Mice and Men

Nobody that was supposed to get to fly today got to fly today, and there were quite a few of them. A checkride, my aerobatics, a young lady getting ready to get started on flying, Steve's students, AE's flight, just a whole list of them. The weather was supposed to be fine, but the clouds didn't clear off until almost 5 pm. It then turned into a beautiful evening, but by then it was too late for most of us. Urgh.

Kaylee has already had quite an adventure. At 2 a.m. the mom posted a picture of a bunch of taillights. A rock slide had taken out part of a road and caused a massive traffic jam on the highway, and they were stuck in traffic. It took them 4 hours to go 12 miles. A drive that should have taken 14.5 hours took almost 24. Let me reiterate that there were 8 children and 3 adults stuck in a traffic jam for hours at 2 a.m. after 14 hours of driving. Lord have mercy. However, the pictures they took of everyone were happy, smiling, etc. Rachel (mom) posted that the kids were such good kids that she'd be willing to have taken them by herself, and that everyone was doing well. They sent this picture when they hit the Florida state line, and at 8:14 pm I got a text that they had all arrived safely, they have an ocean-front view in their rom, and the kids were all out swimming and burning off energy and having fun. They'll be down there now until Friday, and then get to drive back home. Steve and I are hoping she comes back with a heightened appreciation of aviation. ;) But in the meantime, I'm pretty sure she's having a blast. I'm so happy for her. :)

Have Mercy

And she is on her way. As I said on Facebook, Dear Lord, please be with the three adults in this van who are driving 8 children 14 hours down to Daytona Beach for a week. They do not make a strong enough Valium to get me to even consider taking on something of that scope. Fortunately there are adults who CAN do something like that, and Kaylee is in very good hands. :)

For the record, every time I look at that picture I posted yesterday of the airplane, my right foot twitches to stomp the rudder...

At lunch today somebody brought up the photo formation stuff, and I was thinking about some of those photo flights, with the "Thunder Pig", CJ-6, the (total of 5, wow!) Mustangs, a couple T-6s, and the T-28, and it's funny, I have the same reaction every time so far. I'm new to this stuff, just doing my best not to goof it up, stay as smooth as possible, be professional, predictable, clear and concise. I'm always concentrating, keeping an eye out, and then at some point when we're all up in the air and settled in, a moment comes where I'll look over my shoulder and really see the airplane(s) lined up right off me. I don't know how to really describe it, but I get this physical feeling, like a little electrical jolt in the chest, and I can feel it tingling down through my fingertips. It doesn't feel like adrenaline, at least not the adrenaline I'm used to, so I really don't know how to describe it, but it's like a lot of little bubbles, or light electricity. Too bad they can't bottle and sell it. ;) I get the same feeling when the Mustang is cranking around to come up on me, or is right off me or me off him. Watching the planes from the ground is one thing, and I enjoy that too, but being right next to them flying through the air where they rule, that's something else. Even one of the worst flights I can remember, at Oshkosh when I couldn't get fuel, missed most of the pre-briefing trying to get fuel, had radio trouble, probably pilot induced, had to do a go-around because I was too hot to land behind the Mustang safely, and pretty much just messed it up from get to go, very publicly...even that flight, after the photos were taken and we were just flying along, and we switched places so that he was flying off of me instead of me off of him, and I looked around for a second, and there we were, at Oshkosh, over the water, with the sun glowing off the polished metal, my hand on a warbird stick, a Mustang just a few feet away, and bam, there it is, and life is good. I think it feels a little like...awe. That's probably pretty close. With maybe a touch of fierce happiness. And normally I do not awe all that easily. ;) It's funny--when I'm not being my own worst enemy on a formation training scenario, getting all tense and goofing myself up--I am more relaxed and comfortable and happy/content flying along just a few feet away from another airplane than I am about anywhere else. It just feels right. It'll feel even more right when I can actually do it smoothly and consistently, if I ever get in enough practice to be able to get there. Okay, I'm done being sappy. But I'm still a girl, and I can get away with that. Occasionally. ;)

Let the weekend and Spring Break begin, ladies and gentlemen!

Wait, Wait, Go!

Well, there are worse ways to spend a day, but it was a little slow. I took off this morning bright and early to fly the 340 over to Illinois for maintenance. It was so beautiful out, I just took off VFR, turned off the radio and plugged in my iPod. The rest of the day was spent waiting to find out if I'd get to fly it home or have to be picked up. (The answer was--get picked up, after 4 pm). I drove into town to have lunch, and worked on my formation paperwork that I'd brought along. I'm not enjoying that. The 16 pages of multiple choice questions look like they were written by the same people who wrote the FAA's questions. You know, how most of the answers could be correct, but one is the MOST correct, but you don't know which one that is? It also asks me for power settings of a Yak, which I don't have any way to know. Several ask me how you would communicate something, giving 4 different ways that would all get the point across fine. I've heard all 4 used. Ugh. I wonder how all the current FAST-rated folks would fare on taking this test. Of course, I know how most current pilots would fare on taking those writtens again too. I'm not sure which of my points that makes: that a lot of people don't know as much as they should, or that the tests are dumb and not an indicator of how well you can do something. We'll go with "b" for that answer, I guess, in the spirit of this complaint. ;) On the other hand, there are several questions that have some pretty funny answer choices to them, too, so obviously the FAA didn't do them, as the FAA is trying to regulate anything with a sense of humor out of existance. ;)

So, I had to be picked up in Illinois and brought home, and Justin got that tragic duty. ;) I had left the headset for the 340 in the 340, so on the way home I just put in my iPod and went along for the ride, occasionally playing charades to converse. Not a bad way to go along for a ride of an afternoon.

When I got back, it was 7:30 or so, and I picked up Kaylee from the house and drove her right out to the mall. She had a couple things she needed for her Spring Break trip, and usually we have a hard time shopping and finding stuff. Today was completely easy. It still took two hours, but she found a new swim suit, shirt and jean shorts, all three of which are usually a lot harder to get where she likes them and they fit her and they're comfortable and she'll actually wear them. ;) One store we were in, the cashier asked me if I had any coupons, and when I said no, she found one there and scanned it in, saving us over $20! I thought that was very nice. And handy.

Once we got back home, Kaylee still had to finish her homework, and then the chore of packing began. Oh my. We did get her down to one bag, but she still has way more clothes than she needs. But hey, if it's all in one bag, then...good enough! Tomorrow we take her to school, after school we bring her bag, and away she goes, headed for Daytona Beach, where I am sure she will have a wonderful time. :)

On another, completely unrelated note, this made me laugh. I'm fairly sure I've ridden through and saved a few take offs and landings that looked like this:

Workin'

I feel a little better, having gotten some things done. I finished my recreation of airplane usage for a specific plane, since November, and got that turned in for the tax guy. I then caught my own logbook all the way current through today, and it's only 7 p.m., so I may get a few more things done yet tonight as well. I'm looking at starting in on the formation paperwork, and maybe some end of month billing that's coming up fast again. At least I've been getting something accomplished--sometimes if I'm busy during the day, by the time I come home in the evenings, I don't feel like doing anything productive. Since I DO feel like being productive, and can't think of any decent way to end this entry, I'll just go be productive. ;)

Progress

I told myself that I had to finish a tax thing for someone before I could start in on my formation written exam. It took me a couple hours tonight, but I finished up what I could do on the tax thing for now, and the rest I should be able to complete tomorrow evening after a run out to the airport. I'm not going to start in on my 16 pages of questions at 10 pm here, but hopefully by this weekend I'll get it done and sent back off to the check pilot.

I had two flights today, but one was canceled when the flaps failed. The other was a quick and dirty .7. So I spent over 4 hours out at the airport today to bill out .7 of CFI time. Whoo! ;)

As I was up flying this morning, I heard Steve on the radio flying with a fellow as well. I get a little kick out of us flying around at the same time in different airplanes, although I couldn't really say why. It just makes me smile. I also flew over the top of Kaylee's school, which also made me smile. I guess I'm easily pleased!

I heard back today on two more guys about the T6 formation clinic the end of April. One is a newbie who said he'd be here weather permitting, the other is a "Lead" who said he wants to come and will try. So that was good news.

A couple quotes for the day:

"Experience is what you think you’ve got when you’re about to get more."
"Experience enables you to recognize mistakes when you’ve made them again."
~Sammy Mason

I sort of hate that both of those are true. ;)

Kaylee is starting to get ready for Spring Break, and when she gets back, she was invited to spend a night with another friend. She's looking forward to her break. Some sun, some water, some friends. I went to Daytona Beach with friends for my Spring Break too--but I was a little older than 11. It was also the first time I ever wore a bikini, and coincidentally the worst sunburn I ever got all over in my life. I was purple, with blisters. Who thought that rubbing on Baby Oil and lying on a beach for hours was a good plan?? Good grief there's no way I'm not going to end up with little skin cancers...which reminds me. Packing Kaylee lots of sunscreen and strict orders with her chaperones to use it...

