A Sociopath's Guide To Flight Simulation

By Richard Burgess a.k.a. Bill Smith
7 June 2010

Part Two

I dealt with Laura's unwelcome interruption of my secret flightsim session as expeditiously as possible, and then resumed the task of configuring my Boeing Triple Seven at Paris Charles De Gaulle airport.

As the aircraft captured the glideslope for runway 08L, I completed my landing checks, confident of a smooth touchdown. Minutes later, I brought the giant aircraft to a full stop at the second taxiway and began to relax. Logically, she could not have possibly known that I had been flight simming on my computer when her call had been put through to my office. It must have been a wild guess on her part, designed to catch me off guard, and it had worked very well. I had been too distracted to absorb all the detail, but what she had been so excited about basically involved her flying down to Sydney for two days of golf with a couple of people who I remember meeting briefly only once before. I also recall taking an instant dislike to both of them.

Eliza Yo and her husband David had struck me as a couple of complete sociopaths, incapable of genuine friendship with anyone. It was clear to me that their invitation to Laura must have had conditions attached to it and I was certain that their ulterior motive would be revealed soon enough. I had no doubt that golf was a secondary consideration, designed to draw my wife Laura into some kind of scheme which would serve their own interests, most probably to Laura's detriment. She was to leave the next day, Wednesday and stay at their house in North Ryde. This, I realized now, could only end badly.

But there was a more positive flipside to Laura's absence which I needed to consider. The great thing was that I could get home early on Wednesday and continue my simulated world flying tour on my home computer without feeling guilty about ignoring her. (Laura sees an awful lot of the back of my head silhouetted in the light from my flight sim computer screen and I know that it irritates her more than a little.) And so, early the next morning, I drove Laura to Coolangatta Airport, with daughter Hannah sitting in the back seat nursing her school bag. While the girls chatted about golf and some other "girly things", I began to hatch a plan for a flight sim marathon during Laura's absence. I planned to commence a clockwise circumnavigation of the Australian continent starting on the west coast, visiting all the major cities, returning to my departure point by Saturday lunchtime. It was going to be tight schedule, involving some time off work and some seriously late night / early morning flight-sim sessions.

Dropping Laura and her golf clubs curbside at the Qantas terminal, Hannah and I kissed her goodbye and then swiftly departed the airport. I swung the car northwards in order to arrive back at Broadbeach in time to drop Hannah at school. I dashed into the office and instructed my secretary to hold all my calls. On the internet I checked all the airline schedules and began to devise a route that would begin at Perth and visit as many coastal Australian airports as possible on a virtual circumnavigation of the continent that would bring me back to Perth in three day's time. After a couple of hour's research, I had compiled an itinerary that included thirteen stops. Flying in "real weather" would take me through some tropical thunderstorms in the north of the continent at this time of the year, which would add some variety to the trip. I decided that I would need to get started straight away and that I would suffer far fewer interruptions on my home computer than I would here in the office. Gathering up all the necessary aeronautical charts, I dashed out of the office, telling my secretary to cancel all my Wednesday appointments as something urgent had arisen unexpectedly.

'See you tomorrow' I said, as I headed for the elevator.

By lunchtime, my virtual continental circumnavigation was well underway. Flight QF 914 to Karratha was only an hour from its destination, and I heated up a frozen dinner in the microwave to simulate the kind of meal that I might get on a real flight. Later that day, when my next flight to Broome was at cruise altitude, I called Laura on her cell phone to check that she had arrived safely in Sydney. She told me that she was already settled at Eliza Yo's house looking forward to an early start tomorrow at the golf course. In the meantime, she said David and Eliza were planning to take her out to dinner to discuss an "exciting new business opportunity".

'They won't tell me what it is yet, but they reckon that it's already changed their lives. I'm intrigued to know exactly what it is.'

I found this last piece of news unsettling, but not entirely unexpected. I knew that there was a hidden agenda in their invitation for Laura to play golf at their private club. But I would have to wait to know the full details.

Later, at around 3:30 PM, just as I touched down at Broome Airport, I heard Hannah turning the key in the door to our apartment. I did not want her to catch me in the middle of a flight sim session, so I turned off the computer screen and scattered some files from my briefcase across my desk. Trying to look busy, I picked up the phone just as she poked her head around the door to my study.

'Dad, what are you doing here?'

'I left the office early and brought some work home with me; so that you wouldn't come home to an empty house.

She looked disappointed. Clearly, she had been looking forward to having the house to herself for a few hours. While she changed out her school uniform and made herself a sandwich, I made some work-related phone calls before planning my next flight to Wyndham. I also made time for the 200 meter walk down to the surf. Considering how close we lived to the beach, it was surprising how seldom I enjoyed a walk along the sand at sunset. I really do need to get more exercise!

