A Roll

Kaylee's on a roll, having gotten another A+ on a reading comprehension test today, interestingly enough over the first "Chronicles of Narnia" book. One more test tomorrow over spelling and she should be done with tests for the week. :)

Tonight was her Awanas, and she finished the T&T "intro" booklet, meaning she earned her colored book bag, her new Awanas shirt (both green), and her book to study for the year. Her team also won the games, so all in all Miss Kay had a very good day.

I just did end of month stuff and house stuff and some SMA stuff and kept busy...

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“A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.”
~Alexander Pope

"A man can fail many times, but he isn't a failure until he begins to blame someone else."
~John Burroughs

"The only gracious way to accept an insult is to ignore it. If you can't ignore it, top it. If you can't top it, laugh at it. If you can't laugh at it, it's probably deserved."
~Joseph Russell Lynes, Jr.

Randomly

Kaylee got an A+ on her Social Studies test, which she announced to me by shouting it as she got into the car after school. :) We spent some time this evening cuddling on the couch and talking about life in general. I wish I could remember some of the conversations we have, but it's non-stop from one topic to another, from silly to serious and back, and too often by the time I go to write about it, or think to write it down, it's all gone. I remember that we talked about special needs kids, and once when I told her I loved her, she said "Mommy, are you dying?" Where she comes up with some of this stuff...

Friday we had the Baron pulled out for the trip to Kentucky. I needed to see how many headsets were in the plane since we needed five, so I opened the rear baggage door and leaned my head in to see the plugs in the rear three seats, where I promptly put the sharp point of the hinge of the baggage door into the middle of my forehead. It still hurts up there, but at least my hair hides any mark. Good to see I still have such grace. ;)

So what do you do when an adult you know really thinks something fictional is real and may come after them and they are actually prepared for it both physically and mentally? Like say werewolves just for an example. Yes, really.

The below is a video clip of one of our local pilot friends. His name is Mike, and Steve knows both him and knew his dad well; both were pilots, both on the board out at the airport. Mike was a lawyer, and locally known as good at what he did, and a Christian. Mike was diagnosed with terminal cancer, and this interview is about what he wants people to know about life and priorities. His interview starts at about 3 and a half minutes into it...


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"Since no one is perfect, it follows that all great deeds have been accomplished out of imperfection. Yet they were accomplished, somehow, all the same."
~Lois McMaster Bujold

Cheery

The day passed uneventfully. Kaylee had a good day at school, came home and we went over a math paper and a social studies paper for a test tomorrow. She got all the answers right the first time I asked her, so we only went over it once. We then had a long conversation, the three of us, about her and cheer. Her cheer class was supposed to be tonight, and she still said she wanted to stop going to cheer. We talked about why, the consequences of stopping, and wanted to make sure she understood that she can't change her mind again this year-if she's out, she's out. She made the decision to be out, and seemed quite relieved about it when we agreed to let her stop. She also came with me to the place to let them know she was dropping out for the year. It actually ended up being a good lesson. She wanted to just stop going instead of having to tell them anything, but we told her either she was going or she was going to tell them she was not going, but that it's cowardly and inconsiderate to just leave them hanging and quit without a word. So she and I went, we told the lady, and Kaylee felt good about it in the end... She'll gain about 90 mintues a week where she's not got something to do after school too, which is nice. :)

Home

We got a pretty early start to the day this morning, packed up and made a quick stop at McDonald's for breakfast. We needed to go from Paducah to Cape Girardeau to pick up Kaylee, then on to Kokomo. It was beautiful in Paducah, beautiful in Kokomo, and a quarter mile visibility with fog in Cape. It cleared off quickly enough, and we had a nice, uneventful flight home. It was a fun weekend for everyone! Kaylee had a blast with her grandparents-she got to go on the "Chocolate Express" which is a train ride dedicated to chocolate, which is the best thing ever. They went to see "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs", did lots of playing and baking of cookies, and Kaylee has been wearing her new ladybug necklace all day. Meanwhile, we really enjoyed our weekend away too--it's always fun spending time with friends. And now we are trying to get back to Work As Usual Mode. As Kaylee said, "I wish we could skip Mondays!" :)

Paducah

Friday after I picked Kaylee up from school, I took her right to Kokomo Airport, where she, Steve, myself, Chuck and Nathan loaded up ourselves and our baggage in the Baron and headed off to Cape Girardeau. It was IFR at Kokomo, but once we got above the clouds, it was a pretty flight over. We dropped Kaylee off, so she is spending a little time with Grandma & Grandpa for the weekend, and then we took back off and flew to Paducah. After I lifted off from Cape, we had a first-an altimeter failure. It resolved itself about 20 minutes later, as I was touching down at Paducah. Different...

Paducah is having a "Rib Festival", and the entire downtown area has been taken over with tents. There are so many types of BBQ available that you wouldn't have a clue which one to go to! We wandered around by the river, checked out the scenery, enjoyed the sights and sounds (and smells!), and ate dinner at a local place that has a nice outdoor area a story up in a wooden...gazeebo-like-thing...where I had the best "stuffed orange roughy" thing. It was Really good, and we had live blues music playing just below us on the street. Great atmosphere.

Saturday we woke up and wandered around by Mayfield, which is where Herky Green (the man the Mustang is painted to honor" is from. He has a plaque in town, and I took photos of it. Pretty neat. We also drove around Kentucky Lake, went to the various marinas including Moore's, which has a "new" restaurant on field that had the best mushroom burger I've EVER had. Nathan and I split it because it was so big, and no other portabello burger has come close to that one. Good stuff. We also went around to visit Nathan's former stomping grounds-where he went to school, where he lived, the park he played in as a kid, all that fun stuff. We came back home long enough to take a power nap, then headed back downtown to the rib festival, where we still didn't have ribs, but rather ate at a steakhouse downtown with an old school friend of Nathan's and her husband. Once again, that was one of the best steaks I've had. They know how to prepare food down here, apparently, but that was some good stuff. We topped off the evening with strawberry shortcake for the boys and a fudgy thingy for the girls, walked off a small amount of our dinner, and came back to the hotel to recuperate and get ready for tomorrow.

It's been a fun weekend. When I called Mom to talk about what time to get there tomorrow, they were at the movies, so I'm sure Kaylee is having a great time as well. It's been a nice little vacation. :)

Lacking

I must confess to a sincere lack of much interesting to report these last two days. I've been whittling down my emails again as I catch up on several SMA, work and personal things. I've been writing thank you notes and sending off pictures to people. Organizing quite a few things, cleaning the house, doing a bit of accounting, hitting banks and stores and the post office and Kaylee's after school activities, recovering stuff from the Bash, and preparing for this upcoming weekend's trip south. Speaking of the Bash, someone saw the total and sent in an additional $32 so the gross would come in at $10,000.79. :)

Kaylee's been doing great. She got an A+ on her math and spelling tests this week, and has just been a great kid. Patient, easy to get moving in the mornings without complaint, taking care of her room and such, sarcastic and funny and as always, just fun to be around...

After staring at these two paragraphs for an hour while I watch a season premiere on tv, I have decided that I still have a serious lack of anything interesting to report!

Bash Results

And a wild rabbit trail:

I had the volume turned down, but the television news report last night was showing a bunch of people lined up to get their flu shots and their H1N1 flu shots, flinching from the needle, etc., and as I watched the scene without listening to the actual news report, my own story popped into my head. Were I a novelist, I'd write a story about one of the most effective methods of actually infecting a huge percentage of the population with...whatever...a disease, a tracking device, whatever, by injecting it in the line-up of willing and unknowing people at flu shot clinics all over the world. Yes, I know, Kaylee comes by it genetically. ;)

Today was "finish off the BBQ Bash" day. Counting money, getting figures down, tallying up rides and food and just all the details, communications with various folks to tie things up, website updates, all that good stuff. We're not quite done, but we're close, and it looks like this year the total in thus far is $9,968.79, which frankly is amazing considering the crowds this year were down a great deal and the biggest financial boost in years past were the T-6 rides, which were very light this year as well. I didn't expect anything close to that this year, and I'm just impressed and a little humbled. This is a very hard time for most people in one of the top five hardest hit cities in America right now as far as the economy and unemployment. But people still came out to help, people still donated, and it really means a lot! I didn't take very many photos, but here are the few I did take. I know others did take more pictures, so I'll post some of them as they come in... :)

*Yawn*

The Stants family is dragging today, and I'm sure others are too. There is still quite a bit of stuff to put back in order at Glenndale that the guys have been working on, and we're still working through the tally of what came in for the event. I worked on the few photos I took and have been trying to play a little catch-up on the house before it gets declared a disaster area. :) I had a board meeting tonight at the school, and it was over in record time due to a Colts game that the majority wanted to see.

Kaylee told me tonight that she doesn't want to be in cheer any more. I asked her why, and told her to take a week off and decide for sure, because if we pull her out, she's not going to be able to just go back in later. (They work on a specific routine, etc.) So she took tonight off and seems quite serious about not returning. We'll see...

In the car the other day, Kaylee was telling me about one of the girls in her class who loves to read and watch scary things, vampire books, etc., and keeps trying to get Kaylee to read and watch them too. Kaylee says to me, "I don't get it. Why would somebody want to be scared? I get scared and I don't like it AT ALL. I try so hard to not be scared! It doesn't make any sense!" The difference for her is that she really DOES get scared; truly, fully, 100% terrified, and it's not a little thrill like it is for some people. I've told her before to be careful what she watches and reads, because even simple things can give her serious nightmares and terrifying thoughts, and once it gets in her head, it doesn't ever really leave, poor girl.

On a sad note, a little girl named Olivia passed away from SMA last night. Her dad is a Respiratory Therapist. She wasn't sick at all, just had normal secretions that we all just take care of without even thinking about it, but it plugged up her airway. Her dad tried to save her, but he couldn't get the secretions and plug out in time, and she died in his arms. She was 3 1/2 years old. And SMA strikes again...

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"Perception is merely reality filtered through the prism of your soul."
~Christopher A. Ray

"We don't see things as they are. We see them as we are."
~Anais Nin

(Isn't that the truth...)

BBQ Bash 2009

Whew!

Well, the Bash is over for one more year. People had a good time, lots of food was consumed, money was raised, there were no unpleasantries, and that all makes for a successful event!

Friday I did a fly-over of the Howard County Veterans Association in the T-6. They were looking for me to come over at 11 a.m. after they did some program on the ground, so I went over at 11 on the dot, turned around and came down in the other direction, slowly "waving" at them with the wings. The campers and such went on for about 3/4 of a mile long. I happened to be carrying the entire Glenndale Airport's Friday Lunch crew's lunch in my baggage compartment, so the next stop was taking the burgers and hot dogs into Glenndale just in time to be cooked up for a hungry crowd. :)

Friday was a set-up day, getting everything ready for Saturday, which encompasses more than anybody wants to read about. Duane gave some rides in the T-6. there was a little flying going on, Tre and Nathan made & brought homemade chili and grilled cheese sandwiches on Texas toast (yum!), we watched the movie "One Six Right", and ended the evening around the camp fire, where Kaylee fell fast asleep and softly snored while sitting on my lap and keeping us both warm. My Jeep was low on gas, but by the time I left, the gas stations on the way home were all closed. No big deal, I could get it in the morning.

Saturday morning Kaylee was pretty tired and I was a bit too, so we didn't get going in a super timely manner. We made it there in time for breakfast, and the day began. The crowd size was down this year from anything it's been in a long time, so I was surprised to learn that we gave more regular rides this year on Saturday than we did last year when we had a really good-sized crowd. There wasn't a big crowd, like I said, but there was a steady stream of riders all day long, and we ended up giving 136 rides. Not. Bad. I gave a few rides in a C-182, and ran a few people back and forth to Kokomo. The winds were not overly helpful (Saturday or Sunday either one), so the Mustang couldn't safely make it down to stay, but Nathan and Steve flew it overhead to say hello. I was in the 182 at the time so I didn't get to hear it, but I did get a good look at it a couple of times, which was worth a smile. The thing that was down the most this year was the T-6 rides-Duane didn't have to sit in the plane and run non-stop this year. Food sales and regular rides were really good though. Saturday evening was the Giant Airplane Shuffle. We had a bunch of airplanes that we would have left sitting out normally, but Sunday's weather forecast was not looking too hot and we did not want all these planes sitting out to get rained on. So I ended up flying the 182 and the Cherokee 180, and we got those two, the RG, the Toga and the T-6 all put away before coming back to another evening by the fire. It was chillier Saturday night, so I wrapped up in a blanket, and Kaylee crawled up on my lap under the blanket and finally fell asleep again.

Sunday morning I woke up early but I was tired. Kaylee was worse, she did not want to get out of bed for anything. Church started at 10, and we left the house at 10 till 10, meaning I still didn't have time to stop for gas. By now I'm staring at the needle a bit, and yep, it's not quite below the E yet, but it's sure on it. Our weather today was supposed to stink again, but really the morning was fine for awhile. We had our church service, then the rides began again. Chuck took me to Kokomo in the Citabria and I brought the T-6 back into Glenndale's Runway 18 for the day. I came up short on energy to flare and had a great bounce-best bounce I've had in that airplane since before I did the checkout with Jim-and I actually started laughing. It was a good and short landing at least. lol It did start raining not too long after that, but our guys kept the rides going for most of it, and people just came inside, snacked, and waited it out. After that, the skies cleared for awhile, and we had a beautiful several hours of flying and playing. Kaylee said today was the best day ever, and tonight in her prayers she thanked God for the "Best BBQ Bash EVER!" She had a few rough times on Saturday, but today she had a blast, no problems at all, and ending on a good note always makes the whole thing feel better. :)

A newly diagnosed SMA family stopped in today, and I got to meet the most handsome little guy with SMA Type 2. They are just starting on their journey in SMA, but I can tell after meeting the mom that she's one of "them", a "Badger Mom", one who doesn't just throw her hands up and say "it's over", but rather one who said "they said he wouldn't walk--we're going to see about that. He's already standing and we're going to keep working." It's not an easy journey, but when you can see the backbone already, you know they're going to be okay, or 'okay' as it is redefined after getting such a diagnosis.

In the afternoon I started giving rides in the T-6, and I ended up doing...six or seven of them. The ceilings were a little on the low side, so we couldn't go do any aerobatics or anything, but I did some low passes and people got some hands-on flying, flew over their schools and homes and farms and such. We held our raffle drawings, ate more food, finished up the regular rides, and needed to do another airplane shuffle to get all the planes put back for the day. The weather had gone downhill, ceilings and visibilities both, but Kokomo was still reporting decent weather of 6 miles and 2400', so Ty took the 182, Steve took the RG and I took the T-6 and we launched for Kokomo. Their AWOS was reporting...optimistically...but flying through the mist/light rain did clean off all the bugs on all three airplanes, and they had been covered. The clean airplanes are a bonus, because getting stuck-on dead bugs off a few days after they've "landed" is one tough job, and those wings were literally covered in them. We pushed the T-6 back into the hangar by hand because the tug is still broken, and caught ground rides back to Glenndale. Oh, by the way, Chuck had to stop and get gas in my Jeep before coming out to Kokomo because it was so low on fuel. Doh! When we made it back to Glenndale, we were really surprised to see how fast the clean up crew had gotten to work. Tables and chairs were down, stakes and tape was down, signs were down, food was put away, it was amazing! There was more to do, and there will be for a few days as things get put back in place, but after awhile we all sat down and just relaxed for a few before heading home for the night--for the first time in two days before 11:something p.m. :)

Pizza Hut donated pizzas, Coke donated drinks, Frito-Lay donated chips, Mitch donated a hand-built pedal plane done in a beautiful metallic purple and silver color scheme, Bill donated his DJ services for two days of great music, Nathan & Tre donated the hog and a whole lot of other food & time (& airplanes), Sheryl donated framed aviation art from the post office, the skydivers donated two jumps into our field, well, way too many people to list donated their time and muscle and supplies and property and planes and money. Like I say, and mean quite vehemently every year, we couldn't do this without a whole lot of people. The experienced pilots who can make it happen even when the wind and weather isn't perfect. The ground crew who keep the planes on the ground safe, parked, fueled, taxiing properly, inbound properly. The food crews who cook, serve, clean, straighten. The sales crews who answer questions, sell tickets for rides and shirts and hats and raffles and all sorts of stuff. The crew that keeps the grounds clean, the trash emptied--if you'd been at Mt. Comfort this year and been stuck on a flight line with port-o-pots with NO toilet paper and completely overflowing trash cans, you would realize real quick how important those guys are. The folks watching the moonwalks and doing the face painting, and the fire-putter-outers who fix whatever is going wrong at the moment at any given place whether the concession stand be out of forks, the ride folks out of tickets, the radios with dead batteries, or the million other little things that always need addressed by somebody at an event. It really is amazing the sheer number of people it takes to successfully complete the Bash, and they all have my true gratitude!!

Thursday

The day was pretty much as busy as yesterday as far as always doing something from early morning until late in the evening, but not as busy in total number of items done. Steve and I drove to Logansport, where I turned in the Chrysler at lease end. I made it back in time to go with Nathan over to Muncie in the Baron to pick up the Cheyenne. It was a bumpy but nice day to have a rolling good day to fly, and my trip home was uneventful. He then let me fly the Cheyenne for awhile, which was fun as always. We checked out the Howard County Veterans gathering over where the airport used to be, checked out activity at Glenndale, did some takeoffs and landings, etc. Very nice morning, I enjoyed that.

The afternoon was more paperwork, phone calls, set-up, traveling to Glenndale and back a few times, getting time sheets, doing billing, taking Kaylee to gymnastics, all that stuff. I also took her to Target so she could spend the money she'd saved up on a couple of little dolls that she wanted. She was quite happy to do that, and she's being very patient with how busy we are right now. She's also excited about the Bash starting tomorrow. I think she's mostly excited about the moonwalks/bouncies, but either way she's looking forward to it, and that's good. :)

Dear Diary

Today I:

Woke up at 7:20 and was out the door by 8:08 to take Kaylee to school as usual. I dropped her off and drove right to Greentown where I picked up the Jeep from maintenance and left the Chrysler to finally get that nail out of the tire. I drove straight to Kokomo airport where I pulled out the Baron and flew it into Glenndale. I was supposed to have a lesson from 9-11, but I was completely out of time to get the flyers to the rest of the airports if I took that lesson, so I snagged the student and took him along on another cross-country marathon. He was working on cross-country work anyway, so he enjoyed it a lot. Plus we went from maps and a stop watch to 3 GPSs and an Avidyne to help us find these places, and a whole lot faster than he was used to. With no dilly-dallying, we took off out of Glenndale and flew to Indianapolis Executive, Anderson, Muncie, Monticello, and back to Glenndale. Right when I landed, after filling out his logbook, Steve and I hopped in the Corvette and met the others for a quick lunch. Back to Glenndale where Chuck and I took off in the Baron out of Glenndale and went back to Kokomo where I was supposed to pick up Nathan and take him back to Muncie. We ran out of time, so instead I drove back to Greentown with Chuck to pick up my Chrysler, while he drove the Jeep back to my house and I followed him. I picked him up at my house and drove him back to Glenndale so he could get his own vehicle, and so I could drop off all my pilot information to Steve to fax in to the FAA for our BBQ Bash. (Pilots giving rides have to provide their life story to the FAA these days.) Got that all done and ran off to pick up Kaylee at school. Took her to the post office and then to the party store where I laid down the deposit for the jumpie/bouncie/moonwalk thingies for our Bash. Ran her home, stuffed a snack in her, went over her Bible verses with her, then dropped her off at Awanas. Came home, entered time sheets and other various billing things, threw in two loads of laundry, did the dishes, then picked up Kaylee at 8 p.m. Fed her dinner, went over her spelling words for her test tomorrow, and it's now 8:38 and for the first time today I'm going to actually sit down, write out this boring entry that even I don't plan on re-reading, hopefully eat something myself, plug away at some paperwork/email things I need to keep working on, and plan out tomorrow's plan of attack.

Whew.

Nifty Nifty, Look Who's...

Happy Birthday to Steve! Today he turns the Big 5-0. The next decade encroaches. You know, it sounds stranger to have a thirty-something married to a fifty-something than it did to have a thirty something married to a forty-something, even though the difference hasn't changed. It's okay, I'll be in the forty-something range soon enough. ;) We didn't do a lot of celebrating today. With the BBQ Bash coming up, he wanted to wait until it was over with and he could actually relax and enjoy and we'll have a little get-together one weekend coming up and do that. We ate out at lunch and didn't make anybody sing to him or anything.

After lunch I took the Baron on a Mission. I needed to distribute flyers to all the airports anywhere close to here. I made it to Marion, Wabash, Huntington, Peru, Logansport, Delphi, Frankfort, a pass at Glenndale, and back to Kokomo. The winds were calm-ish, so I would land on Runway 27, taxi to the terminal, shut down, get out, pin up the flyer, fire back up, end up taking off on Runway 9 and heading off to the next airport where I'd do the same thing. I'd just take off and land on whichever runway was closest. It went pretty fast, and I got to all those place in about two and a half hours.

I finished in time to fuel her back up, put her away (completely covered in bugs!), and head home to grab some stuff prior to going out to Glenndale for a lesson in KS. It was a really nice evening and we had a good flight. There were several folks out there working on the hangar or on some other projects or just hanging out, so I stayed about half an hour before gathering up the energy to go home. :)

I think the bugs came from Huntington's trees, but I'll tell you what, I could hardly see out of my windshield, which had been freshly washed by Levi right before I got into the plane, and the leading edges of the wings, the props, the hubs, all of it was just covered, like I'd hit a bug slaughterhouse. Doing a runway check at Glenndale didn't help. Jim K. informed me that they were planning on mowing the grass tomorrow anyway so I didn't need to help them out tonight. ;) But the plane was a mess prior to Glenndale anyway. I ended up in some interesting conversations with folks at the various airports, and several of them said they were planning on coming out, so that's great. I've got more to go tomorrow, so I'll try to get to that in the morning...

And They're Off

The Monday of the BBQ Bash week is always a "hit the ground running" day. Steve took the day off of instructing to get done as much as he could, and I stayed busy all day myself. Sending in faxes here, making phone calls there, arranging things, etc. I have more to do tonight before bed, but it should be a little more laid back (and not involve the phone at least).

Kaylee is complaining of a runny nose that won't quit, and I just hope she doesn't get sick now. Well, never, preferably.

Tonight Kaylee had cheer practice, and I had the idea to take the 90-minute window I had open to take the T-6 out to Glenndale and be able to do a few catch-up takeoffs and landings when I could hit (gently, preferably) ;) both Runways 18 and 36 thanks to calm winds. Alas, the tug was down/apart for repairs, and that's not exactly an airplane you can pull out with your bare hands, so I just patted it, locked back up and went and did other productive and much less enjoyable things instead.

Lee Bottom has a fly-in every year that's a lot like our BBQ Bash only bigger. They put out a newsletter, and as I was reading it, I knew I'd like these people. Actually, I met them at Oshkosh last year at a friend's forum, and I can tell from how they acted and write that they are "our" kind of crew. For a few examples:

"The fly-in will not be put off due to fog, winds, or scattered showers. When there is fog, it is gone by 10am, winds are something you should be trained to handle, and scattered showers are just that." (Scattered, so come in when they aren't there. In other words, be a real pilot.)

This one cracks me up simply because Steve and I have complained about it. You can't give a briefing or have an event or do a formation flight or an air show thing or anything without hearing ad nauseum "Safety is key. Our number one goal is to have a safe show/flight/event." REALLY?? No kidding. It just gets really old wasting time hearing about the obvious, and it's just red tape that you have to say because that's the politically correct party line. Most everybody there is trying to be safe, and anybody who isn't there to be safe isn't going to suddenly go "OH, okay, I guess I'll be safe after all since you said that." So, all that to say that this was their paragraph about their event's suggested operations:

"If you’re like me, you get tired of reading about safety. The other day I struggled through two such magazine articles about formation flying and professionalism in the cockpit. These were the typical “procedures saves everyone” and “a professional attitude saves everyone” pieces you’ve seen a hundred times and I sincerely thought of using them as toilet paper. The truth is, procedures can help make things safer, as can professionalism. But the people who live by these ideas also die by these ideas and they are among the small group of people who are capable of sucking the sweet out of candy, the smell out of roses, and the fun out of flying. Ultimately, true aviators have a working knowledge of these things and are able to use them to make their flying more fun and safe, not procedurally perfect and miserable.

Humans did not take to the air to be uptight “by the book” robots. Instead they went airborne to have fun. So, here’s the deal on safety at the fly-in. The following are our suggested procedures to help make things safer, but ultimately you are in charge of your own safety. Should something not work for you, get out of the system or do whatever it takes to make things safer and then get back in. Keep an overall picture in your mind of what’s going on, think of how your actions affect others, stay calm, be on the ball, and you’ll find that safety happens."

Yeah, what they said.

Back On Course

This morning by 8 I was checking weather and doing some flight planning, and by 9:20 I was out the door and on my way. The flight to Massachusetts was eerily easy. Cleveland let me fly right over the top of them, which may be a first. New York center gave me direct to my destination, which may also be a first. I only got one re-route other than the "direct to destination", and it was a simple thing that didn't even take me one degree out of my way. By now I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop and them to start harassing me and sending me all over the place, but it never happened. The fog and overcast ceilings that were at my destination when I left were gone by the time I got there, and all in all it was a quite unnaturally nice flight out east.

That reminds me. I am really grateful for the equipment available today. You don't know how many times in the "old" days we would take trips and the weather would be nothing like it was forecasted to be, taking you from a happy-go-lucky flight to a surprise approach at minimums at the end. Or how many trips you weren't sure you could (or should) take because it was below minimums when you left, was supposed to get better, but you never knew if it DID get better or not until you got there and got to see for yourself, and sometimes it was and sometimes it wasn't so much. These days I can check the weather all the way there, see the trends, watch what it's doing, and have no surprises when I get there. Nathan has better equipment in the Baron than most professional including airline pilots get on their planes. It's nice.

The trip home was more typical. They didn't like what I filed out (which was the same as what I filed in) so changed it around enough that I had to sit on the ground for a few minutes with paper maps out and figure out where all they wanted me to go. :) Cleveland wouldn't let me inside their airspace on the way home, I got a few re-routes and such, but nothing exciting. I got about an hour of IMC in, 8 hours total flight time, four each direction (for the logbook).

