The only thing we had going on today was a recital Kaylee had for a saxophone quartet she is in. This quartet will be performing Class 1 at ISSMA, meaning if they get a gold, they will be moving on to State. They sounded pretty good to me. :)
Sunday, January 31, 2016
Saturday, January 30, 2016
The evening
I've not been in a very good mood. I thought I had been concealing that, but apparently not. When I told Steve I was going to drive around, maybe go out to the airport, maybe pull out the T-6 if it worked, he said he was going to come with me. Brave of him, so I didn't mind. ;)
We get out to Kokomo, and we look at the T-6, and there are several things in the way including two tugs. The Corvette is sort of in the way if we want to move the one tug so that it's no longer in the way. Tug #1 won't start. I try and try and open the "cowl" and eventually it starts somewhat on accident, and I leave it running. Tug #2 won't start. Eventually we open up the cowl, I go and get a fuel can, Steve pours fuel directly into the carburetor, and it starts. It makes a TERRIBLE squealing, eating itself, metal on metal noise, but it starts. We move it out of the way. We push the Corvette out of the way. It has a flat tire so it's hard to push. I start off steering, but that's not working, so I get out, and push with Steve. We get it moved out of the way. We move a few other things. Finally we hook up the tug to the T-6 and pull it out. After getting in, strapped in, and ready to go...the T-6 won't start either. We unbuckle, climb out, I go get a screw driver and the "power pack", Steve hooks it up, and I finally get it started. I warm it up while he puts everything back together. At this point Steve is done and doesn't feel like flying, but I coerce him into it, and he climbs in the back, but forgets his headset, so there's no way to talk.
We fly for awhile, and I decide him with no headset would be a bad time to do random aerobatic maneuvers when we can't communicate, so instead I fly around, enjoy the view, fly by Indian Hills, give him the stick with the universal "You wanna fly?" stick shake, which he did, flew over our house, watched the sun go down, and then I came on in for a landing at Kokomo. The winds had calmed down some by then which was even nicer, and the sun was just going down. It was a lot of work to get to go flying for a short period of time, but it was worthwhile to me.
We get out to Kokomo, and we look at the T-6, and there are several things in the way including two tugs. The Corvette is sort of in the way if we want to move the one tug so that it's no longer in the way. Tug #1 won't start. I try and try and open the "cowl" and eventually it starts somewhat on accident, and I leave it running. Tug #2 won't start. Eventually we open up the cowl, I go and get a fuel can, Steve pours fuel directly into the carburetor, and it starts. It makes a TERRIBLE squealing, eating itself, metal on metal noise, but it starts. We move it out of the way. We push the Corvette out of the way. It has a flat tire so it's hard to push. I start off steering, but that's not working, so I get out, and push with Steve. We get it moved out of the way. We move a few other things. Finally we hook up the tug to the T-6 and pull it out. After getting in, strapped in, and ready to go...the T-6 won't start either. We unbuckle, climb out, I go get a screw driver and the "power pack", Steve hooks it up, and I finally get it started. I warm it up while he puts everything back together. At this point Steve is done and doesn't feel like flying, but I coerce him into it, and he climbs in the back, but forgets his headset, so there's no way to talk.
We fly for awhile, and I decide him with no headset would be a bad time to do random aerobatic maneuvers when we can't communicate, so instead I fly around, enjoy the view, fly by Indian Hills, give him the stick with the universal "You wanna fly?" stick shake, which he did, flew over our house, watched the sun go down, and then I came on in for a landing at Kokomo. The winds had calmed down some by then which was even nicer, and the sun was just going down. It was a lot of work to get to go flying for a short period of time, but it was worthwhile to me.
