"Guillermo" wrote:
I had another situation where it was a little more unclear, when
departing from an uncontrolled field, IFR plan on file:

70V: "jax center, Cessna 70V at xxxx, would like to pick up IFR
clearance to FTY"

JAX:"70V, squawk 1234, climb to 5000, I'll have the rest of your
clearance in a few minutes"

5000 feet would put me in the clouds, and having not heard the words
"cleared to", I wasn't sure if I was considered to be flying IFR at
this point, so I told the controller that 5000 would put me in the
clouds, and he responded to go ahead, that I was already IFR.

Technically, this is a bum clearance, since you didn't have a clearance
limit. On the other hand, once you clarified your IFR status with the
controller, everybody is on the same page, even if the right magic words
weren't spoken. I'm not sure how you were supposed to navigate, but I
guess I would just continue on my present heading.

Whenever I'm not 100% I understand a clearance, I just read it back the way
I'm planning on executing it; this gives the controller a chance to correct
any errors (and gets it on the tape). In your case, I would have read back
something like, "70V is IFR at this time, 3500 climbing 5000, XXX heading".