Steve and Kaylee had a good day today. He had one Discovery Flight, and Kaylee drove him to and from the airplane with the golf cart. She was quite careful, parked it, drove it appropriately, and did a very nice job. They also had a "car wash" back at the house, and that was her idea. They washed up the Corvette and drove it around, washed the Jeep, and Grandma & Grandpa's car too. When I pulled into the driveway, I didn't have the car shut off before she was rocketing out of the house to get a hug. :)

This is the week prior to our BBQ Bash, so things are going to get pretty crazy I'm guessing...

Change of Plans

Well, the weather in Massachusetts just wouldn't cut us a break. It would have been possible, but it wouldn't have been much fun. We would have had to stop somewhere in Ohio for fuel so we'd have enough fuel to shoot several approaches. The weather was below minimums where we wanted to go and at minimums or close to it everywhere else out there, so we'd have been likely having to find a couple of places to make attempts, along with everyone else. So we're looking at going tomorrow if it works out on his end.

Instead, we went out to Kokomo where Nathan had an orientation flight in the T-6. When I was out at the terminal building on a golf cart with the family of the gentleman on the ride, another man came up to me and asked my name. I told him, and he said "Oh, I know your husband." He asked about a particular thing, which I didn't have, and then paused and said "You know, I don't cotton to women drivers and women pilots." I just look at him. "But I hear you're different. I hear you're okay." Whew, that's a relief. ;) I'm not quite sure why people with that opinion feel the need to share it, as though they are bestowing a huge compliment, nor am I sure what they expect to hear back to that. *shrug* Well, the gentleman on the orientation flight had a great time though, and his family had fun as well. That is really always a fun thing to be able to participate in. I always enjoy those rides. :)

We all ate lunch out there, then drove out to Tipton. This week is the Tipton County Pork Festival. It sounds funny, and when Steve and I were first dating and he wanted to take me there, I thought it was a joke. But it's no joke, it's actually a very large festival for a small town. The streets are packed out, and they don't just have little rides, they have a big ole ferris wheel and several larger carnival-style rides. Concerts (some American Idol person was singing tonight) and contests and games and booths and tents and huge amounts of food, featuring excellent pork tenderloins and BBQ. But first was the parade. We walked from Nathan's house to the main street and sat and watched the parade. Something like five bands come from all over to participate, the Shriners were there, and of course horses and firetrucks and tractors and cheerleaders and mascots and candy-throwing kids and all sorts of things. It's a pretty big parade and the streets are lined for...I don't know how many blocks. A lot.

When the parade ended, we all went back to Nathan's, and the kids all hit the pool for a refreshing dip while we sat on the patio in the shade with cool beverages and watched. They were in there for a long time, maybe two hours. Once everybody got hungry we walked back downtown to the festival. We had the pork (of course!), watched "Granpa Cratchet" which is a puppet show for kids with a little humor for everyone, the kids all got their face painted, we got a funnel cake and some kettle corn, the kids all went on one ride, and played a couple of games (this was all free except the food and the ride). By the time we walked home it was good and dark and there were a lot of stars out.

We got back to Nathan's, the kids divided up the candy they'd all caught at the parade, and we made it back home around 10 p.m., all pretty tired in a good way. It wasn't the original plan for the day, but it was a nice detour and we enjoyed the day. :)

I did put a few photos from today up on Kaylee's site, the bottom half of the "September" page...

Nine Eleven

The date known by three digits, at least for this generation...

Yesterday I was driving down the road close to my house when I saw a black kitty-I of course pointed it out to Kaylee, who noticed at the same time I did that the kitty was chasing, and catching, a baby bunny. Kaylee was really unhappy with that, so I stopped the car off the side of the road and tried to chase the cat away from the baby bunny, to no avail. Kitty wasn't giving up its dinner. It picked the bunny up by the scruff of the neck, and Kaylee was outraged, so I go chasing this cat carrying a bunny up to somebody else's front porch, where it drops the bunny and hides. Bunny is too freaked out and dumb to let me help it, so it runs behind the same thing kitty is hiding behind, sees kitty, and runs close by and huddles. I can't get to either kitty or bunny, and I'm on some stranger's front porch, so I inform Kaylee that the bunny is out of the kitty's paws now and that we can go. Kaylee shoots distrusting looks at kitty over her shoulder, and says "I love cats, but that was a BABY BUNNY. I mean, COME ON!"

I spent a lot of the day returning phone calls, emails, doing some accounting, the usual lunch at the airport, and some pre-planning for a trip tomorrow out east where "direct" just won't do. Of course it has to look like rain and fog in the morning as of right now. Steve is on a flight down to Dale Hollow (TN) with a customer. He should be back shortly here if all went according to plan, but he didn't file IFR again, so I can't track him. I think he does that on purpose. ;)

After school today, I took Kaylee right to an eye doctor's appointment. She has been complaining of straining to read at school, of having trouble seeing smaller letters, but while at home reading books and stuff we've never noticed her having trouble. So today was the day to be checked out. We enjoyed the 40 minute wait to get in, just sitting in the waiting room goofing around and talking, and I ran into someone who used to fly with us that I haven't seen in about 8 years, and he was married now and has two kids, so that was pretty neat. But once we got back into The Room, it got a bit harder. For one thing, they dilated her eyes with those drops, and after the first eye got "dropped", I wasn't real sure they were going to get that second eye done. Kaylee came real close to telling the assistant to forget it, was half panicked, but she took a deep breath and handled it, and I was proud of her. But then we had to wait 30 more minutes for the eye drops to take effect, and by now we'd already been there an hour. Kaylee hadn't eaten since lunch, she was right out of school and tired and hungry and getting cranky fast. So while we were in the room, her sitting in the little blue "throne" chair, these were part of some of our conversations:

"Hey Mommy? What if the door is locked and we are trapped in here?"
We're not trapped in here.
"But if we were, what would we eat? I know, we could eat some of the extra off of your jeans."
I'd chew on your flip flop.
"Where would we go to the bathroom and what would we use for toilet paper?"
There's a sink, and a trash can, and paper towels.
"I don't want to be trapped in here!"
We aren't trapped in here.
"Okay."

silence.

"Mommy, I think the walls are closing in! They are! Look, the walls are getting closer together!"
If they were, they'd have hit me by now because I'm sitting right up against one.
"The ceiling too! The ceiling is coming down! The whole room is getting smaller!" (accompanied by lying down in a ball on the chair and hyperventilating, and repeated for five minutes over and over)
The room is not getting smaller, Kaylee.
"Okay."

silence.

"Hey Mommy. What if these machines came to life and attacked us?"
We'd have to fight back I guess.
"They're bigger than we are. And that one is sharp."
We're stronger. Besides, we'd just open the door and leave.
"What if we can't get the door open?"
(I get up and open the door) The door opens, we are not trapped, the room is not getting smaller, and the eye machines aren't going to come to life and eat us.
"Okay. But it feels like it."

