Frog Applause by Teresa Burritt for October 31, 2011

Welcome to the phallocracy! Hope you enjoyed the treat!

The last two lines scan nicely

The sun rises, I hold your hand.I turn to look at you; you are goneI hold your hand.

[copyright p colli 2011.]

When I read the cartoon I heard it in Julie Andrew’s voice: “These are a few of my favorites things . . .”

I see Iran has no problem buying jets manufactured by the Great Satan.but, unlike the 911 bunch, the Iranian flight trainees didn’t skip class when they got to the part about LANDing the plane

That is correct. You have never tricked my treat and it is high time that you did.

Some of these comments seem to have “drifted” from some other comic. They make less sense than the comic and it makes no sense. Oh Well, life goes on.

Those weren’t trainees. They’re professional pilots. You watch too much mainstream hate media, my friend.

@BillThompson. I tried putting it to Sound of Music too after reading your comment. It didn’t help much but it made the medicine go down.

I concur with Baslim. The landing was well done. It’s not all that uncommon for this malfunction to occur (‘tho I never had to make such a landing – I have had unsafe gear indications but they proved to be false). I’m a bit surprised that the runway wasn’t “foamed” with a fire retardant considering it’s the Tehran airport. In the U.S. foaming the runway is largely discontinued now as more trouble than it’s worth.

A much more challenging test is to land with one of the main landing gear retracted. Here’s a video of one that was well done. Click here

With an unsafe gear indication in the cockpit, frequently the pilot will make a “fly-by” of the airport tower and get their feedback on whether the gear is down. You’ve still got to be prepared however for the possibility of a collapse after touchdown. I’ve done the fly-by before, and then landed without incident.

@Baslim: normally passengers wouldn’t be moved in this situation. There’s plenty of elevator control for a smooth, controlled lowering of the nose to the runway at the lowest safe speed possible. Were passengers to be moved aft, the possibility of the aircraft falling back on its tail would come into play if the pilot overreacted at all during the touchdown (i.e., put too much back pressure, too rapidly, on the yoke which could force the nose too high and cause an overbalance and tailskid contact with the runway).

This reminded me of John Lennon singing on “I am the Walrus” on the Magical Mystery Tour LP: “Yellow matter custard, dripping from a dead dog’s eye.”

Aww… “I never held you in my arms” is so sad. :(

It’s best if you can trick her treat into treating your trick.

Iran Airliner: Dude should get the Ayatollah’s Medal of Honor or whatever they award over there. That was a well-executed landing.

The “Cigar” on the Blog: This is one case where a cigar is definitely just a cigar.

TNT seems like a really bad name for an airline.