Hot Potato

OPENING REMARKS:

"Hey everybody - LOOK AT THE MOON!"



PART ONE - In the words of Bloodbath: "Happy Saturday!"

- AAAWWW, YEEEAAHHHH!!!

The goal of this mission was to keep the HOT POTATO moving the entire night, passing from Pilot to Pilot.

Navigational Style:

- zigging and zagging
- HONK sounds to signal last-minute turns
- secret backroads
- Hapto's name invoked as a navi-influence (Stogie denies this & blames it on ADHD)

Shore leave at a 7-11 had many of us hungry and thirsty from a fast-paced ride.
A small bag of spiced triangles was promptly Bogarted away from its owner.

Skunk sez "we-shoulda-got-a-bigger-bag"

- He said it really fast.
- it felt like ONE WORD!
(how did he do that?)




PART TWO - The Footbridge

After some more twists through Cambridge and The "Ville, Skunk suggested a pass through a recently constructed footbridge near the border of the Northern Wilds near Routes 16 & 3.

Dark and murky, nearly jungle-like, and without safety rails, SCUL met a man on this footbridge named Ray Bradbury who told us this tale:

Plot summary (STAY ON THE PATH)

The story begins in the future, in which the time machine has been invented but is still very temperamental. A hunter named Eckels pays to go traveling back into the past on a guided safari to kill a Tyrannosaurus Rex. As the party waits to depart they talk about the recent presidential elections in which an apparently fascist candidate, Deutscher, has just been defeated by the more moderate Keith, to the relief of many concerned. When the party arrives in the past, Travis (the hunting guide) and Lesperance (Travis’s assistant) warn Eckels and the two other hunters, Billings and Kramer, about the necessity of minimizing the events they change before they go back, since tiny alterations to the distant past could snowball into catastrophic changes in history. The hunters must stay on a levitating path to avoid disrupting the environment and only kill animals which were going to die within minutes anyway.
Despite his earlier eagerness to begin the hunt, Eckels loses his nerve at the sight of the Tyrannosaurus. Travis tells him he cannot leave, but Eckels panics and veers off the path. The two guides kill the dinosaur, and shortly afterward the tree that would have killed the dinosaur in the absence of human intervention falls on the corpse. Travis’s elation quickly changes to fury when they find Eckels and see by his muddy boots that he did in fact fall off the path. Travis threatens to leave Eckels in the past unless Eckels removes the bullets from the dinosaur’s body, as they cannot be left behind.
Upon returning to the present, Eckels notices subtle changes. English words are now spelled strangely, people behave differently, and, worst of all, Deutscher has won the election instead of Keith. Looking through the mud on his boots, Eckels finds a crushed butterfly, whose death was apparently the cause of many changes. He frantically pleads with Travis to take him back into the past to undo the damage, but in reply Travis deactivates his weapon's safety, and there is only an ominous “sound of thunder,” the same sound which had previously preceded the arrival of the Tyrannosaurus. It is ambiguous as to whether Travis shot Eckels or himself, but it makes undoing his actions impossible either way.

- Pilots had to keep the HOT POTATO moving during the entire telling of this tale.

- one Pilot reported spotting a butterfly.




PART THREE: Bunny Frenzy

With bunnies scattering in our path, the SPUD was allowed to rest down by the tracks for the knighting ceremony of Epoxy, as performed by Dr. Claw. Three cheers for Epoxy, and the Funk was quietly Busted with few words and a mighty smile, as seems to be the way of this mysterious new Aviator, 1st class.

Someday, he will speak and we shall learn the Secret of Life.

- AAAWWW, YEEEAAHHHH!!!




PART FOUR - "we shoulda got a bigger bag"

Time for Derby - in which we partake of the fruit of the secretly-purchased, non-Bogarted "bigger bag" instead of doing battle with our ships…

With spicy triangles in heavy circulation, newer Pilots practiced derby moves, and Joyride won the award for "most gracious thank-you".




PART FOUR & a HALF: "Take the Long Way home & have FUN with it!"

- And so we did, with nearly a marathon's worth of lightyears under our space-belts.