Wow

This whole week has been horribly hot and muggy...welcome to Summer. Yesterday I flew the 172 out of Glenndale at 9 a.m., and as of 9 a.m. we already were sweating to death, and that's just wrong. That afternoon I did something I haven't done in a few years-I went and got an actual professional hair cut and style. Of course it only lasts as long as I'm there (the style part that is), but when she was done, I had to admit it looked nice, to me anyway. I'm not sure it looked $30 nice, which is why I usually cut my own hair, but hey, $30 over several years isn't that bad. ;)

I was supposed to take Kaylee to the fair that afternoon, and her friend Grace was going to be able to go with us so that I wouldn't have to get, um, "tired" of spinning and make her go alone or quit too. Things changed around a bit and it was going to be the two moms and two kids, and then Kaylee tells me that she doesn't want to hurt my feelings and isn't sure how to tell me this, but she'd like to just go with them. Well, alrighty then, I was a little surprised, but if that's what she wants to do, I'm okay with it. Their whole family went, and Kaylee tagged along by herself, and she had a great time, and I didn't have to get sick at the fair this year out of love for my daughter, and I guess all's well that ends well. Thanks to the A. family for adopting a third child for the evening. :)

Then came today, which started normally enough. I kicked rear end on getting things done and ready. My pile of paperwork, billing, SMA stuff, sending out work stuff, household bills and duties like catching up laundry, cleaning, I was on a serious roll. We had lunch out at the hangar, and from there I ran errands, completing the stuff I started at home. Shipping boxes, bank runs, all that stuff. I was supposed to go back to Kokomo and take a plane over to Muncie for a lesson, but as I was running my errands I noticed the sky looked particularly non-good over to the west there, so I stopped in at Glenndale to deliver a check and look at the radar. Well, that flight wasn't going to happen. While I was at Glenndale we got the news that a longtime friend and business partner, Greg Messer, had died sometime that morning, sitting at his computer. He was going to come over to the office today to return something to us...I emailed him day before yesterday and he talked to Steve last night, and this morning he was gone. He was 45 years old. It's a little surreal, and troubling, and problematic too, for multiple reasons. I still can't really believe he's gone, and he was Steve's main brain backup on a lot of things, and he'll miss him as a friend and as a muse. Greg did a lot for me with the SMA Angels and SMA Support technical end of things over the years--what I did back in my hayday, back when SMA Support was my 14-hour-every-day-fulltime-job, all that was only possible because of Greg...as were a lot of other things over the years. He was sarcastic and twisted and funny, but honest and good, and I will miss him too.

Tonight I met a friend for dinner, and have come home to work some more, as we're supposed to leave Sunday for a family reunion in Nebraska, be gone three days, be home one day and turn around and go to Oshkosh for ten days. Now...who knows. You just have to put one foot in front of the other and try to be prepared and do the best you can, but there's a Lot of work that has to get done in a Short period of time...