Shoulda Woulda Coulda

I should be finishing up a history of every flight on an airplane for a tax guy. I should be entering time sheets to keep them caught up prior to the end of the month. I should be issuing a couple of receipts from SMA Support. I should be going through my pile of mail on my desk. I should be sending thank you cards. I should be updating my logbook before it becomes another massive chore. I should be filling out my 16 pages of formation questions. I could be updating all the photos I've taken in the last month or so. I should be getting the sheets out of the dryer and making up our bed. I should be composing an email of all the avionics issues in an airplane to send off. Instead I sat here staring longingly at the couch, wanting to take a nap before my flight this afternoon over at Muncie, without the motivation to even think straight.

I didn't feel all that great, but once I did get in the plane to go over to Muncie, I decided to have fun with it. I took my iPod along since the music isn't working in the RG, and on the way over I did some...special chandelles. And stuff. The winds were down Runway 5 gusting to 20, but that's all the way at the other end of the airport, so I just took off on 14 instead. This is when it's handy to not have anyone impressionable with you so you can just...go. :) When I was coming back in, I came in on Runway 5, and was going to do a little something for the landing, probably do a tight taildragger-style power off approach, but Steve and a student were taxiing down to take off, so I just behaved and landed like a normal person.

I spent several hours this evening contacting more T-6 people and seeing if they'll come the last weekend in April and let us use each other as targets for formation, and I contacted two more lead pilots to see if they'd bring their plane, be willing to back seat or fly as needed. I wish I had another check pilot available, cause right now there's only one, and he said he'd probably be able to come Sunday, but I don't know that I'll have a four-ship Sunday, while I should have Saturday. So I'm waiting to see if he can make it Saturday too, and if not, if 3 others can stay until then. But hey, you can't control the weather, much of maintenance, illness, other people or life in general, so you make your plans, roll your dice, and deal with what you get.

Kaylee was excited today as we finalized some plans for her to be able to go to Daytona Beach over her Spring Break, staying at an ocean front hotel, at a very low cost, with a friend, well supervised. We'd just decided we couldn't take her right now, and an opportunity came up for it to happen anyway, just in time. Pretty neat, and I know she'll have a great time. :) I also just registered her for summer camp, a horse lover's option. So she'll be horseback riding every day at camp on various trails, along with some of the usual camp stuff. Let a fun summer begin to be planned for a kid heading into 6th grade next year. :O

Okay, none of us got much sleep last night for various reasons, the other two are already passed out and I should be...

Up Close

So, I flew over Canada today. I happened to look at my cell phone and it had a message that said "Welcome to Canada! Roaming data may be billed up to $2.05/MB per your plan. Turn off data or use WiFi to avoid charges." I did not know that. I promptly turned on Airplane Mode on my phone, and waved hi to Canada.

This morning I woke up bright and early in order to fly to Detroit, where I attended a formation ground school that lasted from 10 a.m. through to almost 5 p.m. This was an official ground school hosted by a check pilot for several signatories (like 'my' NATA), who sent home a 16 page test to fill out and turn back in, after which he'll send paperwork and a certificate that the ground school was officially and fully completed. After that I'd need a certain number of logged hours of formation training with a safety pilot, then a checkride which includes an oral and a flight exam. They've sort of stepped up this stuff--instead of just getting a 4-ship together and showing you won't run into anybody, it's a full fledged checkride with written, oral and flight exam along with minimum dual required. A bit of a hububub. Well, for us great unwashed nobodies, anyway. ;)

It was IFR this morning, so I shot an ILS in, parked in front of a building, walked in, and there were over a dozen folks there upstairs. It was an enjoyable time, we covered a lot of material, I met some new and nice folks, and it was a good refresher.

And hey, I got to see Canada for a few minutes, eh?! ;)

Day Off

I tried to go do aerobatics today on my day off, but Mike was busy in the afternoon and the weather in the morning wasn't very good. I could have gone tomorrow afternoon, but I'm going to be in Detroit, so I told him I'd hit him next weekend. I wish I could just take the Decathlon by myself and work on stuff after he gives me some pointers, but...I'm sure a lot of people wish the same thing, and I'm glad to have the opportunity. :) He's a good aerobatics instructor, knowlegeable on all the various forces and control inputs and reasons and theory, not just having somebody pull back on the stick until they go around...

I finished the book "Faith and Flying" today, and enjoyed it. There's a lot in there that just about any red-blooded pilot can appreciate, at least the ones who actually like to fly, not just play with computers. I did have to laugh though. This guy, a kid who never graduated from high school let alone went further, but still managed to work his way up to test pilot and fighter pilot instructor and all this stuff, he was asked to ferry a bunch of P-51s, not in the best shape, during WWII. He read the book the night before, then hopped in, and had this to say: "With the flaps fully extended I was able to hold a reasonably steep approach angle and see over the nose and well ahead of the approach. The airplane had such good control balance that it was easy to coordinate the approach, correct for wind drift and finally join rubber with asphalt with a gentle chirp. I guessed it was one of the easiest taildraggers to land that I had ever flown!" I swear I could smack these guys. ;) He learned to fly the good old-fashioned way, he had a total of four hours of dual instruction until after he was a CFI, which didn't require the rating that it does today, and he checked out in every airplane by somebody just telling him to hop in and go do it. It's harder to get away with that today in the Land of Liability. Something else he would do is go out on his own and do loops and try to skim the grass with his tires on his recovery. He'd go lower and lower and try to judge it to get as low as possible without smacking the ground. He'd also do spins all the way to the ground, kick it out and recover at the last second, and land out of it. He missed once (more than once) and managed to live through it, though he destroyed a few airplanes. There's my line. I have a family, and an entire life to live still, and while I do like to go upside down, and have fun, and probably expose myself to more risk than average, I have no desire to see if I can skim the earth on my recovery. I have too much to hang around for to do that just to see if I can. But it was a fun book to read about a pretty impressive life of both, as the title suggests, flying and faith.

We had some friends over tonight and hung out on the deck, the kids played around, I got some pizza and we just kicked back and enjoyed a few hours. Happy Saturday. :)

More Boring Airplane Stuff

Actually, I wasn't really all that bored. :)

Oh, right, that's for you, gentle reader. (Anybody remember who used to call people "gentle reader"?)

Today's trip was in doubt from the get-go, due to 70% chance of rain and storms that they were forecasting last night. So the go/no-go decision had to be made at 6:30 this morning as it was too soon to call the night before. First looking at radar this morning didn't look all that good, but it was all just rain, no storms, and there was no good reason not to go unless you just don't like to get wet. It was supposed to be 1200', maybe 800' ovcst in Waukegan, 2 miles and light rain, no biggie.

As I'm writing this, it's 100' vertical visibility, 1/4 mile, fog and rain here at Waukegan. No, of course it wasn't like that when I landed--I'm brave, not stupid. ;) But it was an approach to true minimums, that's for sure. I had lights at 200', didn't have the runway until 100'. Since the weather was supposed to be decent, and D had been doing such a good job flying from the right seat, I moved him over to the left seat today for the first time. While we were still out over Lake Michigan, weather there was reporting high ceilings, like 7000 scattered, with 2 miles and light rain. No sweat! Next report was "few at 200'". No sweat. Then as we were being vectored for the GPS approach in, ATC called up a Citation in front of us and said "Wx reporting now 200 ovcst and 1 1/4 miles. You want the ILS?" He said yes. They started him on the ILS, asked us what we wanted, we chose the ILS as the GPS approach wouldn't get us low enough, and that meant a tailwind approach, just about 10 knots. D as a new instrument pilot who had never flown an approach in anything faster than a C-172RG was kept hopping talking to Chicago approach in their busy Class B airspace and the tower, and trying to nail this approach which was now certainly the real deal. Tower came on and told us that the Citation was reporting 200' and a mile when he broke out. I had to help a couple of crucial times, but D did really well for being thrown into the pot like that. If you think it's tricky shooting an approach to minimums, or if you don't think so, try sitting there talking someone else who is slightly shaky on it through it... The last ten seconds went like "IgotLights, getovertotheright, eeeasy, notthatsteep, nose down, Runway, power out, FLARE!" ;)

Within 10 minutes of us landing I called up their weather and it said 1/4 mile, fog, and 100' vertical visibility, where it has stayed ever since. Another few minutes on that approach and we'd have had to go missed and go home. Which, of course, I had plenty of gas to do. We were the last plane to get in before the field was closed for arrivals for the next three hours. Some folks say they'd rather be lucky than good, and I always say I'd rather be both, but today's meeting would not have happened had we 1) left at 9 a.m. like originally planned (we left at 8:30), and 2) not gotten lucky on headwinds, on routing, on weather cells to not have to deviate around, on traffic and on timing. It's good to be lucky. :) (Although, since it wasn't supposed to be anywhere close to that low in the first place, perhaps there was a little unlucky in there to balance it out?)