These were interspersed with increasing periods of jumping, dancing, trying to touch things, and overall "I want outta here NOW" behavior while still behaving very well for a hungry, tired, sitting for almost two hours right out of school 8 year old with a vivid imagination and eyes dilated so she couldn't even see anything clearly. (Which also freaked her out, and I don't blame her!)

Bottom line? Doc Mike says her eyes are less farsighted than they were last time, that they are in the "normal" range for her age, and that if she wants to get a pair of reading glasses to take to school and wear "as needed" that's fine, but she doesn't really need anything. I think she was half looking forward to getting glasses, so we looked at frames. The "cheapy" reading glasses were $30, and the "frames to fit your face" reading glasses would have ended up about $100. I told her she'd need to wait until she was a little more blind than "normal", or see if we could find a less expensive pair at Walgreens or something. :)

Kaylee spent the evening on my cell phone. I had to make a bunch of calls too, and I ended up using our land line so she could hide in various parts of the house and talk to her friends from school. She called three of them, and they sat and chatted for at least an hour. At one point I was on my phone with Chuck for just five minutes, and in that time period I had two calls and one voicemail...all for Kaylee!! Little girl one minute, little teen the next...

Thankful Thursday

I am thankful for my slowly returning health, that nobody else in my family caught the plague, for Kaylee's peace and contentment and growth, for Steve's hard work and atttiude/perspective, and for people who stand behind/beside you when things get a little tough.

The day dawned foggy again, but by 10 it had mostly burned off, allowing a student and I to go on a cross-country flight to Warsaw and back. I found that I was okay at altitude for the most part, but the descent was a little hard on my sinuses and ears still. I picked up a quick lunch, ran three errands, and then I had to come back and take a nap. At least it's more than I could do two days ago. :)

Kaylee had gymnastics today, and there was only one other girl in her class. Last week she was the only one, and they said if there were no more kids for the next two weeks they would cancel that class. I'm not sure if one more kid is enough or not, but I guess next week we will find out. I enjoy watching Kaylee, but I do not enjoy being in there. It's a concrete room, which means sound is amplified a lot. It has little metal folding chairs set up right next to each other, fifty of them in a cinder block room smaller than my living room. So you are cheek to cheek with a whole lot of people in a loud room that smells like stale Doritos stuffed in sweaty gym socks. There are usually a few people who actually gets cell phone reception in there who will speak very loudly on the phone to hear over the din and include us all in their phone conversations. There are always people talking back and forth, who also have to do so loudly to hear each other over the din. There are always tons of little bitty kids trapped in that little room, bored and unhappy, where they can't run, play, or do much of anything, so of course there is a non-stop litany of "Johnny, don't do that. Come back here. No running. Brittany, stop that. I said no. No. No. Stop it. Don't do that. Stop touching that. Stop banging on that. Stop screaming. I SAID STOP SCREAMING!" Multiplied by a dozen families or more depending on when you're in there. It can be a headache-inducing, stress-elevating, head-banging cacophony. *sigh*

Kaylee and I sat and watched some of her videos from her website from when she was little. She looked at a couple of them and said "awww, I was cute!" At the end of one of them, I said "way to go, Kaylee! Big girl!" and she looked at me and sounded almost surprised when she said "awww, you love me." Yes, yes I do, and I told her I'm just as proud of her when she walks into a new place with her head up or does a great round-off or gets an A on her spelling test as I was when she pulled herself up on the couch for the first time or walked to me without help. Moms are just like that, but we do learn not to say "BIG girl!!" in public lest we embarrass them. :)

Some quotes that have come in lately...
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"Let your love be stronger than your hate or anger. Learn the wisdom of compromise, for it is better to bend a little than to break. Believe the best rather than the worst; people have a way of living up or down to your opinion of them. Remember that true friendship is the basis for any lasting relationship. The person you choose to marry is deserving of the courtesies and kindness you bestow on your friends."
~Jane Wells

"It is said that grace enters the soul through a wound."
~Heather McDonald

Overcoming Obstacles:

“The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value. I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.”
~Thomas Paine

“Face your deficiencies and acknowledge them; but do not let them master you. Let them teach you patience, sweetness, insight.”
~Helen Keller

“Lack of money is no obstacle. Lack of an idea is an obstacle.”
~Ken Hakuta

"Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, that lasts forever."
~Lance Armstron

09-09-09

Congratulations to Holly (Nathan's daughter) and her fiance Ryan on the birth of their daughter Leilani today!

Kaylee was excited because it was "Grandparent's Day" at school today. :) They got to bring her a hot lunch, play "bingo"-where she won a prize, eat together, she got to show them her room and desk and some of her work, and I think they all had fun. I put up pictures on her site under September.

Tonight was Kaylee's first night back to Awanas. She's in "T&T" this year, which goes from 3-5th grade. She was excited but a touch nervous about being the youngest in the new group and maybe not knowing anyone. But as soon as we walked in, she was hugged and squeezed by her former "Sparks" teachers, and as soon as she found her friend Riley, she was jump-up-and-down excited. She started off wanting to hold my hand and ended up barely saying goodbye when I went to leave, confidence back and intact; life as it should be. :)

Kaylee and I had been talking about the armor of God, and today in my email of "daily promises" was an email about the belt of truth in the armor of God. I read it to Kaylee who was a little amazed to read about that after we'd just been talking about it.

I was busy enough today running around and now can't hardly stay awake at 10 p.m. here. There was too much fog to fly this morning, and tomorrow doesn't look any better.

"Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in."
~Leonardo Da Vinci

I can attest to the veracity of that quote, sadly. You can't make yourself be interested in something, either. *sigh*

Briefly

My dad ended up on tv coverage of a gay protest outside of a Wal-Mart. No, he wasn't participating, just exiting the area, but it's still funny.

Today I turned a corner and am finally really on the mend--weak, but on the mend. Kaylee had dance, Steve is working on the BBQ Bash among other things, and I'll probably take my first instructing flight in over a week tomorrow if I wake up feeling all right.

And life goes on...

Up Up and Away

I emerged from my cocoon today, around noon. That seems to be the time I recover from the morning "let's get all the crud moving around your lungs and sinuses again" phase. I ran into Richard & Ann, who let me know that if they hadn't seen me by today they might think of coming in after me. :) It's good to have people waiting to make sure you're still alive. :)

Today was a fly-in at Indian Hills. It's a yearly event, and one that Kaylee always really enjoys going to. Chuck is gone, as are Steve and Kaylee, so I just went out on my own to sit in the sun and relax a little bit and see how it went. I got to eat a nice hot-off-the-grill brat, kick back and chat with some people I hadn't seen in awhile, and I even got my first ride in a Luscombe. We never got above 700' above the ground, because right about there was when my head started hurting. Just a quick trip up, around, and in for a landing. It's a nice little plane, it was nice to get back up in the air even if briefly, and I look forward to getting Ty to let me play with it some when I'm feeling better. The only problem was that I KNEW I wasn't going to be flying today, so I wore a skirt. The Luscombe is higher up off the ground than you'd expect, and we had to turn the tail of the plane around so I could climb in without providing a side show to the peanut gallery.

