"Dean Ing - Flying To Pieces" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ing Dean)

became a toast, and the toast became a rallying cry, and when some
smartass dreamed up an unofficial patch the Boring Old Farts got a
slogan, too; stolen, naturally, from the First Troop Carrier Command.
The patch showed two winged purple shafts crossed over a pipe and
slippers, with a legend beneath: vincrr QLTI PRIMUM GERIT; He Conquers
Who First Grows Old, or, The Old Fart Wins.

It was understood that the member who called an emergency footed its
bills except for breakage and, now and then, bail; those blowouts were
not exactly formal affairs and you didn't bring your wife because she
might get into a dustup with one of the strippers. It had been nearly a
year since the last bash and Lovett smiled to reflect that old Elmo, now
in his eighties, was still kicking. Lovett was pleased to see that the
emergency was to be held in the Bentwing offices, which meant Elmo's
hangar at John Wayne Airport in Orange County, with the planes booted
outside and a bunch of tables for the girls to strut on. He'd done that
once before.

started flying in formation, they wouldn't hit anything beyond "Wise
move, Elmo," Lovett muttered. When the bottles the hangar. The B.O.F.s
had tried hiring American Legion halls, private clubs, and in one case,
a country club. The tabs for wear and tear had proven greater than those
for food, booze, and entertainment combined. Actually, they had it down
to a science by now. You put your keys, along with everybody else's, in
the same box with a combination lock when you came in. If you couldn't
work the combination a few hours later and then find your way out of a
hangar, you had no business operating a vehicle. Some people said, those
weren't just awfully exacting standards. The hell with them.

Lovett toyed with the idea of passing on this one. It would be a long
cross-country alone to Southern California in his Varieze, a swept-wing
little two-holer he had built from Rutan plans when plastic airplanes
were still exotic. He would hear the same stories again, tell some of
them himself, like the time over Korea when one of the Mighty Mouse
rockets fire. d from his own F-84 started doing slow rolls until he
passed it, and his slipstream sucked it toward him like a big explosive
bullet with his name on it. The Mighty Mouse wasn't a smart munition,
but neither were you if you trusted it. This one was so dumb it
sideswiped his wing without taking half of it off.

Yeah, stories like that, some of them embellished with each retelling.
The problem, he realized, was that the B.O.F.s really were boring old
farts now to most outsiders. And it would be a long flight back, nursing
a hangover. On the other hand, he could spend a night or two with his
daughter, Roxanne, and more to the point, Chip would be there. Lovett's
hesitation was more bullshit, and it didn't take him in. scraw
"Hold a tiedown space for my Varieze," on the Xerox/and, sought an
envelope for it. With all the oddball aircraft Elmo rented out to the
more adventurous of the Hollywood crowd, surely there would be room.