What book are you currently reading?

[Hydromet]

Another + for Tales from the Sea of Cortez. Steinbeck is my favourite American author, edging out Hemingway and Mark Twain, who sometimes makes it obvious that he was, at heart, a penny-a-word journalist. Another Steinbeck favourite is Travels with Charley in Search of America.

[Mrs Ex-Ascot]

Just finished Winkle: The Etraordinary Life of Britains Greatest Pilot by Paul Beaver.

Very enjoyable and interesting read. One for C16 and FD2.

[OFSO]

Many years ago I discovered the rather Boys Own Paper "Boysie Oaks" books by James Gardner, full of fast cars, guns and gorgeous girls. Recently Mrs OFSO discovered his more adult espionage novels set in Europe before and after both wars. I'm currently reading "The Secret Trilogy".To anyone like myself who spent his formative years in Darmstadt, Frankfurt, and Berlin - the real Berlin, still divided, when you needed a "Persilschein" to get thru Checkpoint Charlie, and a few packets of "Silk Cut" and some silk stockings purchased at KDW to do business in the DDR - his books are amazingly true. Highly recommended, even if you do need to make notes. And it's fun spotting real people, renamed for the novel.

[tango15]

Interesting, OFSO. I shall order a copy, having, as you say having too been the subject of attention of the DDR Polizei on more occasions than I care to remember when crossing sides in Berlin.

I have just finished reading 'This is Bellingcat'. A very interesting history of the organisation, how it came to be, and how they were able to prove that the missile which downed MH17 was Russian, fired from Ukrainian territory, and how they submitted their findings to the ICC. I must admit, it has changed my perception of the organisation.

[ExSp33db1rd]

Just ordered Peter Duffey's book, Comets to Concordes. Looking forward to it, enjoyed flying with Peter in The Good Old Days.

[Mrs Ex-Ascot]

Just finished reading Jack Mallock, legend of the skies by Alan Brough. A very interesting and enjoyable read.

All thanks to OHL's post on Jack Mallock on the forgotten pilots thread.

[OneHungLow]

Just finished reading Jack Mallock, legend of the skies by Alan Brough. A very interesting and enjoyable read.

All thanks to OHL's post on Jack Mallock on the forgotten pilots thread.

Glad you enjoyed the book. Sad that after enjoying such a varied and interesting life as an aviator, Mallock was to depart this vale after of tears flying into a nasty, but not atypical African storm cell!

[Woody]

About early 20th century Johannesburg, a pretty lawless place, OHL may recognise some of the place names!

https://www.jonathanball.co.za/componen ... -de-melker

[Mrs Ex-Ascot]

Just finished reading Mallocks Spitfire by Nick Miekle.

Excellent book with loads of photos and technical details, complimented with loads of personal anecdotes.

[PHXPhlyer]

Not a book yet but should be soon.

Read his previous book:
Down the Mississippi
A Modern-Day Huck on America's River Road
By Neal Moore, Cindy Lovell · 2012

22 Rivers
Why a lone canoeist travelled across America

https://www.readersdigest.co.uk/lifesty ... ss-america

Lone canoeist Neal Moore descended New York State’s Mohawk River, at the end of a journey that began 22 months and 7,456 miles ago, meeting people across 22 states and 22 rivers

His paddle has plied 21 bodies of water so far on his way across the continent. Downstream always means easier paddling, yet he knows that dangers abound—wedge up against a log or rock and the current will flip him and sink his earthly goods.

All the upstream slogs were worse, of course. His eyes would scan the river for the calm seams of flat water, and the points of land that subdued the stream and made the way less difficult. Lest he surrender hard-earned progress, he would dig and dig long past the burning of his shoulders in mid-morning and on into the long and stiflingly hot—or freezing and windblown—afternoon.

The lone canoeist’s objective
Neal Moore keeping his journalMoore kept a journal detailing everywhere he went and everyone he encountered. Credit: Neal Moore

His declared objective was to journey along 22 rivers, across 22 American states, in 22 months. He would “string together rivers” and those living along them to see what still connected the people in that divided country.

