Jim said seriously. "I don't think I could top that. What was your best event in history?"
"Well, it's hard to pick," Lourdes said "I'm thinking, like, the idea of science, I think. Science as a whole thing."
"That surprises me," he said.
"Me, too," she said. "But I think it's because it asserts reason over an emotional fake-certainty that people get into, sometimes. Like, I think it's the backbone of the culture in Star Trek, of people realizing more how the universe works instead of blaming things on superstition or ideologies. And like the movie 'Lincoln' with Daniel Day-Lewis. Science shows gives us proof people are people, and that differences that mean so much to people, may have no basis in fact."
"You're deep sometimes."
"It'll pass."
"No. I like that in you. So we get to choose ideas? Then my best event is the discovery of the monolith on the dark side of the moon."
"Real life," Lourdes said.
"Probably when the Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect stowed away on the Vogons' ship."
Lourdes was not aware of that one.
"Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?" he said. "You never read that?"
"No. Sorry."
"It's a four-book trilogy."
She laughed.
"Yeah. Typical of it," he said with a smile. "The author's got a screw loose. In a good way. You read much?"
"Yes, I do!"
"Okay. Best event or thing or something?" he said. "I'm guessing when the planetoid hit the earth and made the moon."
Lourdes looked at him like she was tired.
"Alright," he said, giving up. "I don't know. There's whatever happened in Egypt three thousand years ago that was the impetus for a lot of western thought from written law to civilization. There's the Buddha. The struggle of knowledge and science, like you said, where we pulled ourselves up as a culture by our own boot straps from the depths of the dark ages. There's medicine that helps keep billions alive.
"I don't know how to pick."
He thought for a few minutes.
"I think love," he said, finally.
Lourdes said nothing.
"Directed positive emotion that pulls people together, that makes people want to be together, to be better people so they can be together."
Lourdes smiled. "That's deep, too."
"You started it."
CHAPTER 21
They wound up in a large shop west of Show Center, looking through racks of shirts, hats, patches-everything an airshow buff might want.
Jim followed along dutifully.
"The air conditioning's nice in here," he said.
"Refreshing," Lourdes said, lifting a short-sleeved top off the rack to look at it better.
"I think the light blue looks good on you," Jim said.
"Me, too." She put the shirt back nonetheless. "What doesn't look good on me is a pea-soup green. Doesn't fit my coloring."
"I see that," Jim said.
He pulled a long-sleeved baby-blue shirt for himself off a rack and asked for her input.
"Lovely," Lourdes said.
"Uh," Jim found the top on the rack that she'd looked at. "I-am kind of wondering if it would be okay for me to buy the both of these for us. They look like they match, even if mine has long sleeves."
"I know you know I don't want to spend money. I just quit my job. And I don't like the charity aspect of your gift. So no thank you."
"Yes, I see that," Jim said almost timidly. "I don't want to offend you. And I know you're also camping and don't need to pile things into your plane to stay under gross. But I do have an ulterior motive in my asking?" He said it as a question.
Lourdes stopped by a counter full of jewelry and patches in the middle of the store.
"May I help you?" the lady behind the counter asked.
Lourdes almost asked her for help. "No thank you," she said to the lady. Then to Jim she asked, "What is it?"
"Because I'd like to ask you out on a date tonight," he said.
The lady grinned, taking a step back to give them room.
"And I'd like everyone there to know you're with me." His smile was warm and friendly.
"A date." Lourdes glanced at the lady who was nodding yes behind her grin.
Another lady walked up to the counter and stood beside them to watch.
"Lourdes," Jim asked, "would you go out with me tonight? Just the two of us. And thirty thousand other people?"
CHAPTER 22
The entire airport could see the major airshow in progress, aerobatic planes trailing smoke through sailor's knots in the sky, the announcer relaying every detail over loudspeakers as if it were the Superbowl. The air was tense with adventure.
