and to lay the 'you're going to be a test pilot/die in flames' rubbish to rest
Good sir, I have a conservative view of life (boring old engineer and all) .. which gets more so as I get older, more doddery and less desirous of dying.
TPs get to have lots of boredom (for which the sensible ones strive) and the occasionally interspersed moments of terror (when something happens which they didn't expect) .. to let us mere mortals have an easier time of it and get all the excitement we need in the bar on overnights.
Rest assured that the topic is bound to be a dinner topic.
You cite Checkboard .. I quite liked his summation ... "Flaps aren't tested in this region - here be dragons". It's a bit like the old QA audit axiom .. "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence".