Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 7: Line 62

 Even allowing for his irregular history—a mother, so it was said, vanished when he was yet a babe—a father, disreputably adrift somewhere in the Old Confederacy—Counterfly's propensity for gratuitous insult had begun to pose a threat to his probationary status with the Chums of Chance, if not, indeed, to group morale.

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It seems to me, Lindsay's concern for Chick Counterfly has nothing to do with Chick Counterfly. That's why he "frowned in perplexity." Because he doesn't know how to berate Chick into falling in line without looking like a jerk, seeing as how Chick Counterfly's family situation makes him a sympathetic character to the other members of the crew. We already saw how Miles Blundell bit his tongue when Chick insulted him out of respect for Chick's pathetic upbringing in a vulgar and low social environment. But Lindsay has "group morale" to think about. Because if "group morale" falls, things aboard their tiny airship might get dangerous. And dangerous working conditions can lead to a truly terrible conclusion: loss of profits!

Okay, sure, maybe Lindsay cares about the crew and he's truly thinking about the crew's safety is an argument somebody might make who forgot they read that part where Lindsay dangles Darby dangerously over the side of the airship as punishment.

Lindsay sucks.

We get a little bit of Chick's history from this line which sets up some future drama if Pynchon decides he needs more drama later. Who was Chick's mother? Where did she go? Why did she abandon him?! Why is his father disreputable? What's he doing in the Old Confederacy? Might he come looking for his son someday, purporting to have missed him all these long years but, in reality, attempting some huge con to get his son's money? That's a plot which always comes up with estranged fathers in sitcoms, right? Usually in a poignant episode that downplays the laughs and which ends with everybody hugging after they stand up to the charlatan father.

We also learn Chick has probationary status with the Chums of Chance. Earlier we learned he was the newest member (as even the Narrator is unsure how he might act in various situations) and now we learn that he's not yet a full member. But even Lindsay won't boot him out of the organization. Mostly for Lindsay's own sake, of course, in that Lindsay doesn't want to come off as an unfeeling jerk in the crew's eyes. Although what are the crews' feelings for Darby if Lindsay can swing him around over the side of the airship without Lindsay worrying about what people might think of him? Darby must be just annoying enough to everybody on the ship that they don't mind him getting comeuppance every now and again.

Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 7: Line 61

 Hearing this, Lindsay Noseworth frowned in perplexity.

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The "this" which Lindsay heard was Chick Counterfly insulting Darby Suckling's work ethic. That upset Lindsay. Remember, Lindsay is the guy who just held Darby over the side of the Inconvenience for doing nothing, really. He threatened a member of the crew's life because that crew member "spoke informally." But now Lindsay acts sad and confused that Chick Counterfly has called Darby a saphead for risking his life for The Man. Lindsay is telling on himself.

For Lindsay, it's okay for a person in charge to threaten the life of the workers for any thing that he thinks might interfere with the work. One of those things that might interfere with the work is one of the workers telling another worker that they're an idiot for accepting the mortal dangers of work that has little meaning in the overall scheme of things. To possibly trade your life for a mere wind reading when, from the deck of the gondola, you can get a pretty good idea of what the wind's doing is a sucker's game. But voicing that reality is not something a foreman or manager or owner or Second-in-Command can allow. Because it goes against the work. And to the person in charge, the work, or the bottom line, is more important than the worker.

Chick Counterfly has just brought the stink of unionizing onto the Inconvenience with a casual insult.

Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 7: Line 60

 Though the extreme hazard was obvious to all, Darby's enthusiasm for the task at hand created, as ever, a magical cloak about his elfin form that seemed to protect him, though not from the sarcasm of Chick Counterfly, who now called after the ascending mascotte, "Hey! Suckling! Only a saphead would risk his life to see how fast the wind's blowing!"

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"A magical cloak"? "His elfin form"? What am I reading? Tolkien?!

Actually, I would be reading Tolkien right now but I couldn't find my copy of The Lord of the Rings. But just like the dumb hobbits and lousy elves in that series, Darby Suckling very much has a magical cloak that protects him while climbing around on the outside of the balloon; it's called plot armor. He has to live so that he can grow into a surly teenager and punch Lindsay in his smart (so smart it's practically Vulcanic!) mouth. Unless that never happens and now I'm worried Darby might fall to his death in this scene!

Chick is totally right about sapheads in this sentence (and it is "a sentence" even though Chick's quotation contains three sentences of its own! Language! Go figure, right?!). Some people can be fooled into risking their lives for the most mundane reasons and those people are rightly called sapheads. My guess is the derogatory term derives from the term sappers and the menial, often dangerous work they did.

I first learned what a sapper is from playing the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay game. I probably learned most of the stuff I first learned by playing roleplaying games. I first encountered Dungeons & Dragons when I was ten or eleven and was soon also playing Gamma World, Star Frontiers, Boot Hill, and Top Secret. Probably more games than that because my friends and I played whatever we could get our hands on, even making up a game that encompassed ideas from all the games we were playing which we called Now & Later.

For some reason, this scene reminds me of an old video from the 80s or early 90s when "caught on tape" video shows were all the rage. It was footage taken by an Australian teacher out on a hike with students. He warned a couple of them not to go out on this thin pass over a chasm and was filming them as they were not heeding his cries. Suddenly the path gave out beneath them and they began tumbling down into the ravine while he followed their progress with his camera and shouting, "I told you not to go out there!"

Man. Remembering that video always makes me laugh! It also makes me envious that I'll never get an "I told you so!" in quite as quickly or as ill-timed as that bastard!

Apparently there was a silent comedy from the 1920s called The Saphead. The synopsis is "The scatterbrained son of a Wall Street tycoon goes to the stock exchange and saves his father from bankruptcy." He's probably called a saphead because he helps some dumb rich guy stay rich. Boo! Hiss! We hates him!

Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 7: Lines 58-59

 (For readers here making their first acquaintance with our band of young adventurers, it must be emphasized at once that—perhaps excepting the as yet insufficiently known Chick Counterfly—none would e'er have entered the morally poisonous atmosphere of the "frontón," as such haunts are called down there, had it not been essential to the intelligence-gathering activities the Chums had contracted to render at that time to the Interior Ministry of President Porfirio Díaz. For details of their exploits, see The Chums of Chance in Old Mexico.)

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This parenthetical reference answers some of my questions about the previous sentence. Some people might be thinking, "Yeah. That's how books work. Maybe give the author a little time to explain themselves!" But other people might be thinking, "Shut up, jerk!"

Actually, I don't mind taking the time after each sentence to consider what's being said or, more aptly, what's not being said. It helps a person get a handle on the story in their own way. What if I read one sentence, considered it, and came to a stunning conclusion which is confirmed in the next sentence? That's something most readers wouldn't experience if they didn't stop to let things percolate. They just might go on living their lives thinking the author exposed the twist in Sentence B when the author had actually exposed the twist in Sentence A!

It's too bad I didn't go on a tangent in the previous entry about the kids participating in gambling like I almost did because this parenthetical reference would have seemed to be speaking directly to me. My favorite bit of the disclaimer about how the Chums would never participate in this mean activity is the Narrator saying, "Except maybe Chick! We don't know enough about him yet, being he's new to the group!" You know what the Narrator really wanted to say but is too couth to say it is, "Counterfly would have lost the Chums of Chance's per diem for the entire trip on football bets and prostitutas, no doubt about it!"

The Chums of Chance were contracted to work for the Mexican government in this story. So they seem to be a mercenary organization. Or freelancers, if the term "mercenary" seems a bit too rough. That could still mean their organization is tied up with the U.S. government though.

This sentence also gives us the name of the book which may have been evocative to the youth of the 19th Century but just sounds boring after my supposed title of The Chums of Chance are Bested by Football Hooligans. Some 19th Century kid was probably all, "Oh boy! Gee squillikers! Old Mexico! By gum, that does sound exciting, doesn't it, Mother?! Could we possible not eat for four days so that I may indulge in a right jolly good adventure fantasy!"

You know what I just got an idea for? A role-playing game based on Horatio Alger novels!

Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 7: Line 57

 It will be recalled that this method of passing information had been adopted by the crew during their brief though inconclusive sojourn "south of the border," where they had observed it among the low elements who dissipate their lives in placing wagers on the outcomes of pelota games.

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It will not be recalled because nobody read any of these fictional Chums of Chance novels, you jerk! What was this novel called? The Chums of Chance are Bested by Football Hooligans?

The Chums of Chance work for an organization that probably isn't the United States of America or else wouldn't they constantly be causing international incidents with their adventures in other countries like Mexico or Indonesia or Atlantis? On the other hand, they do seem pretty patriotic if I had to judge by their celebratory bunting. But that also just might be camouflage for the Chicago World's Fair!

The phrase "dissipate their lives" feels particular insulting to me. Thanks, Pynchon!

Chapter 1: Section 1: Pages 6-7: Line 56

 Miles, with his marginal gifts of coördination, and Chick, with a want of alacrity fully as perceptible, took their stations at the control-panels of the apparatus, as Darby Suckling, meantime, went scrambling up the ratlines and shrouds of the giant ellipsoidal envelope from which the gondola depended, to the very top, where the aery flux was uninterrupted, in order to read, from an anemometer of the Robinson's type, accurate wind measurements, as an index of how rapidly the ship was proceeding, conveying these down to the bridge by means of a written note inside a tennis-ball lowered on a length of line.

* * * * * * * * * *

Here we go again with the "Miles is a fat klutz" shit! I know Pynchon hasn't given us an actual physical description of Miles but I would wager that 98% of all casting agents would only put a call out for overweight kids for this part. It's a trope for a reason and that reason is the same reason it was, for many years (and still today maybe?), to have every fat person in a film or television show shown holding food whenever they were on camera! Unless the reason is unimaginative script writers, directors, and casting agents?

If I were on dating apps, I would simply lift the description of Chick and use it to describe myself. "A want of alacrity fully as perceptible." Okay, maybe I'd have to change the wording a bit by taking out the "as"! But you get my point if you know the meaning of "alacrity" and "perceptible" and "want" used to mean "lacking" (which is what I guess it always means although it connotes a slightly different feeling when used as a verb, as if your desire for the thing you lack is the foregrounded idea).

What Pynchon does at the beginning of this sentence is to just cement the two-dimensional, cartoon nature of these two characters (which cements the idea that the whole Chums of Chance crew is a 70s cartoon (or, you know, Victorian era kid adventure dime novel)). Miles is the blundering (Blundell!) fatty and Chick is the slackluster rebel (COUNTERfly!) without a fuck. So that's the subject of the first sentence of this sentence taken care of!

The other half of the sentence (the object, I guess? Because that half is about the object the subject is verbing? (Hee hee. So dirty!)) helps flesh out the description of the Inconvenience from the previous sentence. I thought maybe there was a ladder but now we see Darby is just climbing up the ropes surrounding the balloon (ellipsoidal!) to which the gondola is attached and that the anemometer is located directly on top of the balloon so as to get a perfectly clear and unobstructed reading of the direction and strength of the wind. So Darby's really risking his tail here!

The Robinson Anemometer (which is what the text under the anemometer says but you probably couldn't read it)

Darby sends the data back to Randolph by writing a note while clinging to the top of the balloon buffeted by the winds and then stuffing that note (if it hasn't blown away) into a cut open tennis ball (who hasn't cut open a tennis ball and then used it for all sorts of strange purposes one of which was almost certainly some weird new space vehicle for their Star Wars Jawa action figure) and lowering it down on a line. I know I just repeated a bunch of what Pynchon said but I wanted to highlight how difficult it probably was for poor Darby!

Chapter 1: Section 1: Page 6: Line 55

 As their orders had directed them to proceed to Chicago without delay, Randolph, after studying an aeronautical chart of the country below them, called out, "Now, Suckling—aloft with the anemometer—Blundell and Counterfly, stand by the Screw," referring to an aerial-propulsion device, which the more scientific among my young readers may recall from the boys' earlier adventures (The Chums of Chance at Krakatoa, The Chums of Chance Search for Atlantis), for augmenting the cruising speed of the Inconvenience—invented by their longtime friend Professor Heino Vanderjuice of New Haven, and powered by an ingenious turbine engine whose boiler was heated by burning surplus hydrogen gas taken from the envelope through special valve arrangements—though the invention had been predictably disparaged by Dr. Vanderjuice's many rivals as no better than a perpetual-motion machine, in clear violation of thermodynamical law.

