Inside the Carpark

[Alternate Carpark]

I'm writing a book of various psych Evaluation tests for people who have "INSANE" stamped in big bold red letters on one of of their identification documents.

Psych Evaluation # 27 : Dog Bite.

Follow the procedures contained within.
Do so at various social gatherings.
Observe the listeners and take notes.

Question: What's worse than being bitten by 1 dog?
Answer: Being bitten by 2 dogs.
Repeatedly ask this question, adding 1 more dog to the question and answer each time.
EG: Next time the question is 2 dogs and the answer is 3 dogs and so forth.
----------------------------
Main Procedure:
A: Ask the question.
B: Observe and take notes.
C: Answer the question.
D: Observe and take notes.

REPEAT A - D
------------------------------
Sub Procedures
e:
If someone answers the question incorrectly,
observe and take notes.
Do not use negative words to inform them that they are incorrect.
Give the same response to anyone who answers incorrectly.
Observe and take notes.
Give the correct answer.
Observe and take notes.
Repeat A-D
------------------------------------------------
f:
If someone gives the correct answer,
observe and take notes.
Either congratulate that person or become upset that they answered.
Give the same response to anyone who answers correctly.
Observe and take notes.
Repeat A-D
-------------------------------------------
g:
If someone leaves,
observe and take notes.
Ask them to stay as you have more questions.
Observe their body language before and after you ask them to stay.
Pay close attention to murmurings as the person leaves.
Observe and take notes.
Repeat A-D
-------------------------------------------
h:
If all listeners leave,
observe and take notes.
Repeat g: to all who leave.
Observe and take notes.
Continue to ask yourself the question.
Refer to e:, f: and g: and replace "someone" with "you."
Repeat A-D until you are satisfied you have enough notes.
-------------------------------------------
i:
If someone knocks you out, take notes after you regain consciousness.
Take notes of any vivid dreams.
Find a mirror to check if someone has drawn on your face with a Nikko Pen.
If someone has drawn on your face while you were unconscious, refer to your notes to try and determine who drew on your face.
Take notes.
-------------------------------------------
j:
1: If you have concluded who drew on your face, find them and compliment them on their artistic ability.
2: Observe and take notes.
If that person is not the artist, repeat 1: and 2: till you find the correct artist.
-------------------------------------------
h:
If you are satisfied you have enough notes,
Close clipboard, put pen back in pocket,
Go get some light refreshments, mingle.

If you wake up after being knocked out and the gathering is over, everyone has gone,
close clipboard, put pen back in pocket.
Go home.

 

[Alternate Carpark]

Here's another book I'm writing about the adventures of Alternate Carpark and Jet Su Shi based upon real experiences throughout my insanity infested 40+years on this planet.
Copied from another thread because it should belong here in the writers section.
Rough drafts of course.


The Adventures of Alternate Carpark and Jet Su Shi.

#1: The first time I ever saw his beak.

Antarctica....a long long time ago.
A lone Penguin stands on the edge of a small cliff, the sun gently warms his soul.
Below he can see the ocean calmly undulating to the rhythm of it's own heartbeat.
Far in the distance behind him he hears the joyful sounds of other Penguins
as they celebrate the new life that breeding season brings every year.

He still comes here to the breeding grounds but ever since the loss of his own life partner he has never attempted to find another,
for his love for her was more than just instinctive.

Way up in the clouds, Dick Smith, modern adventurer, all round swell guy and Austrailia's #1 Peanut Paste connoisseur
was flying his helicopter on yet another trip to the icey continent.
He had the helicopter in cruise control as he was busily preparing a round of Peanut Paste sandwiches
when an unidentifiable aircraft on a routine geographical survey flew too close to the helicopter thus temporarily draining it of all it's power.

As the copter quickly descended, spinning wildly out of control, Mr. Smith did everything to regain control as the power reinitialised,
but it was too late and the copter crashed heavily.
Luckily for Mr.Smith he crashed into a soft snowy embankment not far from the Penguin on the cliff edge.

Shocked and astonished at the sound of what had just happened the Penguin turned to see what was going on and just as he turned to see,
was hit in the face with a Peanut Paste sandwich, his beak protruding squarely through the centre of it.

