'Twas the night before Wagsmas, and within sight of the carrier;
Not an aircraft was flying, not even a Harrier;
The time off requests placed via Outlook with care;
In hopes that the Hornet soon would be there;
The checklists were laid on the desk all widespread;
While visions of 3-OK danced in my head;
My Track Clip was attached tight to my cap,
I had just settled in for two more weeks' nap,
When on my nightstand I heard just one buzz,
I unlocked my phone and saw what the notification was.

Off to the computer on lightning I rode,
I booted up Windows and threw in my code.
The light from the monitor burned my eyes,
I squinted and blinked and to my surprise,
When what to my stinging eyes did appear,
A new hoggit post which appeared thru the tears,
A high karma redditor- a thrill up my spine!
I knew in a moment that it was NineLine.
More rapid than biplanes the modules they came,
And he underlined, and bolded, and posted them by name:
"Now, Tiger! now, Sabre! now Warthog and Viggen!
On, Frogfoot! on, Fishbed! on, Mirage and ... ON, HORNET!
To the top of the sub! to the top of the page!
Now update away! torrent away! download away all!"

With the speed that from Eagles, Flankers do run,
The long awaited download had quickly begun!
So up through my router, the patch info flew
With the files full of textures, and LEX vapors too—
And then one hour hence, I heard a small chime
Surprising, the download took such little time!
As I drew on my headset, and was tuning my sound,
Across my bright screen E.D.'s logo was found.
I spotted the square icon, all shiny and new
It read "F-18 Hornet", with background of blue.
Yes! Here it was, all mine, mine to fly.
After long years of waiting, the moment was finally nigh!

What to do? Which maneuvers? With what procedure to start?
My wingman suggested that carrier ops would be smart.
Undaunted, a quick mission editor session ensues,
After all I have seen traps done plenty by Tom Cruise.
Although the conditions were clear skies, unlimited visibility,
It would still prove to be a test of my flying ability.
"Here we go", I thought loading in on a 5 mile approach,
My wingman unaware that I could use a coach.
I said "Oh, forget it" and configured the jet.
Gear, hook, and flaps were quickly all set.
My speed was quite high when intercepting the slope
I popped out the boards to not look like a dope.
Back and forth quickly on the throttles I plowed,
I thought "This time I'm sure my wife will be proud!"

1 minute later there's a fire on the deck
The only thing said over comms: "Hey, what the heck?"
To my wingman, who's convinced I'm horribly inept,
I state "I'll do better with wings variably swept!"
While that may be true, for now I will sing:
“Let's go fly the wings off this thing!”

two things...after the second stanza, I paused to to check and see if I was available for DL (it's the 30th in Russia the time of this post). Last recommend changing the last line to “Let's go fly the wings off this hornet insect!”

Lasted two lines before cracking up. That was great. Well done.