Lourdes and Jim sat on plastic seat, steel-frame chairs in the middle of one of the huge, educational Forum "tents"-a steel building with canvas sides-listening to a lecturer talk about the world of flight from a humorous perspective. The building was about two-thirds full. Some people drifted in; some drifted out. The air was very casual.
All were in a pleasant mood and laughed off and on at the lecturer's wisecracks which had loosened them up into a joking free-for-all: hangar flying large style.
One man yelled to the lecturer up front. "Excuse me, but why can't I fly over and fuel up at my cousin Elmer's gas station out on the highway?"
Another man added in an exaggerated country accent, "Because he don't have ethyl-well, he may have Ethyl, but not the kind-"
People laughed.
"Because it isn't high enough octane for some engines, and you could get detonation in your engine," someone yelled back a little more seriously.
"Hundred Low lead is a better fuel for those higher compression engines some planes have," another put in.
"Most little planes don't have that high a compression, and don't need hundred octane."
"Engines have better performance on higher octane."
"Octane's just an anti-knock rating; it doesn't give you more power."
"And, Mitchell," someone else said. "Elmer's gas is lead-free, and your 100LL fuel has a little lead in it that lubes your valve guides and stuff."
"Not needed for the smaller engines like ours," another said.
"And," the lecturer said with a smile, trying to remind folks he was still in there somewhere. "Car gas has a bunch of stuff in it that airplane fuel isn't supposed to have that could be bad for your engine. I took a research team over to that fictitious Elmer's gas station, sampled his car gas, and I found ethanol in it and some other stuff-that can hurt some airplane engine seals," he held up a jar of liquid for them all to see, "Elmer had some mayonnaise in there, and some jiz," he held up another jar-
All of this played on the shoulders of other comments the audience had made and tipped the audience into cat calls and laughter.
"I like this guy," Jim told Lourdes.
Lourdes smiled and shook her head at the zaniness.
The lecturer continued. "And there were some chemicals my team told me about but which I could never pronounce-and a partridge in a pair tree-all dressed up in a soup that looked like my grandmother's day old broth."
"But my plane has an S.T.C. for auto gas," someone yelled.
"That was way back when, Orville," someone said. "Before they started monkeying with the chemical nature of the fuel."
While the group kept talking, Jim leaned over and told Lourdes quietly. "You have an S.T.C. for autogas?"
"I think there's one buried in the ship's papers somewhere from years ago, but I've never used it.
"Good. Because modern fuel used with an old S.T.C.? The fuel's different than it used to be. It may or may not make you land in the corn-which would be homesick fuel going back home," he said with a grin.
Lourdes grinned at his grin.
The lecturer summed that part up: "Some aircraft engines are actually made for autogas and prefer it if there's no lead. But for the others, which is most of them, so far, if you ever do want to use autogas in your plane, if it i
sn't itself made for it, you should check with your A&P to see if the kind of fuel you want to use is both legal and is not going to hurt your engine. Auto gas isn't the same everywhere, you know. So ask your plane's doctor what it should have."
Lourdes asked Jim, "Do you have your A&P?"
"No," Jim said. "But Mike's been nagging me on it, as well as a couple other guys. I told 'em I am not a real airplane mechanic, but they say I could be with a little more effort."
"Maybe that would be a good thing?" Lourdes wondered.
"Well, I was using part of the shed-the one attached to the barn-as a brothel-"
"Ah!" Lourdes said. "Not fence jewels?"
"I give up," he said with a smile. "I'm a 'respectable' lobbyist for the Republican Party in Washington, fighting for the Defense of Marriage Act and against women's choice."
"You are soooo totally full of it!"
"You bet your sweet- I am," he said, shaking his head in disgust.
"Are you a republican?" she asked.
"Not with stuff like that in their platform, no. And double-no. I do like the idea of having a better national energy plan that incorporates more natural gas, but honestly, do I have to put up with stuff like that to get it?"
The group in the Forum "tent" was carrying on humorously with whatever topic, because people around them kept laughing about something, but neither Lourdes nor Jim paid any attention.
