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Yesterday's news story about six year old Falcon Heene yesterday supposedly stealing his father's home-made balloon for a joyride was the best story I've seen in years. It had everything - an air chase, a ground chase, and multiple happy endings (the first, when a gallant rescuer made a grab for the craft as it descended and helped pull it to ground in one piece - the second when Falcon was found hiding in the attic after letting Daddy's toy adrift).

As we all know now, Falcon was hiding in the attic of his family home the whole time. Interestingly, about fifteen minutes into the piece, someone left a comment on MSNBC saying "he's probably hiding in the basement, trying to escape the whipping of his life". Attic, basement - that person should start a 1-800 business. There's also an interesting comment from Falcon himself ("we did this for the show") - see above.

Watching yesterday's story, I was reminded of the very first manned balloon experiment, which took place in Paris on the 19th of September, 1783, aboard a handsome balloon - the Aerostat Réveillon - designed by Jospeh and Etienne Montgolfier, the 12th and 15th-born sons of an Annonay family of paper makers.

The balloon's creator's did not wish to expose themselves to the uncertainties of flying but instead placed aboard a sheep, a duck and a rooster. With the success of the flight, performed in front of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, they followed it up with a flight two months later in which a doctor, Pilâtre de Rozier, and an army officer, travelled nine kilometers, and soared to 3,000 feet.

And here, we leave Wikipedia for myth. A popular myth among balloonists is that the aforementioned doctor had some concerns they may, in dropping from the sky, be taken for the eighteenth century version of aliens. So he took the precaution of including a bottle of fine French champagne aboard the craft - so that anyone arriving with pitchfork in hand could be convinced as to their authenticity as Frenchmen.

Travelling by balloon is so much fun, and so frivolous and grin-inducing, that I'm inclined not to disbelieve this, just because in this case, the truth really doesn't matter. And as for our future-past time-traveller, he/she could do worse than arrive back in our period of history with a bottle of champagne aboard his craft. At a minimum, it would help smooth their introduction.