"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
If you follow aviation accounts on social media, you’ve probably noticed how quick fellow aviation buffs are to pounce on photos of unidentified aircraft. The only thing worse is when the original poster gets the aircraft type or model wrong … then it’s Katie bar the door!
It’s been ten days since I sent the account info to PayPal and they haven’t made the deposit, so I remain a nobody and the coffee’s gone cold.
It has often occurred to me that perhaps the comparatively new science of aviation will bring the making of wars to an end by reason of the very terrible consequences which will fall upon those nations which, in the future, have the temerity to declare war upon each other.
Okay, we’re all up to our eyeballs with social distancing and sheltering in place. So here’s something different.
Suddenly there’s no traffic. We’ve never heard so many birds. We could get used to this.
I won’t even mention all the things you can watch on streaming TV, because I know we’re all doing that anyway, so much so that it’s starting to slow the internet down, like disinfectant wipes in the sewers.
It’s getting old, blogging about sheltering in place. But we’ve got it easy — for far too many Americans, the shutdown isn’t merely old, it’s a financial disaster.
Maybe we should come up with a standardized personal space reminder phrase, something along the lines of “Distance, please.” You know, like skiers and bicyclists with their “On your left,” like the French with their “bonjours,” like that one friend we all have with his “You gonna eat those fries?”