ATC Memes
Weird guy transfers to Prescott tower
This happened about fifteen or so years ago. A guy named Dave transferred from Orlando Executive tower to Prescott Tower in Arizona. On his first day at Prescott tower, he does the normal meet and greet of the office people. He seemed like an ordinary guy…right up until he turned around. Once his back was to someone, they could see that he had a “Captain Kirk” action figure stuffed into his back pocket. The legs were inside the pocket, and the upper body was hanging out, faced away from his body. The arms extended forward in the typical “bear hug” fashion that is common to plastic action figures.
None of the office people had the courage to ask him about it. It wasn’t until he was being given a tour of the tower, that a controller on position asked; “Hey man, what’s up with that doll in your pocket?”. Dave replied; “He’s not a doll”. The controller gave a slight laugh, and asked; “Ok, what’s with the Action Figure in your pocket?”. Dave replied angrily; “He’s not an action figure! His name is Jim!”.
This got a lot of looks from everyone in the tower. The controller stopped his line of questioning and went back to working position. An awkward silence fell over the tower. You know what I’m talking about. It’s that silence that’s normally reserved for when you have two or more people working together that hate each other’s guts.
Dave and his tour guide soon disappeared down the stairwell, and the whispers began immediately. “What the heck is wrong with that guy?”, asked the ground controller. “Man, that’s one weird friggin dude” replies the Local Controller. Before Dave got back down to the office, people on their day off had already heard about the weird new guy. Continue to part two…
