ending and equally-unwinnable “WAR ON TERROR!!!!” We were told a certain story by the government about how a dozen or so “Muslim extremist” terrorists commandeered four airliners that fateful day in 2001 and used them for their evil purpose. Anyone who doubts the official story is derogatorily labeled a kook or “conspiracy theorist” nutjob. But many do doubt it…or aspects of it. Were we told the full and complete, truthful story? Personally I do not think so.

And so we come to Ferguson, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. There on August 9 of this year, an unarmed black kid named Michael Brown was fatally shot by a white policeman. (Although, calling Brown a “kid” is deceptive; he was 6’4” and 300 pounds.) The exact details of the shooting are disputed and controversial. The incident sparked some serious demonstrations and unrest on a scale unseen since the civil rights riots of the 1960’s and ‘70s.

The Ferguson Police Department’s handling of the protests and demonstrations has been controversial and, some would say disproportionate. One of the things the Ferguson P.D. did was to ask the FAA to declare a so-called “no-fly zone” around the city. There is a mechanism in the Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR’s) which allows this. It is called a “TFR” or Temporary Flight Restriction.

TFR’s are put in place over disasters, natural or man-made. Generally, they exist to keep sight-seers out, which could create an unsafe situation in the air. But restricting access also allows the safe, unimpeded transit and operation of fire-fighting, air ambulance, National Guard or other disaster-relief aircraft. In most cases, a TFR will not exclude aircraft carrying properly accredited members of the news media (the public has a First Amendment right to know, you see). But sometimes even news and media helicopters are kept out. This was the case with the Ferguson TFR.

We learn from a story in today’s Washington Post that the Ferguson P.D. specifically wanted to keep the news copters out…to prevent the media from covering the demonstrations and the P.D.’s handling of them. The TFR that was issued under the specific FAR normally would have kept all aircraft away from Ferguson. But the wording was carefully crafted by the FAA and the Ferguson P.D. to allow other, normal aircraft operation through the area but at the same time keep the pesky news reporters with their cameras out.

Read the story HERE.

The day the TFR was issued, the St. Louis County P.D. said it was not to keep the media out but for “safety” because people were shooting at police helicopters.

There were no incident reports of anyone shooting at police helicopters. (Having said that, it is true that a bullet from a rifle fired into the air might endangered a low-flying helicopter.)

The P.D. announcement was bullshit. The cops merely wanted to keep the news helicopters away. So they lied.

And so we have yet another instance in which it is reported to the American people that public officials lied. Whether or not what they did was justified is beside the point: They lied.

Politicians of the future need not wonder why we don’t believe a word they say.