On an ironic note, as I was waiting on D to arrive this morning, I pulled out an old Bonanza magazine and opened it to a random page, and it was talking about how in that author's opinion, pilots shouldn't fly single pilot IFR in a single and especially not in a twin, because of how much there is to keep up with. He guesses that we may have rules some day limiting people's right to fly single pilot IFR. He's right--there's a lot to keep up with, particularly if something goes wrong. I can see where the day will come that I wouldn't feel like I could safely keep up with it all. That day isn't today, but when it comes, I'll take care of it. Just as you, Mr. Bonanza author, chose your own comfort level; so you can worry about you, and I'll worry about me, capice? ;)

When it came time to leave, it was raining pretty hard there, there was rain all along the route of flight, lots of little cells of some heavier stuff, and we were departing at the same time as a bunch of O'Hare traffic. It was turbulent, and D kept saying "Brown is down, brown is down" as he wrestled with it. We got tossed around, kept low forever, routed the usual dumb changes for traffic and airspace, hit an updraft that shot us up over our altitude, we even picked up a little ice at one point, and I was constantly going back and forth from the NEXRAD to the onboard radar to keep us out of what we didn't need to be in. Our approach back into Kokomo, they cut us in fairly tight on it to keep us out of a heavy cell near the airport. By the time we landed, we both felt beat up by the whole day. I guess flights like today are payback for the nice relaxing ones...you know, so you appreciate the easy ones more, or to keep you on your toes, or to make you earn your paycheck, or something. I don't know about D, but I feel that pilots are vastly under-paid some days. ;)

I got the plane fueled up and put away just in time to go pick up Kaylee at the bus stop. She got in the car, looked at me and said "Mommy, nice hair. You're all straggly." I'd been rained on, three times actually, tossed around an airplane for a couple hours, and my day started at 6 a.m. So yeah, this is what that looks like--isn't it attractive? ;) In the meantime, it's Friday, and I'm home now and relaxing and nothing on the agenda for tomorrow, so it's time to kick back!

Boring Airplane Stuff

I'm starting this in a nice FBO in Wise, Virginia. The name of the airport is "Lonesome Pine". It's a neat airport, kind of up on a flat bit of almost-mountain. The field elevation here is 2700', and right off the end of the runway, the ground drops off into a large, well, hole. The guy said they get some pretty strange winds out there, which I was expecting just by looking at the terrain, so I did the landing myself instead of passing it off to the fellow learning. But it ended up being a non-event, a nice, smooth approach, albeit with an interesting view. Wouldn't want to miss, I'll tell you that. :) There are a couple of pretty decent sized mountains close to the pattern (the other side from this photo, can't see them here). I'm going to see if I can get any pictures when I leave, but don't worry, if I need to be concentrating on flying, I will. ;)

Wise, Virginia is very conservative. There is a "Jesus Saves" note on the fuel board, tracts on the pilot's table, two Bibles sitting out in the main lounge area, and cards advertising the local First Church of God too. They also have a bunch of photos, posters and models of warbirds, the Aeroshell Team, and Bob Hoover. This place has pretty good taste as far as I'm concerned. ;)

As we were walking in, there was a trailer over there with a powered parachute sign on it. D looked at me and said "If I come back here this afternoon and you're up buzzing around in one of those, I'm going to be jealous." What an excellent idea--a powered parachute in the (little) mountains. Er, maybe not. Did I mention there's a big drop off, lots of trees and rocks around there? I didn't even feel overly secure in one of those over the flat farm grounds of Kansas. It would be really beautiful, and I'd think about it, but they aren't here today anyway. I'm probably happier to stick with my 335 hp engines anyway--both of them.

I am getting a credit card through the company I fly for, in order to be able to take care of ramp fees and refueling up while they are off doing their thing, etc. Well, my card came in yesterday, and it came in with the name printed as "Nancy Stants". Calling me a nancy seems like fighting words...

When it was time to go eat lunch, the gent behind the desk gave me the usual small-town courtesy car instructions. Oh, the exact scenario may vary, but the theme is the same. This one was "You have to git in on the passenger side for some reason, and it knocks a little, so go easy on the throttle, but she'll git you there." I love small town airports.

The next leg of our trip took us to...where am I? (Quick look) Fairmont, West Virginia. Density altitude where we took off in Wise, VA was up to 4200', but we had a 5200' long runway and it wasn't an issue. The view was nice on takeoff, but I didn't have time to get any pictures. Oh well, you'll just have to take my word for it. ;) It was 82 degrees F on the ground, which is what bumped the density altitude up, but as we came up through a cloud layer at 15,000', we then picked up a little ice on the wings. One season to the next in 10 minutes flat. :)

The runway here in Fairmont is 2880' with the displaced threshold, which of course I ignored, so I have 3194'. I laughed as we came up on it, because there is a 100' drop off with a river in it right off the end of this runway too, it's the end showing in this photo, though you can't tell, and there's a 40' hill right off the other end (with a highway on it), and it's sitting on a plateau down amongst some little hills. It's cute-it has character. The 'short' field landing was easy enough, but I was doing some planning for the departure--I was taking into consideration the shorter field here, with the higher density altitude, I made sure I filled up over at the other place so I'd burn off an hour on the way here and still have enough to get home with reserve so I didn't have to take off out of here full of fuel, I had no head wind helping out, so I picked the runway with the slight downslope and the hole at the end, not the hill, to use for takeoff, and so forth. (And deciding that this would not be the time for an engine failure right on takeoff). Today was the first time I actually had to pull out performance charts and figure out density altitude and hold the brakes with 38" of mp and 2700 rpm and etc in that plane. She's not the best short field take off airplane I've ever seen, but my wheels were off the ground before I got to the numbers at the other end of the runway, and interestingly, I ended up using almost exactly what I thought I was going to. Good to know...

As D took the courtesy car to go do his thing, the guy behind the desk said, can you guess? "You aren't going to be going far, are you? I mean, we don't mind, but this here car ain't in the greatest shape and I don't know how reliable it would be to go real far. It's old, and it sounds funny, but it's still running for now." Heh. Love 'em.

The President was in Ohio today, as there were several very large TFRs right along our route of flight. Our flight path took us directly through the TFRs, right over the center of all of them, but the TFRs expired at 6:15, right about when I'd be getting there. So I called up and asked if we needed to deviate or if we were okay, and they said it was fine, the TFR was over. My phone clock said 6:15 pm right as I got to the edge of it. Kind of interesting timing.

We had some thunderstorms popping up, little cells to move around, and they made for great training and pretty scenery, too. Twas a kind of long day, but I had some nice views, and it was a productive one where at least my end of things went well. That's always a bonus. ;)

Random

I got new shoes today, because the last pair of shoes I got were too big at the toe, and Steve kept telling me they looked a little clowny. I didn't care too much, but after he said that I couldn't stop seeing it every time I wore them, and I tried to keep not caring so as to not waste my money, but unfortunately the damage was done and I now felt like Bozo-ette walking around in them. So today I picked up another pair that did fit better. I put one on and showed it to Steve, who said "Hey, go put on the other shoe on your other foot and let's call Kaylee in here". So Kaylee gets in there, and Steve said "Which shoe looks better?" Kaylee points to my new shoe and says "That one, definitely. It looks more feminine. The other one looks all manly. And big." And Steve tosses in "And clowny." After they spend a few minutes making fun of my footwear, we move on, with me properly chastised for my previous poor taste. Of course I'm not helping myself because I also got a pair of canvas shoes like the ones I used to have that are black and white. Not that I cared, but they were early in style when I first got them, and now they are "old" style, and I still got them anyway because they were comfortable. Folks will just have to deal with it. ;)

I was driving out to the airport today, not to fly on this beautiful day, alas, but to accomplish some errands out there for Steve, and make sure the 340 was fueled up for my trips tomorrow. As I was driving out, I started going over some of the formation stuff in my head. I went through a little briefing, run up, got lined up on the runway, doing an element take off, and gave a big ole nod, was up flying around, picturing hand signals and such...and didn't realize I was actually doing it, and talking, lips moving, pumping my arm and doing other various ridiculous looking hand signals until I happened to glance into the car driving in the lane right next to me and saw three people staring at me like I was a nut-job. I froze for a second with my hand up and my mouth open, then gave them a great big joker grin and sped up past them. Might as well finish the job and remove any remaining doubt as to my sanity. ;) What would have been REALLY funny is if I'd somehow been driving by someone that knew that stuff and they had gone ahead and say switched sides when I gave the cross-under signal.

So, tomorrow is Virginia in the morning, then West Virginia in the afternoon. Friday is Wisconsin, weather permitting, and Sunday is Detroit. We'll see if the weather holds out for us...Friday's looking pretty iffy...

