Fair to Middlin'

Kaylee had a drama class last night, which she had fun with. It's a once-per-week class, to keep them involved until tryouts for the next play. They play games, all theater/drama related, teach the kids a few things, etc. She loves it, it's right up her alley, and she has a friend or two there to hang out with too.

I kind of had a feeling last night, as I mentioned in the blog, about the weather. Every TAF for a 75 mile radius said the weather was supposed to be clear. I didn't feel so sure about that, and when I woke up this morning at 5:45 or so, the first thing I did was pull over my phone and look at the weather. Three hundred overcast with a blob of rain/storms headed right for Kokomo. Groan. I knew it. I spent about 15 minutes studying radars, and decided I should be able to get out safely. It was raining pretty good when I got out to the airport, but the storms seemed to be more south of me, and it didn't look so bad at the airport--just rainy. I had a couple of other issues, but finally it was time to go. We got in the plane, taxiied all the way to Runway 5 (so I could take off towards the nearest exit of the cell, not towards the worst of the cell), called up Clearance, and...nothing. I tried Grissom's air freq next and got nothing. So I called Lockheed Martin on the phone to pick up a void clearance, because the clouds were too low to launch and pick them up in the air. Lockheed Martin had me on hold for a long time, and finally came back and said THEY couldn't reach Clearance either. Meanwhile a car with flashing lights came running up the runway towards us, which was...odd. Kokomo's AWOS wasn't coming in, the VOR was down, so I clicked on the lights, and the runway lights wouldn't come up either. Ah, gotcha, that's why I couldn't reach Clearance. Finally LM got back to me and said they were trying GUS again, they made it through, I got my void clearance, and we were on our way, about 20 minutes later than we intended. Fortunately we always build a cushion into these trips. Once we were up in the air, we broke out of the scuddy clouds, ended up on top in the sunshine, and had smooth sailing the rest of the way to St. Louis...

My right brake also quit working on me, but I'm getting pretty good at stopping and turning and such with differential power and one non-working and one half-working brake.  You just gotta be reeeeeeally slow when it's time to fully stop, or you end up all cockeyed.  I'm sure the line guy at St. Louis wondered why I was approaching him so slowly, but he'd be grateful if he knew.  Or maybe not.  Those guys out there walk right up to my nosewheel and chock it while my props are still spinning, Drives me nuts--I can't hardly look inside to shut down my avionics and airplane because I'm too busy watching him to make sure he doesn't trip and end up in my blades, or turn and walk into them.  Sounds dumb, but it happens, and I don't want it happening on me!  They need to back up and wait for me to shut down.  I said that once, to a different guy, who just laughed. Next time I go in I'm going to tell them again.  It's a jet center, maybe they're used to doing that from the front with jets, but they need to stay away from my props...

The trip home also started off IFR, so I enjoyed doing the single pilot busy airspace takeoff IMC hand flying thing to keep you honest.  Changing frequencies, altitudes, headings, and departure procedures constantly for the first few minutes.  The glass panel still makes it a little too easy, but it's good practice anyway.  When I came back into Kokomo, the AWOS was still down, but my Avidyne had the winds at 340@13 gusting to something or other.  I came in on Runway 5 anyway, because I knew I didn't have much if any brakes, so I wanted the longer runway to roll it out and get good and slow on.  I confused somebody else that was up in a 172 who didn't understand why I wasn't on Runway 32, but I wasn't going to explain myself, especially on the radio.  ;)  Jon worked on it after I landed, and I went on home.  I was really, really tired.  I'd been up too late, I'd been up WAY too early, I'd been focused and now I was tired.  I took out my contacts, put on comfy pants, laid down on the couch, and then Steve called and needed me to take his student.  I almost went out there in sweat pants.  ;)  I didn't even put my contacts back in--my eyes were too gritty--I just wore sunglasses and had my regular glasses on my neck in case I needed to read something.  The student is pre-solo, and the winds were gusting up to 30 knots or so with a 10-12 knot gust factor, which is a lot. We went around the pattern for an hour and a half, and let me tell you, that's a long time to bang out one gusty crosswind takeoff and landing after another.  We got tossed around like nobody's business.  He got to practice getting hit with a gust and blown back into the air and using power to work it back down.  I got to rescue an airplane from some fairly interesting positions.  I will say, it kept me awake, on short final anyway.  ;)

On my way home from the airport, I stopped at Soupley's to pick up dinner...I mean I stopped at Steak-n-Shake to pick up dinner...and I've been hung on the couch like a limp blanket for the last few hours, avoiding taking a late nap so that I can get to bed at a reasonable hour. 

I are tired.  G'night.