Several people asked where Kaylee was-she almost always comes with Steve and/or me, playing with Sadie the dog (who was there) and running around usually barefoot. It was nice that she was missed. :) I was there a little over two hours when I felt my stamina draining down fast, so I decided that was a good enough excursion into life for one day, and came home...

Steve and Kaylee made it back late this afternoon. They got to go out onto the lake this morning and go swimming, and Kaylee wasn't afraid at all. She had a life vest on of course, but swam around and was bothered only by dragon flies, which she came to a peace with eventually. Last time there was a "herd" (as she put it) of dead bugs floating on the surface of the lake, and she climbed Steve like a totem pole, screaming, to try to get out of the way, almost drowning him in the process. That was a couple of years ago, and fortunately she's much better now that she's big and strong enough to pose a real problem in that scenario. She ended up sending me over 150 text messages over the 2 1/2 days there, which was highly impressive, even using lingo like "brb" and "g2g" and "tmi" and "ttyl". Steve showed her the basics of the texting thing and she found smiley faces and everything else and just took off with it. Scary, man! The good thing is that when not using the shortcuts, she is actually using very good spelling and punctuation. I'm not going to tell her that's different than the way most kids do it.

Steve said he made a rather pretty landing in the Saratoga back at home, backed up by Kaylee saying "Smooth!" right when he touched down. She's learning the fine art of landing critique early--now I just have to remember to tell her not to poke fun at other people's landings unless they are her parents' (father's) landings. ;)

The rest of the family claims to have had a fun weekend, and they sure had a better time than they'd have had sitting here watching me nap and blow my nose. I'm glad it all worked out...

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"How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives."
~ Annie Dillard

Briefly

Okay, I have had enough of the house. Realllly enough. I was still fairly miserable this morning, but the period of "feeling better" lasted longer this afternoon than previous days. Surely I can get out tomorrow, before I go stark crazy. I don't have the stamina to do much, but I'm going to have to do something, that's for sure.

Kaylee and I have been chatting by text message all day again. I had over 30 of them before lunch. Good thing we don't pay by the text! :) I've had to delete them off my phone three or four times to keep from having my memory full. I just find that funny. She tells me when she gets ice cream, she talked to me when it stormed and she was kind of afraid, she told me about fishing and when she was eating dinner, going out on the deck to relax, all sorts of things. We even prayed together by text tonight before she went in to bed. It's like she's still here. :)

Solo

You've heard it said that if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. That's why there was no post for yesterday. :) We were supposed to head out yesterday afternoon for the lake, but we waited until this morning to see if I would have a miraculous recovery. I woke up better than the day before, as in I could actually get OUT of bed, but I just didn't feel good enough to go on a trip, let alone a flight with the pressure on my sinuses. So Steve took the Saratoga and flew himself and Kaylee down to the lake and I sank back into the couch.

It was the right choice. After a leisurely morning, I slowly got ready and ventured out to drop off our airport billing in the mail and pick up some food since I had neither milk nor cokes nor much of any food at all in the house. I was halfway through the store run when I broke out into a sweat, got dizzy, and had trouble just checking myself out and getting home. (And I used a lysol wipe on the checkout kiosk buttons and cart handle I touched at the store by the way). Just being able to be out of bed for awhile is not enough of an improvement to be hauling around on a trip. To finish off this pity party, I woke up feeling like the right side of my face was packed with cement and my right eye has been all goopy all day. Yuck. Sinus infection now too? Maybe.

I got carded at the store today, buying generic brand Nyquil. Somebody had to come over and look at my ID and type in my birthday because apparently it has 10% alcohol in it and that now requires age verification. I can say that's the first time I had to show proof of age for Nyquil...

I was watching Kaylee and Steve on the computer as they flew to the lake, so I was a little surprised to get a text. It was from Kaylee, telling me they were in the airplane and she was bored. We texted back and forth several times while they were in the air, and it worked fine. I got one from her after they landed. She apparently commandeered Steve's phone, and she and I have texted back and forth almost all day. She let me know she caught and held a fish, what they had for dinner, all sorts of things. She filled up the memory on my phone with over 50 texts throughout the day, and it's been really funny chatting back and forth with her this way. I feel like I'm talking to a teenager, not an 8-year-old. Except her spelling is better than that of a teenager. ;) At one point I asked her if it was really her or if Steve was typing for her, and she said of course it was her. She even put a =roll eyes= in one message. She's a hoot! I've enjoyed talking to her this way today, even if I do need my old phone back if I'm going to be doing that much texting. This phone isn't so good for that. ;)

I swear, all that typing 'chat' on Disney Fairies has really done her well on the technology end of communication. I'll have to get her going better on typing emails out to people now. She can definitely do it now...

Dazed Day

There should be a rule about blogging while under the influence of medication. ;) The thing is, nobody wants to read about how you feel like doo-doo, except maybe your mom, but that's pretty much what is on your mind when you feel that way, and it defines your day. For example, how you know you feel like doo-doo:

*You know those scrawny people who say things like "Oops! I forgot to eat today!" and you want to glare at them because of all the things I've forgotten in life, eating isn't one of them? Well, today I looked around and it was past 3 p.m. and I had forgotten to eat. I wasn't remotely interested in food, and nothing I thought of sounded even remotely appetizing. Now they ought to bottle that up and sell it.

*I'm driving down the road because I need to get to the post office drop-off box, and the car I am following is driving 10 miles under the speed limit, keeps making every turn I do right in front of me, and forgets to turn his turn signal off every time. Normally this would be cause for gritted teeth, deep breathing exercises and reminders of why it's not important in life to get somewhere a little faster. Today I coasted along staring at the pretty blinking light for four blocks with a bemused expression on my face.

*I had to speak to someone in person who caught me in sweats and no make-up. I couldn't muster the energy to be embarrassed.

*The weather is pretty much nirvana perfect for aviation or just getting out and about in life, and I can't even work up a huge amount of outrage that I'm stuck inside where there are plenty of Kleen-x and DayQuil boxes.

