Like a Comet

So today was the first day of 5th grade. I didn't sleep well at all last night-I couldn't fall asleep, and I couldn't stay asleep either. I wasn't worried about her first day of school or anything, I just Could Not Sleep. Doggone insomnia that hits randomly now and then. *sigh* Anyway, when my alarm went off at 6:14 a.m., it didn't even matter because I was already awake. Which is nuts. I got up and went to the living room, and within four minutes Kaylee came walking in rubbing her eyes-she'd set her alarm and gotten up all on her own. She was eager to go, but said "I don't really care for getting up when it's still dark." Yeah, me neither kiddo, but I suppose we'd both better get used to it. ;) We had almost an hour to get ready. She wanted me to curl her hair with a curling iron, and then didn't like how it looked so made me flatten the front back out. She wanted to put on mascara, lip gloss and eye shadow. I said okay...to the lip gloss. She put on the new outfit she picked out yesterday, and finally we were ready to go. It took me a whole six minutes to get to her bus pickup location, so we waited there for over ten minutes, watching other kids sitting in cars and waiting. Kaylee was so excited, and had someone she already knew who was also there for her first day, and that made things a little easier too. When she drove off on the bus, I sent up a prayer that she would have a good, positive first day of school. It was her first time in a public school, her first real school bus ride, her first day of 5th grade, all new teachers, new environment, she has more than one teacher, has a locker, and doesn't know any but one kid in the whole school, didn't know where anything was, none of it. She did swimmingly. (The school mascot is a "comet" by the way.) Steve picked her up at the bus stop after school in the Corvette with the top off for her first official ride home. :) She had lots to say about her new teachers, her new school, her new buildings, all of it. And there are something like 25-28 kids (can't remember the number off-hand) of kids in her class, of which 8 are boys and the other 17-20 are girls, so she has lots of potential new friends. She's...eager. And I am happy for her. :)

After I dropped her off at school, I ran home, showered, ran out to Glenndale and flew KS with a student over to Muncie for the second day in a row (different student). This student needed her 3 solo takeoffs and landings at a tower controlled field too. The problem is, the tower field is an hour round trip flight, so to save students money I usually go over with them to practice it dual for the first time for a few "laps", then I'll have them drop me off at the FBO so they can go do their solo 3 take offs and landings. Today the airfield was deserted. We did two practice ones, the student was stumbling a little on the radio but doing okay, so I had them drop me off. Student takes off, and whomp, it's incoming traffic from everywhere. Four or more airplanes in the pattern all at once all of a sudden. Tower had my student do a 360 degree turn to the right, then another one to the left and follow a jet in (and caution wake turbulence) all on their first solo landing at a tower. I'm inside listening to this with my head in my hand. But I'll tell you what, the student killed it. In a good way. And from that first takeoff on, they took control and did great. The line guy came up to me and said "Hey, your student is doing great with all this" and the tower even got on the radio and said "NICE job KS, you're doing great". It was their first time ever talking to anyone, and they nailed it. After three full stop TOLS, they came and got me and we headed home for a total of 2.4 hours flight time. Hood work, VOR tracking and tower TOLS all in one flight. Check.

I was 20 minutes late for lunch but folks sat there and let me eat with them anyway. ;) I then ran to Sheridan to meet the next fellow, for another 2.2 flight, this time down to Terre Haute's little "Sky King" airport. They have a 3500' x 50' runway and a 1900' x 50' runway, and it's right outside the Terre Haute Class D airspace. I like it. Neat airport. Anyway, this was an IFR flight, and we got lots of stuff in. Filing, radio work, hood work, VOR tracking, they changed our airway on us and had us intercept it, approaches, we even did a little partial panel work. Good times, good times.

My brief stop at Glenndale to pick up a hood for that "IFR" flight allowed me to see a little box sitting on the counter. MY CELL PHONE! Woo hoo! My phone died, so I've been without for several days now. That was my replacement phone, and I was quite happy to see it, even if I couldn't do anything with it yet.

By the time I got everything put away and got home it was after 5 p.m., so Kaylee got to tell me all about her first day of school. I then activated my new phone and I am Back in Business. I've lost all the texts I'd saved from Kaylee and a few others that I wanted to save, but my voicemails and photos and contacts and such are all on there, so I'm not in too bad of shape for having had a phone meltdown, particularly since it was all free to replace, including shipping. All's well that ends well. :)

Richard got me a beautiful red flowering plant as a thank you for helping with his head, and Kenny got it planted today outside, and it is just sitting so prettily out there. I enjoyed seeing it when I came in tonight from work. It will bloom a couple of times, and it is in full bloom now, so I get to enjoy it several times this year. :) Tomorrow will come early again, but I think we're off to a swimming start...