Mondays

Life in aviation-I started out with a full flying schedule from 9 a.m. through to almost 6 p.m., but with some folks rescheduling, I actually ended up only flying about 4 hours today. That's still pretty good for a Monday, and Steve is busy until pretty late tonight too. We've had a couple of weeks in a row of (hot but) perfect flying weather, which we're grateful for, and we'll take it while we can get it. I've got one guy ready to solo, one getting close to a checkride, one making good progress towards solo as well, and one with one more flight to go to be done being checked out in the high performance airplane he's going to take on a trip. All great progress.

I debated writing this one, but as far as I know, since I moved it, this blog now has few readers, all of whom I'd say know me well enough to take this in the spirit it's intended. I figure our parents might get a kick out of this anyway, and that's worth it. ;) After a flight lesson where a few things clicked with the student, we shut down the plane, and they said "YOU are GOOD. You are REALLY good. You are excellent at teaching, and I wish you could teach some of my graduate students." I was of course pleased that some lightbulbs had gone off and that lots of progress was made--but the funny part was when we came inside, and they walked in, and to the folks in the room there said "She's good--she's really good!" Of course Steve rolled his eyes and asked if I'd paid them, but it was great fun. ;) The problem is, this person has an IQ somewhere in the stratosphere, has held some very high level jobs in some pretty big industries, including the Department of Defense, and while that makes the compliment even more fun, it also means that it won't be long before this person realizes they can ask me questions they understand the answers to better than I do. ;)

We got Ty hooked on Butter Burgers today, much to his chagrin, and then I had my last flight of the day, where we went to the crosswind runway and practiced those for quite awhile. When I got back, Steve and his dad went up flying in the Saratoga, and hopefully had a nice flight!

One last thing I've debated about posting, mostly because I don't like griping, but I'll try to post the details without a bunch of commentary and see how well I do. ;) You know I've tried to get in the formation clinic training, for about two years now. There are only two NATA clinics per year, one held in Florida and one in Iowa, both of which would cost me an arm and a leg to fly to and from, let alone actually do any flying, and both at very bad times of the year for us. In the meantime, any other formation clinics going on are usually for folks who are already formation qualified just knocking the rust off and/or having some fun. I can see where those are important to have too, of course, but what it boils down to is if you don't have three other good friends with T-6s plus Lead-certified pilots hanging out with you all the time, and/or a ton of time and money to take the plane far away for one of the two clinics, it's not a simple task to get the formation card done. So there's another, a new-this-year formation clinic being held, this one is being held nearby, the first weekend of October. I email and ask for info about it, get no response, and on my third contact email I hear back that Friday will be a training day, then Saturday is open only to Quiet Birdmen, which I was told I am "unqualified" for (they don't allow women in the organization), and then Sunday is a fun flying day of contests and such. I am welcome to come Friday for the ground school, which I've been through several times now, and get some training flights in Friday and maybe Saturday after the mysterious QBs get back from their event elsewhere that day. Maybe. If they stick around and are willing to go with trainees. Of which there may not be many, they don't know. *sigh* I just want a clinic I can go to for a weekend where I'll be able to work hard all weekend long with instructors and airplanes and learn what I need to learn to be a safe, proficient formation pilot. That shouldn't be such a pain in the rear end to accomplish. It really shouldn't. Do they or do they not want to "keep these planes flying" as the tag line goes? I'm kind of tired. The thought of showing up at a good ole boy clinic, alone, where purportedly up to 100 mostly linked T-6s are coming to play around, just makes me feel...tired. Of course, after a good night's sleep that may change. ;)

Kaylee's school is going well so far. We've got a good routine going, and I'm having her bring her math work home each night so we can keep up on that better than before, and so far so good. Of course now it's time to add in Awanas, gymnastics and dance. We'll see how that works out, and if it's too much, we'll cut one of the "sports" out, but so far so good, and Kaylee is having a good time with school and everything...
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"Watch your thoughts, for they become your words. Watch your words, for they become your actions. Watch your actions, for they become your habits. Watch your habits, for they become your character. Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny."