FSS vs. automation

I've been planning a little weekend getaway for self, wife, and son for a
while now. I've a club airplane lined up, I've paid off the weather gods,
and I've arranged for someone to feed the cats.

I've also been playing with Aeroplanner just for fun (I've not yet decided
if it's a keeper, but I've only barely touched it). I did a plan for my
trip, and built one of those "trip tik" things (or whatever they're
called). Looking it over, I see a NOTAM that my target airport is closed
UFT. What?

It was late, and I was tired. I'll deal with it in the morning, I decide.
This morning, I check for the NOTAM via DUAT, and I don't see it. Good
news.

But it's nagging against me...what if I merely missed it in DUAT? So I call
FSS for the story.

I ended up speaking to a briefer that took the NOTAM from the airport. I
found out why it was closed (paving the intersection of the two runways),
how long it was closed (a few hours), and what work was planned for the
next few days.

I'm a huge fan of automation (I'm a software engineer; it's required of me
{8^), but that human factor can come in quite handy.

This is the second time in recent history that this has happened. A few
weeks ago, I flew out to Factoryville to save myself a phone call. The
weather was for reasonably high ceilings everywhere...except Factoryville's
neighborhood. It was weird.

So I called FSS, and had a chat with a briefer. She brought up the same
information I could from the Internet (including the "chatter" between
meteorologists - I love those pages). However, it made a significant
difference to be speaking to someone that worked with this material every
day, and who could explain tidbits of it that puzzled me. It ended up
being a 20 or 30 minute weather lesson, and the most interesting weather
briefing I've ever received.

It almost made up for the fact that Factoryville had high ceilings just like
everyone else (although they were dropping a bit as I left {8^).

- Andrew