www.TalesFromTheWildBlueYonder.com
Lately I've been getting my ass sued by a rich guy for no good reason.
I offered to teach him to fly, he fell on his ass. To read about it from the ridiculous git-go try this: http://johnolson.blog.com/?p=754
CAUTION: lots of 4-letter words in my blog!
I have a new zoot suit and I am very happy with it.
I met a Mexican woman when I went looking for someone to make me a new turban and she did a great job and she’s really fast. I had her fix some clothes and a wing bag and some other stuff, and I’ve always been happy with the results. So, I had her make me a new suit, since mine are getting pretty ragged.
What I want most in a flight/scooter suit is easy-on-easy-off and that’s what this suit features. The zippers run all the way from the ankle to the armpit, with a slide on both ends. This makes it really easy to pull the suit on, and lets you open the suit to warm your hands or to access your street clothes or pockets or what have you. I also want red these days, because I do a lot of riding on streets and highways and I have this notion the red is just slightly safer than any other color.
The suit also has little stirrups to keep it down at the ankles, which may make it better for flying my open trike as well.
The fabric is the most basic I have found at the local fabric store and there are other, more pricey cloths, including gabardine, which is one of my favorites but is twice the price. These cloths come in about any color and pattern you can imagine, but for some reason they do not sell cordura. But you could get a wild suit in some outrageous colors or a sensible suit in a black or gray. They have some nice camos as well. My suit is one layer of cloth but she will sew in a lining for more warmth, if that’s what you want. The zipper is large-tooth spiral, and there are eight slides-per-zoot. Suit.
So who wants a new zoot suit? The price starts at $95 plus $10 to ship anywhere USA. You’d need to send some basic measurements in centimeters. NOTE: Approved by the Free Mexican Airforce
I was contemplating cutting all my hair off, and I came upon this place. Somehow, I lost interest in a haircut.
Apparently, there is a plan afoot, to mow down this entire little mountain, which is only about 500 feet tall, and doesn’t look like much in this photo, and haul it off as fill for a two-mile-long footing that will jut out into the Sea of Cortez here, as a dock for cruise ships. Supposedly, the Mexican federal government has already cut loose with the pesos and given the project the green light. There’s lots of enthusiasm for the project and plenty of thinking that, if you can just hold on until then, everything will be okay again.
Yesterday I rode Balaso up to the border at Lukeville, AZ, to pick up my mail and have a hamburger. By the way, they have great burgers right on the border, at the Gringo Pass Café. There’s not much else on the border there on the gringo side but countless border-patrol types, lots of suspicion and paranoia. Meanwhile, on the Mexico side, there is a vibrant populace, by comparison. It is really night and day.
I nearly broke 10,000 miles on Balaso on this journey but not quite. I am reading 9,992.3 miles now, all of them pretty much trouble free. I have had to replace both tires and repair the rear tire once, and I have replaced the paper air filter that comes standard with a fabric K&N filter that takes oil, but that is all.
I would never be able to ride all the way to the border from here, which is 100 kilometers, if not for the clever cruise control I have come up with. I bought this plastic clip you see here at some bike shop somewhere, the idea of which is that the rider does not have to hold the throttle anymore, he can just rest his hand on the clip and have a sort of cruise control. But my hand cramps so easily it does not work. So I clipped a couple of vise-grips on there and now it works fine. I don’t have to grab the throttle at all. I just fly. NOTE: this devise is not recommended by SkyWriter. It is good only for empty stretches of highway like you often find out west.
I paid $3,000 for my Honda Elite 110 a year ago last November. I am putting about 8,000 miles a year on her and I am very pleased.
Probably not as pleased as I might be with this little beauty here, which is for sale at the local Mexican Walmart-like store Bodega Aurrera. The price tag of $13,690P comes to about $1,020 US dollars. Plus, it’s a 150cc rather than a 110. But can we ride this little wonder in America?
No way Jose… No, cabron!
