A large two engined train was crossing America. After they had gone some distance one of the engines broke down. "No problem," the driver thought, and carried on at half power. Farther on down the line, the other engine broke down, and the train came to a standstill.
The driver decided he should inform the passengers about why the train had stopped, and made the following announcement:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, I have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that both engines have failed, and we will be stuck here for some time. The good news is that you decided to take the train and not fly."
It wouldn't have been bad if you HAD been in a plane... Slightly the same thing happened with my father and me.
We were flying from Philadelphia to San Francisco on one of those huge four engined planes. Shortly after take-off we felt a huge rumbling. The crackle of the intercom came on, and the pilot said:
"Attention passengers, engine number one is experiencing some problems, so we will be shutting her down. We apologize for the inconvenience, but the flight will now be a five and a half hour trip, instead of the usual five hours."
There was a mild groan from the passengers, but it was interrupted by the same rumbling.
"Passengers, we again apologize, but enginge number two is now experiencing a malfunction. It too will have to be shut down. The flight will now be a six hour trip."
A louder groan, which was again disrupted by an even louder rumbling.
"Again, we apologize, engine three has burned out. We will arrive in San Fransisco eight hours from the take-off time."
Understandably, the people in the plane got fidgety, and my father said, "I sure hope engine number four doesn't go down."
"Yeah," I said, "then we'll be up here forever."