Spring

One more time--today's the first official day of Spring, and we had a high of 85 degrees in mid-March! Unreal. Man I hope this isn't a foreshadowing of a seriously hot summer, though. Spring is great, but 85 is about as hot as is comfortable flying around in enclosed little airplanes. But for today, I'm still diggin' it. ;)

I was supposed to have two flights in the 172, but on the first flight of the day, the flaps failed to come back up, and my next flight was canceled for maintenance. Steve went out east w/Nathan, and it was a good day to go somewhere...

I took Kaylee to the dentist after school, and she got a good report. All her baby teeth are out now, no cavities, and when the topic of braces came up, the dentist said that really her teeth are already pretty straight, a little crowded on the bottom, but that's it. We can get a free consultation with the orthodontist some time and see, but her teeth are strong, healthy and straight. So she got my strong and healthy, as I've almost never had cavities, and Steve's straight, as he never had braces. I'm so glad she didn't get my snaggle teeth, snarly mouth, had to have a bunch of teeth pulled stuff. :) Kaylee hates the fluoride, and can't wait until she never has to do that again. She also doesn't like the suction machine, but she does the whole thing a lot better than a lot of kids, and better than her mother, too. ;) She claims to want braces. I think she'll want them all the way up to when they tighten those wires up for the first time and she's eating jello for the 3rd day in a row with an aching jaw. Yeouch.

Happy Tuesday, and Happy Spring!

Sprung

I tried not to laugh, but I can't help it. That's just funny, there.

I really need to catch up my logbook again. *sigh* Today was a 1.1 flight in the 172 doing checkride prep, tols. Then another flight for an hour in a Cherokee 235, airplane checkout. Nice handling airplane...it's a 180 on steroids or a baby Cherokee Six, whichever you prefer, but it's a good airplane. :) It was again a beautiful day to fly, although bumpy and gusty a little. I'll still take the sun, thank you.

Yesterday I finished up a Stephen King book that had to do with alternate realities, harmonies in those alternate realities, etc. It was pretty interesting and even a little thought provoking, as Stephen King often is, which is something most people wouldn't associate with a "horror" author. This one wasn't scary or horror in the least, but about a guy who found a bubble in time through which he could change past events...or so he thought. But the past didn't want to be changed, the realities didn't want to be moved, and things would happen in one timeline that had happened in the other. He called them harmonies. The same car, the same guy, different names but similar personalities, etc. He also found that even when he did something good, managed to stop bad things from happening to good people, stopped bad people before they could harm good people, etc., the ripple effect, the butterfly effect on the world was never good, and in the end, the way things were, even though bad for some individuals, was still the best outcome, the way it needed to be. For example, he stopped the Kennedy assassination, to stop Vietnam, etc., and the consequences were widespread and devastating in another way. The storyline made me think of how we can't see the whole picture like God can, how we can't see why it's okay to let good people be put in harm's way, can't see the alternatives or all the "strings" or outcomes or whys, but that doesn't mean that there might not be an order to the seeming chaos...

Speaking of harmonies, I have another book to read called "Faith and Flying", written by a highly accomplished test pilot for Skunkworks, who didn't even graduate from high school, was a well-respected Christian and a heck of a pilot. I'm only a few chapters in, but I already had to nod and relate to a couple of his stories, and ironically enough, here is a paragraph he had to say about faith and God's hand in his affairs.

"I wondered about my good luck at being at the exact right altitude and distance to glide back safely to the airport (after engine quit at night). I also wondered about lightning appearing at the right time to guide me through the mountain pass. Luck favored me in the moments of need, and with fantastic accuracy. But if luck is strictly by chance, without timing or purpose, it is powerless to affect conditions for good or bad. It seems more reasonable to me that an omnipresent, helpful and caring hand prevails in the careless affairs of men. God may choose to untangle the errors we make, perhaps within a second of time, and change that which is termed bad into something good. Also, who is to say that even occasions of death are not carefully and mercifully permitted at the exact moment most beneficial for all concerned?"

He had a comment about panic that I liked:

"Panic disables the body and mind during times when they are needed most. It is totally void of optimism and will turn otherwise controllable situations into disasters. However, panic can be suppressed by the will. No matter how impossible a situation may appear, panic can be replaced with faith, optimism, and a refusal to accept the prevailing discouraging circumstances as final."

Last but not least, I had to laugh because when he was a kid, he kept goofing up at the airport, breaking things, falling over things, busting up airplanes he was just trying to fuel up, etc., and finally his boss told him "I know you want to become an aviator, but you're just not cut out for it! You're rattle-brained! You'll kill yourself in an airplane! I'm sorry, but you have to go, I can't have you around here any longer!" So the kid rides off on his bicycle, crying and crushed, and then about halfway home, he felt what he called "hot flames of purposeful anger", furious at the suggestion that he could not become a safe and competent aviator. He started over then at another airport, and like I said, became one of the premier test pilots out there, wrote the book on stall/spin aerodynamics, etc. I can relate a little to how he felt back when he was a kid, as I may have been told something similar at one time and had a similar reaction to it. That's where the similarity ends--I'll never be a famous test pilot or anything else, but I can relate to the feelings. :)

Last but not least...I'm guessing this got long enough to lose most anybody who reads this, most of whom are skimmers, which is probably for the best. ;) But there's one thing in particular that I'm really bad at. I grew up where you took care of yourself, you did what you needed to do and you didn't rely on other people to do it for you. This comes in handy in a lot of ways. Don't get me wrong-- I'm happy to help other people where I can, but when it comes to me, I just prefer to rely on myself. I realize that can be dumb or a flaw at times, but I can't hardly help it after this long. :) We joke about me being a princess, about the guys pulling planes out for me and such, but I don't ask them to do that and I'd rather do it myself than ask 99% of the time. I didn't even like asking someone to start the 340 tug for me when my knuckle was all bruised up and it kept kicking back on my hand and hurting me. Back when I was learning to fly and more than a few students and instructors made it clear that I didn't "belong" there, it didn't matter, because I didn't need them. I could study on my own, pay my money like everybody else, and pass the same test as anybody else. I had one goal, and I could-and did-accomplish it just fine myself, even a rating with an instructor who was pretty...unhelpful, let's say, whose contempt of and goal to wash out students was not exactly hidden. So, relying on yourself sounds fine in theory...but you know what you positively cannot do by yourself? You can't be four airplanes all together all at once all by yourself. And that's why I like the formation clinics designed for people who don't know each other but all have the same goal, to get together and get a job done, and they do, efficiently, with no muss or fuss. No having to ask for favors, no politics, no games, no wrangling. But that simply ain't reality here, something I will finally stop fighting and complaining about, and just concede. It will likely still take some time, but favors and politics and wrangling it is. And so be it.

(That's another area I'm lucky to have Steve. He's so good at wrangling and planning and organizing.) :)

As I type this, it's officially the first day of Spring! Warm breezes, blooming trees and flowers, bright sun, record-breaking temperatures...how I love thee...

Smilin' Irish

(Even though I'm not really Irish).

It was a great Saturday. You couldn't hardly ask for nicer weather--light winds, warm sun, some puffy white clouds for a backdrop. I flew with a student once the morning fog burned off, and we had air smooth as glass to work on the pattern and take offs and landings. Steve brought me in some lunch, and the kids all played outside until about 7 pm when we left, driving bikes and golf cart and scooters and walking all over and just getting some fresh air and sunshine for the first weekend in quite awhile. After lunch I went up with Mike in the Super Decathlon; I joked that for St. Patrick's Day I thought it was appropriate to see if I could make something turn green. ;) We climbed up around 6500' above the cloud deck, and I worked on making a couple different type of rolls smoother and better. Mike did one maneuver, and when we went inverted and hit -1G, I came up out of my seat a little too much. I wasn't strapped down tightly enough. Once we got right side up, I fixed that. ;) I should have brought a hair scrunchy too. My hair went all over the place. Heh. I took a camera up with me (sealed into a pocket where it wouldn't get loose) to take an inverted photo, but I didn't end up doing it. We flew for a little over an hour, which was great, and I decided rather than start in on another maneuver, I'd digest on these first and hit some more next time. I enjoyed that, and it was productive, too. I don't need to be Bob Hoover on aerobatics, but I have certain personal...standards. Besides, it's fun and a great workout. :)

The whole airport was hopping. Our 172 didn't stop flying until late in the afternoon. The RG gave Boy Scout rides for several hours. The Decathlon was up 3 or 4 flights. Steve had a flight in a guy's new Cherokee 235. There were airplanes all over the place today. I can't believe this is mid-March. I will SO take it.

Everyone got stuff done and lots of fresh air today. Whadda nice day. :)

Friday Fun

I flew to Mexico, today, and it only took me an hour and forty minutes. Mexico, Missouri is actually a nice little airport, and they obviously got federal funds to update their FBO facilities as well, as it was nicer than anything we've got around Kokomo. :) The two guys who were with me today were two of the three guys who were stranded in Mississippi with me, and the one looked around and said "If we had to be stranded, why couldn't it have been HERE?" Truly!

Speaking of stranded in Mississippi, I noticed that there were a couple of flights I didn't really talk about. One of them I wrote out but never published, and the other, The Mississippi Debacle, I never even wrote out. I've gone back and forth on whether it's a good idea or not, then decided to figure it out later. Some day if I get bored I may sketch out the Mississippi trip for those who may be interested. It certainly has humor in it, if you're a slightly twisted kind of person. ;) The other one, I never have found any humor in it, so I don't see the point, yet. But Mississippi, that has all the earmarks of a Cluster that would be sort of funny...as long it isn't happening to YOU. ;)

This morning's flight started in the almost dark even though it was 8 a.m. Dumb Daylight Savings. The weather was fine where we were, but there was a line of storms building between us and our destination, which I picked my through (well, around) easily. A quick landing in Mexico, topping off with gas so I'd have plenty for maneuvering later, dropping off the passengers, and I took back off to go to St. Louis, where I'd be picking up a couple guys. The line of storms had really developed, and it was JUST on the other side of the St. Louis airport, mostly. I had a small cell to my left and one to my right on final approach for the runway, while the worst of it was just on the other side of the airport, where I was happy to have it stay. :) It made for an interesting visual approach, for sure.

Since I had a bit of a wait in St. Louis, I took a courtesy car and drove into town again, though this time I refrained from taking more pictures of the Arch, which looks the same as it did last time. ;) Besides, it was rainy and gray, so it didn't look that good anyway. This time I went to a little hole in the wall place that Justin suggested for desserts called "Gooey Louie"'s. You know anything with the word "gooey" in it is going to be wicked good. They bake only with all natural and homemade ingredients, and the taste proves it. I do not want to know the calorie content of this one, but it was still warm when I got it, and good enough I was scooping it out of the pan with my finger, as I was lacking a fork. ;)

While I was waiting on the ground, I learned of an SMA family whose house burned down in the night, due to someone who set a nearby shed on fire, arson, which spread to their home. Worst of all, the little boy's grandfather was getting the SMA baby out of the house, and went back in to try to save all the boy's equipment too, and was overwhelmed and died from smoke inhalation. The baby and his parents are okay, but they lost everything, including their father/father-in-law. Many prayers going to that family as they start dealing with this. Of course the SMA family is pulling together to help make sure the little boy has all the equipment he needs and the family has help with whatever can be done...

By the time we left St. Louis, the skies had really cleared off, making the flight home a lovely non-event. The guy with me had never flown in the flight levels, so I filed for 19,000' just so he could say "Flight Level 190" on the radio and reset the altimeters and such. Some of us piston pounders get a little bit of a kick out of that still. ;)

Speaking of piston pounders, a couple of Citation X pilots were in the jet center where I went today--they walked past the 340, came in, and were talking about the "little Cessna twin". One fondly, one disparagingly. They were standing 2 feet from me talking for a few minutes, about 'my' little plane, about their lousy schedule and demanding pax, dressed in their white starched shirts with bars, but they didn't know of course that I was the one that flew the 340 in there. I smiled at both of them, sitting there in my comfortable jeans, going home to my family tonight, perfectly happy, while they took the trash out of their airplane just like the rest of us taxi drivers. ;) I like my kind of flying; all of it. While I can't say for sure without doing it, I don't know that I'd like their kind of flying. And I know I hate starched shirts tucked into dress pants...

I also departed behind a giant Gulfstream jet today that I wondered about. They had white smoke pouring out of their right engine, then it turned to black smoke as they added more power. They sat on the runway for a very long time running it up pretty high while we sat at the hold short line, and finally they went for it. I was half afraid I was watching something bad going down, but they made it out of there. What do I know, maybe that's normal for Gulfstreams. Yeah, no. Or at least I hope not.

It was a good day to earn a living in aviation, plus I got to snuggle with my kiddo when I got home. Happy Friday!

Thirsty Thursday

Another gorgeous one. I won't get tired of saying that, in case you're wondering. ;) The trees and flowers are waking up, and while I still won't place bets on whether or not we're out of this winter, I will enjoy the nice weather while it's here.

I had a student right after lunch today, as I often do. But today I drank a huge amount of iced tea, and when we went up flying, it was warm, and turbulent, and windy, and we did a bunch of stalls, and after about an hour I was glad she was done, because I had three large mugs of iced tea sloshing around in there and I needed to land and hit the bathroom. Mental note to self: stick with one to two mugs of iced tea. Or a short flight. ;)

We went out to eat at Olive Garden for dinner with a friend, then had an EAA Chapter meeting out at Glenndale--the voting in of new officers and all that.

Kaylee had instrument tryouts today at school--the kids could choose three instruments to try out, they would be scored 1 to 5 on each instrument (one being worst, five being best), and then they could pick one instrument to potentially play for band starting in 6th grade. Kaylee chose all wind instruments, and she tried out the clarinet, sax and french horn. She got a 3.5 on the clarinet, a 4.5 and a 4.5 on the sax and french horn both. She ended up choosing the french horn, which bums out her dad, who was quite an accomplished sax player and even has a sax he could even teach her on. At first I thought it was just her that chose the french horn, but Steve said it sounded like they pushed her that way too. I don't know, might have to ask about that. She doesn't know how to play any of them so I'm not really sure how they scored the kids on that stuff, but hey... So anyway, she may see about joining band next year. We'll see. :)

Kaylee also got a test thing back today that says she reads at an 8.3 grade level. She's slipping--she was reading at that level last year. Pick it up, kid. ;) No, she's doing fine. Report cards should be coming out again here in the next week, and then the last quarter is on and 5th grade will be done and over with and everyone in one piece and doing fine. First year at new school: success. Whew!

I Love Spring

I just had to say that.

The high was 81 degrees today. Eighty-one. Oh yeah...

Today's job involved taking the 340 over to Muncie to have the G500 updated, which was going to take an hour and a half. Well, the only solution to that problem is to go over the lunch hour and minimize the loss of productivity. Right? Right. I rode in the back on the way over, facing backwards, with Nathan & Steve up front. It's really comfortable back there--even with three of us in the back, we had plenty of leg room and other room, the seats were comfortable, and it was just a nice ride. This is good since I mostly have non-pilots back there. :)

By the way, Muncie's restaurant has all you can eat shrimp, fried clams or chicken strips, you can mix and match, it comes with coleslaw and fries, and it's $10! I had a salad and half of a chicken salad sandwich, but the couple of clam strips I stole were really tasty. ;)

Right when we got back I had a flight in the 172, checkride prep. Unfortunately we ended up with two bad plugs and couldn't go fly--it wouldn't burn off. But Jon was still there, so he found and replaced the bad ones. While it was too late for us, at least the guy who is practicing in the morning for his checkride wouldn't find it then instead of us this afternoon...

Someone approached me today about being the CFI in a PT-26 for a small group of folks. Could be interesting, if it works out. I always like to fly something new. :)

Sunny Tuesday

It was a fly day, and a gorgeous one to boot. For the first time in ages, not only was it 70 degrees and sunny, but the winds were actually reasonable too!

This morning I was to start off someone's tailwheel endorsement, and we were going to fly the Champ. That plan was aborted when his preflight uncovered a broken wheel. After all that, I had no choice but to fly the Cub instead. Another preflight, all is well, but I can't seem to keep the Cub running. Chuck leaned in and said "You DO have the fuel on, don't you?" You know what? The Cub stays running a lot better when you turn the fuel on. Oh brother.

I did maybe find a better way to get in the front seat. Maybe. I need to try it again to see. Rather than trying to climb up in there all folded up and try to fit, instead I got one foot up there, grabbed onto the bars, swung my entire upper body out over the ground, holding myself up by my arms, and leg-lifted both feet/legs into place, then swung my upper body back in place, while my legs slid right down to the pedals. Of course, should I lose my grip on the bars while I'm swung out like that I will be planted head first upside down and backwards on the concrete. But as coordinated, graceful and ladylike as I am, that shouldn't be a problem, right? *sigh* Aw, man...

We finished exactly in time to go to lunch, after which I had a dental appointment. The restaurant ran late, so I was almost at a point where I had to decide which was worse: going home to brush my teeth and being a few minutes late for my appointment, or showing up for a dentist appointment with BBQ Chicken sandwich in my teeth. I chose to possibly run late with clean choppers, but I still made it in time. ;) I was getting two teeth fixed along with the usual cleaning, and when I told him that the one good thing about chipping my front tooth was that it made me quit biting my nails, he said "You're a nail biter??" I said yes, and that I was a former ice chewer too. He said he couldn't believe I'd made it thus far without my teeth having a problem, but that now that one chipped I'd better start being more careful with biting on crunchy/hard things. See, I've only been 40 for 3 days and already I'm supposed to start eating softer foods. Sheesh. ;)

He ground my tooth down, smoothed it out, and the one next to it. Yuck. It feels a lot better now, and looks better, and I should have done it about 6 months ago, but I don't like dentists, even dentists I like. Got that? But still no cavities, ma! :)

One anecdote the dentist told me is that he's learned over the years that people who have a serious craving to crunch ice are often found to be anemic or borderline anemic. I sort of dismissed it, because ice doesn't supply your body with any kind of increased iron levels, so what could that have to do with it? Another doctor friend, however, said that people with low iron levels often feel cold, and if they crunch on ice or other cold things, it makes their body kick up their internal heaters, and that it's possible that that's why they crave eating cold things like ice. I used to be borderline low on iron, and I used to eat every piece of ice, but not any more, and I haven't really craved ice crunching in awhile either. A crock of hooey, or an interesting little thing that may tie in? What say you?

I got out of the dentist appointment in exactly enough time to make it to my next flight, a checkride prep flight in the 172. We worked on ground reference maneuvers, VOR tracking, slips, steep turns, just going through the maneuvers for the private pilot checkride. Finished that and went up in the RG for a little while, and apparently it was a very popular time to go fly, as there were a bunch of us up. What a beautiful day to fly...

I've noticed lately on Facebook that there are a couple people in particular who, once they get on, spend the next hour or two posting nothing but angry tirades or links to political or anti-religious articles they find. I hate to block somebody I know and generally like (or am related to), but neither do I need to spend my time wading through all that. I would like to ask them why they spend so much of their time and attention on something they don't even believe in, in the case of religion, or like, in the case of politics. It's almost ridiculous, and I'm not sure what it says about someone who hates religion so much they will spend all their time finding every negative thought and bit they can about it. Fine, if you don't believe, then don't believe, and move on. Doest thou protest too much? Spend so much time putting it down because you're secretly still trying to convince yourself that it's not true? Otherwise, why so much angst over "nothing", as you're convinced? Just sayin'...

Kaylee is using up her $25 Amazon card buying some music and having fun picking out what to get. She really gets some good mileage out of her Kindle Fire. I'm glad, and it's been a good tool for entertainment and learning both.

Here's a photo from the latest issue of Warbird Digest Magazine. You can click on the photo to blow it up, where you can see that it gives a little info about the plane, along with Nathan's name as the airplane owner and my name as the pilot of the T-6, the "photo platform". That's got to be the biggest airplane I'll probably ever fly that close to. Pretty neat. :)

Mondrag

Whew, what a draggy day! I had a nice rousing round of sleeplessness last night, saw all of the hours of the clock go by. I even tried to lay back down before lunch, and still couldn't go out. So I spent most of the day feeling pretty fuzzy. Fortunately I didn't have anything important to do!

After lunch, Steve and I went out to the hangars and cleaned up after my party. I did all the dishes, emptied out the coolers, emptied the little trash, put away some drinks, took down the rest of the decorations, and hauled all our stuff out to our car, while Steve did the rest. Then while he returned phone calls and did some computer work there, I updated the OS on Nathan's iPad, updated a couple of apps like ForeFlight, then updated all the charts. You know, nothing exciting, just getting some stuff done to keep things in order.

Mom & Ernie left this morning, heading back to Missouri. I'm so glad they were able to make it up--it was a great surprise. :) Ernie also found silver rings with real birthstones in them and they got my name and birthdate engraved on one, and Kaylee's on another. No more rusted rings and discolored fingers. :) They're lovely!

Tomorrow morning I'm supposed to start someone's tailwheel training/endorsement. I'd said I wanted to fly something with a stick and a tailwheel, except the front seat of the Cub. He signed me up for the Cub and the Champ both, maybe not knowing which one to do. I can tell him which one to do. ;) Then after next week I've got a friend's daughter who wants to learn as fast and hard as she can, getting her Private in a tailwheel. AND, we're not supposed to be below 70 degrees all week. Oh yeah...

G'night

It's amazing, I hit 40 and time went by so fast I even lost an hour! I still think Daylight Savings Time is stupid, and I'm going to hate getting up back in the dark again, but that's life, isn't it. :)

It was a good birthday. Originally we were just going to go to a steak house in town, just the three of us. Then Steve said Kaylee wanted to decorate up the 340 and have us fly to Muncie for dinner instead. Since she'd wanted to do that for her birthday, I could see her wanting to do it for mine, so I agreed, thinking it was kind of funny. In the morning, Steve and Kaylee left the house to go decorate the plane and a little work for him, and they were gone until early afternoon. Kaylee played at the hangar with the other kids, etc. When they got back, Kaylee had me take her to a nail salon, where she insisted on buying for both of us to get our nails done. We were supposed to go out to the airport around 5:30, after which Steve would be done with his Discovery Flight, and we could all go eat. Steve texted me that he was running late and it would be closer to 6, but we were already done with our stuff, so I just suggested to Kaylee we go out early anyway and just wait. She very nonchalantly said "Nah, I'd rather just drive around and look at stuff for awhile than go back and sit out there and do nothing." So I stopped and got gas, drove around, killed time, got a drink, then was on my way. Kaylee says "Are we going to go the way we normally do? By the school?" Huh? I said yes, then asked why, and she said "Oh, I want to see if their billboard says when Spring Break is, so I can maybe get together with K'Mia." When I pass the school, I happen to glance in the back seat, and she's texting somebody. Hmm. Steve had told me about a party Bob was having out at OKK, that they were parked all over out there and that they were using our grill. I see the cars, Bob's hangar was all closed up but that didn't mean anything. I figured maybe because Kaylee was texting a warning that the usual crew suspects might be in our hangar, then wasn't sure about the eating thing. Steve and Kaylee had me close my eyes, and walked me into the hangar, and said when to look, and when I opened my eyes, instead of seeing a few friends, there were I think 42 people there, and a rectangle on fire that I saw was actually a cake with 40 flaming candles, and decorations hanging off of airplanes, and a banner on a table, four gas cans with bows on top as a present, and a lot of people staring at me. Including a surprise visit from my Mom & Ernie who came up from Missouri, which I did not know was happening. So Steve and Kaylee successfully surprised me, all right!

The first order of business was to blow out all those candles before they lit the rest of the cake (or hangar) on fire. Steve pulls out a fire extinguisher just in case. I hear I have Chuck and Judy to thank both for the cake and the 40 lit candles. ;) We had wonderful food; steaks that Steve T grilled up, sushi that John D brought in for me, fruit and banana pudding and veggies and bread and rice and just all sorts of good stuff. We had coolers full of beverages and another fully stocked table of beverages from Justin, and folks were well taken care of. :)

We were out at the hangar until something like 10 pm, or maybe it was 11, I don't remember. While I'm not generally a big fan of being the center of attention, I have to admit, this time, it was a fun evening, and I appreciated everyone coming out, bringing stuff, hanging out, and spending the evening with us. That makes the single biggest birthday party, and I think probably the only actual birthday party I've ever had as an adult. Seems like a good year to have had a shindig. Twas fun, and even better to have an excuse to get together and hang out and eat. :)

RLS

The last two days I tried to come up with something to write, unsuccessfully. Some of the things I feel like talking about aren't really things to post; the rest seems kind of tedious. I guess it's a symptom of Restless Laura Syndrome, something that has happened off and on since I was a little kid, so no, has nothing to do with the date. ;) And no, nothing's wrong--let's just call it a version of "Twitchy".

So, here's the tedious.

The Colts got rid of just about every player I know. When Irsay decided to "rebuild the team", he wasn't kidding. They are going to a team none of us knows or cares much about...

Flew in the 172 for an hour this afternoon with a pre-checkride student. We had winds gusting up over 20 knots, and it was a little bumpy, but it was good practice for them, and I didn't mind the Vitamin D dose. I did have an urge to fly something with a stick and a tailwheel, anything except the front seat of a Cub, but I'm out of luck on that for a little bit. :)

It's odd, I know, but I'm not really looking as forward to airshow season as I usually am. I know, right? But it's kind of been that way awhile, not just these last two restless days. I feel...I don't feel..., eh. Maybe that'll change once it gets here. I am looking forward to seeing the Doolittle Reunion gathering. Twenty five B25s, that's gonna be a sight and a sound to remember, and hopefully my little photo platform part, whatever I end up doing, will go smoothly.

On to the not-tedious! Kaylee won an Award at school today. Each month her school focuses on one part of what it takes to have good Character. For that month, each teacher nominates two kids from their class as recipients of the Good Character award. Kaylee was awarded the good character award for "Honor" today. She won a certificate, some candy, got her photo taken, and was happy to have been nominated. I think that's a neat idea by the school, to focus on the main positive character traits, cover each one thoroughly in school, then positively reinforce the kids too. Responsibility, honor, courage, etc. Pretty neat!

