Well, the Air Force always has my outhouse:
Ok, yesterday, August 12 I'm standing in this glass HOUSE at 8944 feet above mean sea level minding my own business and trying to conjure up some nonexistent smokes to justify my existence as a volunteer fire lookOUT.
I look up from my logbook.
A guy waves at me from an F-15 Strike Eagle, flying at my elevation at whatever classified faster-than-hell speed F-15s fly, heading right fOR my outHOUSE, which is 150 vertical feet and maybe 300 feet horizontal below the lookOUT, the only place they could find enough dirt in which to dig a hole.
Obviously the jet jockey was after my outHOUSE, not me in my glorious glass 1920s technology L-4 Cab.
Either that, OR he thinks I'm IN the outHOUSE.
Dang, and my Pard just reshingled the roof of the world's highest throne too. And I laboriously packed all the leftover and old shingles up to the lookOUT to use as kindling, all fOR nothing except the aerobic exercise and the chance to see a missile strike on the world's highest throne.
Two seconds later the F-15 looked no bigger than a tiny toy plane screaming down into Shovel Creek, the creek immediately west of me.
He's going to crash! He's below Shovel Ridge! He'll never climb OUT of it.
I'll get my first smoke.
In my next heartbeat the plane climbs up and OUT of Shovel Creek and over the ridge abOUT a hundred feet off the ground, and disappears into the west.
I call Hamilton: "Ain't that a violation of the Wilderness Act?" I ask. I thought no airplanes were allowed. (I'm right, too, unless there is an exemption fOR F-15s. I think the Air Force just feigns ignorance: that they know nothing abOUT any planes flying low over wilderness.)
"Happens all the time," Hamilton says. "This is a military aircraft corridOR."
"Well, I object. It's supposed to be quiet OUT here in the wilderness."
Secretly, I recall the sheepherder who put a .30-30 round into an F-4 fOR scaring his sheep some years back. "Nice shot." I tell myself.
"Salmon Mountain, here comes another one!" Hell's Half Acre lookOUT warns. "Here comes two more!"
I look intently, hearing thunderous noise, but see no jets.
"I guess they're scared of me, 'cause I called Hamilton on that one," I tell Hell's Half. Fat chance.
Thank God these guys are flying fOR our side. I never dreamed they could do such things. It's like they were glued to the ground at faster-than-hell miles per hour.
Two hours later, Bob comes to relieve me. I have been on the mountain since Friday, and I'm not ready to go. But my time is up.
I shake hands with him, shoulder my pack, walk down past the target/outHOUSE, and walk the mile and a half down to my truck. Then I drive the long bumpy road OUT to Nez Perce Pass, and down into Montana, and from there home.
Where the GIT's are going Message Board - Msg: 25859015 (16 August 2009)
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