At evening, sunset often beams upon a chosen spit of sand—the river showing him where to camp. He likes islands for their safety from animals but also from people. An hour before nightfall he unloads his gear, pitches his tent, fixes some supper, maybe cracks a beer. And then he dines in perfect solitude seated upon an overturned plastic bucket, watching the timeless mystery of day becoming night. Music of coyotes, crickets, frogs. The silent coming of fireflies from across the water, piling into the willows above his head.

He turns in early, marvelling at the strength in his 49-year-old limbs, which increases by the day. He’ll wake up one hour before dawn, and in concert with the first hopeful rays of morning he will push off into the stream, leaving nothing behind but the humble notch in the coarse sand where his canoe has passed the sacred night.

The lone canoeist’s life struggles
When Moore was a 13-year-old growing up in Los Angeles, his older brother, Tom, whom he adored, crashed his car and died from his injuries. Devastated, Moore passed his teenage years in a spiralling funk—drugs, attempted suicide—made worse when his beloved mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and began a slow decline.

His father was a fifth-generation Mormon, and it was traditional for devout Mormons to go on a two-year mission between secondary school and college to spread the gospel. His mother, her health dwindling, stated her dying wish: it was time for her son to serve that mission.

Moore was anything but devout. But his mother wanted him to do something transformative. To do something pure. If she died while he was away, she said, he was not to come home for the funeral.

Surprising even himself, he went. His assignment was South Africa, from 1991 to 1993. During his first month in the field, he got the phone call he’d been dreading—his mother had passed away. Honouring her request, he stayed on.

The mission changed his life. In South Africa he learned to live outside his dark thoughts. To serve wholeheartedly. To walk freely among strangers and learn their stories. To shake hands African-style, thumb upward. To smile and mean it.

“When you push yourself out of your comfort zone,” he concluded, “this is when extraordinary things can happen. This is when you learn and grow.”

Travel and life experiences
taking it easy near syracuseTaking it easy near Syracuse, New York. Credit: Neal Moore

Over the next decades he lived as an expatriate, teaching English in Taiwan, selling antiques in South Africa, adventuring in Egypt, then heading into Ethiopia’s broiling heat. He went back for a visit to the United States in 2009 for a paddle down the length of the Mississippi River. He wanted to see how the middle of America was faring during the Great Recession—this despite having never previously spent more than an afternoon in a canoe.

Cancer had taken his mother, and in 2012 it tried to take him, too. He needed surgery, which left him unable to walk. Over the course of months, he crawled and then stood and then took a few shuffling paces. Finally, he was able to once again go on long treks.

Divided States of America
Neal Moore canoeing near Helena, MontanaMoore makes his way through the Gates of the Mountains near Helena, Montana. Credit: Norman Miller

From overseas, after the 2016 election of Donald Trump, he watched division and rancour infect his beloved country. He needed to rediscover America, to see what still held it together. His 50th birthday was only a few years off. Cancer would be back for him, he knew it. He’d love to plan an amazing excursion. Without a wife or children who’d miss him, he had the luxury of time. And he knew exactly how to use it—he’d traverse the continent by canoe.

The open canoe would not only honour the continent’s first inhabitants, it would put as little as possible between himself and the world. His plan was to travel west to east, Pacific to Atlantic. The trip would need a flourish at the end, and he knew just the thing—a victory lap around the Statue of Liberty, symbol of the American people, who were what this trip was about.

PP

[PHXPhlyer]

22 Rivers

Part 2

The lone canoeist’s journey begins
Making friends on the Missouri RiverMaking friends on the Missouri River. Credit: Neal Moore

On February 9, 2020, Moore sets out from Astoria, Oregon, at the mouth of the Columbia River. He packs a tent, a sleeping bag, jugs of water and freeze-dried meals, then points his bright red five-metre canoe upstream. He starts paddling—1,078 uphill miles to the Continental Divide in Montana (rivers: Columbia, Snake, St Joe, Clark Fork).

