Crab (Cakes?)

I hate that it's already Tuesday!  Man.

Okay.  Sunday was mostly our day of rest.  Steve worked outside a lot, I don't even remember what Kaylee was doing, and I sat in my recliner and read a book and watched a Netflix series on my iPad.  That's right.  All day.  That evening I took Kaylee to her church youth group, and there were more storms out there, and a huge rainbow.  I parked in the lot so I could face the rainbow, and just sat and watched the weather until she came out and was ready to go home.  Beautiful.

In fact, that storm Sunday was another tornado, one that went through Logansport this time.  A little damage, nothing too bad, at least.

Kokomo is still very messy.  You drive around and see tarps on roofs, tree limbs down, trunks torn out of the ground, on roads that you hadn't been on yet.  On one road they are piling up huuuge piles of branches in this parking lot that's big enough I've always said I'd use it as an emergency landing spot if I needed one, and I think they are chipping them up.  The piles are stories high in multiple places.  Highland Park is messed up, and the apartments down the road.  Just going to the bank today I found new damage, more houses and trees down.  Kaylee and I drove around and looked at some of the damage today.  There are still some places closed off, roads shut down, and some places, from what I understand, might not have power yet.  That's a long time.

I was up at 4:55 a.m. Monday morning, driving out to the airport in the dark, with the moon and stars out.  Watched the sunrise from 19,000', and ended up in Baltimore, MD.  This time there was a chance it was going to be an overnight trip, so I packed a bag, too.  Having been there before, I also packed a sweatshirt and a fuzzy blanket, because they keep it arctic in there.  There was a TV commercial being filmed there, for the airport itself, and there were actors, actresses, directors, all sorts of people hanging out in the pilot's lounge, which is not very big.  Seven seats max in there.  I walk in, and I'm the only actual pilot in there for awhile, and I look a lot less like a pilot than the actors they have there acting like pilots.  ;)

At one point, this one guy was hitting on an actress, older lady, attractive, and at that point it was just the three of us in the room somehow.  He's telling her how beautiful she is, how she looks like some other actress who is also beautiful, and he's talking about all the professions he's held.  Doctor, EMT, police, pilot.  She giggles and says "Is there anything you DON'T do?"  My stomach hurts at this point.  Then she asks about the flying.  By his answers, he is most definitely not a pilot.  I'm trying to ignore them, for my own health, but when he makes a comment about landing on a runway number that doesn't exist anywhere, I look up at him and shoot him this look, with my eyebrow up.  He's facing me, she's facing away, so she can't see me, but he can.  He saw me, cleared his throat, and started talking about his doctor days again.  I mean, c'mon.   ;)

Later there was another actual pair of pilots in there with me.  The one guy sounded exactly like Vizzini from Princess Bride.  I walked back in, and they were already in there.  I put my stuff down, pull out my sweatshirt and put it on, and get comfortable.  He gets up and goes to the front desk and says "It's 91 degrees outside, I know, but is it mandatory that I FREEZE to death in here??"  He'd tried to adjust the thermostat (I did too, the first time, to no avail), and we couldn't access it.  She had to call maintenance down there to unlock the unit so they could warm it up in there.  I pointed at my sweatshirt and he said "Huh.  You've been here before, haven't you."  Yep.  Once I've been somewhere, I come prepared next time.  ;)  Next, pilots in monkey suits will probably be complaining about being hot in there, but hey, at least it was decent for a couple of us that one day.

It was soon time for lunch, and I'd been looking forward to that.  I went to pay my bill, and glanced at it to make sure it said 100LL, and then saw how many gallons it took, and I said "That can't be right, I should have twice that much."  She said "I told  them to top it."  Well, they didn't.  So I ran out to the plane, verified that they hadn't gotten either tip tank or the wing locker tank, and had  her send them back out.  They missed three out of five tanks on there.  Good thing I checked before it was time to go.  Anyway, so the three of us pilots decided to go to lunch.  I always go to this place on the water, has great food, and great ambiance.  Pilot #2 didn't care where we went.  Pilot #3 wanted to go to a Perkins or something.  I said no way in heck was I doing that, I'd wait for the next van load (there was no courtesy car.)  He then said he'd like to go to a place called "Dock Side", which is not on the water but has good food.  Fine.  They did have a fantastic crab cake, but that was it, and it was in the middle of Baltimore, so no ambiance either.  I enjoyed the crab cake immensely, apparently they are  known for them there, and it was huge and tasty.   But next time I'm going back to the place on the water--they have way more choices of seafood.  :)

I found out that we would not be staying the night after all, and indeed we watched the sun go down on the way home at 18,000'.  So I saw both the sunrise and the sunset in the air that day.