Somewhat dazed and confused at this new experience, he turned around a few times to see what was what,
let out an apprehensive "warble" which when interpreted would say something like,
"Oh dear this is a bit awkward, I seem to have something stuck on my beak, this certainly changes things somewhat."

Just as he was about to remove this strange thing from his face, a large glass jar of Peanut Paste struck him on the side of his head with such force
that not only did it render him unconscious, but it also forced him off the cliff edge and into the ocean below with sandwich firmy stuck on his beak.
The ocean swallowed him up and he was never seen again.

A few years ago I used to frequent this Sushi Bar, situated just off the main mall in the centre of Brisbane. What initially appealed to me about this establishment
was the complex little conveyor system that delivered the food as it meandered through the restaurant.

I know what you're thinking, there's no way something like this would be in Brisbane. Granted, we have to my knowledge the only chinese restaurant in the world,
called The Flying Duck Restaurant", that has tables that double as catapults, a real tourist attraction to be sure.
But one does not expect Brisbane to be so culturally diverse and innovative to have a Sushi bar with a food conveyor installed,
but there it was and it was always a joy to have my lunch there.
The one thing that intrigued me the most about this place was, lying on the conveyor was this Penguin which to the best of my observation skills never moved,
not even a whisper of a breath.

No one else seemed to take any notice of this Penguin and being highly introvert and shy back then I dared not inquire about this oddity.
For all I knew it could have been a fake plastic one.
I suppose the perpetual mystery as to whether this Penguin was alive or not was part of the joy of being there.

One day a Norwegian family had entered and were marvelling at the conveyor system and enthusiastically were trying every dish that slowly passed in front of them.
Their little boy shreiked with delight as he saw the Penguin approaching and quite excitedly poked it with a fork.

To everyone's astonishment including mine, the Penguin lept to it's feet, assumed a praying mantis stance, it's eyes gleaming with great fury and the bloodreign and the hey hey, then waddled toward the now frightened boy, fell over and created a small atomic explosion that wiped out half the city block.

I awoke with a bright light stinging my eyes, I was numb and freezing and as my eyes and mind began to focus more
I could see that everything around me was white so I figured I was either dead and gone to the great afterlife,
or in the morgue looking up at the lights and ceiling or something that I didn't want to even consider, I was in a Disney's Ice capades show.

"You must be one with the cold", a calm voice filtered into my conscious.
" Do not fight it, embrace it", added the voice and as my focus became clearer I saw that this voice belonged to the Penguin from the Sushi bar.

"I take it we are in Antarctica then ?", asking somewhat annoyed and perplexed.
The Penguin didn't answer and just serenely stared out over the ocean with the sun warming his face.
"What's your name then Mr.Penguin", I asked enquiringly.
"My name is Jet Su Shi, what is your's ?", he responded.
"Alternate Carpark", I said as I stood up next to him and looked out upon the ocean.
"Bwahahaha, what a foolish name", he bwahahed.
" Not nearly as foolish as your emotional outburst in the Sushi bar", I snapped.
"You really spoiled that Norwegian family's holiday dude !"
"You're so right, are you hungry"
"Famished"

We've been very close friends ever since.

 

[Alternate Carpark]

#2: Our quest to find Gorillas in the Brisbane Botanical Gardens. Part 1

After a wonderful reunion breakfast with the owners of the Shushi bar, Jet and I, content and full as a goog,
made our way toward the river to relax in the glow of the morning midsummer sun and gentle breeze
and to watch the trees gently sway back and forth.
There's nothing like tuning into the music of nature.

As we approached the entrance we could see some commotion, people stopped in their tracks watching two police officers arresting some guy
who for some reason was laughing uncontrolably.

Jet Shu Shi started jumping up and down, clapping his flippers, twirling around, making all sorts of happy giggling sounds.
Jet was doing his happy dance.
No doubt in response to the commotion we were approaching.

This puzzled me somewhat, I mean what's so joyous about witnessing a guy being arrested, but then I saw what had tickled his fancy.

Something I always found quite amusing myself. The police officers were wearing shorts.
This weird dress code has only been introduced in Brissie in the last couple of years.
Jet was so lost in his happy dance now, which did grab the attention of the the children and many of the adults who still had some kid stuff in them.

I rocked up to the police officers and made inquiries about the guy they were arresting and asked them how they felt about having to wear shorts.