He portages over the Divide, then does an eight-month, 3,600-mile downhill run to New Orleans (rivers: Missouri, Mississippi). The final leg, 2,890 miles over several months, takes Moore east along the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, then up through Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky, and eventually to New York City (rivers and waterways: Gulf of Mexico, Mobile, Tombigbee, Tenn-Tom, Tennessee, Ohio, Kentucky, Kanawha, Allegheny, Chadakoin, Lake Erie, Erie Canal, Seneca, Oneida, Mohawk, Hudson).

Along the way, he dodges barges and container ships, startles grizzlies, is bumped hard by a bull shark and is escorted by dolphins. He capsizes twice and is hit by all kinds of conditions: heavy winds, sleet, downpours and floods. And there is spectacular scenery. Every day he experiences the involuntary laugh of a free man revelling in his element.

Meeting America
When the pandemic hits shortly after the start of his journey, things shut down. Moore changes his plans, but pushes on. He dines with the homeless and with mayors and with multimillionaires. Strangers shelter him for the night, buy him meals, show him the town, explain their histories. An Umatilla Indian in Oregon acknowledges with approval that he’s “going the wrong way,” west to east, reversing the direction of 19th-century settlers.

"The pandemic hit, things shut down, plans changed, but Moore pushed on"

In the Columbia River Gorge, a Klickitat chief shares his enduring love of the Columbia River and its salmon. Recreational fishermen insist on giving him all their food and beer. At dinner after a treacherous lake crossing in Montana, a cattle auctioneer tells him that he and his family were watching, ready to jump in their boat and come to his rescue. He attends concerts, pokes around museums, visits old friends, makes new ones. He goes out of his way to meet America.

Curious locals and unforgettable experiences
In Bismarck, North Dakota, a farmer-turned-entrepreneur convinces him to get a tattoo. He chooses one in honour of his brother, Tom, and listens to the life story of the artist, 42-year-old Lance Steven Paulk, who has spent more of his life in prison than out, including time in solitary confinement next to Charles Manson. That night when Moore opens his journal, he sees that it is July 13—Tom’s birthday.

The beauty of a river is that it bears you along through seeming wilderness until it opens suddenly upon a town. This balance between nature and civilisation appeals to Moore, who is at least as interested in people as he is in the land. At river towns as old as the country itself, he hauls his canoe ashore. He’s often swarmed by curious locals: where did he come from? And he’s going all the way to where?

In St Joseph, Missouri, he is hailed by an extended family partying along the river. He cautiously comes ashore and within minutes is part of the group. They thrust a drink into one of his hands and a grilled bratwurst into the other. Half an hour later, still holding his drink, he finds himself in a dune buggy careening over the edge of the banks of the Missouri River, a giant grin on his face.

A special gift
Gale Boocks gifts Neal Moore a paddleGale Boocks gifts Neal Moore a very special paddle. Credit: Richard Sayer

In Oil City, Pennsylvania, an 82-year-old former pastor named Gale Boocks greets him on the banks of the Allegheny River. Boocks had known Verlen Kruger, considered by many to be the greatest American canoeist in history, and owns a paddle that had belonged to the legend. Boocks has read about Moore in the paper, and has come out looking for him so he could bequeath the paddle. Stunned, Moore accepts the gift on the understanding that he will merely be its temporary custodian until someday passing it on to another enthusiast.

People in hardship
It isn’t all rosy. At a bar in Montana, Moore slips up and accidentally reveals his politics, something he’d promised himself he wouldn’t do. The crowd turns on him and calls him an enemy of the United States. The next morning the family that has been hosting him shows him the door.

But that is the only real stain on the trip. Any other time he expects danger or hatred, he finds their opposites. He tries to avoid places that attract drug addicts, so at a campsite on the Snake River that looks a little sketchy, he is apprehensive when approached by a fellow camper. But despite missing an eye and being what society deems “homeless,” the man, Brian Bensen, turns out to be anything but a threat. He has equipped himself with a two-by-four-metre trailer with solar-­powered air conditioning and a TV, and is eager to share whatever he can with anyone who needs it.

“I feed as many weary travellers as I can,” he tells Moore.

"At one bar, when Moore reveals his politics the crowd turns on him"

Another night in Idaho, camped behind a church, Moore hears two men outside his tent raving in a drug-­addled fury. They menacingly approach his flimsy shelter, commanding him to reveal himself.