Today was get some stuff done day.  Nothing that would interest you, but stuff all necessary to get done.  We're coming up on crunch time towards the BBQ Bash, but then I think after that it gets a lot quieter again...

I didn't take photos of the sunrise or sunset this time.  Or of my giant crab cake.  Just this photo coming out of Baltimore, over the water.

Kiss Me

Kaylee, Ann and I went to the IUK auditorium tonight and watched "Kiss Me Kate", a civics theater play with the local orchestra.  Another classic I'd never seen before, so I enjoyed it.  It has some lightly bawdy songs/scenes, but it wasn't too much.  It was fun.  The male lead had a great baritone voice and the female lead killed the song "I hate men".  Nailed it.  The guy started the evening by telling us they were doing a collection for United Way towards helping Kokomo.  He also mentioned that they'd had to cancel their tech rehearsal, their dress rehearsal, their first performance got rained out, and they'd been moved to four different locations.  He said "the great thing about live theater is that you never know what's going to happen.  Frankly, tonight, neither do we!  The show must go on, and we are Kokomo Strong!"  They did a great job with it.  And for those of you not here, "#KokomoStrong" is what people are saying as far as rebuilding, also "765StandBackUp"  Little social media campaign.  Kokomo was the #1 trending hashtag the other night on all of Twitter, which was relatively impressive.  There is still a huge mess around, and there will be for awhile.  Driving around town you see more and more.  Even on the way to the theater tonight.  The people who lived in the apartment complex have all been told they can't go back after today.  Someone was in there getting their stuff when the roof collapsed on them, and they were injured.  The place is condemned and everyone is displaced.  There are still some people without power tonight, and something like 60 people who didn't have anywhere else to go living in the Red Cross shelter in town.  Over 1000 homes damaged or destroyed.  High school kids from all over have come out and helped with clean-up.  Meanwhile, some of us are pretty much business as usual, and thankful.

Kokomo Goes Another Round

Boy, it's been a busy few days.  So let me start with a blizzard.

Driving through DQ tonight for dinner (hey, the chicken isn't bad), I decided to get a mini blizzard of a new flavor to try it.  Maybe half of it was what I was planning on eating.  When it comes out to me, it's huge.  I say "That's really big for a mini."  They said "Oh, I thought you wanted a medium".  Drive-thru girl is replaced by drive-thru guy, who two minutes later hands me out another giant blizzard.  "I already have my mini turned maxi blizzard".  He is stumped.  Can't figure out what to do with his.  So he just shrugs and hands it to me anyway.  I now have two huge blizzards and nobody to eat them.  They're sitting in my freezer right now if anybody wants a peanut butter cookie dough blizzard.  Size-too-big.

Also, before I get to the part you already know, Kaylee's school pictures came back.  These are cell phone snapshots of them emailed to myself, so the quality is less than stellar, but it gives you an idea anyway.

So, you might have heard, Kokomo got hit with some unpleasant weather.  It started off looking like a totally normal afternoon.  I had two students that afternoon so had been watching that line of storms all day.  As far as I could tell, it was just a normal line of storms.  Yawn.  I figured it would be through in time for my 6 pm guy but not my 4 pm guy.   I have exactly one hour before I'm supposed to do something, so I turn the TV on "On Demand" to watch a show not on network tv.  I'm sitting there maybe 5 minutes, and my phone starts shrieking with an alarm.  Tornado warning, seek shelter immediately.  Yeah, right, think I.  Here they go again overblowing this stuff.  Then the sirens go off.  I pull up the regular TV, and I'm watching, and it says "Tornado spotted by Frankfort heading right for Kokomo."  Oops.  I shut down the computer, the TV, and then the power went out.  Well, that's not a good sign.  I went over to Ann's, and we got a flashlight, the lantern, the basement lights on, etc., and then I ran back home to let the cats into the house.  I figured their chances were a lot better hiding under our couch than sitting in a box on the deck.   We spent some time in the basement waiting for that cell to move through, as I tried to keep up on my iPad.  Right about then my 4 pm student said "Wanna go fly?  HAHA" and My 6 pm guy said "Well, because of the bad weather, my family's schedule is goofed up and I'm probably going to have to cancel our 6 pm".  I wrote back "Since I'm sitting in our basement while a tornado goes by while I type this, I'm guessing we won't be flying anyway regardless of your schedule."  He didn't know what it was doing in Kokomo.

There was round after round of warning and storm.  For awhile I sat in the car, to charge my phone and listen to the radio.  They were calling out "Another funnel spotted here" and "Another funnel touching down here" for what felt like forever.  Later learned the NWS claims 12 tornadoes in Indiana.  The worst one we got was an EF-3, and it went right through town.  Again.  It took out the Starbucks completely flattened, the county "retirement facility" was severely damaged, an entire group of apartment buildings was condemned, grain bins, and sadly a neighborhood that got nailed last tornado too.  There was tree damage and home damage in a swatch across the city and out to within just about a mile or two of Kokomo Airport.  I was up flying today, traced over the damage, and you could clearly see the path of the tornado  in all the flattened corn and string of debris.  It's a bit of a mess.

That tornado came with almost no warning.  No idea it was coming.  So Steve was out at Eastern to pick up Kaylee when his phone went off with the alert.  He called me and we figured out where he could go.  She was locked in at the school, and he ran south to get out of the path.  When he finally did get to pick her up, it took them over 2 hours to get home.  The tornado had taken out power all across the city, and blown down trees and debris into roads.  So one road after the other was blocked off, traffic was at a standstill on the main roads, and he couldn't find a way home for a long time.  He tried it from every direction before finally being successful. There were 18 downed power lines on Park Rd by our house.  The tornado came through the country club, right by our end of the park.  It was close.  I'm grateful that it missed us and the airports.

We were, however, without power.  Normally we're not, due to our location by the station, but this time with all those down lines...but we figured we'd be up pretty quickly.  It was hot, muggy, dark and quiet in the house, and I was surprised to wake up in the morning and still not have power.  So we went out to the airport and picked up two of our Oshkosh generators.  Side note.  Jon and Steve were loading them, full of fuel.  Jon said "But you'll need help unloading these at home."  Steve said "Nah, Laura and I can do it."  Jon said "But these are really heavy."  Steve says "Yes, they are, but have you seen her lift stuff?  We'll be fine."  And so we were.  They weren't that bad.  That old TV we had was WAY worse than those generators, and some of the furniture we've moved, too.  Piece of cake.  ;)

Steve didn't have quite the right cords, so we just plugged the two generators into each of our houses, to the refrigerator, to protect our food.  We'd not been opening and shutting the doors, so everything stayed cool till then.  He went out, got what he needed, came back and was hooking everything up, shutting power down to the house, feeding the generator in to the main area, got it all done, and his Mom walked outside and said "Power's back up".  For a second he thought he'd done something terribly wrong and fed over to her house without intending to or something, but then realized...the power was back up.  All that work and NOW the power comes back up.  We were without power for about 25/26 hours in total.  That's a long time for our area.  So we packed the generators back up, and today took them back out to Kokomo.

The city is already running again.  For awhile the main roads were parking lots as people had no stop lights so used each one like a four-way-stop.  Several roads are still shut down, and there is so much damage to fix up across the city, in personal homes and businesses.  Power is still out for about 12,000 people, including a couple of our airport friends.  I am thankful to be sitting under a light in air conditioning today.  I spent the day like any Friday.  Flight lessons and lunch and laundry and picking up the kid.  Kokomo rebuilt after the flood that made it an emergency disaster area.  It rebuilt after the 2011 tornado that took out much of the same area.  And it'll rebuild again.  I didn't take any photos--from what I've seen, there are already a ton of them out there.  Here's what I wrote on Facebook about it since it's good to see the good, too.

