Dealing With the Memories.

Fokker D-7, flying condition, photo by Julian Herzog, (Wiki.)

Louis Shalako

When my dad went into the old age home, I had to clean out his house. Part of the job involved packing up all of his radio control aircraft and equipment. I burned a bunch of planes out behind the garage after removing motors, fuel tanks, hardware, servos and radio equipment. My sister has a plane in her basement. I have a plane, my brother ended up with a couple of planes.

The real problem is, or was, that I also had a dozen boxes of tools, spares, electronic equipment, hardware, fasteners, engines, fuel tanks and wheels. Everything, in fact, to get started in radio control. There’s enough stuff there to keep a small air force in action for quite some time, if you had any idea of what you were doing…

And I moved that stuff four times in four or five years. Every time I opened it up, my heart kind of sank and I closed the boxes up again. I just couldn’t deal with it.

My dad taught me to fly, and he also taught me how to build an airplane. One thing my old man could do was build an airplane. Anyhow, it was something we did together much of the time, for about seventeen years, longer for him as he started first. He was in his fifties. He’d built rubber-band and free-flight aircraft starting at about ten years of age—in 1942, with WW II all over the front pages.

It was something he’d always wanted to do. The last time we flew was in 2006. He had the training box and I had the kill-switch. When he lost it, I simply let go of the spring-loaded switch and took over. His Parkinson’s had progressed to the point where he was unable to fly on his own.

(I’m sort of emotional writing that, but not crying or anything. It’s just a heavy, emotional feeling, ah, grief, loss, regret. Something like that…)

When my brother started asking about that equipment, I had my reservations. The trouble is, that I’m not likely to do anything with it. My nephews are thirteen and sixteen. It’s now or never, most likely, for boys like that to really get interested in flying…

Shit. But flying really is a good thing—I can’t stress that enough.

So. Why the fuck not, eh?                                    

I do have some concerns.

The transmitters are old. They wouldn’t be allowed at the club field now. Setting up an electric airplane for radio control has its dangers. A banger engine won’t fire itself up at top revs. An electric plane, if the servo switches on the transmitter are set up wrong, ‘off’ might in effect be full-throttle. They don’t know a damn thing about battery charging, not walking away and burning down the friggin’ house…all the same damn worries the old man probably had. In the end I guess we did all right.

If my brother really thinks radio control is cheap, he’s probably mistaken. It takes, time, money, commitment, and knowledge. You only get that knowledge from learning—training, practice, reading, listening, and really thinking shit out on your own.

Let’s hope the fuckers can learn it.

So basically, I’m going to dump all of that stuff on him!

I have my own radio, my own Fokker D-7, my own charger, batteries, transmitter and receivers.

I hope they have some fun with it, and get some good results with it.

Otherwise, as far as I’m concerned, he can go through the boxes and see if he can get a buck for this and a five-dollar bill for that.

Because frankly, that’s about all most of that stuff is worth.

As far as me teaching my brother and the two nephews to fly, yeah, sure.

That sort of depends on you—whether you’re capable of being taught or not.

I had lessons. I had to put up with it! That was the price of admission, submitting to the notion that someone else might know a bit more than I did. I was also bankrolled to a certain extent, and I always appreciated that.

I crashed, sooner or later, every aircraft I ever flew. It took a good two dozen real flying lessons, out at the club field, before I was competent enough to go solo—and ultimately, to go flying on my own, no instructor, no father there to save my ass if I got into trouble.

That’s not to say I didn’t have fun, and make some great memories, because I did.

We did.

Maybe that’s why I gave it to them.

Hopefully, they will get something out of it.

Because otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

END

Clever Authors Game the Algorithms.

One of many imaginary girlfriends.

Louis Shalako

“Clever authors game the system.” (Or algorithms, - ed.)

"What?"

"Clever authors game the algorithms."

“I know, I know. I know. I’m doing that now, Baby.”

“We are?”

“Ah, yes, we are. And I’m doing real good at it too. It’s just that it takes a while.”

“That nice Hal Higgins bought a sailboat. He and his wife are going on a round the world shopping trip.”

“We’re going to do that too, Baby.”

“We are?”

“Yup.” < grins >

“When, ‘cause it’s boring around here.”