* * * * * * * * * *

Why have the Chums of Chance been tasked with heading to the Chicago World's Fair? I don't know! Why did I suddenly turn into my Aunt Mel asking questions of the other first-time viewers of a movie that hasn't gotten to the answers yet?!

This sentence gives us a bit of a look at the Inconvenience. I don't know what the balloon looks like exactly but there's some space up there where the anemometer hangs and probably a small rope ladder hanging down, which I suspect only the diminutive Darby Suckling can climb to read the meter. Then it's got a screw-like propulsion system to help move the balloon in the direction it needs to go when the wind has turned against them. The huge Screw works like a jet engine if a jet engine were a huge screw instead of a huge fan which, I mean, it is since a fan is just a screw as drawn by M.C. Escher. But I don't want to get bogged down by the hard science of it all especially since the really hard science has been provided by Professor Heino Vanderjuice.

The hard science comes from the turbine engine which powers the Screw. Or maybe it's flaccid science because it apparently is just a figment of Dr. Heino Vanderjuice's imagination! Except that it's right there on the ship doing the impossible thing it's supposed to do! The machine is fueled by the same hydrogen that gives the ship lift so the Chums don't need to carry excess hydrogen. But if the machine is consuming the hydrogen in the balloon's envelope, won't it eventually begin to deflate and descend?! I guess that's why it only consumes the "excess" hydrogen. But then where does that come from? That just sounds like the Chums have, actually, brought more hydrogen than they need to fuel the turbine! I guess that's where the whole perpetual-motion machine comes into play; we just have to accept that there's always enough hydrogen to both lift the ship and power the turbine and never too much hydrogen that needs to be stored, adding excess weight to the ship.

I know what you're thinking! "How does hydrogen add weight to an airship?! It makes it float, stupid-head!" Pshaw! Perhaps in your stupid-headedness you forgot about a little something called "helium tanks"? Duh! Those are heavy!

Is Pynchon taking a dig at scientists here? That they can't believe in something that actually exists if their mathematical equations and tested theories tell them it can't exist? That they're too wrapped up in their heads to congratulate Dr. Vanderjuice for creating something impossible? What a bunch of jerks! Man, scientists are whack is something kids said in the 80s.

What's that? His name? What's odd about the name Heino Vanderjuice? You must not have suspended your belief enough to deal with a Pynchon world where characters have the dumbest names possible! That's a compliment! I love his names!

Could "Vanderjuice" be read as "Wander Jews" which I probably don't need to explain to my super smart readers. They know the history of the Jewish peoples and what pogroms are and also who Moses was and basically the entire description of the Jewish life until May 14, 1948! Unless my readers aren't super smart and they're more like me, a guy who just watched Fiddler on the Roof every single time he stumbled upon it on local television programming as a young child. One time we watched it in elementary school but it's so long that the teacher split it up over two days. I decided to stay home one day, forgetting we were watching Fiddler on the Roof, and missed half of it. That'll probably be the biggest regret rolling around in my head on the day I die, how I wasted a stay at home day on a day we watched Fiddler on the Roof!

Maybe Vanderjuice can be read as "Wonder Juice." So it's like a Philosopher's Stone sort of thing, a magical elixir. Vanderjuice can create impossible things through the magic of science and/or alchemy (choose the conjunction that most describes your feelings on the relationship between science and alchemy).

And what about Heino?! I don't even know how to pronounce it. Like "High? No!" or "Hey! NO!" or "He Eno"? Maybe it's just supposed to make you think about ketchup for the sake of thinking about ketchup. That seems like a solid artistic statement.

We also learn from this narrator (who is this narrator?!) about two more Chums of Chance books. In these two adventures, we get another example of how the surface of the Earth is the mid-point of the Chums' world. Atlantis is deep beneath the ocean; Krakatoa, being a huge volcano, is high above the Earth. Being "down to Earth" takes on a new meaning with these kids. Or the same meaning, really! Just more literal. When they're on Earth, they're more in reality. When they're above or below it, they're in a kind of fantasy realm where possibly anything goes.

* * * * * * * * * *

Postscript: Heino is a shortened version of the name Heinrich which means "Ruler of the household." This is a fitting name for the leader of the Chums of Chance. But it is also coupled with the name "Vanderjuice" which could possibly be read as "Wander Jew" or "The Wandering Jew." Which means the name is contradictory. A man with no home who is also the ruler of the house.