" Yes it can be embarrasssing at times to wear these shorts while on the job, especially if we have to wear ties", remarked one officer.
"Yeah, TIES ! with SHORTS ! what the hell !" moaned the other.
"So why is the guy laughing so much", I enquired,
" He's not channeling The Joker or something is he?"
"Ah no", replied the officer," this guy had stolen some jewelry and we recieved a call, then saw him running through the gardens, so we gave chase.
As he turned around to see us, he burst into fits of laughter
, crashed to the ground right here and well, he hasn't stopped laughing."
" So you see, the psychology boffins within the police Dept. knew they were onto something with this whole 'police officers wearing shorts' tactic.
The criminal types don't stand a chance !"
"Maybe you guys could expand on this concept and start wearing large fake noses and stuff ?", I ponderingly mentioned.
The officer scribbles this information down in his notepad.
"Will pass this valuable information on to the boffins post haste", the officer said as his knee caps twitched with excitement.

As one of the officers escorted the criminal type off to their paddy wagon the other officer,
in his best "Authoritive Voice 101" um voice proceeded to disperse the crowd.
"Please disperse good citizens, nothing to see here, move along !"
And slowly everyone returned to their own matters of state.

"Jet, I heard that there are Gorillas here in the gardens."
" Really AC ?, and what would make you believe there are Gorillas here."
" Well I heard that people have found banana skins way up in the tree branches."
"Hmm, that's good enough for me."
"Okay, I have a compass and I straightened my hair this morning so I'm ready."
"Hmm, I suppose a compass might come in handy, but what's with the hair ?"
" Well if I'm not confident about my hair I wont be able to focus on the task at hand."
"Sigh...Fine, I suggest we split up, scower the gardens for clues and meet back here in an hour."

Jet sat down, closed his eyes and began to meditate, slowly tuning into the energy of the garden attempting to feel the presence of any Gorillas.

This was more difficult a task as he had hoped as his concentration had been disrupted on many occasions.
He was hit in the back of his head by a frisbee, a football and and was run over by some guy
trying to impress the lady types with his woeful inline skating prowess.

Add to this, a bunch of Uni students decided to reenact the Battle of Waterloo, West Side Story and a few of their fav Veggie Tales songs,
all mixed into one act because they only had an hour for lunch.

Meanwhile , I was busy running around looking for clues.
I first looked in all trees and the dense foliage but to no avail.
Then around all the lakes, behind large boulders.
After nearly an hour of searching my enthusiam and confidence had waned considerably to the point that I was now looking
under discarded food wrappers thoughtlessly strewn all over the place.

I even tried to break open the door to the gardener's storeroom believing the Gorillas might be sleeping in there,
playing snap, or maybe doing some needlework.
"Oh man, these Gorillas sure are hard to find", I said dejectedly.

I had a few minutes before I had to return to where Jet was, so I went and sat under a large tree and watched some people kicking a football around.
As I began to calm down I decided to utilise the medative skills that Jet has been teaching me all these years,
so I closed my eyes and began concentrating on the behavior of Gorillas but was jolted by two things.

One, whenever I tried to think about Gorillas all that repeatedly came to mind was "Two plus two is four",
a line from one of my all time fav Barney the Dinosaur's song and two, a loud rustling sound above me followed by a nasty konk on the head by a football.

Grr, I had totally given up now and as I was standing up a banana skin flopped on the ground right next to me.
I quickly looked up and lo and behold, another banana skin was dangling off one of the branches.

Excitedly I raced back to where Jet was but decided to surprise him and as I approached him I slowed down to a walk,
doing my utmost to hide my renewed enthusiasm.

"Have you discovered anything Jet ?"
" Well yes and no, I have discovered that I now have vast amounts of compassion for Uni teachers and
I have no information about the Gorillas."

"Well I found banana skins in a tree just over yonder !"
"Woot !"
"Doubly so !"
"Let us away to yonder tree AC"

We make our way toward the tree unbeknowest to us, two shadowy figures follow us at a distance.
"So AC, what manner of advanced skills that I have been teaching you did you utilise to find this evidence?"
"Um, a football"
"Hmm, I don't recall teaching you anything about footballs, care to elaborate"
" I had given up and was resting under the tree when a football came crashing down through the tree and hit me on the head,
I was just about to leave when a banana skin fell next to me."
"Ah, it's that cosmic "being in the right place at the right time" thing you have been blessed with again."

"Yes I can remember on many occasions when I've be very hungry sitting in my car and all of a sudden someone pokes their head through a window in the building and hands me food, I love those kind of moments."
"AC, that's a maccas drivethru !"
"Don't you oppress me Jet...M'kay !"

After much searching around the base of the tree we found no evidence of Gorillas,
so Jet suggests we must climb the tree to where the dangling banana skin is.
"Look, I'm not too keen on climbing trees, can't we just get a book about Gorillas from the library?"
"Hmm, I'll go you one better, give Jane a ring, if anyone knows about Gorillas it's her."
"Jane?"
"Yes Jane...Jane Goodall, you remember we met her last year?"
" Now why didn't I think of that", as I whip out my mobile phone.
"Oh I can think of multiple reasons why", Jet bemused quietly to himself.
"Jane, how are you it's AC !"
"AC?"
"Um yes AC....you know we met in Rangoon last year, me and Jet?"
"Oh Jet, the adorable little Penguin, how are you both?"

"Fine, listen Jane we're at the Brisbane Botanical Gardens here in Queensland Australia and we're investigating reports of Gorillas here,
any advice would be most appreciated because we have run out of clues and ideas."
"Gorillas in Brisbane, highly unlikely but stranger things have occured...hmm...
you must think like the Gorilla, behave like the Gorilla, you must become the Gorilla."
"Umm..."
"Must dash, say hello to Jet for me, kisses !"
I bead of sweat runs down my forehead as put my fone back in my pocket.

Jet looks at me and realises what Jane suggested, " We must transsubstanciate into Gorillas, woo freakin' hoo !"
Jet closes his eyes, begins to rub his flippers together and starts chanting as the two shadowy figures watch from behind some bushes.
"I have a better idea, let's NOT transsubstanciate!"
"Jet, you know how this transie stuff messed wif me head last time, I strongly suggest tha"
Before I could finish my sentence there was a flash of bright light that engulfed us both and my ears were pierced with a loud ringing.
As the light and ringing slowly subsided Jet and I found ourselves up in the branches of the tree.

"Mmm, not bad but these fleas need some chicken salt", as I pick another flea off Jet's back.
After a hearty feed of fleas and scratching our behinds we had transsubstanciated way too far and had forgotten why we were up in the tree
so we just sat there for some time hitting each other on the head.

" So AC, what you think about 9/11, an inside job instigated by the League of Chickens hell bent on controlling the world for their own amusement?"
"Who cares, the OC and American Gladiator's are on tonight."
"What about FEMA and those scary looking detention camps they're building all over America. Don't they remind you of the death camps in Germany during WW2, especially with those gas lines running all round the buildings?"

"Look, I don't care about your silly conspiracy theories, all I want is to be happy, fall in love, have kids and spend my retirement watching television and pottering around in my garden."
"Speaking of television, do you believe it's the first phase of global mind manipulation culminating in a matrix style future,
where we are all just individual cells of human energy made to work like mindless drones
to fill up the elite's pockets with more money and fulfil their insatable desire for power?"

I stand up and angrily jump up and down........a lot !
"I am so sick of hearing about your weird theories that paint a bleak and hopeless future for humanity !"
Suddenly and unexpectantly there was heard a loud crack.
Almost immediately after the loud crack was heard, a large branch could be seen falling rapidly toward the ground some 40 feet below.
Not far above this large branch were two creatures who were also plummeting toward the ground.
Their names were AC and Jet Su Shi who were now making loud noises of their own.

Amidst the cloud of dust, as I lay on my back, I turn my head looking for Jet but can't see him. I try to get up but to my horror I cannot move.
This effort causes a sickening feeling to come over me and as I slowly fall into an unconscious state,
I catch sight of what looks like two shadowy figures leaning out from behind the base of the tree.

My eyes slowly open to a flickering light in the ceiling and as I turn my head I see I am in hospital.
As my eyes begin to focus more clearly I see someone sitting in a chair.
"Hello Son, how are you feeling?"
"Mum!"
" Well you've really messed yourself up this time haven't you AC. The doctors say it will be quite a while before you come off life support.
"Where's Jet?" I asked hesitantly.
"Dead. You landed right on top of him and snapped his neck, at least he died quickly and painlessly...stupid Penguin."
"Listen I have something important to tell you Son. The doctors say that when you are able to come off life support
you will most likely remain a vegetable and I suppose they will want me to look after you.
But I really don't want to, as a matter of fact I hated every moment I had to look after you.
I could have been a movie star, but instead I had to look after you and to be quite honest
I really don't want to be burdened with a drooling vegetable for the rest of my life."