Kaylee had a spelling and a math test today, and got an "A" on both. She was the only kid in her gymnastics course that started today, so she got one-on-one attention the entire time. She loved it, and the teacher was letting me know they'd let it go three weeks, and if she was still the only attendee, they'd cancel that class and she'd have to move to a different time slot. Steve had several flights today, and tonight is hosting a "Flying Squirrels" meeting (boy scout troop thing) at Glenndale, discussing takeoffs and landings. Tomorrow we are supposed to pack up and head south for the weekend, but the way I feel right now I don't see how that's going to work and I don't know that they'd want me to show up on their doorstep anyway to share the germs even if I haven't visited in like a year or more. *sigh*

My mom, who works in a health care clinic at a university and must have an immune system of stone by now, sent me the list of comparison symptoms between "cold" and "flu" and voted "flu", and the majority of flu symptoms do seem to fit me, not that it matters in the end. But does anybody else remember when if you spiked a massive fever, had a bucket by your bed in case you didn't make it to the bathroom, and drank 7-Up with a cold wash cloth on your forehead you had the flu? And if you blew your nose constantly and coughed and sneezed all over the place, but could still somewhat function, you had a cold? What IS this stuff we have these days? Now there's flu without nausea, colds with fevers, they are all just kind of merging into one nasty little bug everyone just calls "a virus". Mean little buggers...

Here comes evening and I'm fading out. So, quotes to end on:
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"When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life."
~Jean Shinoda Bolen

"A bad habit never disappears miraculously; it's an undo-it-yourself project."
~Abigail Van Buren

Doh!

Okay, fine, I'm sick. I thought maybe I was just a little worn down from a busy weekend, but no, I caught some bug. Sunday I had a nasty headache and stomachache, but fortunately had brought enough Tylenol with me that I could still do the formation flight. Monday afternoon I felt fine but was hit with a wave of exhaustion and I fell asleep on the couch at 9 p.m. or so. I woke up shivering and achy, and had a weird night's sleep freezing cold and sweating at the same time, with my skin and joints all just aching. Tuesday morning that was all gone, so I thought I'd recuperated, but after lunch my throat started hurting, and by the end of that day I could hardly swallow. I almost couldn't get a Tylenol down. Today my throat is a little better but feels swollen, I've started coughing and sneezing, my nose started running, and I have eaten a pop tart and a shake (for my throat) all day because I'm just not hungry. Dumb viruses. Well, maybe that last one isn't so bad. ;) I really don't feel as bad as it sounds, well, other than at night. For some reason when evening hits, that's when I feel the worst. Like I'm starting to feel now again, in fact.

Kaylee and Steve are fine. Steve was working at his big computer job/project until 3:30 a.m. At least that's what time he said he made it home-I wasn't awake to find out for myself. He was back up and at it and at the airport for a 9 a.m. flight--who never showed up. He's headed back out to that computer job again now, hoping it won't be another late night. Kaylee has just been studying for her spelling test, going over some more of the math problems, cleaning her room, talking on the phone to a classmate friend, and playing on the computer. You know, life for a third-grader. :) Me, I've been trying to do end of month billing and catching back up on laundry and such. I've made progress, but I think it's about time to get a cup of hot tea with honey, a book and a couch, and fade out.

One thing. I read all the categories below of what killed pilots, and this graph just makes me kind of laugh. I think you'll find if you read all of those, you could lump them into one big one: they hit the ground too hard. It's like the old joke of "what killed him? His heart stopped!" Well, 25% stalled...and hit the ground. Insufficient terrain clearance? Yes, that means they hit the ground. Lost control in bad weather? And then hit the ground. Aerobatics below a safe altitude...still hitting the ground. Failure to avoid objects? Hit object, then hit the ground. So, personally, I was thinking that not 9% as listed below, but actually 100% of pilots are killed when they..."failed to avoid collision with the ground". Whew, glad that's settled. :) (They should have worded the article accompanying the graph more along the lines of what caused pilots to get into trouble. Or maybe I'm the only one sarcastic enough to find this ironic...I'm okay with that. ;))

Tuesday

I fell asleep somewhere around 9 p.m. last night and woke up in time to go back to bed for the night. My throat hurt(s) and I am just probably recuperating from the weekend...

Today for lunch five of us piled into the Baron while two more went in an RV (airplane, not recreational vehicle) and we all flew to Greencastle. Steve was doing a flight review with a friend in an RV, and they decided to go to Greencastle, and it seemed like a good plan to meet up with them. The food there is quite good, and my leftovers will work for dinner, too. :) It was a pretty day for a flight, with hardly a cloud in the sky. A wise pilot will check for TFRs (flight restrictions) and NOTAMS (important notices about airports or runways or such) prior to a flight so they don't do something like blast through a presidential restricted area or land on a closed runway. The computer at the hangar wasn't working, so as Nathan fired up the Baron, I called Flight Service on my cellphone and asked for TFRs and NOTAMS for that route of flight. The guy paused and said "Are you IN an airplane right now?" I said yes, and he laughed and said "Well I guess I'd better hurry up then!" The last time we'd been to Greencastle was when Jim, Chuck, Nathan and myself flew down in the Mustang and the T-6 in formation. Nice...

I picked Kaylee up from school, and she had her math book with her. She has a math test tomorrow, and her teacher said she had a lot of corrections to do on her math papers and that she needed to study for the test. I asked Kaylee if she wanted to do that before or after ballet, and she shocked me by saying "before", so she could relax afterwards. I thought for sure she'd put it off, so I was glad she didn't. I was going over the math with her, the ones she'd gotten wrong, and I pointed to one and she immediately said "It's 'B'." I told her she needed to know HOW to get that answer for the test, and she said "No, this IS the test, and I remember that the answer is 'B'." Oh boy. That was ME. Memorizing the answers to do well on tests but not really studying. I made her go over them and others like them so she'd have to learn the concept not just memorize the answer, but she'd get tired and just start tossing guesses, or giving up. We ended up spending an hour on math tonight, and part of that was on counting back change from a purchase. Since I know of a LOT of teens and adults who can't figure out what someone's change should be from a purchase, and it really irritates me, I'm going to make sure Kaylee gets it figured out.

Kaylee also wore a pair of jeans today that are a little snug around the waist, and she informed me that she's fat, because everyone around her that's her age is a lot skinnier than she is and that she doesn't feel good about herself. Ugh. Fortunately, she's a dramatic kind of person who throws stuff like that out one minute and then is completely over it the next minute. I have to remember that when dealing with her, because I'm the opposite way.

A local law was passed nearby that bans anyone from standing by the side of the road with a sign to collect money. Anyone wanting to do that has to stay at least 50' away from the road. Here's why that makes me shake my head. Their reason for passing this law? To "protect" people from getting hit by cars on the road. Not to stop panhandlers, because that would be in violation of their rights. But to save them from harm. This law also affects the firefighters who go out with boots for the MDA and the teenagers who stand there with signs for car wash fundraisers for their schools and so on. So. Do we really need government to create a law telling people they can't stand within 50' of a road for their own good? Shouldn't that be a decision they get to make all by themselves? Either they're running around the fact that people have the right to stand on a public street corner with a sign by claiming it's for their safety, or it really IS for their safety and we're one step closer to being told what risks we as individuals can and cannot be allowed to take. *sigh*...