I feel like I am at Oshkosh as I sit here listening to airplanes that keep flying overhead and a couple of generators run during the middle of the day. As you may guess, that means we still don't have power. But everywhere I've gone today, I have seen hordes of Duke energy trucks running everywhere. They are doing a great job getting people back up and running as fast as they can. Now I've been isolated as far as TV, so I hope the media is showing what I've seen so far. Because here's what's more important to me. When that Starbucks was flattened, there were customers and employees all crowded into the two shelter-safe bathrooms. Those two rooms were the only thing left standing. A waiter from the Chili's next door and an unidentified man ran over when they saw the building collapse and started digging down immediately to get people out. Menards didn't have power but they ran generators and opened their doors late last night so people could come get emergency supplies. Sam's Club opened as soon as they got power this morning and offered to sell their gas, food and supplies to anyone, member or not. There are no stoplights working on most of the main thoroughfares, and it is a parking lot. But cars are not trying to push through and run the lights. They are treating each one like a four way stop, nobody pushing, nobody honking, nobody trying to blow through there. Teachers sang songs with elementary children huddled under tables as the tornado damaged their school, keeping everyone feeling calm and safe. Teens in town did not have school today, and on their own, got together at 1 PM and met at the school in order to organize and go out and help with cleanup and anything else they could. There were isolated instances of B&E last night in an area, but the overwhelming number of people are standing up and reaching out. I haven't heard whining or victimology, just "we're ok, now how can we help?" Thanks Kokomo.

Here's one article about a guy who organized helpers, too.  Here's a video of some damage as seen from the air.  And this Facebook page has been a huuge source of information and support for people in the middle of the storms and ever since.  It's like two guys in their house doing this, and it's been a big blessing.

A guy named Chris got together with Steve and wrote up an article about Kaylee and I.  Kaylee read it and said "I said YOU weren't normal, I didn't say *I* wasn't normal".  I said "No, but you're not normal."  She says "No, but I'm not normal in a different way then you're not normal."   And that's okay too.  ;)  If you haven't seen it, here's the article.  I thought he did a nice job with it.  It'll come out in the EAA magazine too, next issue, which is neat.  I was thinking I could have used a photo that was a little less messed up on the old hair, sweaty, messy, etc., and then I thought...nah.  That's what I look like on a hot day in a T-6.  Deal with it, people.  Supermodel I ain't.  ;)

So we're all alive and well.  I've been called, texed, PMd, emailed, and Facebooked from lots of family and friends around the country, appreciate the concern, and we're doing fine.  :)

Tuesday

I flew with someone early this morning and sent them off solo, not a first solo, but a first "just go fly around and look around and have some fun" solo, not just doing takeoffs and landings in the pattern like normal solos. 

Meanwhile we were trying to get ready to send an airplane out on another Mav. flight, and it required waiting for an airplane to get back, swapping camera pods, looking into a maintenance issue, figuring out weather, trying to talk to the California guys and getting no response, etc.  Steve C. took off finally and got that accomplished. 

Also meanwhile, my young guy was on his second attempt for a checkride.  This time he was ready to go.  He only missed one thing on the oral, about special rules airspace (like out in Washington DC).  The examiner wanted him to know you have to go through a computer course, take a quiz, etc. Something I thought was really funny, was the examiner then said during the debrief afterwards "I've never been there before, actually", and started asking me questions about dealing with DC airspace.  On the flight portion of it, the only thing he dinged him on was minor, in that on the initial departure radio call, he wanted him to say he was going to be departing the area to the west, not wait until after he took off to then announce he was departing to the west.  Well, that's nothing.  He said the flight was fantastic, the kid nailed all the maneuvers confidently and smoothly, etc.  But Steve and I saw his landings, and he needs to tighten up.  They were a little fast, and a little high, and he was coming in high, pulling power way back, and floating too long.  But the examiner didn't complain, at least, but next time I'm in the airplane with him I'm going to crack back down on that.  ;)  That checkride took up the whole day though.  He was out there with me from 9 am on, we were doing a few last minute things until the examiner got there at 12:30, the oral wasn't over until  3:30 pm, they took a break and got some pizza, and didn't start the flying portion until about 4:45 pm, and they were done by 6, and then we had the paperwork and debrief.  So from 9 am until about 6:30 pm that  checkride was front and center and foremost on my mind.  The kid really needed to pass, and *I* really needed the kid to pass.  You don't send someone off for a checkride twice and have them fail twice.  Like I said, I'd lost one checkride in over 20 years until this, and I sure didn't need it to go bad twice in a row.  So I was a little tense about, but I did know he was good to go.  Knowing someone is good to go isn't always helpful though since anyone can have a brain fart, mental error, etc. at any given time.  I'm glad he didn't.  Whew.

When we finished with the debrief, I went in the back of the RG with a Steve and a Steve.  Steve S. was checking Steve F out in the RG and meeting with him about some CAF stuff.   So we went to Muncie and had dinner, talked, and then on the way home I flew up front while Steve S was in the back.   We didn't get down until like 9 pm.  Long day, a little tiring because I was on edge waiting for checkride stuff, but Steve got a lot done, I got some things done, and some flying commenced, and in the end a kid was very happy, with big teeth showing behind the examiner's back.  The kid then took his mom up flying.  He asked if he could do that, and we said "Hey, you're a private pilot now! Go for it."  He was pretty excited.  That's fun.  :)

The pit crew working on the airplane.  (Dave H, Jon T and Justin H)

Muncie at Sunset, on our way home from dinner.

More Mavrx

Today was long and annoying.  We had everything planned out to put up two airplanes and two pilots at the same time to knock off a bunch of Mav. flights.  We get out there at 8 a.m. and I text them to verify our cards were wiped and ready to go, and they acted like they had no idea they were supposed to have done that.  So I sent them a screen shot of our conversation the day before where I told them we had to have the cards and they were in the upload box now.  From there it went downhill for the next couple of hours until finally I was able to leave around 10:15 a.m.  Of course by then the clouds started rolling in, and we lost a couple hours of good morning time.  Tomorrow I'm busy.  So today was the day, and THEY botched it up.  They also don't talk to each other, even though they're all on the same group email/chat.  I had two different people send four different messages about how I should mail in the cards today, then one of them even sent a message to Danny, who didn't even have anything to do with today's flights.  I got one mission with 10 fields mostly done, probably have a few problem areas, but the second mission was a total wash.  The clouds were so thick there was no way.  I had to stop at Muncie for gas on my way back.  Well, I could have made it, but I'd have made it with 20-30 minutes of fuel remaining...if it burned what it should...which you can't tell well on those old not-that-accurate gauges.  So maybe 2 gallons usable fuel per side left in the tanks?  No thanks.  So close, but not close enough.  Reminded me of when I stopped at Exec for fuel when I was only 20 minutes out too.  But hey, that last 20 minutes would be a real knuckle-biter, and if you're wrong...

When I came in to land, Nathan was landing in the Cheyenne on Runway 5, I was coming in on Runway 14, a jet then landed on Runway 23, and Cusick made it back and came in on Runway 32.  Winds were 110 at 4, for the record, but we all just came in from the direction in which we came, except Nathan who used the long runway with still the headwind component.  But we all came one right after the other, and we'd all left at various times and gone to various places.  :)

From there I was working on a few things at the airport, dropping off the Mav .cards at UPS, and driving to Greentown to pick up Kaylee from drama practice.  She was about 40 minutes behind and I almost fell asleep in the car again.  Then we went to dinner, all of us, which was nice.

Mostly the day felt grating and harsh and always on the verge of annoyance.  I guess that makes it Monday, huh?  :)