And with that she stood up, turned the machines off and left the room.
As I once again started slipping into unconsciousness I cursed the inconsistancy of shadowy figures
who decided not to be there in the room to turn the machines back on.

End of Part 1

 

[Alternate Carpark]

#2: Our quest to find Gorillas in the Brisbane Botanical Gardens. Part 2:


I slowly awaken to the sound of a muffled voice over a PA system.
It takes me a little while before I realise I am still alive.
I am relieved about this but then remember my loss of Jet Su Shi.

As I lay there it slowly dawns on me that this is not the room I was in. Why would they move me I thought.
And come to think of it, mum loves Jet and just as I was thinking this I hesitantly attempted to move my legs.

To my surprise and relief I could and it was then I realised it was all a dream, quite a nasty dream.
And what of Jet, surely he is still alive then, but where ?

I lifted my hands up to rub my eyes only to my surprise , find that I couldn't.
Oh far too many surprises for one day and I had just woken up.
I looked down and saw that my wrists were restrained.
Fair enough I suppose, I see this on doctor shows all the time, restraining psychopaths and over actors and such.
I tried to relax in the hope that I didn't get an itch.

Had a bit of a laugh about how real the dream felt, closed my eyes and started to relax.
After some time the door opened and I could hear two people walk to the bed, ah the nurses I thought as I opened my eyes.

I did not like what I saw.

Two men, tall, black suits, their backs to me. My heart started to pick up speed in a strong uneven rythmn that cause sweat to run down the side of my face.

"Mr.Carpark", said one of the men as he turned around.
"Your reprogramming is almost complete. Just one more session and you can begin your mission."
"Mission ? What mission, what's going on, who are you guys?", I nervously demanded.
While he proceeded to answer these questions I became lost in thought. I was thinking about how these questions were so cliche.

I thought about this for a long time and laughed to myself about the silliness of being human.
Another part of my mind was screaming at me to get back to the real world because the guy was talking about Jet.
Angry at myself for being lost in thought ,I returned to the room.
"..and when we signal, you will place this in your little Penguin friend's drink and your mission is complete."

Doubly angry at myself now for missing vital information.
"Why do you want to kill Jet?"
The other man looks at the first man and then goes back to fiddling around with the machine that he's been working on since they arrived.

"Mr. Carpark, maybe the treatment has damaged your hearing somewhat. We don't want to kill the Little Penguin, on the contrary. When he wiped out half a city block, yet miraculously leaving everyone in the blast radius unharmed, we have been most interested in his abilities and have been following you both waiting for an opportune moment to capture and study him."

"We calculated the best way to capture him is with your help as he trusts you without reservation."
"I will never help you, I will never betray my best friend," I declared.
"Oh but you will Mr.Carpark, oh yes you will."
"You see, my collegue here has been hooking you up to the machine again for your last treatment and you will do everything we say without question and not even be aware that any of this has happened or that we even exist."

At this horrifying revelation I became aware of the metal apparatus strapped to my head and the multitude of wiring hangind down from the bed to the machine.
Before I could even attempt to shake it loose the switch was flicked, I screamed in agonisng pain and the room went white.

Leaves were slowly falling toward me. Rays of sunlight flashed intermittently upon my face as the branches swayed in the cool breeze.

I felt a growing pain in my back. I let out a slow, "Ow."
"Ah, you have finally returned from the land of sleepie sleeps my branch breaking friend," smiled Jet as he looked down upon me with flippers behind his back and a slight concern revealed in his brow.

"By the looks of things you had some intense dreams while you were out."
"How long was I out ?"
"About an hour or so, come on AC let's go get something to eat. As much as I enjoyed the fleas, they were not very filling."
I slowly get up off the ground, look up at the broken branch to see how far we fell, stretched out my arms and fell flat on my back.
A slight cloud of dust rises around me, much to the delight of Jet.