Scam artist Charlie Gray and scumbag lawyer Joe Zebas, in their quest for justice and compensation, are still sniffing up my skirt. How do I know? Well, thanks to my Google analytics, that’s how. I hope they gag on what they find…
Some of you will remember back some months ago when Jose and Charlie first discovered my blog, and got wind that I was poking fun at them. You’ll remember how they were hitting and hitting my silly nonsense and coming up on a hundred hits on my blog, and I was watching the tally rise each day and keeping score, and it was all thanks to the fine techies at Google. They kept me informed.
Well the lawyer and his stooge are still at it, but they have become clever. They clicked some setting somewhere in their Windows or in their AOL or whatever, that deleted their name so that what used to show up as Joe Zebas or Zebas Law Firm or one of my favorites-Jose Zebras… is now showing up as…
(not provided)
As if I didn’t know. What used to show up on my blog as Joe Zebag, hey! I like that, Joe Zebag! It was a typo but I like it! I think I’ll run with it! What used to show up as Joe Zebag is now…
(not provided)
I guess they musta got tired of me picking on them, is all I can figure. Sorry fucks. And they’re still planning on picking on me I’m sure. They have nothing better in life to amuse them I guess. Anywho, here’s the latest from Google analytics for SkyWriter: TAKE IT AWAY JOSE!
Top Referrers
- johnolson.blog.com – 30 Visits
- facebook.com – 26 Visits
- ushawks.org – 18 Visits
- blog.com – 15 Visits
- learntohangglide.com – 12 Visits
Top Searches
- john olson blog skywriter – 21 Visits
- (not provided) – 20 Visits
- john olson blog – 19 Visits
- johnolson.blog.com – 11 Visits
- sky writer ole – 10 Visit
Pathetic numbers I know but the point is… if I lose Charlie and if I lose Jose, I will have lost a significant percentage of my readers. I can’t win for losing it seems.
On a happier note, I am camped atop a wonderful sand dune that makes a near-perfect bowl and is about 60 feet high, out by the Reef Restaurant between Peñasco and Choya Bay. I am just waiting for a day with honkin’ north-easterly winds, when I am just sure this dune will turn on and get soarable. And it will be fabulous I’m also sure.
Which brings us to today’s blog themesong.
Today the breeze blew up for a while but then died out. Snowball took a few little sledrides and did all right but by then the wind had died out to 
nothing. I sat there very contented for a while, and I am reading COLDITZ, about a German POW camp during WWII, and I watched a buzzard about a quarter-mile out front circle out pretty high. Behind me, downwind about a quarter mile is the Sea of Cortez.
Forgive me about the Scam Artist and Scumbag Lawyer update, but I always like to end on something happy. I will send pics soon. Of the flying that is.
This blog dispatched from down on the border the Gringo Pass Café, Lukeville, AZ.
One of the things I love about Mexico is that food is pretty cheap. Especially Hass avocados. They’re about 25 cents apiece. I love to make huevos rancheros for breakfast, and serve them with slices of ripe avocado or fresh pineapple. I make huevos rancheros with tostadas instead of tortilla, unlike anyone I know except about everyone in Nayarít, which is the third state down the coast of Mexico from Arizona. What’s the difference between a tostada and a tortilla you ask? Hombre, you really are a gringo… 
A tostada is a toasted tortilla. They are crisp rather than doughy. They are like eating corn chips except bigger and round. When you make huevos rancheros this way, you can pick them up and eat them by hand. Tostados, and tortillas in general are more that a food. They are an ancient food-delivery system.
The other key ingredient is frijoles rifritos-refried beans. You don’t need much, but they are indispensable. Also, this is one of the few recipes where I like to have a microwave but I don’t have a microwave so I just warm up the beans in one small pan and the salsa in another but I’m going to assume you have a microwave and tell you how I make huevos rancheros with a microwave because it is so easy and clean-up is nothing.
1 bag of corn tostadas
1 small can of refried beans
a few spoonfuls of salsa pico de gallo
2 fresh eggs-extra large
sliced avocado or pineapple or papaya is great too
Spread a layer of refried beans on two tostadas with a knife like you might peanut butter on a cracker. A thin layer is fine.
Set them on a plate and also a small ramekin-like bowl of the salsa-about a half-cup. Put the plate in the microwave for stand-by.
