Plastic Planes, and whatnot....
Plastic Planes, and whatnot...
Boing Boing had a link up this morning, to this particular Donald Duck cartoon:
This one was always a favorite. It was the inspiration of many a plan, in my youth. The idea of melting things down and molding them into something else held an odd fascination for me for a short time (roughly age 6 to age 28). I present this cartoon as much the inspiration for my plan to build a hovercraft.
Why a hovercraft? Couldn't say, for sure. All I can point to know is the closet show-off in me...the quiet kid who still wants to find a way to be noticed. Whatever way, I'm 32 now, and I can still remember as clearly as day the 1 1/2" x 3" ad in the back of nearly every Boy's Life magazine, declaring that You Can Build the Hovercraft with these easy plan. The ad featured a boy sitting on a tripod hovercraft that seemed from my vantage point to be 3 round discs connected with PVC pipe, with the body of a tricycle sitting atop. The boy in the seat seemed to be nearly drooling with insane glee at the prospect of driving this hovercraft around the neighborhood.
Come to think of it, I'd have been a gibbering idiot at the prospect of my own hovercraft, and still would be. It is why, to this day, those "Hoverround" commercials hold my attention so much. The social stigma and my lack of desire to answer everybody's never ending questions about why exactly I'm using a hoveround all the time are the only thing that keep me from ordering one of those boogers. If my home were a little large, I might order one to move between the rooms of my house.
When I was 8, or so, I started devising a plan of sorts, based very much on this cartoon. In this plan, I would find a way to secret household trash into a hiding place under the deck behind the house we lived in at the time. When the time came, I would take trash from the hiding place, as well as toys that I and my sister no longer used (and probably ones that she still used, frankly), as well as trash from a small junkpile our neighbor Imogene had behind her house.
I spent many a day wondering if I could find a way to take the broken down Volkswagen bug sitting in Imogene's driveway apart, to melt it down. I figured that it being a mechanical device, I could probably salvage vital engine parts from the bug's engine compartment (somehow, I figured sparkplugs were of vital importance...a drawing I found years later tucked into a book of stories featured sparkplugs and wires prominently). I was sure that if I asked, Imogene would give me the car...it belonged to her son, and it had served as little more than a nest for cats having kittens for a couple of years....
My parents had a peach tree at one corner of the house. It didn't bear fruit...no other peach trees were nearby to pollinate. Still, it was a fairly neat little tree, made all the more fascinating to the young Tommy because one Saturday morning, the tree split, and approximately a third of the entire tree fell off from a spot about four feet from the ground up. The sap-weeping wound on the trunk of the tree was a source of interest, but ultimately, I found myself more content to study the fallen branch. I asked, one day, if I could chop that branch up.
My dad had a hatchet that we'd used whenever we went camping. He told me I could use that...which led to one particular eventful afternoon when I was just sure that I'd accidentally started an amputation of my left leg. One errant chop with the hatchet one day after school, and I went screaming inside that we had to take me to the hospital!!!!
Let me pause in my rambling to ask you, one of my threes of readers, to take your right pinky nail, and run lengthwise like a knife up the underside of your left forearm. See the little white line that's probably appeared on your skin? That's pretty much the same injury I sustained with my errant chop. There may have been some bruising associated, but not so much that I remember it clearly. Years later, it's come to my attention that the hatchet was likely dulled to prevent just such a hospital trip....
But I digress...
The chopping? Was to make enough firewood to heat a pot to melt the Volkswagen Bug and neighborhood trash down into enough plastic to create my own hovercraft.
I wish there were more to tell here, because I LOVE wasting people's time.
I found myself at something of an impasse when still constructing plans.
You notice that Donald uses a large iron kettle to melt his trash down into the raw material necessary for his plastic plane. I figured I need something close to that size, but in my journeys around the Suburban Hills subdivision, I'd come into contact with nothing that would even be a reasonable substitute. Mom had a large pot that she'd used for homemade soups and chili, but I figured a fire hot enough to melt down a Volkswagen would most likely melt that chili pot, and I couldn't figure Mom or Dad would be too happy about that. Truth be told, I was a big chili fan (and still am), so I figured discretion as it concerned pots of chili was the best course of action.
The other quandary, I realized, revolved around baking the engine parts, as Donald does. It would bear out to be something of a problem owing to that at 7, 8 or 9 years old, I wasn't allowed to use the oven without supervision. To this day, there are probably those in my own family who would argue that such is still the case.