“Soon, Baby. Very, very soon now.”

“Aw. Do you really love me?”

“Of course, Baby. Of course I love you…”

< smoochies >

END

Zen, Living the Dream

Zen. Living the Dream.

Louis Shalako

I ran into an old friend on the beach. I laughed when I saw him. 

That’s a kind of joy, ladies and gentlemen.

He was telling me about some work.

He was saying we could get eighteen bucks an hour. He was asking me about drywall, and framing, and partitions, and interior renovations. Something about a building or a few buildings downriver. He doesn’t have that much experience himself.

I told him all about piecework. The boss is offering so much per square foot of board, so much per linear foot of framing, so much for this and so much for that. You’re a subcontractor and you’re either making all your own contributions or you’re kind of an outlaw in this day and age. Yeah, and if you really hustle, and if you know what you’re doing, you can make a pretty good buck for someone with no real skills and no real education.

(One. I have skills. Two. I have an education. Three, I don’t want the fucking job. – ed.)

I don’t want the job. I don’t want the job for eighteen bucks an hour. I don’t want the job for twenty-five bucks an hour, and I don’t want the job for fifty bucks an hour. Yeah, I don’t want to get a crew together, I don’t want to buy a pickup truck and buy a bunch of tools and get up at the crack of dawn every stinking day (which to be fair I do anyways) and round up a crew and try and get them onto a jobsite without loaning or advancing them money so they can get through until payday and by the way we need to sit around in a coffee shop parking lot for half an hour while we’re at it. (Three or four times a day.)

KeepOnTruckin', (Wiki.)

I told him a little bit about ceilings, about hanging twelve-foot sheets of five-eighth drywall while standing on a scaffold and praying your partner will get a couple of screws in there before you die and your arms fall off and it kills the both of you, and him a married man and everything.

I told him I had seventeen novels. I told him I just got thirty bucks from Google Play. He agreed that was pretty smart, like that James Grisham guy, and I didn’t correct him on the details. He told me I need to send one of my books to James Grisham and they’ll tweak it a bit and then I’m on my way. I know what he’s saying, but I didn’t correct him on the details.

I gave him the same advice I would give any young (middle-aged unemployed guy) today.

Don’t do nothing to jeopardize that pogy claim, that welfare cheque, that annuity from the insurance company because you were in a bad car accident fourteen years ago and have some severe head injuries.

(Don’t fuck up that disability pension, in other words. – ed.)

Because in today’s marketplace, you really can’t afford to succeed. For the first time in thirty years, all of a sudden you’re buying your own eyeglasses, paying for your own rotten teeth to be pulled, and paying for your own scrip for your own narcotic pain pills, also one or two members of the diazepide family of mood-disorder inducing dopes, and whatever. You know what I’m saying.

Basically, I figure I’m living the dream. I have achieved every fucking goal I ever had, chief among which was not to work for a living. That’s why I’m not a greeter at Walmart.

I am officially retired from the world of working for some capitalistic bastard. Now I’m the capitalistic bastard—and I like it.

I like it just fine, ladies and gentlemen. In fact, I’ve been so successful at being a lazy cunt that I am now in a position to give something back to my community.

See my Billion Dollar Giveaway.

Krusty Mickdermid, Walmart greeter, (stolen photo.)

Why in the fuck would I go to work, for thirty-five hours a week at minimum wage? Hey, I appreciate the cheap prices, Walmart. But, uh, I won’t even do that for cash under the table for fuck’s sakes. You work a hundred and forty hours a month, for what? Fifty bucks a month more than I make now, and you get to pay all your own prescriptions, eyeglasses, and you’re too fucking scared to line up at the food bank. You’re standing around in a stupid shirt. You’d be surprised by how many people tell me they make too much money to go the food bank, and the fact is its bullshit. You just told me how much you make—and this is just my opinion, but you really should make a point of going there once in a while. Who in the fuck told you that you make too much money?

‘Cause my journalistic instincts are aroused. I could really make something of a story like that…

The fact is, we’re living the dream.

We won’t give that up too easily.

We’re going to sit around on beaches, write stuff, and be ourselves.

The world doesn’t have to like it or even accept it.

That’s just the way it’s going to be.

End