Fry up a couple of eggs over-easy or, if you like them as I do, just put a lid on them and baste them until the whites are cooked.
About a minute before the eggs are cooked, turn the microwave with the plate on high. For some ovens 30 seconds is about right.
When the eggs are cooked to your liking, put one egg on each tostada. Pour the salsa (which is now warm) over the eggs and garnish with the fruit.
Vouila! you have huevos rancheros Nayarít. Yum.
SkyWriter. Reading, writing, flying, traveling and eating!
In a future blog from SkyWriter, we will take a look at how the fliers down here in the Free Mexican Airforce, use common old bailing wire to lash their burritos to the exhaust manifolds of their Rotax 503s, then head out into the wild blue yonder to brown them up nicely even as they fly the whoopers…
I mean, the tourists THE TOURISTS…
Today’s blog themesong is whooper-friendly
“Grampa?”
“Yes son?”
“Why were the whoppers grounded?”
“The whoopers son, they’re whoopers not whoppers.”
“You mean not like at Burger King?”
“That’s right son. These are birds not burgers. They are magnificent birds, and they’re very endangered.”
“Grampa?”
“Yes son?”
“What’s endangered?”
“That means they are about extinct. There’s only a few left and some good people are trying to save them.”
“Why are they grounded Grampa?”
“Well they’re not son, it’s the pilots who are grounded.”
“Why don’t the whoppers just fly away?”
“Because they would be lost son, and we have plenty of lost whoopers. The whoopers would be lost and that’s what the nice men are trying to avoid.”
“So why are the nice men grounded?”
“Because they might make a buck son. That’s why.”
“What’s grounded Grampa?”
“That just means they can’t fly.”
“But if they can’t fly, what will happen to the whoppers?”
“Well, nobody knows. But it is the rules that are sacred son, so the pilots are grounded. That’s all there is too it.”
“Grampa?”
“Yes son.”
“What rule is it that is sacred?”
“Well, all the rules are sacred son. But this one is the rule that it is illegal to earn a buck flying those funny-looking little planes we love. And the people in charge-the rotten people-have gotten wind that these nice guys who look like whoopers just might be making a buck. They might even be earning a living flying the whoopers, Heaven forbid. It’s all illegal”
“Grampa?”
“What son?”
“Why can’t they earn a buck? Why can’t they earn their living? Why is it all illegal?”
“Good question son. Because the powersthatbe-a bunch of feckless deskrats-have declared it that’s why. A bunch of guys who all we know about for sure is that they will never fly and never have to worry about earning their keep are in charge and they say Thou Shalt Not Do This Harmless Thing and Thou Shalt Not Do That Fantastic Thing!”
“Grampa?”
“What’s freckles?”
“Feckless son. It means spineless, feeble, weak. Useless son.”
“Grampa?”
“Yes son?”
“When I grow up I want to make a buck flying funny-looking planes just like those nice guys who look like whoppers. I don’t care about illegal.”
“Well you know what they say son?”
“What’s that Grampa?”
“Like father, like son.”
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
So the latest absurd bird saga with the stinkin’ feds as come and gone. It appears that wiser minds have prevailed, at some government level. Maybe they just couldn’t stand to play the fools on NPR. They said You guys can’t do this because we think you are making a buck and someone said Oh no these guys are not making a buck. They get paid for breeding the whoopers and for brooding the whoopers and for hatching the whoopers and for raising the whoopers and for teaching the whoopers and for training the whoopers to fly, and they get paid for leading the whoopers and for… oh! Wait! No! Let’s stop right there. They are not paid to lead them or to fly with them at all! In fact, they are not paid anything. They are starving. And so are their families. Is that okay?
While you guys collect your salary.
Dumb fucks who want to herd birds anyway! Sheesh!
But me, I have to back up to where they say Thou art forbidden from earning thy keep as a triker.
What the FUCK?
Who are these creeps we have in charge anyway? What I say what! do they care about how we trikers make a living? Is there something inherently sinful or murderous about flying a trike? Is there some actual reason for them to forbid us from offering our fellow man the greatest experience many of us will ever enjoy? And charging for it?
Fuck no.
They are a bunch of assholes, no two ways about it.
Of course, we trikers all know why the bureaucraps have written up these rules to keep us down. Because the other fliers-the real pilots if you will, have jumped through numberless silly hoops to keep on doing what flying they can dig up, and they don’t want some guy they perceive as a yahoo to show up in a little contraption that cost a fraction and do their job better and cheaper too. They got theirs damnit, and they don’t want us to have any. Fuck a buncha us.
Of course, there are no real pilots hopping rides at the beach. There are no real pilots doing anything anywhere for $40. And taking a ride in a 50-year old spam can just ain’t much fun anyway.
Well, the deskers have it not just for trikes. It’s happening all around u
s.
On a lighter note, if you’re 25 and love to read just for the fun of it, may I suggest a great book with whoopers? I mean, SkyWriter is about reading too, right? Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, by Tom Robbins, is a hilarious read. It has whoopers as mentioned, but also a hitch-hiking babe everyone can love, a rascally old chink who get’s his piece, cowboys and cowgirls and plenty of wisdom. I carried this book around until it was dog-eared and tattered, and then I gave it away. Check it out!
Hellfire, you might even enjoy my thrilling novels:
Ahh Mexico. Here’s a sign I pass every day:
LOVE It’s easy to be a man for you!
Now I ask you, are those not the most bodacious tatas you have ever laid eyes on? Can you appreciate the marvelous flesh tones? And how about that look she gives me. I don’t know about you, but to me she says something like Come over here you big gringo. It’s lunchtime.
And how about this one for the Camel Toe Cafe? Notice the paint-job details? I wonder who the camel toe artist is, and does he put that on his resume?
Which brings me to today’s blog theme song, I hope the Beach Boys don’t mind… Click here!
There wasn’t much I learned in Barbara Knowles’ creative writing class back in the Summer of Love. I was just 16 then, and so of course I already knew everything. But if anything Mrs. Knowles taught me stuck in my head at all it is this: irony and dilemmas make for compelling story telling.
So how’s this for irony, many of you have read it here before but I am still stuck on it so you might want to move on, and if you are so inclined here’s a suggestion, another blog from another Olson called: www.overlawyered.com
How’s that for Ironic?
But back to my own personal irony: on the day when Charlie Brown fell on his ass and sued me, we were planning (or so I thought) to fly my really, really, scary machine.
Which brings us to today’s blog themesong…
On the day that Charlie Brown busted his face when he fell on his ass, I was going to start letting him try to kill me over and over and over again, but instead he’s suing me for malicious negligence. Because he stumbled beneath the Milky Way. And fell on his ass.
We never did fly.
How do you like them apples? In terms of Irony, I’d like you to top that.
Mrs. Knowles, I have Irony, in my life.
Now, much is discussed about the dangers of flight training. There are columns and magazines and newsprint and books and CDs and videos written and otherwise produced about flight training, and how to make it safe or safer. There is no shortage of people who claim to be expert about flight training safety, and some of them are flight instructors. We even have the Feds themselves-the guys who sit behind a desk 40 hours a week and never do any flying at all, or very little anyway-coming up with silly sayings to make flight training trite, like Safety First! and Safety is NO ACCIDENT. This from guys who, what we know for sure; they will never risk their necks and teach someone to fly. Uh uh, ain’t gonna happen. That would be a conflict of interest.
But what you almost never hear is the Truth About Flight Training… and so… here it comes…
At some point, you just gotta let that fuckin’ guy try to kill you, and then just hope he don’t! You’re gonna have to save it over and over again, but you gotta let him try to kill you. Hell, he’s gonna try to kill you both. Over and over again. Did I say that already?
Ironically, I knew Charlie Brown could not fly.
Ironically, this was about the only thing I really knew for sure about Charlie Brown-he could not fly.
This was why he came to Rodeo (that really dark place where he fell on his ass) in the first place. Or so he says… He came out to Rodeo because he had a sudden compulsion to do what I discovered at a relatively young age-to fly trikes. And I had no reason to doubt him. Hell plus two, I think it’s the greatest thing a body might do-fly a trike.
