"There are only two kinds of piles," the old mechanic was looking up at me fueling a nearly new Southwest Missouri State C-172, of which I (on paper) had "exclusive use" for my Air Taxi. Summers, I leased a Pawnee or CallAir from him. He was fond of laying his Alaska bush pearls of wisdom on me. "That pile you just flew in with is tired," he said grumpily. "That pile over there," he was pointing at a CallAir crash that had been hauled in on a trailer, "is all used up."

Not a nice way to talk about that pretty 172 or your airplane. But it helped instill in me, at an impressionable age, complete belief in Murphy. This guy was an A&P with Inspection Authority.