By early evening, after sharing a takeaway pizza with Hannah, I was ready to begin the next leg of my tour. By late evening, as Hannah was getting ready for bed, I was already contemplating whether or not I should "press on" to Darwin. I set up the route in the FS flight planner, downloaded the "real weather" from the internet and refueled the 737. I remember asking myself if I should I attempt one more leg of this marathon before I go to bed?

The next thing I knew I woke up at 6:30 AM Thursday, still sitting in the chair in front of my computer; still wearing the clothes I had worn to work the previous day. I showered, changed into casual attire and made some lunch for Hannah to take to school.

'Are you not going to work today dad?' she asked as I drove her to school.

'I think that last night's pizza disagreed with me' I lied.

The fact is, I was desperately looking forward to firing up the Boeing on the home computer and jetting off to Darwin.

It was almost lunchtime when I took a call from Laura, by which time I had battled a bumpy approach into in hot and sweaty Darwin and was already planning to fly on to Cairns.

'I rang your office' she said, 'but they told me you called in sick. What's wrong?

'Stomach trouble, but I'm over it, so I'm going into the office now'.

Laura implored me to take plenty of fluids, and then began a rather bizarre and totally unconvincing lecture on the benefits of taking large doses of vitamin supplements. She explained that at last night's dinner in Sydney's Chinatown, her hosts David and Eliza Yo had invited her to become a distributor for a company that manufactures these supplements; Utah Wholesome Health. The Yos had asked her to stay on in Sydney for one extra day, Saturday, to attend a seminar that would detail all of the benefits of this "exciting new business opportunity".

I immediately smelled a rat, but I needed time to find out more about this company before I attempted to dampen her enthusiasm. I reluctantly agreed to her extending her stay in Sydney, and said I would tell Hannah to expect to see her mum back at home on Sunday morning.

So, now...should I go in to work for a few hours or go back to my flight simulator? Well the flight from Darwin to Cairns would take two hours, thirty minutes so I could get the plane up to cruise altitude, dash in to the office (just to show my face) and then after a little while, looking all pale and pathetic, could leave and go back home to land flight QF 1875 at Cairns airport. That sounded to me like the best course of action, so I set up the 737 with 24,000 Lbs of fuel and got the flight underway.

Later, with the plane left to fly to Cairns on autopilot, I dragged myself into the office, and had a brief meeting with my secretary to catch up on missed calls and re-scheduled appointments. I took care to keep my voice soft and expressionless as though I was genuinely sick. I think I was pretty convincing. My secretary said I should go home, but I told her I'd stay for a while and do some paperwork. In fact, I turned my attention to finding all the information I could about Utah Wholesome Health. At first glance, it looked like a typical pyramid scheme. The claims made about their products were clearly pitched at a semi-literate audience. The actual products were shockingly over-priced and the emphasis seemed to be on the promotion of "potentially" huge earnings. This was in the form of sales commissions derived from the recruitment of friends and family members into a (technically illegal) endless-chain of product distributors. About the only thing in their favor was an independent medical review board which was happy to endorse their products and the fact that as a publicly-listed company, the share price continued to boom.

I phoned a friend of mine (another flight-sim addict) who works at the Department of Consumer Affairs; to see if he had any inside knowledge of this company's operations. He said he'd look into it and let me know. But he said a whole lot more than that because once we got onto the topic of flight simulation we lost all track of time. It was almost 2:00 PM when I glanced at my watch and realized I needed to get home quickly before QF1875 reached the top of its descent.

With the briefest of goodbyes I hung up the phone and ran to my office door. Composing myself once more, I stepped out and slumped past my secretary, telling her that I would try to make it into work tomorrow if I was well enough.

Minutes later I leapt out of the elevator into the underground car park and ran to my car at full speed. I accelerated out into the street and had to concentrate very hard on not exceeding the speed limit as I could not bear to think of adding a speeding ticket to my hitherto unblemished driving record. Minutes later I raced into the parking lot under our apartment block and jumped out of the car. I ran to the elevator and pressed the button....nothing. I pressed again, several times in quick succession but the "up" arrow didn't even light up. I had to get back to my flight simulator before the plane reached the top of descent! Taking a deep breath, I heaved open the door to the staircase and began to run up to the tenth floor. After just five floors I was gasping for breath. At the eighth level I lost my balance and fell forward onto the landing. I clung onto the handrail and pulled myself inch by inch all the way up to the tenth floor, by which time I thought I was having a heart attack. My hands shook as I took the keys out of my pocket and reached for the door. I had to use both hands to get the key into the lock. Turning the handle, the door opened and I dropped to my knees. Gasping for breath, I crawled painfully across the carpet towards the study door. I had no idea if I would make it back to the flight simulator in time.

To be continued...

Richard Burgess a.k.a. Bill Smith
leesmith@ca.com.au