Friday, January 29, 2016
Friday
I've been back in business on walking and eating this week, and feel better after just a week. Too bad you can't get as good of results in weeks 2 and 3 as you do in week 1 of a venture. It's annoying working at something and seeing minimal results. But this week was good. :)
After a final verification and consult and whatever else you'd call it, it was confirmed today that I'll be doing the insurance checkout in the Cheyenne, probably within a few weeks here. You know, it's funny, I've been trying to find where the tire pressure is located in the POH without much success. ;) Checkouts always seem to include things like what the green arc range is for this or that, tire pressure, whatever, things that I can either look at the gauge and see for myself in person, or could look up while on the ground, or ask the mechanic to look up. Of course the important stuff is included in the checkout too, like "This system just failed in this way so what are you going to do now". I like those. That there's good stuff. I just impressed D the other day, we were talking about ice, so I mentioned the alternate air in the 340, and how it has two positions; one for regular cool alternate air, and the next is heated alternate air, like the last straw you've got, but if you pull that, you have to depressurize and open the pressurization "vents" (if you want to stay conscious). Good stuff, man. :)
We have some bacon in our fridge that needed cooked up, so tonight while Steve was on the deck, I made some "messy cheese sandwiches" (bacon, melted cheese on toast). He walked in, smelled it, and had to make some too. He gets done, and I get a text from Kaylee who was up in her room. "Are you making bacon?" "Hey, I want bacon". And here she comes trotting out of her room with her nose in the air sniffing. It took her long enough. I told her to make her own bacon, she said she didn't know how, so I walked her through making bacon in the microwave, which is not quite the same as on the stove, but it works. The only thing I didn't have her do is walk the bacon making tray over to the sink, because...it's full of burning hot grease and I can just see her dumping that on her hand, arm, feet, whatever. She's more graceful than I was at 15, but still...not THAT graceful. ;)
Bedtime. Busy day tomorrow. And warm. I had two 172 flights today, both went pretty well, if I could get the weather to cooperate long enough I have two people I could probably solo in not too long here...
Thursday, January 28, 2016
Flying By
I blink and it's almost Friday here. It's starting to feel a little bit like hamster-in-a-wheel time lately!
Kaylee had "Musical" practice from 6-8 pm tonight, and a "ton" of homework. But even she admits that compared to 7th grade (I think), this has been a piece of cake. One year, 7th I think, she had homework so bad that she'd be working on it solid from the time she got home until sometimes 11 pm or midnight. Each teacher would give hours of homework, and all together it added up to UNREAL. Since that year, nothing else has felt quite so bad. So I guess that's a bonus. Anyway, she ended the evening doing something she enjoyed, with the singing/dancing practice. While she was doing that, Steve and I met a friend out for dinner and had a couple hours to eat and relax.
Now I'm just working on trying to write a few things properly, and my brain is starting to hurt. On to tomorrow, maybe some nice weather, and maybe a few students.
Kaylee had "Musical" practice from 6-8 pm tonight, and a "ton" of homework. But even she admits that compared to 7th grade (I think), this has been a piece of cake. One year, 7th I think, she had homework so bad that she'd be working on it solid from the time she got home until sometimes 11 pm or midnight. Each teacher would give hours of homework, and all together it added up to UNREAL. Since that year, nothing else has felt quite so bad. So I guess that's a bonus. Anyway, she ended the evening doing something she enjoyed, with the singing/dancing practice. While she was doing that, Steve and I met a friend out for dinner and had a couple hours to eat and relax.
Now I'm just working on trying to write a few things properly, and my brain is starting to hurt. On to tomorrow, maybe some nice weather, and maybe a few students.
Wednesday, January 27, 2016
N. Carolina
I don't have any Kaylee stories today--I was gone and she claimed nothing very interesting happened, just school and life.
Me, I was up at 4:25 a.m. this morning, at the airport by 5:40 a.m., and on my way to North Carolina by 6. This trip had the potential to be a problem. From early afternoon on yesterday, I kept noticing the temp and dewpoint the same, with 100% humidity. As the evening progressed, the forecast changed to patchy fog after all, and there was a line of weather between here and there that included a whole patch of fog, moving towards where I was going, ceilings and visibilities well below my minimums. I just knew when I woke up I was going to have trouble. I filed an alternate for a nearby airport that had an ILS and hoped I'd have at least 200' and 1/2 mile, but most places were below that, too. The secondary alternate was pretty far away to guarantee required conditions. So the first thing I did when I woke up was look at the weather with one eye squinted...and it was okay where I was, but still questionable for when I'd get there. Except when I did get there it was all gone, and I had a perfectly nice visual approach. Turbulence that was forecast? Didn't exist. The moderate icing that was showing in a big swath along my path for a large range of altitudes? Never happened. It was a perfectly easy, good flight. I spent a fair amount of time watching, planning and prepping for various forecasted issues that never showed their heads. Of course that's better than having those things happen and you don't have any info or plan. :)
The person I flew over took the courtesy car, so I couldn't leave, ergo no actual lunch for me, but I'd prepared by bringing along a couple snacks. The only down side to snacks is that they have just as many if not more calories than a real lunch, while still leaving you hungry and dissatisfied in the end, as you mentally know you didn't actually eat anything "real". But it's better than being hungry! It was a beautiful day down there, warm, so warm that when I went for a walk, I had to pull off my sweatshirt. It was really nice. My poor system doesn't know what to do going from cold to warm to cold to warm back to cold. ;)
One thing of actual interest (to me) happened today. I had an F-16 off my right side in N. Carolina! And I wasn't in trouble! The airport I had listed as an alternate had something go wrong, and they were closed when I left. Accident maybe? Anyway, there were several F-16s holding out there, and I flew right past one. ATC called him out to me, "Twin Cessna blah blah, traffic is an F-16 right off your right wing" and I got to say "I've got the F-16 in sight" and I almost giggled. That was cool. I couldn't get a photo, but I have a nice mental image of it. Sweet.
Me, I was up at 4:25 a.m. this morning, at the airport by 5:40 a.m., and on my way to North Carolina by 6. This trip had the potential to be a problem. From early afternoon on yesterday, I kept noticing the temp and dewpoint the same, with 100% humidity. As the evening progressed, the forecast changed to patchy fog after all, and there was a line of weather between here and there that included a whole patch of fog, moving towards where I was going, ceilings and visibilities well below my minimums. I just knew when I woke up I was going to have trouble. I filed an alternate for a nearby airport that had an ILS and hoped I'd have at least 200' and 1/2 mile, but most places were below that, too. The secondary alternate was pretty far away to guarantee required conditions. So the first thing I did when I woke up was look at the weather with one eye squinted...and it was okay where I was, but still questionable for when I'd get there. Except when I did get there it was all gone, and I had a perfectly nice visual approach. Turbulence that was forecast? Didn't exist. The moderate icing that was showing in a big swath along my path for a large range of altitudes? Never happened. It was a perfectly easy, good flight. I spent a fair amount of time watching, planning and prepping for various forecasted issues that never showed their heads. Of course that's better than having those things happen and you don't have any info or plan. :)
The person I flew over took the courtesy car, so I couldn't leave, ergo no actual lunch for me, but I'd prepared by bringing along a couple snacks. The only down side to snacks is that they have just as many if not more calories than a real lunch, while still leaving you hungry and dissatisfied in the end, as you mentally know you didn't actually eat anything "real". But it's better than being hungry! It was a beautiful day down there, warm, so warm that when I went for a walk, I had to pull off my sweatshirt. It was really nice. My poor system doesn't know what to do going from cold to warm to cold to warm back to cold. ;)
One thing of actual interest (to me) happened today. I had an F-16 off my right side in N. Carolina! And I wasn't in trouble! The airport I had listed as an alternate had something go wrong, and they were closed when I left. Accident maybe? Anyway, there were several F-16s holding out there, and I flew right past one. ATC called him out to me, "Twin Cessna blah blah, traffic is an F-16 right off your right wing" and I got to say "I've got the F-16 in sight" and I almost giggled. That was cool. I couldn't get a photo, but I have a nice mental image of it. Sweet.
Bright star/planet on the right, and the faint line, the first crack of the darkness, before dawn, when sane people are still in bed. But it sure is beautiful to watch from above. Every. Time.
Duplin County, N. Carolina as seen from my little hike. ;)
Mountains
Sunshine on top of the overcast in Indiana
Tuesday, January 26, 2016
Tenderloin Tuesday
I didn't have a tenderloin, not after I stepped on the scale this morning, but it was still Tenderloin Tuesday at lunch. ;)
As I said on Facebook, I woke up this morning with a headache, and when I went into the kitchen to grab some Tylenol, it was still dark. I shook out four tablets, got ready to pop them in my mouth, and noticed that they weren't white. I looked a little closer, and sure enough, they were blue. I was about to pop four Tylenol PMs. I'd have had a really long nap and only hope I'd have woken up before my flight on Wednesday. ;)
I'll be getting up at 4:30 tomorrow morning for a trip to North Carolina. It looks like some precip and some ice down south, but as long as the ceilings and visibilities hold out, I'll be good. The temp and dew point are forecasting to be the same, with 100% humidity, so I'm a little concerned about fog, but they aren't calling for that yet, and I hope they don't. Right now every MBros flight is important. This one is for one of the other guys that I've only flown a couple of times. I'd better not wake up to fog, that's all. At least give me 300 and 3/4, because that's the minimums where I'm going. ;)
Kaylee had her choir pictures taken today. She wore the dress, makeup, etc. and they did the photos during second period. Kaylee wiped all the makeup off afterwards. I asked why, as I'm pretty sure most of the girls wore it the rest of the day, and she said "Why do I want all that stuff on my face? Besides, I can't keep it looking nice very long. I rub my eyes too much." She's 15, and an attractive young lady, and sometimes she'll even dress up nicely, and she just doesn't feel the need to wear makeup other than when on stage, so far.
I got a good hike in today finally, over an hour, was a good stress relief too. We've got some things in flux, unrest, whatever, so exercising was a better option than eating cupcakes. At least for now. ;)
Kaylee is officially getting herself up and ready without anybody even checking on her. She sets her own alarm, gets herself ready, comes in and gives me a hug goodbye, takes care of her own breakfast, and Steve takes her to the bus. Steve says it's not fair because now I'm out of an early morning job. Before I had to get up too, make sure she was up and going, I used to tuck her blanket in around her and get her breakfast, etc. Now there's no reason I have to get up early until I have to actually get up. He says it's not fair, and he's right, it's not, but I'm sure not complaining! The only thing I'm complaining about is that I woke up early this morning, my first time I could have slept in, anyway, because of the headache, and I just stayed up. And tomorrow I'll be up at 4:30 a.m. But the day after that, I'm totally sleeping in. ;)
As I said on Facebook, I woke up this morning with a headache, and when I went into the kitchen to grab some Tylenol, it was still dark. I shook out four tablets, got ready to pop them in my mouth, and noticed that they weren't white. I looked a little closer, and sure enough, they were blue. I was about to pop four Tylenol PMs. I'd have had a really long nap and only hope I'd have woken up before my flight on Wednesday. ;)
I'll be getting up at 4:30 tomorrow morning for a trip to North Carolina. It looks like some precip and some ice down south, but as long as the ceilings and visibilities hold out, I'll be good. The temp and dew point are forecasting to be the same, with 100% humidity, so I'm a little concerned about fog, but they aren't calling for that yet, and I hope they don't. Right now every MBros flight is important. This one is for one of the other guys that I've only flown a couple of times. I'd better not wake up to fog, that's all. At least give me 300 and 3/4, because that's the minimums where I'm going. ;)
Kaylee had her choir pictures taken today. She wore the dress, makeup, etc. and they did the photos during second period. Kaylee wiped all the makeup off afterwards. I asked why, as I'm pretty sure most of the girls wore it the rest of the day, and she said "Why do I want all that stuff on my face? Besides, I can't keep it looking nice very long. I rub my eyes too much." She's 15, and an attractive young lady, and sometimes she'll even dress up nicely, and she just doesn't feel the need to wear makeup other than when on stage, so far.
I got a good hike in today finally, over an hour, was a good stress relief too. We've got some things in flux, unrest, whatever, so exercising was a better option than eating cupcakes. At least for now. ;)
Kaylee is officially getting herself up and ready without anybody even checking on her. She sets her own alarm, gets herself ready, comes in and gives me a hug goodbye, takes care of her own breakfast, and Steve takes her to the bus. Steve says it's not fair because now I'm out of an early morning job. Before I had to get up too, make sure she was up and going, I used to tuck her blanket in around her and get her breakfast, etc. Now there's no reason I have to get up early until I have to actually get up. He says it's not fair, and he's right, it's not, but I'm sure not complaining! The only thing I'm complaining about is that I woke up early this morning, my first time I could have slept in, anyway, because of the headache, and I just stayed up. And tomorrow I'll be up at 4:30 a.m. But the day after that, I'm totally sleeping in. ;)
Monday, January 25, 2016
Notes
Steve kept saying that Kaylee's friends could come along any time, because they liked the same foods he did. Shrimp, crab legs, calamari, spicy gumbo, they were all over that stuff, more than Kaylee was, so Steve was pleased to have them along helping him eat things. lol They were good kids. I don't know how many people would want to have three 15 year old girls on a trip, but we did just fine. :)
I forgot about a story on the trip home. Because we had head winds and a long trip, I needed full fuel, and to use most of it except an hour reserve. To do that I needed to drain the aux tanks as low as possible. So Steve was over there napping, and the right aux tank was showing 2 gallons and the left 4, so I turned the right engine fuel pump on low, and had my hand down on the right selector, waiting for it to get close to zero, so I was ready to switch. I'm sitting there waiting, and suddenly the engine stumbles. I immediately switch it to the main tank, but the engine dies completely. Hmm. I wait for a second for it to kick back on, but it doesn't, so I look back up at the fuel flows again, and the right engine is running just fine--the left has shut down. Huh. Fine. I switch on the pump and switch the left tank to the left main, and it takes a few moments, but it fires back up and smooths out eventually and we're still on our way. For some reason it had run out of fuel before it got to "zero", which is unusual. Meanwhile Steve had woken up with the engine quitting, not knowing what was going on, and said his heart rate was up a little bit. I told him to go back to sleep but he informed me that he was all out of sleep now. ;) If you put it on paper, it sounds bad. The "critical engine" quit while we were pretty heavily loaded. But...the autopilot was on and it and the yaw damper and the auto trim connected to it handled it so well you couldn't tell by feel which engine had even quit. The plane was fine, airspeed stabilized well above where it needed to, it was just a non-event. Today I asked Kaylee if she knew what had happened, and she said "I figured you were switching tanks and the engine just stumbled, that's all." She wasn't concerned in the slightest and her friends didn't have a clue anything had even happened. The biggest casualty was Steve's seat. :D It's payback for that time he ran the Cherokee Six tank dry and left it there for awhile at night over Lake Michigan with me half dozing in the back with no headset not knowing what was going on, and that airplane only HAD one engine. So on second thought we're still not even. ;)
Kaylee was not pleased to be back at school today, but a few things did please her. She ended up with an A+ on two Biology exams, giving her A+s in four of her classes total right now. And she was given an expanded or additional role in the musical. Mrs. E picked her and another girl to add to what she is doing, and a couple of people said "Welcome to Varsity Starlets". Kaylee laughed and said there's no such thing, but like in anything, the teacher has what you'd call "go-to" people, and they jokingly call those "Varsity Starlets", and added Kaylee to the list. As a Freshman she feels pretty honored by that. :)
So, I have too many photos that I like. I took like 140, so here are about a third of them.