As I write this, it's crossed past midnight, which means it's officially my birthday. So, I looked around. You know what? It's just as I thought: 40 looks exactly like 39. ;)

Hizzoner

Two days ago I heard of a retired Navy Captain who was also a blogger. I heard of him when someone announced that the Israeli built F-21 fighter jet that he flew for a civilian job crashed on Tuesday. He was a former instructor at Top Gun and was a captain at several fighter strike squadrons, among a whole lot of other credentials. He was also an excellent writer. The day I heard that he'd passed away, I went to his blog, and I was sucked in, reading his entries for hours. He was conservative, a man of faith, a patriot to the core, honest, funny, and a poet. The day before he died, he had an incident with his jet where his drag chute didn't open upon landing. He had to execute a go-around at the last minute, drag the airplane back in real slow, and burn up his brakes to get stopped. The last two lines he ever wrote on his blog were pertaining to that incident, where he said:

"It’s funny how quickly you can go from “comfort zone” to “wrestling snakes” in this business.

But even snake wrestling beats life in the cube, for me at least. In measured doses."

He was frequently vocal about "life in the cube" aka office cubical, loved what he'd done his whole life, which was flying jets. The day after writing about his chute failure and wrestling snakes, he was on a flight; the weather went bad very quickly and he couldn't get in--he went to an alternate airport-and they socked in and he still couldn't get in. He went back to his home base for one last shot, low on fuel, worsening conditions, and all anyone knows is that his plane went down. He was considered an incredible pilot and person, leaving a wife and three children, and even the Secretary of the Navy posted a message on his blog. He left quite a legacy behind, and like I said, I've spent a fair amount of time reading and catching up, and the memories people are leaving behind of him say a lot about who he was. Funny how you can sort of come to care about and respect someone you've never even met, and even relate a lot to what they have to say and how they feel about things from flying to family to politics. So I guess this is my toast to a man I never met, Ret. USN Capt. Carroll LeFon.

Truth via Garfield

Yep, I think that about nails it! :)

Hump Day

When Kaylee went to bed last night, she requested a specific set of foods for breakfast. Because I love her and I find indulging some of her quirks to be fun, I agreed to it. See, she started the ISTEP (I almost typed that iStep like it's an Apple product or something) today, and she wanted to have her best brain function going for the testing. This is the state-wide annual progress testing stuff for those of you not in Indiana. Anyway, she wanted eggs for the protein, a whole-grain waffle for staying power, she wanted a carrot (which we did not have), and she asked for a mocha coffee drink. I said no to that, that she didn't need a massive slug of sugar and caffeine, and she said "Okay, how about just a tiny drink or two of it to wake my brain up." Okay, deal. So I got up early this morning, made her a waffle, scrambled her an egg, and gave her a little tiny cup with about two swallows of mocha coffee in it. She claims that it was perfect and helped her do really well today, and she wants me to do the same thing tomorrow. She's lucky I like her--I don't get up early to cook. ;) But it's cute, and if it will help her focus, I'm all for it. I don't know how many weeks it runs, but it's Wed-Fri this week for sure.

We were at Applebee's today for lunch, and when the Colts announcement came on, they turned off the music and turned up the televisions to listen in. Jim Irsay, I can hardly stand listening to him, and it was particularly bad today, because the man can't go three words without saying "Ummmmm". We've all had public speaking classes. You know better than that! We were all commenting and harassing him about that, so when the waitress came over to take our order, I said "Ummmmm" a couple times, once not on purpose. ;) Then Peyton Manning got on, and he was choked up, and did not say "umm" once. HE knows how to speak properly in public, at least. Well, he's gone, wants to keep playing so will end up somewhere, and wherever he goes, I hope he is able to win a Superbowl. I will cheer him on wherever he goes. He's a rare breed of athlete who is a class act, hard worker, talented, giving, a true leader AND a decent human being. You just don't see that a lot in the NFL. Or the NBA. Or anywhere else.

Kaylee recreated her flip page video that she lost last night. I sent a note to school informing them that she HAD done her homework--twice--and that the computer had frozen on it--twice--and that she hadn't had time to do it a third time, but would do it today. So, today she did it again, on our computer instead of the school one, and it saved, and published, and all was right with the world, and I got to reinforce the lesson of saving your work as you go whenever you possibly can and how yes, you still have to finish the job even if it's really irritating to have to do it over and over. Life, right? But on the not-as-good parenting side, last weekend I'd told Kaylee she could invite a friend over this weekend, forgetting that would hit on my birthday. I know this is selfish, but once I remembered, I didn't really feel like doing that. But I'd already told her I would. So, since I tell her that if she commits to something she needs to follow through, I'd decided I probably needed to suck it up. Except Steve must've talked to her first, because she started to ask and then said "maybe next weekend", and she wasn't even pouty about it. This is one reason it's good to not be a single parent--sometimes you don't have to be the bad guy. ;)

Sighs of all Size

I just saw on Facebook that Peyton Manning is out of the Colts and maybe going to another (unnamed) team.

*le sigh*

It was tougher to wake up early this morning than it was yesterday morning. I can do extra early once and be fine, but twice in a row will get me. Not that this was a hard flight day. First, it was so severe clear, with such strong winds at altitdue, that I didn't even go IFR. Took off VFR in the dark, we watched the sun rise, and we were in the air a whopping 30 minutes. The two gents with me ran to their meeting, while I got to sit in the nice restaurant at Columbus, there. If you get a chance, it's a good place to go to eat. If you're trying to impress passengers, they'll get a view of Indy as you go by there, the food is reasonably priced, there's a lot of it, it's good quality, and you're right by the ramp with lots of uncovered windows, so you get a good view of a lot of traffic. The decor is nice too. So I sat there and had a big ole homestyle breakfast for $9. They make everything from scratch, by the way, and it was tasty. ;)

While I was there, I visited with the newly hired CFI for the place...who is one of ours. :) He's doing well, and it was good to see him. Spent a little time answering emails, and then my gents were back earlier than they thought. We took off, again VFR in severe clear and high winds, and when I leveled off, we only had an 18 minute flight home. It's a five-hour round trip drive to the same place. We win. ;) I had 70 knot winds even down at 3,500' on my way up. Good grief...

Got back to Kokomo in time to go to lunch with everyone. I told Steve I needed a nap. He said "Let me get this straight. You flew 30 minutes, had a big breakfast at a nice restaurant, sat around and chatted, flew 18 minutes home, went out to lunch, and all that was so much effort that you now need a nap." Sounds bad when you put it that way. ;) But it wasn't the effort involved today, it was the not-getting-enough-sleep part of it, and at least I still brought in a paycheck out of it, right? ;)

Kaylee created a little flippage video on her school netbook for a project due tomorrow. The only problem is that the program is SO basic that it won't let you save it until you're ready to publish it, and once you publish it you can't edit it. So you can't save your work until you're done. And it's a 100 page project. You see where I'm going, right? She lost over 50 pages once...redid it with a minimum of whining, did it even better, got all 100 pages done, and her netbook locked up, dropped internet (when nothing else in the house did), hung up for over an hour, and finally lost her work again. Now she still has her math to do on that netbook, due tomorrow, it's getting late, and all that time and work she put into doing this video thing is gone. SO frustrating...

I went to the store today just in the nick of time to avoid a milk emergency, and I also got some wine. The lady at the counter asked me my birthdate, and when I said 3/10/72, she said "Oh, I have to see it, you're under 40." I said "only by 4 days--I turn 40 on Saturday." She said "Yes, but if you LOOK under 40 I have to see your ID, and you look way under 40." Well, thankyouverymuch, I like you too. ;) She was actually very sweet. An older gentleman came in, needed to replace the battery in his blood tester for diabetes. He couldn't hear well, couldn't think very fast or understand her questions, so she just took over. I'm standing there behind him holding a gallon of milk, a big thing of OJ and several other things in my hands, but she didn't rush him or get irritated--she just came out from behind the counter, took his piece of electronics, figured out what battery it needed, went into the right section of the store and got it, and then installed it into the unit for him because it was one of those tricky little round disk batteries. She was patient and cheerful and defines small store customer service. I was proud of her. :)

Well, for the record, I am not planning on watching the sun rise tomorrow. ;)

I Found My Thrill...

I'm sure the folks at "Blueberry Hill" have never heard that one before. ;)

So, as expected, the alarm went off at a time that had a "5" as the first number, which is better than "4", but still pretty early as far as I'm concerned. I pulled up the weather and forecast, and everything looked good, and as I stepped outside I saw stars. Good deal. As I got closer to the airport, I noticed my stars gone, and then it started spitting snow. By the time I got the plane out, there was a thin layer of snow on the ground and it was coming down pretty good for a little cell. Bugger. :) It didn't take very long at all and we were through it, out on top, and enjoying a sunrise, albeit from the wrong direction. It smoothed out up above and made for a very pleasant morning flight.

