California Dreamin' [part VII]
Continued from part VI. To read this story from the beginning, go here.
Wednesday, April 26
on board United 719 to San José
"United 7-1-9 contact Denver centre on 1-2-0 point 5-7-5."
"United 7-1-9, 2-0-5-7-5, good day."
Jack's told me more than once, with little boy excitement in his voice, that when he's on a United flight, which is several times a week, normally, he listens to channel 9 on the in-flight entertainment system. Chanel 9 is the cockpit. You can hear the pilot's conversations with air traffic control. Not just the pilot of your flight, but the pilot of every plane within range, and the range is several hundred miles.
"United 5-0-2 request level 3-5-0."
"Salt Lake, United 5-0-2, good morning."
"United 5-0-2 descend to level 3-5-0."
"5-0-2 Salt Lake, roger."
The calls to and from Denver are decreasing in frequency, and I'm starting to hear from air traffic control in Salt Lake City.
Jack is on his way there today, to visit a client company. Everyone at the client company is Mormon. Everyone in Salt Lake City is Mormon, so that's no surprise. Jack used to tell me stories about them: the way they dress, the way they speak, their bizarre culture that, for example, requires you to become a "member" of a bar before you can have a drink there.
Once, he told me the story of how he told Peter the story of what happened in Salt Lake City on a day when the client was very happy with Jack's work: "So I was talking to Peter and I said, hey man, you'll never guess what they let me do, and Peter replied, Their wives?"
Peter is a master of the one-liner.
"They let me play their organ."
The clever Gentle Reader will imagine Peter's riposte.
"Air Canada 5-7-5, require level 3-2-0."
"Air Canada 5-7-5, Salt Lake, good morning."
While I understand perfectly why Jack would want to listen to this—he has a love affair with planes— I couldn't imagine why I would. But today's in-flight movie is The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, a film which I could not possibly be less interested in watching, and the too-loud conversation of the passengers directly behind me has prompted me to put on the headphones and search for something to drown them out.
Soon, I become fascinated with the challenge of decoding the air traffic control language.
"mumble...mumble... unintelligible... clear direct sage"
I hear the phrase "clear direct sage" several times, but cannot discern what it means.
"November seven two hotel golf, clear direct Iowa City."
"Roger, two hotel golf."
Then I realize Sage must be the name of an airport, and air traffic control was telling the flights they had a clear path, and should proceed directly to it—in as few words as possible.
The movie I'm not watching is showing a scene in which the children appear to be having dinner with Frank and Gordon, the new spokesbeavers for Bell Canada.
"United 5-0-2, traffic at twelve o'clock, two miles east on 7-2-0."
"Denver Centre, we have them in sight."
"Have you ever seen the movie Pushing Tin?" I asked Jack, once.
"Of course."
Jack owns nearly a thousand DVDs. They've been in storage since January, when he decided to sweep his life clean and get out of his South San Francisco apartment. He's been living in hotels all over Silicon Valley since then, and shopping for a house on one of the hills in the City. When he finds one, he'll be commuting down to the Valley, to Big Ass American Software Company, half way to San José. But none of that matters, you see, because Jack's been closest to me emotionally when he was 3,000 miles away, and farthest from me when we lived ten blocks apart. He'll keep me exactly as far away as he chooses, regardless of where my GPS is.
On Friday night Jack will pick me up in Beauty, and I'll tell him that I listened to the air traffic controllers, and he'll laugh, and say, "What's great is when one of them does something really stupid, or really nice. Then they use ten words instead of seven."
"November five four foxtrot tango tango, contact Salt Lake Centre."
"Tango, tango, Salt Lake."
"Tango, giving you lats longs to avoid military airspace."
"Go ahead, Salt Lake."
"Proceed direct Wilson Creek 0-9-5 at 0-4-0."
"Thank you, Salt Lake."
"You have a good day, Tango."
To be continued in part VIII
Wednesday, April 26
on board United 719 to San José
"United 7-1-9 contact Denver centre on 1-2-0 point 5-7-5."
"United 7-1-9, 2-0-5-7-5, good day."
Jack's told me more than once, with little boy excitement in his voice, that when he's on a United flight, which is several times a week, normally, he listens to channel 9 on the in-flight entertainment system. Chanel 9 is the cockpit. You can hear the pilot's conversations with air traffic control. Not just the pilot of your flight, but the pilot of every plane within range, and the range is several hundred miles.
"United 5-0-2 request level 3-5-0."
"Salt Lake, United 5-0-2, good morning."
"United 5-0-2 descend to level 3-5-0."
"5-0-2 Salt Lake, roger."
The calls to and from Denver are decreasing in frequency, and I'm starting to hear from air traffic control in Salt Lake City.
Jack is on his way there today, to visit a client company. Everyone at the client company is Mormon. Everyone in Salt Lake City is Mormon, so that's no surprise. Jack used to tell me stories about them: the way they dress, the way they speak, their bizarre culture that, for example, requires you to become a "member" of a bar before you can have a drink there.
Once, he told me the story of how he told Peter the story of what happened in Salt Lake City on a day when the client was very happy with Jack's work: "So I was talking to Peter and I said, hey man, you'll never guess what they let me do, and Peter replied, Their wives?"
Peter is a master of the one-liner.
"They let me play their organ."
The clever Gentle Reader will imagine Peter's riposte.
"Air Canada 5-7-5, require level 3-2-0."
"Air Canada 5-7-5, Salt Lake, good morning."
While I understand perfectly why Jack would want to listen to this—he has a love affair with planes— I couldn't imagine why I would. But today's in-flight movie is The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, a film which I could not possibly be less interested in watching, and the too-loud conversation of the passengers directly behind me has prompted me to put on the headphones and search for something to drown them out.
Soon, I become fascinated with the challenge of decoding the air traffic control language.
"mumble...mumble... unintelligible... clear direct sage"
I hear the phrase "clear direct sage" several times, but cannot discern what it means.
"November seven two hotel golf, clear direct Iowa City."
"Roger, two hotel golf."
Then I realize Sage must be the name of an airport, and air traffic control was telling the flights they had a clear path, and should proceed directly to it—in as few words as possible.
The movie I'm not watching is showing a scene in which the children appear to be having dinner with Frank and Gordon, the new spokesbeavers for Bell Canada.
"United 5-0-2, traffic at twelve o'clock, two miles east on 7-2-0."
"Denver Centre, we have them in sight."
"Have you ever seen the movie Pushing Tin?" I asked Jack, once.
"Of course."
Jack owns nearly a thousand DVDs. They've been in storage since January, when he decided to sweep his life clean and get out of his South San Francisco apartment. He's been living in hotels all over Silicon Valley since then, and shopping for a house on one of the hills in the City. When he finds one, he'll be commuting down to the Valley, to Big Ass American Software Company, half way to San José. But none of that matters, you see, because Jack's been closest to me emotionally when he was 3,000 miles away, and farthest from me when we lived ten blocks apart. He'll keep me exactly as far away as he chooses, regardless of where my GPS is.
On Friday night Jack will pick me up in Beauty, and I'll tell him that I listened to the air traffic controllers, and he'll laugh, and say, "What's great is when one of them does something really stupid, or really nice. Then they use ten words instead of seven."
"November five four foxtrot tango tango, contact Salt Lake Centre."
"Tango, tango, Salt Lake."
"Tango, giving you lats longs to avoid military airspace."
"Go ahead, Salt Lake."
"Proceed direct Wilson Creek 0-9-5 at 0-4-0."
"Thank you, Salt Lake."
"You have a good day, Tango."
To be continued in part VIII
Labels: Jack, moving to California, sprachspiele
4 Comments:
And, despite everything, I'm STILL on the edge of my seat. It's a skill you have that very few writers can manage to exercise over me.
I alternate between being thrilled and annoyed by it.
Carry on.
Here's hoping that one day you'll meet a man who isn't emotionally stunted, and with whom you can enjoy an equal relationship.
The aching and longing in your descriptions of Jack would be (mildly) touching in an 18-year-old; in a mature woman they start to sound more than a little sad...
It's a sad story, Anon. But if Jack and Sass got together and lived happily ever after, Postmodernes Sprachspielen would turn into a what-I-had-for-breakfast blog. And that would be much sadder.
> Then I realize Sage must be the
> name of an airport, and air
> traffic control was telling the
> flights they had a clear path, and
> should proceed directly to it—in
> as few words as possible.
Pretty much, except that they are mostly imaginary points in space that only exist on the maps that pilots use to navigate in the controlled airspace that commercial jets use.
I suspect your eyes are glazing over as you read this comment, but the Wikipedia entry on Flight Planning has more detail (scroll down to the "Describing a route" section).
The Microsoft Flight Simulator game actually does a pretty good job of emulating all this, maybe one day you could ask Jack to give you a demo.
FWIW, the most entertaining people to listen to on Channel 9 are the ground controllers at a busy airport like O'Hare. They regularly get frustrated at pilots who take wrong turns, they will occasionally lose planes (the transponders that are used to identify planes in the air don't work well on the ground) and just in general are far more verbose than the air traffic controllers.
Andrew.
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