Shaking, he laces up his running shoes and grabs his bear spray and a knife. Eventually they leave him alone. Then, strangely, in the morning one of the men returns—and invites him to coffee. Moore sits and hears the man’s story of hardship and addiction, and they part as friends.

Connect and be cool!
Downtown Tat in Memphis on election dayA new friend, Downtown Tat, in Memphis on election night, 2020. Credit: Neal Moore

In Memphis, on the day of the 2020 presidential election, the political tension is palpable. Private security details patrol the streets. Moore takes a seat at a bar to see how things will go. He hears a commotion—not trouble, but laughter. Outside, a man is running with a flag in his hand, on which is printed “Be kool Memphis”. He is posing for pictures with tourists, lightening the mood. Moore gets up from his lunch to introduce himself to the man, who calls himself Downtown Tat.

“What’s the flag about?” Moore asks, inquisitively.

“It’s not just Memphis,” Tat says. “It’s the whole country. We just have to be cool. Be cool, baby!”.

"The vast majority are happy to help, to share, to swap stories and to form intense, brief connections"

Americans, Moore decides, still don’t know how to reconcile their politics, but they’re quite capable of ignoring them. And when they do, the vast majority are happy to help, to share, to swap stories and to form intense—however brief—connections. Whatever you might see on the news, Moore learns that people are still generous and curious, brave and resilient, still connected by neighbourly values.

Final approach
Neal Moore at his final destination in New YorkAfter paddling 7,456 miles, Moore arrives in his final destination: New York City. Credit: James R Peipert

Because of the pandemic, the authorities closed part of the waterway he’d planned to paddle through much of New York State on. Instead, Moore walks over 170 miles to the Hudson River, wheeling his loaded boat along the road. The second December of his expedition is coming on, and he wants to make it to New York City before conditions on the Hudson become too difficult. He is right on schedule.

On December 14, 2021, shortly after this 50th birthday, Moore makes his final approach along the Hudson River to New York City. The press comes out to observe the eccentric in his moment of triumph, and a contingent of kayakers and canoeists joins his victory lap around the Statue of Liberty. But then the winds come up so strong that he ends up with his bow pointed in the wrong direction, and he can’t safely turn it around. This whole trip has been about going the wrong way—so he paddles his canoe stern-first the rest of the way.

Hard to believe it is coming to an end. Tears well up, and not from the wind. Immense above his puny craft looms Lady Liberty, and crowding the harbour are bobbing boats filled with friends and journalists and gawkers marvelling at the magnitude of his accomplishment: 7,456 miles. Twenty-two rivers, 22 states, 22 months, just as he’d said he would do.

His mother would be proud—he had done something truly transformative, something “pure.” Though it’s all over now, he wishes he could just keep paddling.

PP

[PHXPhlyer]

Four takeaways from Walter Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk
Copy reserved from my local library.
Will have to speed read to get through it in the allotted time.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/12/tech/elo ... index.html

“You’ll never be successful,” Errol Musk in 1989 told his 17-year-old son Elon, who was then preparing to fly from South Africa to Canada to find relatives and a college education.

That’s one of the scenes Walter Isaacson paints in his 670-page biography of Elon Musk, who is now the richest person who ever lived. The biography allows readers new glimpses into the private life of the entrepreneur who popularized electric vehicles for the masses and landed rocket boosters hurtling back to Earth so they could be reused.

But Musk’s public statements and actions have become increasingly unhinged, filing and threatening lawsuits against nonprofits that fight hate speech and allowing some of the internet’s worst actors to regain their platforms.

Isaacson portrays Musk as a restless genius with a turbulent upbringing on the cusp of launching a new AI company along with his five other companies.

Musk allowed Isaacson to shadow him for two years but exercised no control over the biography’s contents, the author said.

Here are four key takeaways.

Musk’s upbringing and father haunt him
Isaacson’s book attributes much of Musk’s drive to his upbringing. He recounts the emotional scars inflicted on Musk by his father, which, Isaacson writes, caused Musk to become “a tough yet vulnerable man-child with an exceedingly high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission and a maniacal intensity that was callous and at times destructive.”