I jump up quickly and brush off the dirt and leaves, " I got a head spin Jet, that's all."
"Yes your head does seem to spin a lot AC, we shall continue to work on that during meditation," smirks Jet.

We slowly make our way out of the bushes and into the sunlight.
The warmth sends shivers down our backs.
"What shall we have Jet?"
" How about Kebabs ?"
"Oh you just want to go see that girl again."
"Well she does have the most beautiful eyes."
" Yes...yes she does," as we walk across the lush grass to the Kebab shop.
"Oi Jet, what about the Gorillas?"
"Well AC, how many did you see?"
"One"
"As did I AC, so there you have it there were Gorillas in the Brisbane Botanical Gardens."

As we walked down the mall I began to think of my dreams and I spoke of them to Jet.
It was a most wonderful discussion.

We reached the Kebab shop, our hunger was forgotten for a moment as we both were mesmerised by the girl.
We were in no hurry and were not at all bothered by the other people pushing in to grab their lunch as they rushed around ignoring the simple things, the beauty, the sheer wonder of life.

Eventually we collected our food and sat down quietly, re energising on Kebabs and coffee.
"OI Jet."
"Yes AC."
"How come our Kebabs are always cheaper, I have noticed over the years other's ordering the same and their's are always dearer ?"
"You see the girl with the beautiful eyes?"
"Yes of course, how could anyone not notice?"
"Well many moons ago I told her that she has the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen. She said no one had ever told her that.....ever."

We sat in silence for a while more.

"Jet"
"Yes AC"
"What if right now is a dream ?"

The End.

 

[Alternate Carpark]

Im writing a book about love.

Here's one story that came to me the other day.

Black rocks.

My son and I ventured down to Byron Bay early one morning to catch the majestic sight of the sun emerge from the horizon of the ocean.

We arrived way too early but were pleasantly entertained by the group of enthusiastic and joyful Japanese tourists taking hundreds, if not thousands, of group photos and photos of all the other things they were so happy about.

Just as we were making our way down to the lowest viewing area, we could see the clouds begin to take colour so the sun was about to finally appear.

Then in what seemed like an instant the sun rose out of the ocean, an explosion of radiant light filled the sky transforming the dark clouds into a multi coloured masterpiece.

The Japanese tourists clapped and bowed at the immense beauty unfolding before them.

After about 15 minutes peacefully watching the sunrise, my son and I walked down to the beach, a small dirt track ran off the paved walkway.
Because of it's location this section of the beach doesn't seem to attract many visitors and even though we were planning on walking the main beach I wanted to explore this little section.

As we walked closer to the sand we could see a small stretch of rocks on the sand, the only part of all the beaches that has any rocks at all.

What could my gaze were these shiny black rocks amongst the other various coloured rocks.
Even though most of the various rocks were polished with rounded edges and had smooth surfaces by the effect of years of continual ocean waves upon them, it was the black ones that stood out for me, and for my son for that matter.

They were glistening in the cool of the morning, the colour deep shiny black, smooth like polished gem stones, almost reflective in quality.

My son and I were quite taken by the uniqueness, compared to the other rocks present, of these black rocks. They took on the appearance of precious stones, so much that we collected a couple to take home, treasures to be admired for many years to come.

After fossicking for about 20 minutes I opened my hand and to my amazement discovered that the once brilliant rocks were rough in texture, a dull matt grey in colour
and had lost all of their reflective nature.

They had become lifeless.
I realised it was because they were taken from the ground so I put them back and watched in awe as they returned to their former glory.

We left and wandered up to the main beach.
It was a most tranquil day.

 

[Alternate Carpark]

I'm writing a book about String.
Here's 1 story thus far.

Into The Blue
Everyone knows who flew the first manned motorized plane, the Wright Brothers of course, in 1903.
But how many people know of this man, Dr. Samuel P. Langley? Anyone..anyone..no, didn't think so !
A former professor of mathematics, astronomy and elementary poptart development,
he was also the director of the Smithsonian Institution or the janitor, I always get those two confused.
Langley, by all accounts was an accomplished thinker,scientist and inventor. He had published several groundbreaking papers on aerodynamics, was well respected by his peers and kept his nasal hair neat and manageable. An all round top bloke by anyone's reckoning.