I forgot about a story on the trip home. Because we had head winds and a long trip, I needed full fuel, and to use most of it except an hour reserve. To do that I needed to drain the aux tanks as low as possible. So Steve was over there napping, and the right aux tank was showing 2 gallons and the left 4, so I turned the right engine fuel pump on low, and had my hand down on the right selector, waiting for it to get close to zero, so I was ready to switch. I'm sitting there waiting, and suddenly the engine stumbles. I immediately switch it to the main tank, but the engine dies completely. Hmm. I wait for a second for it to kick back on, but it doesn't, so I look back up at the fuel flows again, and the right engine is running just fine--the left has shut down. Huh. Fine. I switch on the pump and switch the left tank to the left main, and it takes a few moments, but it fires back up and smooths out eventually and we're still on our way. For some reason it had run out of fuel before it got to "zero", which is unusual. Meanwhile Steve had woken up with the engine quitting, not knowing what was going on, and said his heart rate was up a little bit. I told him to go back to sleep but he informed me that he was all out of sleep now. ;) If you put it on paper, it sounds bad. The "critical engine" quit while we were pretty heavily loaded. But...the autopilot was on and it and the yaw damper and the auto trim connected to it handled it so well you couldn't tell by feel which engine had even quit. The plane was fine, airspeed stabilized well above where it needed to, it was just a non-event. Today I asked Kaylee if she knew what had happened, and she said "I figured you were switching tanks and the engine just stumbled, that's all." She wasn't concerned in the slightest and her friends didn't have a clue anything had even happened. The biggest casualty was Steve's seat. :D It's payback for that time he ran the Cherokee Six tank dry and left it there for awhile at night over Lake Michigan with me half dozing in the back with no headset not knowing what was going on, and that airplane only HAD one engine. So on second thought we're still not even. ;)
Kaylee was not pleased to be back at school today, but a few things did please her. She ended up with an A+ on two Biology exams, giving her A+s in four of her classes total right now. And she was given an expanded or additional role in the musical. Mrs. E picked her and another girl to add to what she is doing, and a couple of people said "Welcome to Varsity Starlets". Kaylee laughed and said there's no such thing, but like in anything, the teacher has what you'd call "go-to" people, and they jokingly call those "Varsity Starlets", and added Kaylee to the list. As a Freshman she feels pretty honored by that. :)
So, I have too many photos that I like. I took like 140, so here are about a third of them.
On the way there, Kaylee's friends gave her some gifts, including this tiara. ;)
M, Kay and C on the way to Florida
Kaylee wanted me to wear the tiara for awhile, so I did. See her creepy face in the background? ;)
After we checked into the hotel, first stop was CRAB legs
All of us ordered King Crab. We needed a loan, but it was good.
Four of us girls ate on this chocolate dessert and still had enough for two more nights. Unreal.
The view from our 16th story balcony.
More view from our balcony. Love the sun on water.
The balcony from our room to the rest of the hotel had this view up the coastline.
This was the walkway to get to our room. 16 floors up, Steve hated it. ;)
The elevator had a glass back, so everybody faced the back and watched the scenery go by as you rose or descended.
This looks like snow. It's sand. Pure white sand.
The girls were freezing on this beach, with winds whipping, but they had to go play anyway.
More cold girls
I just liked how that looked. :) Kaylee and C on the beach.
Frolicking in the waves
The girls thought this looked like something out of "Hunger Games". I thought it looked creepier, and when I got a close-up of the door, I started laughing. Perfect.
Anybody who has seen the show "Walking Dead" will recognize the writing on the door.
What can I say, I am easily amused.
Lighting from different times of day.
This is a small portion of our wrap-around deck in our suite. Our personal room and lounge chair isn't shown here, and you can't see that it goes around a corner to the left and has a table, chairs, and more room. Beautiful.
Sun going down on the beach.
Friends taking photos of the sunset
I had the flash on here but it wasn't powerful enough to overcome the sun.
A little better...
Our view looking straight down from our balcony. I don't think Steve looked at this view. ;)
Sun's getting lower.
Goofy selfie stick photos
Friends.
Just watching the lights pop and the sun go down.
Night has fallen.
One seriously full moon over the water
Morning and night.
Palm trees and sunshine!
Going to the beach in front of our hotel. Warmer day, no wind, much nicer!
See the top floor? We're one below that, and the set of three windows you see on the right of the building on the second to top floor was all our suite.
Ladies on the beach one last time for the weekend.
Proof that we were there too. :D
Well, that made me laugh. "Pay Bill"
In the airplane ready to head home!
Pensacola and our hotel from the air.
Reading a book and napping on the way home...
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