And so when he wanted to learn I said ‘Yes’! I said, ‘Sure!’ I said, ‘Saddle up padner! We’ll take that wagon right there! I have three of ‘em! If one don’t do the job, we’ll hop in another. Bound to be one of ‘em to do the trick!’
And Ironically, we never did. Instead, well… You know the ridiculous details by now I guess. Charlie and I never did any flying at all. We never even sat down together in the trike, we never started the motor or made any airplane noise whatsoever, and we never even taxied across the apron.
What we had in mind Charlie and I, was slipping the Surly Bonds of Earth, Dancing the Skies on Laughter-Silvered wings, reaching out and Touching the Face of God. Which themes, keep appearing in my life, in case you haven’t noticed.
Ironically, what we have instead is a ridiculous lawsuit and a really low-down scumbag lawyer; Jose (The Jackal) Zebras.
Mrs. Knowles, how’s that for Irony 101?
On a future blog, SkyWriter will explore dilemma in his life, but for now let me explain that, according to Mrs. Knowles, there are but three classic dilemmas in all of literature, and here they are, chew on this:
Man vs. Himself
Man vs Nature, and
Man vs Man
I am down here on the beach in Sonora and I have been talking up my headless Mexican with the tourists and I tell ya what-I’m pretty happy with him. Some of you who have been reading SkyWriter will remember my headless Mexican but you newbies will need an introduction so here goes: based (you might say) on Carlos Fuentes’ Mexican head, the disembodied head who narrates his new novel Destiny and Desire, my headless Mexican is going to have much more fun than Carlos’ Mexican head ever had. After all, while there’s really not much any head might do but roll around and talk and blink its eyes, my headless Mexican will slip the Surly Bonds of Earth, he will huck himself off the highest heights, he will make a leap of faith, he will hang glide!
Just one of the most thrilling pursuits known to all mankind is what. In fact, a realization of Mankinds’ Most Ancient Dream-to fly with the birds-is what my headless Mexican will do.
Today I sold one of my thrilling Thrillogy to some old bird from Scottsdale whom I took flying, a gal who even went so far as to spend the extra nickel I charge for an autographed copy of my books, who feigned astonished to learn of the theme of my fourth thrilling novel, and who chuckled nervously as I elaborated.
And then she said, “Headless? Hang glide? But, but, don’t be silly… How can he SEE?”
Well, that’s the beauty of my headless Mexican. See, he won’t need to see. He knows me see, and he knows glideheads. Because he’s one himself. And he knows, that if he can just find me, that I wouldn’t do him wrong. That I would shove him out there at just that right moment, the Magic Moment if you will, when he ain’t gonna need to see. Seeing, is the one thing he won’t need to do.
Nope, I will shove him off the cliff in the biggest, fattest, most rippinest therm of the day, and since that day will also be the longest day-June 21 say-it will be a rippin’ Thermal indeed. There will be about a square mile of air out front of launch all rushing up towards the firmament. You could chuck a barn door out there and ride it to the clouds-if you could only hold on. It will be the kind of thermal we gringo glideheads know as a Helen Keller.
That is-even Helen Keller might have specked-out in this thermal!
My headless Mexican (whose name is Jesús by the way, but we just call him Chui) may not be pretty to look at, but he knows. Oh, he knows. He knows that I know a Helen Keller when I see one. And hear it too for that matter. He knows, because he was just about knee-high when he first saw the winged-gringo descend from on high with a foolish grin and drool running down his chin, and plant a perfect landing in the cornfield where he stood a’watching. Seeing, will not be a big priority when my headless Mexican hucks himself off Mingus Mountain, and so I explained this to the old bird, down here on the beach in Mexico.
In fact, I explained, my Headless Mexican will figure his luck has changed in general when he runs into the sky at Mingus Mountain, something that never happens to Carlos’ Mexican head, who really has run out of luck and certainly will get no flying, at all. All my headless Mexican will have to do is hold himself more-or-less in the middle of that bar, give a slight shove thiswayandthat nowandthen, and otherwise holdontight. Before long, he’ll be in the Heavens, where everything is beautiful and nothing hurts.