Musk decided to live with his father from age 10 to 17, enduring what Musk and others describe as occasional but regular verbal taunts and abuse. Musk’s sister, Tosca, said Errol would sometimes lecture his children for hours, “calling you worthless, pathetic, making scarring and evil comments, not allowing you to leave.”

Elon Musk became estranged from his father, though he has occasionally supported his father financially. In a 2022 email sent to Elon Musk on Father’s Day, Errol Musk said he was freezing and lacking electricity, asking his son for money.

In the letter, Errol made racist comments about Black leaders in South Africa. “With no Whites here, the Blacks will go back to the trees,” he wrote.

Elon Musk has said that he opposes racism and discrimination, but hate speech has flourished on X, formerly known as Twitter, since he purchased it 11 months ago, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Musk threatened to sue the ADL for defamation last week, arguing that the nonprofit’s statements have caused his company to lose significant advertising revenue.

Isaacson reported that Errol, in other emails, denounced Covid as “a lie” and attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci, the United States’ former top infectious disease expert who played a prominent role in the government’s fight against the pandemic.

Elon Musk, similarly, has criticized Fauci and raised many questions about public health policy during the pandemic. But he has said he supports vaccination, even if he doesn’t believe the shots should be mandated.

Musk’s fluid family and obsession with population
Musk has a fluid mix of girlfriends, ex-wives, ex-girlfriends and significant others, and he has many children with multiple women. Isaacson’s book revealed Musk had a third child (Techno Mechanicus) with the musician Grimes in 2022, and Musk confirmed the revelation Sunday.

Musk has frequently stated that humans must be a multiplanetary species, warning space exploration will ensure the future of humanity. He similarly has spoken numerous times that people need to have more children.

“Population collapse due to low birth rates is a much bigger risk to civilization than global warming,” Musk said last year.

Musk has referred to his desire to increase the global population as an explanation for his unique family situation.

The book reports that Musk encouraged employees such as Shivon Zilis, a top operations officer at his Neuralink company, to have many children. “He feared that declining birthrates were a threat to the long-term survival of human consciousness,” Isaacson writes.

Although the book presents their relationship as a platonic work friendship, Musk volunteered to donate sperm to Zilis. She agreed and had twins in 2021 via in vitro fertilization; she did not tell people who the biological father was.

'Elon Musk' by Walter Isaacson.
'Elon Musk' by Walter Isaacson.
Simon & Schuster
Zilis and Grimes were friendly, but Musk did not tell Grimes about the twins, according to the book.

Musk asked Zilis if her twins might like to take his last name. Isaacson reports that Grimes was upset in 2022 when she learned the news that Musk had fathered children with Zilis.

“Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis,” Musk tweeted at the time, trying to defuse the tension. “A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.”

One of Musk’s children, Jenna, often criticized her father’s wealth specifically and capitalism broadly. In 2022, she disowned her father, which Isaacson reports saddened Musk.

Isaacson reports that Musk’s fractured relationship with Jenna, who is trans, partly led to Musk’s rightward turn toward libertarianism and questioning what he considers the “woke-mind-virus, which is fundamentally antiscience, antimerit, and antihuman.”

Musk has called into question the use of alternate gender pronouns and made numerous statements some critics consider to be anti-trans.

“I absolutely support trans, but all these pronouns are an esthetic nightmare,” Musk posted in 2020.

But in December 2020 he also posted a tweet, since deleted, that said “when you put he/him in your bio” alongside a drawing of an 18th century soldier rubbing blood on his face in front of a pile of dead bodies and wearing a cap that read “I love to oppress.”

Late last year, he tweeted: “My pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci.”

X, formerly Twitter, is a huge risk
The purchase of his favorite social media platform, gutting the staff and tinkering with policies and branding have taken time and resources away from Musk’s other companies and projects, Isaacson reports.

“I’ve got a bad habit of biting off more than I can chew,” Musk told Isaacson at one point.