During the mid to late 1890's he had already designed and launched anywhere between 1 to 100 million large unmanned non motorised model planes with a high success rate, although some historians doubt the accuracy of this number, jealous much !. He was regarded as the one most likely to succeed to invent and fly the first manned motorized plane in history.

The most astounding thing about this is the sheer impossibility of accomplishing anything in history because history had in fact packed it's bags long before anyone could atempt anything there.

In 1898, he first approached the U.S war dept dressed in camos and jungle paint until someone pointed out to him that paintball wouldn't be invented for a few more decades.
After a hasty change of clothing he again approached the war dept seeking funds for his aeronautical endeavours.

They were so impressed with his technological skills and personal grooming that they granted him $50,000 to make what could be the first motorized manned plane. In 1901 he successfully tested a petrol powered unmanned heavier than air craft. After an all night stint at the local tavern celebrating his success, he joined up with Charles Manley, builder of a powerful new lightweight engine.

Charles Manley's personal grooming standards were well below that of Langley's, and many heated arguments arose from Langley's obsession with Manley's unkempt nasal hair.
It is rumored that Langley would chase Manley around the workshop with clippers, pleading with Manley to let him trim his unsightly folicles. These arguments wasted valuable time as other inventors were also working hard at being the first to fly a manned motorized plane.

Manley, no slouch in the cerebral department himself, hit upon this idea that whenever Langley would start obsessing over his appearance, Manley would grab Langley by the shoulders and look graciously into his friend's eyes and say," Samuel, the last three letters of our last names are the same, how neat is that !"
Langley would look sheepishly at Manley and realize how foolish and irrelivant his obsession was. The arguments became less frequent and much progress was made towards building the first manned plane. Although Langley always kept a set of nose clippers in his vest pocket.

Finally, on October 8,1903 they were ready for their first attempt to fly their plane which they called "The Great Aerodrome."
Some of their Californian peers felt that "The Great Aerodrome" was a preposterous name and came up with alternatives of their own such as,
Boing Boing Go That Way
Intentionally Banking Right
The Flying Machine That Does Not Taste Like A Cookie.
Two Cookies Having An argument
And the one that nearly was chosen, I say Reginald, I'm Quite famished For Some Cookies !

The day had arrived and journalists and curious onlookers came out to see the plane perched on top of a ramp which was a catapult
(similar to the modern catapults of the aircraft carriers of today)designed to launch the plane over a lake and into the history books.
Many psychiatrists were concerned about Langley and Manley's misunderstanding of the concept of time in regards to history being in the past and the impossibility to actually go there, but like everyone else were eager to see if they could actually pull it off.

Manley piloted and launched the plane, to a rousing chorus of oohs and aahs.
Unfortunately a section of the plane broke loose, became tangled in the catapult and the plane crashed heavily into the lake,
to a rousing chorus of oohs and aahs.
The onlookers were quite satisfied with the day's events and the media wrote their usual critical remarks at the failure. Langley wasn't perturbed and they spent 8 weeks modifying the plane and attempted again in early December. This time at the launching the supports for the wings collapsed and the plane crashed into the lake again, to a rousing chorus of oohs and aahs.

The criticism was so fierce this time that Langley gave up his dream of manned flight and became a door to door salesman for personal grooming products and was very successful. Manley spent the rest of his days trying to design a pen that could write under dirt.

Langley or Manley, or anyone else for that matter couldn't figure out why the Great Aerodrome wouldn't fly considering all the mathematics and engineering were correct.
But the Wright Brothers knew something about Langley that was overlooked by others. They knew that Langley always stood with one foot submerged in a bucket of goat's milk whilst shaving.

This of course had nothing to do with the failure of Langley's design for his aircraft but the Wright Brothers just loved telling the story. The relevant information is that Langley was not a great admirer of String. He felt it was too weak and was not cutting edge technology, and therefore did not incorporate String into his design. Langley felt embarrassed and repulsed to use such a common and simple element into his groundbreaking design.

Orville and Wilber on the other hand were great admirers of the versatility and power of String and used it liberally in their design. String gave their plane strength like Langley's but it gave them something Langley's did not, flexibility.
Orville and Wilber Wright were two uneducated, unfunded and unknown bicycle mechanics, and on the 17th December 1903, they flew their manned motorized plane, the Flyer I with the aid of that wonderful yet much overlooked entity, String.