Monday in Missouri

This morning was beautiful-clear skies and it was supposed to get up to 74 degrees. (It didn't!) After dropping Kaylee off at school, I ran out to Glenndale to pick up some supplies and Chuck, and headed over to Kokomo Airport. We flew the Baron to Fulton, Missouri while Nathan chased us in the Cheyenne. We took off about 15 minutes before he did, and landed about six minutes after he did. The winds were not helpful, to say the least. We had about a 30 knot headwind down at 10,000', and Nathan had a 100 knot headwind up where he was, so he came down to 28,000' and still had a bit of slow going for the Cheyenne. Somewhere in Missouri, the clouds came in, and the forecast for where we were going took a turn for the worse. Nothing horrid, but lower than it was 'supposed' to be when we got there. Let me throw in a plug for the Avidyne. That is a *wonderful* aviation tool. In the past, you'd find out what the weather was at your destination about when you got there. These days, I can check on the weather hundreds of miles out, and make plans and adaptations for what is going on. Or at least prepare. In this case, I went from what was originally just going to be a VFR visual approach to unexpected instrument conditions of 800' and 2 miles, with only a non-precision approach available at that field; but I knew that in enough time to be able to get fairly comfortable with the (weird) approaches, the missed approach procedures, the nearest precision approach, etc. Gotta love technology! Nathan got to the approach first, so while he was shooting the approach, center made me hold on an intersection out there. Hadn't had THAT in a long time. A third airplane was right behind me, and HE had to hold while *I* shot the approach. And center couldn't hear you on the ground, so in order to cancel your IFR and allow the next 'guy' to shoot the approach, you had to land, and call 1-800-wx-brief or the direct line and cancel your IFR there. So when Nathan hit the ground, he made a radio call and asked for someone to pass on his cancellation to center for him. A guy did, and I was subsequently allowed to leave the hold and shoot the approach. So as soon as I landed, I did the same thing so the guy behind me could come on in and not wait for us to shut down and make a phone call. Later I talked to him a bit on the ground, and he appreciated that. ;) It was a little funny having a group of stacked-up airplanes in IFR holds at nowhere, Missouri. It was also an odd airport. They had three runways, but they were all little. You could put two of those together and have Kokomo's runway practically. Anyway-Chuck did most of the flying on the trip, by hand, and did a nice job as always. :) When we came in to land, we had a decent crosswind, and the wind over the trees at the end of the runway caused some interesting currents. An all-around interesting and kind of fun flight. But when we got out of the plane, it was FREEZING there. I was shaking in my t-shirt.

We left out of there in the Cheyenne shortly thereafter, leaving the Baron there to get some engine work done. It was an uneventful and fast trip home. We hit at least 400 knots groundspeed at one point. Gotta Love That. At least I do. ;) Back in the traffic pattern at Kokomo, the traffic was telling us there were FOUR other airplanes out there. We Never spotted any of those guys! Now that's pretty bad. One guy saw us, and the rest weren't a factor for our landing, but it bothered us both that we never saw any of the other planes out there out of four. That's just sad. When we landed, the weather for Kokomo had gone downhill too. It was cold, cloudy, and spitting a little. Yuck. Depressing.

We put everything away and then went to lunch at Applebees. It was a late lunch, but we hadn't eaten all day, so we were too starved to wait. When I finished my shrimp, I went and picked up Kaylee from school, and thus began the rest of the day. We went home to change and have a snack, and then change into ballet clothes. In ballet class, they are now working on a 'bar', which is new, and looks actually rather ballerina-ish. It's cute. I may have to sneak a picture. We left there and headed right to cheer practice, where Kaylee wore a Colts Cheerleader outfit-appropriate considering the Colts game tonight. (Which they are currently winning quite thoroughly in the 4th quarter, thank you.) She got done with cheer at 7:30 pm, and it's now dark, colder, and actively raining. (Blah). I stopped at Arby's for dinner, then it was home and she had to do her homework, which included some pages from the Friday she was sick. *sigh* I left two pages for her to do tomorrow morning before school. She'd had enough for one day.

Bedtime for her, Colts Game for me (after entering checks for SMA Support and answering a few emails.) And thus goes Monday!