msfs-2024
So I was pretty jaded getting back to Europe HQ after a full day flying irritating passengers around towns in the middle of nowhere, delivering boxes of who-knows-what to who-knows-where, and finally listening in silence to the inane chatter of of bunch of medics repatriating a heart attack victim who (if I’m any judge) won’t last a week.
Never mind, let’s see how the business is doing, and get out the accounts that my so-called accountants have prepared. Really, guys? We normally align the amounts in columns, and add a filter or two. Some subtotals. Right-click for details. It ain’t hard.
Sigh and try and make sense of the mess. Going surprisingly well actually. Strapped for cash of course but turnover is healthy. But what’s this? New Zealand underperforming, again? Maybe I should take a look.
They’ve a job for today - enough credit to see me through.
And ooh whoosh here I am in Auckland just as if I’d clicked my heels.
It didn’t take long to spot the problem. It had wings and a propeller and answered to Flying Fpucku. Or an anagram thereof.
I look round for the mechanic: agh he’s right there, in my face. “All right boss?”
“No. Can you fix this?”
“Yes. It’ll cost mumble thousand ergh hundred and umpty credits”. He beamed.
I don’t have that sort of credit in cash. Who does?
“What if you just do the important bits? Things that make it go, steer, land, kind of thing”.
“Oh that’ll be almost nothing”.
“Do it then”.
And so I find myself in a plane full of cardboard boxes looking at mostly unlit glass panels while the perfectly tuned engine hums and revolves.
Maybe I shold have asked for radios. But no! ‘Our contract says deliver the mail, and in that task we will not fail’. Like the song says, prosaically. But at least it rhymes.
Up up and away. How glorious to ignore the nags to hold short here and acknowledge this and ooh 25 knots in the taxi, officer, really? I’ll take off where I darn well like thank you.
Now, navigate, it’s NZ. can’t be hard - two islands, sea, north, south - must be over there somewhere. Don’t need GPS, but a NAV radio would have been nice. Certainly easier than routefinding through the grey drizzle that coats northern europe half the year.
And I’ll just go straight there thank you. Seen enough of BUNJO and DIIDAH and WIDDER. I’ll take a good old magnetic bearing from this low tech compass that thoughtfully contains a shot of the hard stuff for if it don’t end well.
And yes VFR - it is literally clear as the literal day out there.
The NZ air force - are they grumpy chaps?
Thought not.
And here we are.
Client doesn’t really care. Yes cash will do nicely. And my reputation? That’s just what other people think.
Don’t sweat the little things folks. You can break the so-called rules.
[Not to be used for real-world aviation]
