"Leaving 6,000, preceed direct Pahokee"

With the plane refueled by the ramp staff at Vero Beach, we hang out by the plane for a few moments enjoying a light night breeze. My friend tells me of some amazingly beautiful girl that he's agreed to fly with tomorrow. We chill out under the wing for a while while he describes how stunning she is. He's now piqued my interest, and I'm looking forward to meeting her. When I ask why he isn't interested in her, he admits he isn't interested in Latin ladies- oh well, that's his loss, not mine.

We get the clearance, and the tower issues a void time that's 4 minutes in the future. The clearance void time was issued because the tower was about to close. If I don't depart by that time, I'll need to call Miami Center to issue a new clearance. I don't bother to rush, because I know we won't make it. Just as we get to the runup area, the tower announces that he's closing up for the night. There's another aircraft on the frequency, and we both wish him a good night.

We complete the runup and get a new clearance from Miami Center. After takeoff, we contact Center and he tells us to fly east until reaching 6000ft, then turn direct to the Pahokee VOR. My PNF is about to accept the clearance by reading it back when I stop him. I don't think he fully understands the clearance. That would require us to fly some 13nm over the water before turning back towards the VOR. That's undesireble from an engine failure point of view. I state my concerns to the controller and ask for an alternative. We're told to fly South, the proceed to the VOR once leaving 5000ft. Thanks Mr. Miami Center!

The flight southbound is mostly uneventful. We penetrate a few small cumulous clouds on the way. Controlling the airplane in a cumulous cloud is difficult because the turbulence really gives you a beating. If you're not focussed, you'll find yourself 300ft high/low and 50 degrees off course. The controlller points out some traffic, and declines a few requests for flight following before handing us off to Palm Beach approach.

Approaching Tamiami, I get ready for an ILS approach. My PNF always laughts when I put on the view limiting device. He thinks it looks funny because he's never used anything like that in Europe. He claims what they do is to cover the forward windows! I find that hard to believe, and chalk it up to something that was lost in translation...

Some tine around here, my PNF completely loses it. He starts playing with the flashlight, shining it in my eyes, covering the instruments and announcing every swing of the compass. He even adjusts my headset! I'm getting more and more pissed, but I try to ignore the distractions and focus on the ILS. His antics continue all the way down to 200ft where I remove the hood, and see the runway just off to my right. The deviation is within standards, and I think I did a pretty good job considering I'd been flying with a maniac for the past few minutes.

I slow the plane and get it in the proper position for landing. At about 100ft, for no reason whatsoever, the PNF decides that Flaps 20 isn't enough, and moves the flap lever to full deflection (40 degrees). Needless to say, I'm a little shocked, and now the plane requires a massive amount of power to stay in the air. I contemplate raising the flaps to salvage the situation, but deem it too risky, as we're now at about 50ft. I make a decent landing, though not as good as I had wanted.

As we vacate the runway, I hear over the radio:

"Tamiami traffic, N123 entering runway 09R for departure, closed traffic."

N123, Tamiami tower, no you're not. The tower is still open and you'll need permission. Continue holding."

I start laughing hysterically, and almost immediately begin to forget the preceeding few minutes. As I'm securing the airplane, I reflect on what had happened. Was the PNF a jackass for doing all that crazy stuff? Yes. But maybe it was for the greater good. When I'm by myself, shooting an instrument approach down to minimums on a dark and stormy night, it won't be an easy, relaxing affair- it will be pretty stressful. I safely completed tonights approach and landing with all the distractions- it was thus a good training experience. I'm one step closer to dealing with that dark and stormy approach...