Today I was in St. Louis longer than normal, and I was over at the Jet Center instead of the Piston Palace, because our usual FBO is being gutted and redone/redecorated top to bottom, literally. For once, our airplane was the nicest one sitting at the jet center though, considering there weren't any jets there and the other piston arrivals were seeking refuge there too. :) Of course, the ramp fee was $40 there vs $15 at the other place, too... The jet center does have a courtesy car, unlike the piston place, so upon advice from Justin, I went into town to "The Loop" and hit up "Blueberry Hill", a restaurant that's won a lot of awards for various things, has a lot of memorabilia on the walls, etc. Good food, nice atmosphere, enjoyed the place. :)

I'd printed off directions from home, and they led me to a housing edition. Doggone Mapquest. So I pulled out my phone, turned on my hotspot, pulled out my iPad because I can see it better, looked up the restaurant, plugged the address into the google maps thing, and I was only about 2 miles away from the right spot. It was a nice drive there-fairly quiet traffic, and I walked around the stores for awhile before going in to eat. Such a beautiful, sunny day there. A little exercise, a little view, a little food, a little sun. The drive home I ended up getting stuck in a long line of traffic all stopped by a train, and I ended up a mile from the airport for about an hour. Then I got a text that my guy was headed back early and on his way to the airport, but was stuck in this terrible line of traffic. Imagine that. ;)

No snow showers on the way home, just wind. Seventy knot crosswinds up at 15,000'. Shoooo...

A fellow came out to the hangar while I was there, said he lived off the end of the runway. He said that he always knew when the "fighter" was up, even if you couldn't see it, you could hear it. Then he said that "that little trainer is fun to watch too." I pointed to the Six and said "that one?" He said yes and asked if I flew in that one, so I said yes, and he said "You scare my mom." Pause. "How do I scare your mom?" He flipped his hand around and said "You know, when you stall it out and fall over and stuff." His mom must have good eyesight, as high as I am when I "fall over" and such. Well, depending on what she means by that, I guess. Most likely Nathan's lower than I am and HE'S the one scaring the mom. Yeah. ;)

Another trip tomorrow, same departure time as this morning (aka 'dark and early'). :)

Potpourri

"God does not believe in atheists; therefore, atheists do not exist." Saw that on Facebook and it made me smile. :)

Speaking of Facebook, I have a FB pet peeve. Well, a couple of them, but most, like all the game announcements, you can hide and do something about. What I don't enjoy is when someone posts about how upset/sad/mad they are, while providing no other details. This draws people out to say "Aw, what's the matter?" to which half the time they say they don't want to say. If you're not going to discuss it publicly, then don't discuss it publicly. If you have something going on in life and you need a shoulder, then email a friend, or call, or post the details on a specific friends' list on FB, or make it public and talk about it. But status' like "My world is ending tonight" followed by silence...come on. I absolutely refuse to participate. I have never and will never type the sentence "What's wrong??" If you want to tell me, tell me; I will be happy to help if I can, or just listen if that's all I can do. If you don't want to tell me, that's fine too. But I'm not playing.

So what about my post the other night on this blog about how angry I was? I didn't post a lot of specifics there, right? I also didn't post a thing about it on Facebook, but rather here, on a blog that about 5 people know exists, most of whom I talked to about it. I also posted enough details for people to know what was so frustrating, not just "I'm Mad, The End." You'll also notice in general a lack of anything on here that I wouldn't want the world to read should they stumble across it...either that, or my life isn't interesting enough to have to worry about it. Yeah, okay, that. ;)

And speaking of life, I am looking forward to shaking it up a little. There are some things we want to do this year, even simple things, but things. It might sound funny as often as I visit other states and such, but hanging out in an FBO does not count--I want to DO something. I have a lot of things I want to do, actually. So we're coming up with some plans, most of which will probably have something else come up in the way of them, but hey, you gotta start somewhere, right? :)

Steve needed to run a couple errands today, one of them being putting gas in my Jeep so I wouldn't have to do it at 6 a.m. tomorrow on my way to the airport. He needed to put gas in anyway in order to have enough to get anywhere, but he could have taken the other car and was instead doing me a favor, which I appreciated greatly. So I went on the errand run with him, with the caveat that I wasn't putting makeup on, changing clothes, or in any way looking publicly appropriate nor getting out of the vehicle in public either. As we were driving along, he looked over at me a few times, and then said matter-of-factly "You know, you really don't even need to wear makeup." He then said something I can't remember specifically about how my skin/face looked just as nice without makeup as with it and that I shouldn't care about being in public without makeup on. I thought that was a nice compliment--and no, you cynics, he didn't need anything from me. ;) Every now and then, conversations come up with Kaylee about love. Not a lot, yet, but I'm sure it will more so as she gets older. And when she asks, I'll tell her that somebody going out of their way to make sure my car had gas so I didn't have to stop at 6 a.m. to fill it up demonstrates love a lot better to me than someone insisting on "we must do everything together", for example. (A note from my legal department: If you are reading this and you and your spouse do everything together and like it that way, that's perfect; I am happy for you and I am in no way denigrating your relationship, but rather stating what is more meaningful for me personally, which may or may not coincide with what is more meaningful for anyone else. Thank you.)

Now, I've got Japanese shrimp to fix for dinner, and I'll have to wind down and get to bed early tonight, as I'll be off the ground and headed west bright and early. Or dark and early, actually...

Gather

Tornadoes & thunderstorms last night, light blowing snow in big clumps falling from the sky today. And March comes in like a very confused lion.

A popular grass strip south of us called Lee Bottom Field was hit pretty hard by the tornadoes. Their house, hangar, and other buildings all lost the roofs, and one building with all their event stuff in it was destroyed. They are without electricity/power, phone, cell service, or working plumbing, and folks are trying to get down there and get tarps over their buildings to stop the rain from finishing off the job of destroying everything inside. Fortunately nobody was hurt, but they have a really big mess to clean up.

Tonight we joined some folks at Indian Hills and had a delicious meal. Juicy pork tenderloins smothered in a mushroom cream sauce, cheesy potatoes, homemade cherry cheesecake, fruits, veggies, cheese dip, a birthday cake for Michelle who turns 38 on Tuesday, all sorts of good stuff. John Dale did the meat, and he also brought a pan of sushi which he made himself with smoked salmon, and it was really tasty. The fellow has skills, man. Skills. Kaylee tried a bite of the sushi, after making a huge deal out of it (just to us), made faces and all this stuff--and Steve had just given her a bite of rice, basically. Normally when I get Chinese, she just wants a side of rice and eats it plain. She loves rice. Unless she thinks there's raw fish in it. ;)

Chuck and Judy are back from their cruise, and they made it out tonight too, so it was good to see them. :) Jim H has a place down in the area where the worst of the storms and tornadoes hit, but fortunately he was spared. He said it was like a disaster movie driving through there to get back up here, but that his stuff was okay, thankfully.

I ate too much tonight, a hazard of going to things like this, but it was a nice way to spend several hours on a chilly evening...

Happy Friday

Well, for some it's a happy Friday. Severe thunderstorms and tornadoes have blasted across a lot of the country today, wiping out a couple of towns in southern Indiana and causing wide spread damage in other states too. We were at the airport when what was in our area moved through, and as usual Kokomo escaped the worst of it. We just got a nice little thunderstorm that was through pretty quickly. Unfortunately the weather isn't done yet, so I bought a book to read since they can't keep the non-stop coverage off of the TV these days any more. This time I'll read instead of getting furious at having my show interrupted non-stop for non-new news. Winds are gusting up past 45 knots now. A little breezy. They said we are having twice as many tornadoes this year than is normal for this time of year. And then on Sunday we are expecting snow and 30s again. Gotta love Mother Nature....

Pulled

I wish I hadn't pulled a muscle in my lower back--and I wish Steve hadn't pulled a muscle up by his neck/shoulder, either. I'm limping, he's groaning...what are we, the Old Couple now?? ;)

I couldn't exercise today, because it hurts to walk, sit up or push up. So since I can't exercise, I might as well eat Doritos and Hershey Drops too, right?

Okay, I just heard about a Cessna 150-152 International Fly-In at Clinton, Iowa each year. An International fly-in of C-152s. I cannot finish this paragraph as to why I find that so funny without then being forced to defend myself against being called a Princess.

Kaylee and Steve were out on the deck, and I started sneezing in the house. Steve comes in laughing; Kaylee had said "Aw, how cute! It's an Ah-Weenie-Choo!" Still getting harassed about my wimpy sneezes. At least I don't rock the household or scare the pets like SOME people! ;)

Nathan sent me this, and I thought it was kind of neat. For a little pointless break in the day, give it a shot. When the guy stops running completely, place your cursor about 1/2" above his head and wait a second.

Oh goodie, it's the end of the month and I get to work on billing again. Tomorrow...this weekend. Yeah, this weekend...