Accident Analysis II

"The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of the accident was the flightcrew’s failure to use the taxi checklist to ensure that the flaps and slats were extended for takeoff. Contributing to the accident was the absence of electrical power to the airplane takeoff warning system which thus did not warn the flightcrew that the airplane was not configured properly for takeoff. The reason for the absence of electrical power could not be determined."

Keeping with my plane crash theme, some people watch true crime stories and murder mystery reenactments but I like to read Aircraft Accident Reports.


I think the reason I like to read these documents is because they are written for the layman with footnotes to define terms I might not understand like "Heading Bug" but the incidents/accidents are outside of my career path. However; the principles that are under the microscope are completely human and apply to any field, including oil field electrician. Reading one of these reports would benefit everyone.

Musical Rescue

I was way up in the sky on the man lift working on a cursed set screw for an LED light fixture that required me to drill it out with zip ties holding my fear in check...and I was pondering at the same time which musician I'd go back in time to save because I was so high I could almost see the airport where the plane carrying Jim Croce hit a pecan tree and ended the life of a musician about to enter his prime years of production. Or more correctly, if I could go back in time only once with the mission to save a musician, which would I choose? And while I would recommend anyone with this mission to please go back and save Buddy Holly and Richie Valens and The Big Bopper from getting on that plane in Iowa, I feel that I'd have to go back in time to save John Lennon. I don't know if I can morally quantify Lennon's value over the three lost in Iowa, or why not save the three members of Lynyrd Skynyrd who died in a plane crash? Well, I had to limit myself in my frivolous daydreams and my reasons are my own.

And with drug overdoses and general misbehavior and suicides of musicians I feel these are not preventable...you'd only postpone the inevitable. Hendrix, Morrison, Joplin, Brian Jones, Cobain were living right on the edge and that was part of their personality and fed their talent. It's a price of fame that some can only tolerate it for so long before they step over the line into oblivion. If you make a woman like Janis Joplin play by the rules and eat her vegetables then you won't get another Crystal Gayle...no. I don't know what you'll get but it won't be Janis Joplin and that's life. And Robert Johnson, for instance, was probably murdered a year after recording the foundations of modern blues but the life he led basically guaranteed an early death. Nothing short of shadowing Johnson as his personal body guard for the remainder of his life would prolong his career. But John Lennon wasn't living on the edge and I think he had much more to contribute to the world. It's a morbid poll but I thought it would engage me for a minute and would give me an idea of the musical ethics of my audience.

What Musical Tragedy Would You Prevent?
	John Lennon's Assassination
	Buddy Holly's Plane Crash
	Otis Redding's Plane Crash
	Patsy Cline's Plane Crash
	Jim Croce's Plane Crash
	Stevie Ray Vaughn's Helicopter Crash
pollcode.com free polls

Hateful Pundits

If I had to sit next to someone smoking cigarettes while listening to this then that would be like when I was in the Merchant Marines. This is actually what the welders listen to in the morning and I want to bash my skull in on the high pressure separator. The best argument I have to prove these assholes are assholes is because they will proudly crow like roosters that America is becoming the next Cuba and all white people need to arm themselves etc etc and then in the same breath they will talk about the most irrelevant Miley Cyrus trivial gossip. I have the same reaction toward them as fundamental Christians...which is if it's that bad then why talk about anything else? Why go on a tour bus and listen to Lynyrd Skynyrd songs, why eat, why talk about football? AMERICA IS BEING INFILTRATED BY A COMMUNIST PRESIDENT. That sounds serious so maybe take it seriously and don't dilute your ignorant hate speech with topical trivia. Walton & Johnson, total assholes. I actually push the ear plugs HARD into my ears so that I don't have to listen to even one word of their ignorant drawling fucking cunt bullshit. They are hateful people and pure pundits inciting hate and diseased thinking. Arrogance compounded by ignorance.

I fantasize about calling them and telling them I am forced to listen to their bubbling vomit thoughts and that maybe they should hit the pause button on the spin doctor dildo they are spinning wildly around on and they must be sponsored by some kind of monster to spread poison like mayonnaise on the white bread of America. These are exactly the kind of cunts who croak like hoarse toads about the central American refugees swimming the river to reach America and steal money and health care and food stamps and jobs from "true Americans" while completely ignoring or selectively forgetting that from Kennedy to Johnson to Nixon to Ford to Carter to Reagan to Bush ALL willfully executed a withering attack on the economies of Honduras and Guatemala and undermined the sovereignty of Panama and Nicaragua and Chile and Argentina, ensuring a populace too broken to refuse to sew 60'' waist underwear destined for the fat man stores of American malls, blatantly seeking to overthrow agrarian-based administrations in favor of the purely exploitative hegemonic government that was thrown out of Cuba by Che and Castro...which turned out to be a minor victory in the defense of freedom in 40 years of total domination by the stars and stripes. And then when the chickens come home to roost and the economically savaged children of the families who were torn apart by CIA induced civil war ALL FLEE THEIR OWN SWEAT SHOP COUNTRIES you add insult to injury by calling them thieves for coming to America, the source of all their pain. Because I'm sure they are too dumb to realize that they are begging the lord of the castle for crumbs and they also need hicks with wide mouths calling them dirt. And the entire problem was caused by an ignorant and obese populace gorging on their own back fat steak fried chicken fried delusions of deceit...which is then denied..because we and not the Levites or Hebrews or Ishmaelites are the chosen people and can do anything we want to anyone and then complain when the imported Mexican cotton pickers plead for more pennies. So disgusting. But it's free speech, Y'all, so that's the good news. With talk radio like this who needs Al Queda?

Resin

Bella's mom scraped the chipped glass pipe with a sewing needle that Oggy had left behind when he went to find scrap aluminum to fix the hotel room heater circuit board. Her slightly hairy lips were an inch above the pipe and she murmured in meditation to herself softly singing a lullaby, a comforting song her own mother had sung to her back in Bakersfield. The pipe had been scraped within the last week but because Ched's SSI check had been stolen from the mattress by the hotel maid there was no money for heroin. Ched was pounding the streets in the evening rain, shaking down debtors and stray fags for quarters, Oggy was in the alleyway, distracted by those damn cats who were breeding, ranting about sterilization and a capitalist conspiracy, Bella was in the bath tub where the candles burned dangerously close to the off white Chinese imported towels. The couple in the next door had finally passed out after three days of rolling on Ecstasy, babbling about broken dreams and funerals for sock puppets...so Bella's mom had found time alone to embrace her happiest pass-time scraping the pipe for resin, the slight scratch of the needle on the glass, the audible smacking of the tar building up on the needle head, Bella's playful splashing in the tub, her childish humming, like when she was much younger. The exotic aroma of heroin tar coming from the pipe made Bella's mom's tongue snake out of her lips seeking the saliva trapped inside the resin, that only a flame could release. The monotone hum from the broken television and the sounds of Bella stepping out of the tub were Romantic symphonies compared to the hateful abuse Ched offered and the ponderous philosophic musings of Oggy. The universe would provide, she knew, she was a survivor, her family was important to her and when her son got out of prison then she'd take them back to Bakersfield and really build a life again. Because she would do whatever it took to protect them and give them everything she had.
Bella stepped out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, her pale skin reddened by the hot water, freckles multiplied, her strawberry blond hair flat against her back, innocent and clean, all the dirt and sand and sin of the city draining into the sewer.
"Bella, I scraped the pipe and I want you to have the first hit."
Bella bounced on her toes and went through the motions of a ballerina move, impressing her mother, reminding each other of classes and performances long gone.
"In a minute," she responded.
"OK, but you know how Oggy gets, talking about Afghanistan exploitation and the costs of drug shipment and donkeys dying in snowy mountains and war..."
"Uh huh." Bella smiled. Oggy sounded so smart and convincing when he opined about global drug trade, spirituality, cults, organic gardening, socialized medicine, non-violent revolution.
Bella toweled herself dry, naked before her mother but unashamed. They could do anything together.
"Anything you need, Bell, and I'll get it for you," said Bella's mom. "Anything."
Bella looked in the mirror, studied her profile, pretended she was pregnant by pushing her belly out and holding it with her hands. The last of the water drained out of the tub, the hair and blood and skin and dirt all washed away. After a bath you could start over and the past aborted.
"Where did you get those bruises on your legs," asked Bella's mom as she saw the blue splotches of coagulating blood beneath Bella's thighs.
"Oh, Oggy beats me at night."

2014: The Year Oggy Gets His Priorities Straight

How this will fit in my trailer and van remains to be seen

*Special thanks to all the Craigslist sellers who deliriously price used digital pianos higher than a brand new keyboard so that I spend less money going to Guitar Center and getting them to price match a package online. The lesson is this: Don't Stop Believing.