"So who did you vote for in the last election?" Lourdes asked.
"I can't say."
"Oh, come on! You told me you were a thief."
"Father Guido Sarducci," he said.
"A real person!"
"Eddie Murphy?"
Lourdes tried to convey with her raised eyebrows that he could keep trying.
"Lewis Black?"
Lourdes chuckled at him.
"Okay," he said. "I voted for Steve Martin, because then as our President, when he was in the middle of the latest SNAFU, he could tell us all 'Well, excuuuuuuse Meeeeeeee'!"
Lourdes laughed.
"What about you?" Jim asked. "Who'd you vote for?"
"Stephen Colbert," she said.
This time Jim laughed at her.
"No, it was Jeff Dunham-and Walter as V.P."
"Ha! Lourdes! He could use his puppets as cabinet. The little purple whacko could be Press Secretary. The suicide bomber could be Secretary of Defense!"
"So you watch him, too?" Lourdes asked.
"Yeah. On the Comedy Channel."
"So you have TV in Missouri?"
"And indoor plumbing."
"Really, I-" Lourdes thought. "I voted for Obama."
"Me, too," he said.
"Overall," she said, "I try to see if there's a candidate that the constituents need at that time, depending on the issues. And I try to find a good person, inside, someone who might handle something well if something comes up we can't anticipate."
Jim looked into her eyes. "That sounds just like me," he admitted. "And I also take into account equal rights."
"Right. I do think that what's good for some Americans should be good for all Americans."
"Like marriage?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "Including that, too. I mean, saying it's only between a 'man' and a 'woman,' aside from the fact those are poorly defined terms, means to them 'any American can marry as long as it's to someone like we would marry,' and that's just wrong. That gives license to any kind of bigotry. It's like saying 'Anyone's free live as they want as long as they do it the way I do.' And there would go freedom of religion, also. And freedom of speech. All so that insecure righteous bigotry-"
"Fascism," he added.
"-can feel safe in the knowledge they're okay inside."
"And not have to face some of their own, private nature, either," he agreed.
Jim laughed out loud. "Have you heard Lewis Black go on about this?"
"No," she answered.
Jim laughed again. "You should look it up on the internet. The Carnegie Hall one, I think. It was great," Jim said to her, smiling.
Engine roar in the air got Lourdes' attention. She turned her head and looked across Jim to see a group of airplanes in tight formation fly through a graceful starburst maneuver.
CHAPTER 23
In the warm late twilight, just before dusk, Jim and Lourdes sat near Millie on the Show Central ramp seventy feet from the huge stage occupied by the Steve Miller Band, listening to great music they'd enjoyed much of their life.
"Jet Airliner" played loudly over the speakers.
It was a lively event. People danced in place alone or with each other. Many stood. Some sat. Some walked back and forth getting refreshments.
Jim stood up to see over some folks in front of them and danced a little in front of his chair.
"Thanks for these lawn chairs, Millie," Lourdes said to her.
"Oh, of course," Millie said. "We bring them for whatever-exactly stuff like this. Nice shirts, you guys," she commented on their look-alike light blue shirts.
"It was him," Lourdes said with a thumb to Jim.
"I know. But it looks nice."
"Because it's an actual date," Jim told Millie, sitting back down in his chair.
Mike returned with some lemon aid for the four of them, handed them out. "You're on an actual date?" he asked. "Like serenading isn't? This one's real?"
"Yup," Jim said.
"And you agreed to this?" Mike asked Lourdes.
Lourdes nodded reluctantly.
Millie reached her lemon aid cup over to Lourdes' and clicked them together, laughing.
"Well, that's the first time he's dated in years," Mike said. "I hope you don't upset the weather gods with any of that. These clouds could dump rain all over us and spoil the concert."
"Not enough clouds," Jim said, pulling out his smart phone. "And lets see." He pressed a few icons to get the local radar. "Nope. See here?" He showed his phone to everyone. "Not this evening."
