When is it OK to Laugh Around Death?

An all too true story -

Prior to two days ago, I would have never thought it was even remotely acceptable to laugh about the death of a single one of God’s creatures. And yet, as I was recounting a sad story to my sister recently, she started laughing. To make matters worse, I found myself joining in.

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I love flying and especially look up to all creatures that can take flight naturally and without things like Dacron and aluminum. A couple days ago I did the preflight on my ultralight and wheeled “Airie” out of the hanger into a most beautiful and clear, summer day.

Having done a recent tune up, the engine quickly rattled to life, and I headed out to the west end of the runway. I radioed my whereabouts and intentions to any potential local traffic and was off. Everything was uneventful as I departed the airport pattern but as I climbed through 2000 feet, I noticed a potentially lethal situation which I was not prepared for!

As you can see, there’s only one seat here and it was that which I was strapped into as I noticed a second passenger - holding on for dear life!

The situation was dire because that little guy must have been holding onto the hairs on my thigh for several minutes and was surely exhausted. I thought about giving him a gentle nudge. But the propeller right behind us was spinning about forty times per second and would have created instant fly dust.

Photographer anonymous - but if I were to have shot a video, you would have seen those tiny wings fluttering in gale force winds of 37 MPH

If I were Sully, who conducted flying safety seminars for years, I might have come up with some solution, but I didn’t and by three thousand feet he was gone. One of life’s regrets that I’ll just have to learn to live with.

Oh, that they were all so small.