After a protracted legal battle over his decision to purchase Twitter, Musk said he regained his enthusiasm for taking over the company when he realized that he wanted to prevent a world where people silo off into their own echo chambers and would prefer a world of civil discourse.

But Isaacson notes “he would end up undermining that important mission with statements and tweets that ended up chasing off progressives and mainstream media types to other social networks.”

Musk team members, such as his business manager Jared Birchall, his lawyer Alex Spiro and his brother Kimbal, sometimes try to restrain Musk from sending text messages or tweets that could create legal or economic peril, according to the book. Some friends convinced him to place his phone in a hotel safe overnight on one occasion, before Musk summoned hotel security to open the safe for him.

During Christmas in 2022 with his brother, Kimbal warned Elon about how fast he was making enemies. “It’s like the days of high school, when you kept getting beaten up,” he said. Kimbal stopped following Elon on Twitter after his brother’s tweets about Fauci and other conspiracies. “Stop falling for weird s—.”

Are robocars, an AI company and a robot called Optimus on tap?
Musk continues moving forward on new engineering projects. Since 2021, Musk has been working on a “humanoid” robot called Optimus that walks on two legs instead of like four-legged robots coming from other labs. He unveiled an early version of the Optimus robot in September of 2022. Musk told engineers that humanoid robots will “uncork the economy to quasi-infinite levels,” according to Isaacson, by doing jobs humans find dangerous or repetitive.

Some of Musk’s top engineers are also working on a “robotaxi,” a driverless vehicle that shows up like an Uber. This past summer, he spent hours each week preparing new factory designs in Texas to produce the next-generation Tesla cars that would look similar to Tesla’s cybertruck.

Musk is also starting his own AI company called X.AI, which he told Isaacson will compete with Google, Microsoft and other companies surging ahead in the past year with public AI projects. Musk had co-founded OpenAi with Sam Altman in 2015 and contributed $100 million to the non-profit. He became angry when Altman converted the project into a for-profit. Musk also ended a friendship with Larry Page when the two disagreed on AI. According to the book, Musk believes he has a better vision for AI and humanity and thinks the data he owns from Tesla and Twitter will be an asset to his next AI plans.

“Could you get the rockets to orbit or the transition to electric vehicles without accepting all aspects of him, hinged and unhinged?” Isaacson asks in the last chapter.

PP

[OneHungLow]

As mentioned on another thread...

Highly recommended.

[tango15]

Vulcan 607. No mention of the Vulcan that diverted to Rio, which, since I was there at the time, knew that it caused a sensation. The TV stations ceased their endless soap operas and sent cameras to the international airport. The roads were jammed for hours. A bit heavy on the names too for my taste, but an interesting insight into Operation Black Buck.

[OneHungLow]

Vulcan 607. No mention of the Vulcan that diverted to Rio, which, since I was there at the time, knew that it caused a sensation. The TV stations ceased their endless soap operas and sent cameras to the international airport. The roads were jammed for hours. A bit heavy on the names too for my taste, but an interesting insight into Operation Black Buck.

Chile...

[Hydromet]

OHL, Musk sounds like a very complex nut case - much like the rest of us.

[PHXPhlyer]

OHL, Musk sounds like a very complex nut case - much like the rest of us.

like much the rest of us.
FTFY
I may be a nut case but a simple one.

PP

[tango15]

Vulcan 607. No mention of the Vulcan that diverted to Rio, which, since I was there at the time, knew that it caused a sensation. The TV stations ceased their endless soap operas and sent cameras to the international airport. The roads were jammed for hours. A bit heavy on the names too for my taste, but an interesting insight into Operation Black Buck.

Chile...

???

[OneHungLow]

Vulcan 607. No mention of the Vulcan that diverted to Rio, which, since I was there at the time, knew that it caused a sensation. The TV stations ceased their endless soap operas and sent cameras to the international airport. The roads were jammed for hours. A bit heavy on the names too for my taste, but an interesting insight into Operation Black Buck.

Chile...

???

https://theaviationgeekclub.com/black-b ... lands-war/

[tango15]

Chile...

???

https://theaviationgeekclub.com/black-b ... lands-war/

Yes, i remember the SAS Sea King - that was Chile.