"Well, I don't guess I should be surprised," Mike said, leaning across Millie to Lourdes and clicking his cup against hers also.
Their playful banter continued through the evening while they listened to a list of classic Steve Miller songs.
Some of the folks in front had sat down as the concert continued playing, so Jim sat back down as well.
"The Joker" rocked the ramp.
The four of them sat and enjoyed the evening.
"How many people you think are here," Millie asked them all.
Everyone looked around at the ramp.
Mike stood up to count. "One, two-thirty thousand?"
"Could be," Jim said looking around. "I don't know. Cold be fifty thousand for all I know. Good draw, either way" Jim said.
"Everything's big around here," Mike said. "We want planes, we get twenty thousand of them. We want music? We get a major concert. Good planning, I think. You know sometimes in the past? I've seen a Quantas 747 land right back there on Runway Three Six, non-stop from Australia, bringing people here for this airshow."
"Me, too," said Jim. "And planes parked right here in Show Center? A Concorde. A Soviet Atonov An-124, Migs, an F-117 fighter, F-104 Starghter, C-5 Galaxy-all kinds of things."
"Bigger is better, to me," Mike said as the crowd rocked on. "I'd have a 747 for myself, if I could. I think it should have a hot tub in it. A King-sized bed-"
"What about turbulence?" Millie asked.
Jim picked that up. "You hit an air pocket, and all the water in your hot tub would fly up out of there splashing all over the ceiling. Get your cafeteria-wrapped sub sandwich all wet."
"So I'd have a butler standing by with gourmet spaghetti, and it'd have one of those little silver lids on the plate, so it'd stay dry. And the butler could wear a bikini, so she'd be ready for it."
"You'd need a restraint harness for the bed," Jim said. You're lying there asleep, and then you'd go flying."
"I make my own turbulence, whether I'm in a plane or not," Mike said.
Jim laughed
. "If I could have any plane I'd want? I'd probably choose something more personal. Like maybe a G-5 corporate jet? If I could fly it myself. Then I could pick up the guys at our home strip and fly off to where ever for lunch. That's living. And an F-14 Tomcat, like Tom Cruise's in 'Top Gun' for back up."
"With a tanker to follow you around," Mike added.
"If it were me," Millie said. "I'd kinda like Mike's RV-9A that you guys are building. I really think that's a great plane."
"Well, if you're gonna get real, I'd take my own RV-6, because that plane is tricked out. And looks like it belongs in a race. What about you, Lourdes?" Jim asked.
"I don't know," Lourdes said. "This is magic?"
"Yes," Jim said. "Never needs fuel or maintenance. Just what would you like?"
The crowd was mostly standing again for another rousing song.
Jim, Lourdes, Mike, and Millie couldn't see the stage at that point, for the people standing in front of them. But they could very well hear the music and were having a great time.
"I think," Lourdes said, "On the grand side of things? I'd take a Starship Enterprise, 1701D-"
"Oooooohh! That is soooooo not here!" Millie said.
"Not fair!" Mike said. "We're talking Earth-based, intra-atmosphere motorized airfoils!"
"With wings!" Jim added with a laugh.
"-and a Millennium Falcon-" Lourdes said.
Mike and Jim laughed loudly, which during a live rock concert meant the neighbors didn't even notice.
"And for a personal plane? To be more real?" Lourdes thought. "I'd probably prefer a stable high wing because I kind of like to sit under the wing when I go some places, like camping or airshows."
"You mean like a Cessna or Kitfox?" Mike asked.
"Like an Albatross," Lourdes said, referring to the large, twin-engine flying boat, messing with them.
They all laughed together in their lawn chairs.
When the Steve Miller Band started playing "Abracadabra," half the audience hit their feet and began dancing to the bouncy, familiar beat, including Mike and Millie-emphasizing beats "and two and," pause, "and two and."
"Oh, God," Lourdes told Jim. "Millie's good."
"Sultry," Jim laughed. "And Mike is so pathetic."