Flying machines. Adventures in traveling.

On one thankfully brief leg of our recent journey, we were scheduled on a Turbo Prop airplane. You remember passenger planes with propellers, don't you? Like in old movies? I tried hard to find some other flight that met our schedule, but in the end, we trudged outside, walked across the tarmac and climbed the stairs to shoehorn into a really small, really loud airplane.

I tried to think back to the last time I flew commercially in a propeller-driven aircraft. Mind you, I am of an age that my early flying time was in this type of plane, beginning with the venerable old DC-3 and DC-4. Think John Wayne in "The High and the Mighty." No? Okay, it was before your time.

I was, in fact, in my early twenties before I flew in my first jet airliner, a Braniff Airlines 707. You don't remember either the airline or the aircraft, do you? Why do I even try? But I digress.

In recent history, my last prop plane ride prior to our recent trip took place in Louisiana. Somehow that makes sense. Back in the employed era, my manager and I made a business trip to Grambling University. I'm fuzzy on the details of the out-bound trip to Grambling, but on the return trip, I recall that Steve and I drove the rental car to Shreveport, arriving quite late in the evening. The ticket counter was unmanned, but after some inquiry on our part, an agent came and checked us in.

Then he walked with us to the gate, checked us through the metal detector, and then walked with us out to the plane. We boarded, joining a solitary passenger, already aboard. The agent then climbed into the plane, pulled the door/stairway closed, and sat down in the co-pilot's seat! I have a vague recollection that he tossed peanuts and snacks over his shoulder to us during the flight, but I might be making that part up.