I have always been intrigued by the cool personal drones everybody seems to have nowadays. When I see people posting aerial photos on social media, especially those stunning videos from high above Miami Beach, I'm a gasp. Ok, so, I have no idea what a "gasp" actually is and I have never seen one per say, but... drones make me a gasp! Despite my extreme case of drone envy, I never bought one, mostly because I was intimidated by the thought of flying one, mostly. It's kinda ironic, since my brother Chris is a world-class helicopter and airplane aviator; he holds the record for the longest flight in the history of the U.S. Military and is now the CEO of Hughes Aerospace. OK, enough bragging about my big bro. Long story short, I'm no Chris Baur when it comes to flying and well, I proved that today. Moving forward, I'll leave the flying to my brother. But I do look way cooler than him! Let me explain...
Uncle Louie is not a professional drone pilot
I recently wrote an article about my shopping addiction; specifically my online shopping problem. I reference this because of my complete and utter inability to just say no (to Amazon). Two days ago, I saw a drone on Amazon Prime. It was regularly $149 but on sale for $55.47 so, of course, I clicked "buy now." Duh! Well, that was Sunday and today when I got home from the office, it was waiting on my porch! I would be lying if I told you I didn't think about whether or not that box would be there every minute of my +40 mile ride home from downtown Miami.
I popped my buck knife through the black Amazon Prime tape on the box like it was butter and studied the drone box. I cracked it open and dutifully read the instructions (all of them), hard to believe, I know, but I did. I plugged it in to charge for 90 minutes and then took a ride to the liquor store by Waffle House to pickup a few cases of Champagne for my niece Emily's baby shower. Then I swung by Bella's school to pick her up; I was supposed to go by Brenda's house to buy a scooter I found on this new app Offer Up but she got stuck in a meeting. The online shopping struggle is real! We came home and ran to the drone, ready to take it for a test flight in my dining room. After an 8-10 minute practice session, and multiple mid-air collisions with a $40,000 Romero Britto painting, I let the battery charge for another hour before taking it outside. I ignored that little voice telling me I was not ready. I was ready to be a flyboy!
My daughter Bella was my navigator and my flight plan included telling her the drone was one of her birthday presents. After all, what seven-year-old girl doesn't need a video camera equipped quad rotor drone? I set it on the deck, I mean helicopter pad, far enough away from my pool so I felt safe that it wouldn't take a swim. I activated the video camera and engaged the rotors. The drone elevated to about 20 feet and I held it steady. Bella told me how cool it was and right at that moment, Jesus took the wheel. The drone rose towards the clouds, above the giant royal poinciana tree, taking a course south by southwest. I pushed the return home button. I pushed it again. And again and, well, our drone was never to be seen again! Bella said "I guess the drone went to heaven daddy."
I contacted Amazon to tell them the return home button was a crock of, well, you know what I mean. They were kind enough to repeat how they understand that a defective return home button can be very frustrating. Right as I was about to tell them exactly what can be very frustrating, they made a generous offer to refund the cost of the drone. My next text was to my neighbor Justin. Hey Justin, if you find a drone in your trees or on the antler of one of those cute little goats you have (and don't eat), it's not the NSA or big brother, it's mine!
I guess the moral of the story is, what goes up doesn't always come down. As terrible as losing a drone may be, this was actually very funny and I enjoyed the laugh. Sometimes you have to put things on auto pilot and accept that you can't control everything. I hope somebody in heaven is enjoying my new drone.