reading an random block from a floppy

[Nick Cabatoff <ncc@cs.mcgill.ca>]

I'd like to do the equivalent of

 dd if=/dev/fd0 bs=1k skip=1439 

without having to read through the 1439 blocks in question; that is,
to not treat the floppy as a sequential device.  This is running out
of a floppy boot image (not Debian's, my own) so I don't have perl
available, though I do have awk.  I'd prefer not to have to write a C
hack for it, as that's my last resort; I know it would be easy, I just
don't want to re-invent the wheel.

Any suggestions of tools I could use?