See, I wanted the hovercraft to be a big surprise for everybody. Maybe I should have mentioned that fact before now. Somehow, I had grand schemes of showing up in the middle of a crowded event of dozens of people at my parents' house (this despite the fact that my parents rarely, if ever, had hosted more than three or four people at a time, at our home)...or perhaps riding victoriously into a crowd of my schoolmates at Riceville school. To that last, I figured I would fake sick on a day where we had a big presentation, a science or history fair, perhaps. And my classmates would be wondering "Where's Tommy?" And at the last moment, I would ride triumphantly in to a cheering throng of fourth-graders on my homemade plastic hovercraft!!!
How could my hovercraft be a surprise if I couldn't bake the engine parts? (I feel it important to note, parenthetically, that I wouldn't need a helmet, as Donald does for his plane. I wouldn't be much more than a foot off the ground, at any given point, so no ultra hot hair dryer was needed.) Mom and Dad are pretty smart people. Smart enough, at least, to comment that these things I was cooking looked something like gears....
Not considered an obstacle at the time? The fact that I could barely use a hammer to build a birdhouse (or a hatchet, without nearly amputating my leg). Consider, though, that at no point does Donald Duck use a hammer in the construction of his plane. A Spackle blade, yes. But not a hammer. It was like I had the ability buried deep down within, something I was born with, that would rise to the surface whenever I needed it.
Come to think of it, it's not that different from the old Underpants Gnomes....
Step 1: Get Materials Together for Hovercraft
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Ride Hovercraft Triumphantly about town
Anyway, I have not much else to say about this little spat of memory, except for these last two things.
First, I figured that I never figured I'd need an apron, as Donald utilizes, owing to that I already wore pants to protect my private parts. Even then, I couldn't think of anything more embarrassing as having to explain to Emergency Room staff that I burned my pecker trying to construct my super-secret hovercraft.
And second? I was sure that I'd end up interviewed by Johnny Carson. Johnny retired somewhere around the time I was 12 or 13, but I'd been up enough Friday nights and Summer evenings to know that he interviewed famous people. I was pretty sure that if I got my hovercraft together, I'd end up on the couch alongside Angie Dickinson, but just before Joe Isuzu.
Anyway, I thank you for indulging me in this little piece....You folks have a good day....
Boing Boing had a link up this morning, to this particular Donald Duck cartoon:
This one was always a favorite. It was the inspiration of many a plan, in my youth. The idea of melting things down and molding them into something else held an odd fascination for me for a short time (roughly age 6 to age 28). I present this cartoon as much the inspiration for my plan to build a hovercraft.
Why a hovercraft? Couldn't say, for sure. All I can point to know is the closet show-off in me...the quiet kid who still wants to find a way to be noticed. Whatever way, I'm 32 now, and I can still remember as clearly as day the 1 1/2" x 3" ad in the back of nearly every Boy's Life magazine, declaring that You Can Build the Hovercraft with these easy plan. The ad featured a boy sitting on a tripod hovercraft that seemed from my vantage point to be 3 round discs connected with PVC pipe, with the body of a tricycle sitting atop. The boy in the seat seemed to be nearly drooling with insane glee at the prospect of driving this hovercraft around the neighborhood.
Come to think of it, I'd have been a gibbering idiot at the prospect of my own hovercraft, and still would be. It is why, to this day, those "Hoverround" commercials hold my attention so much. The social stigma and my lack of desire to answer everybody's never ending questions about why exactly I'm using a hoveround all the time are the only thing that keep me from ordering one of those boogers. If my home were a little large, I might order one to move between the rooms of my house.
When I was 8, or so, I started devising a plan of sorts, based very much on this cartoon. In this plan, I would find a way to secret household trash into a hiding place under the deck behind the house we lived in at the time. When the time came, I would take trash from the hiding place, as well as toys that I and my sister no longer used (and probably ones that she still used, frankly), as well as trash from a small junkpile our neighbor Imogene had behind her house.
I spent many a day wondering if I could find a way to take the broken down Volkswagen bug sitting in Imogene's driveway apart, to melt it down. I figured that it being a mechanical device, I could probably salvage vital engine parts from the bug's engine compartment (somehow, I figured sparkplugs were of vital importance...a drawing I found years later tucked into a book of stories featured sparkplugs and wires prominently). I was sure that if I asked, Imogene would give me the car...it belonged to her son, and it had served as little more than a nest for cats having kittens for a couple of years....
My parents had a peach tree at one corner of the house. It didn't bear fruit...no other peach trees were nearby to pollinate. Still, it was a fairly neat little tree, made all the more fascinating to the young Tommy because one Saturday morning, the tree split, and approximately a third of the entire tree fell off from a spot about four feet from the ground up. The sap-weeping wound on the trunk of the tree was a source of interest, but ultimately, I found myself more content to study the fallen branch. I asked, one day, if I could chop that branch up.
My dad had a hatchet that we'd used whenever we went camping. He told me I could use that...which led to one particular eventful afternoon when I was just sure that I'd accidentally started an amputation of my left leg. One errant chop with the hatchet one day after school, and I went screaming inside that we had to take me to the hospital!!!!
Let me pause in my rambling to ask you, one of my threes of readers, to take your right pinky nail, and run lengthwise like a knife up the underside of your left forearm. See the little white line that's probably appeared on your skin? That's pretty much the same injury I sustained with my errant chop. There may have been some bruising associated, but not so much that I remember it clearly. Years later, it's come to my attention that the hatchet was likely dulled to prevent just such a hospital trip....
But I digress...
The chopping? Was to make enough firewood to heat a pot to melt the Volkswagen Bug and neighborhood trash down into enough plastic to create my own hovercraft.
I wish there were more to tell here, because I LOVE wasting people's time.
I found myself at something of an impasse when still constructing plans.
You notice that Donald uses a large iron kettle to melt his trash down into the raw material necessary for his plastic plane. I figured I need something close to that size, but in my journeys around the Suburban Hills subdivision, I'd come into contact with nothing that would even be a reasonable substitute. Mom had a large pot that she'd used for homemade soups and chili, but I figured a fire hot enough to melt down a Volkswagen would most likely melt that chili pot, and I couldn't figure Mom or Dad would be too happy about that. Truth be told, I was a big chili fan (and still am), so I figured discretion as it concerned pots of chili was the best course of action.
The other quandary, I realized, revolved around baking the engine parts, as Donald does. It would bear out to be something of a problem owing to that at 7, 8 or 9 years old, I wasn't allowed to use the oven without supervision. To this day, there are probably those in my own family who would argue that such is still the case.
See, I wanted the hovercraft to be a big surprise for everybody. Maybe I should have mentioned that fact before now. Somehow, I had grand schemes of showing up in the middle of a crowded event of dozens of people at my parents' house (this despite the fact that my parents rarely, if ever, had hosted more than three or four people at a time, at our home)...or perhaps riding victoriously into a crowd of my schoolmates at Riceville school. To that last, I figured I would fake sick on a day where we had a big presentation, a science or history fair, perhaps. And my classmates would be wondering "Where's Tommy?" And at the last moment, I would ride triumphantly in to a cheering throng of fourth-graders on my homemade plastic hovercraft!!!
How could my hovercraft be a surprise if I couldn't bake the engine parts? (I feel it important to note, parenthetically, that I wouldn't need a helmet, as Donald does for his plane. I wouldn't be much more than a foot off the ground, at any given point, so no ultra hot hair dryer was needed.) Mom and Dad are pretty smart people. Smart enough, at least, to comment that these things I was cooking looked something like gears....
Not considered an obstacle at the time? The fact that I could barely use a hammer to build a birdhouse (or a hatchet, without nearly amputating my leg). Consider, though, that at no point does Donald Duck use a hammer in the construction of his plane. A Spackle blade, yes. But not a hammer. It was like I had the ability buried deep down within, something I was born with, that would rise to the surface whenever I needed it.
Come to think of it, it's not that different from the old Underpants Gnomes....
Step 1: Get Materials Together for Hovercraft
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Ride Hovercraft Triumphantly about town
Anyway, I have not much else to say about this little spat of memory, except for these last two things.
First, I figured that I never figured I'd need an apron, as Donald utilizes, owing to that I already wore pants to protect my private parts. Even then, I couldn't think of anything more embarrassing as having to explain to Emergency Room staff that I burned my pecker trying to construct my super-secret hovercraft.
And second? I was sure that I'd end up interviewed by Johnny Carson. Johnny retired somewhere around the time I was 12 or 13, but I'd been up enough Friday nights and Summer evenings to know that he interviewed famous people. I was pretty sure that if I got my hovercraft together, I'd end up on the couch alongside Angie Dickinson, but just before Joe Isuzu.
Anyway, I thank you for indulging me in this little piece....You folks have a good day....
posted by Tommy at
08:23
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