Of all the senses that my headless Mexican lost when he was parted with his head, the sense he will miss most would be the sense of yell. Because he’d yell for joy, if he could.
In other news, I am down here on the beach in Sonora reading The Underdogs, a Novel of the Mexican Revolution (Los de Abajo) by Mariano Azuela. Suddenly it seems I might not have the first novel of a headless Mexican after all!
Introduction by Carlos Fuentes?! Hmmm…
SkyWriter’s note: to go back in my blog for Chapter Uno of the Headless Mexican saga click this.
This here photo is one of the first families I took to the sky here in Mexico during Christmas break. First the kids flew, and they loved it so much they convinced the parents to fly too. And then the father said to me,
“We’re going back to the hotel for grandpa and grandma.”
This was all good and their pilot was happy with this news, but then when grandpa showed up he was wearing the turban you see here. Well, I took grandma flying and she was a bit reluctant to let the big gringo in between those knees but she had little choice about it. Then it was grandpa’s turn and I explained that I was worried about his turban-would the turban stay on his head as it had so far, or might it sail off in our own wind and take out my prop?
His grand daughter said a few words to him in Farsi or Hindu or whatever, at which point the old gent reached into a pocket and came out with some piece of clots; it looked to be very thin cotton with an elaborate design, and it was folded neatly and seemed to be maybe even starched and pressed. Well, he carefully unfolded this cloth like a sash and proceeded to tie the turban on more securely-he held the cloth under his chin while his wife tied it in a bow like you might your shoe.
The trick worked, the turban did not generate enough drag to be a hazard, everyone was happy and SkyWriter was a few pesos richer.
These were simple folks, as are most of those who fly down here. These folks are no way in Hell ever going to learn to fly trikes and they don’t want a lesson, most of them. They don’t know anyone who does fly trikes whom they might beg for a ride. They want to fly though. They are often desperate to fly. They just want to slip the Surly Bonds for once, they just want to feel what the birds feel, they want a ride and they don’t really care what it costs, as long as it’s within their budgets. They don’t give a fart about the rules either by the way. They just want to buy a ride and thank the sky gods for the Free Mexican Airforce.
To forbid us from selling rides-what a bunch of bullshit! That is government gone loco.
In another humorous moment I took two brothers flying, aged 12 and 7, and the younger one sat on his brother’s lap. This is another thing forbidden in the Land ‘o the Free-you can’t fly three in a trike.
These kids were from Wyoming, where they had seen hang gliders and paragliders before, but they had never flown anything so small. Well, we took off and popped over the dunes and I immediately noticed something causing a stir in an otherwise glassy bay so I motored straight over there. It was about a half-mile offshore so we climbed up to about five hundred feet or so to maintain a safety margin for the beach and we looked down and, sure enough, there was a pod of dolphins-I’d estimate a good forty or so.
We circled them once and then got back on track. We flew up the beach, we flew back down the beach, and when we landed the 7-year old ran wildly into his mother’s arms yelling, “We saw a bunch of trout we saw a bunch of trout!”
I guess when you’re from Wyoming they’re all trout.
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I was hoppin’ rides on the beach at Las Conchas when a late-model Escalade pulled up and out jumped a man who headed in my direction. This hombre seemed very happy about something and I hoped it was me. He was smiling from ear to ear. “Pa volar senyor,” I offered.
“Tu no me acuerdes pero tu me subiste para un paseo en 1994.”
Well, turns out I took this guy for a ride in my trike in 1994. It was at the airshow in Hermosillo, when Patty Wagstaff was the star. Apparently I took this bato flying but that was a while ago.
“Tu sigues a volar senyor?” I asked. Do you continue to fly?
“Oh no amigo, yo no soy volador, pero soy gerente del aeropuerto aqui.” Oh no friend, I’m not a flier. I’m the airport manager here. The news could not have been much better. “Si usted ocupa algun cosa me dices.” If you need anything at all you just tell me.”
I love my yob, here in Mexico.