Mavrx

I slept in this morning for the first time in ages, which was nice.  When I woke up, I noticed that the weather was really nice.  About an hour later I checked a Mavrx mission and realized that the day was actually clear down there and supposed to be that way all afternoon.  So I tried to hurry up, get ready, and get going so I could get that done, since the weather has stopped us from getting a single field done in over a week.  It took me two hours to get going.  The plane I went to was missing a pod.  I got everything set up in the other plane and it needed gas.  I had trouble with all sorts of stuff.  I was in the wrong airplane and tried to text them to change pods, and nobody answered me until I was in the air and then they tried to call.  I had to do something special to the pod to make it work for this mission, and then finally I was on my way.  Except the clouds had moved in.  They were supposed to be 8-22% coverage, but they were instead closing up and fast.   It took me an hour to get down there, and when I did, I was dodging clouds.  I got in maybe 4 out of 11 fields.  It took me 4.5 hours to get very little accomplished.  As soon as I landed, I ran through Culvers for Kaylee, then took her right to church youth group.  Back home for an hour while I worked on setting some stuff up for tomorrow, then back out to pick her up.  Now it's 9 pm, the day is done, I'm still trying to get ready for tomorrow, but almost ready there... Nice restful Sunday.  ;)  Steve says we can rest in the winter.  Which isn't that far away.  Which is true, actually.   It'll still be a little busy for awhile, as one of our workers is leaving.  He got a job offer to fly right seat in a jet down south of Indianapolis.  He has not much total flight time, almost no multi-engine time, and zero turboprop time, so that tells you how desperate this place is for right-seaters, and how excited he is to be getting the chance to do it.  It leaves us back where we started without another instructor and without the main person doing the Mavrx flights, but it's almost September, instructing is slowing down and Mavrx will be over as soon as harvest is done, and winter is quiet anyway.  So it'll be fine.    He lasted two weeks as an instructor with us--which, for the record, is why we don't hire time-builders in general.  ;)   But he did a great job for us while he was with us, was a very hard worker, smart, motivated and able to think on his own.  He's a good worker and we do wish him success, and expect he'll find it.

Westfield

Every year Westfield attempts to have a fly-in event, and every year it gets weathered out.  Kind of like our BBQ Bash the last half dozen or better years, with wind and usually one rainy day.  But always wind.   These guys today were faced with low IFR in the morning, and then to add insult to injury, a couple lines of storms and several pop up areas of heavy rain.  Normally we just wouldn't go, but because of who it was, and that we'd promised to support them, (I was going to go down in the T-6 and give rides) we packed up in Nathan's car and drove down.  Three of the four of us had never driven to Westfield, and in the car only two of us had ever landed there in an airplane, either.  There just isn't much need for us to go in there.  So it was a mini adventure driving to Westfield.  If Steve hadn't been with us we'd have probably never found the airport, as they don't have any signs on the main road, and they're in the middle of nowhere back there.   It was supposed to start at 11.  We got there at like 11:30-11:40, and they weren't set up or ready.  But eventually we got an Italian Sausage sandwich that was good, off the grill, and we hung out and talked for a couple hours.   The rain had stopped by then, with another round coming soon.

Back at Kokomo, we sat in the hangar and watched the storm lines move through.  I mostly laid there and read a book, as tired as I've been lately.  I had to leave to take Kaylee to a party, and then four of us went to dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings.  I'm still full and now I really need a nap...

The unusual sight of us driving to a fly-in in the rain.  ;)

I didn't get a good picture.  Westfield airport under grey skies.

Pouring rain at Kokomo.  This wasn't the worst it got--you couldn't see the trees, VOR or wind sock for awhile there.

Mother Nature...

Yeah!

I got buzzed by a fighter jet today!  There I was, cruising along at 2000' in the 340 in the MOA by Grissom, and my traffic went "DING.  Traffic.  3 o'clock.  300'."  I look  up, and right then this light grey fighter jet goes screaming right off my nose, just barely above me, maybe 50'; he'd been descending since that warning.  He peeled off to my left, then went vertical and started maneuvering.  He either had smoke on or there was a lot of condensation, I dunno.  I don't know what it was.  1) I don't know my fighter jets, and 2) he went by me Really fast.  But it was cool, man.

So, of course, that means we got the 340 home today finally.  It's been done for days, but my schedule and the weather was not allowing me to pick it up in day VFR conditions.  Since it just had a new engine put on, I was going to bring it home in day VFR conditions.  Today was the day.  So Steve had our student John run me to Aurora as part of a lesson.  It was all a little last minute.  I was supposed to fly in Indy in the PT.  It was fogged over down there.  I realized Aurora would be good so texted Steve we could do that if I could get a ride.  I went back to sleep.  I woke up at 8:20 (I haven't been sleeping well) to a text from Steve to be there at 9.  Whoops.  I threw myself around, got in the car, put my face on in the car and everything (at stop lights).  Pulled up NOTAMS and METARS and TAF and radar, saw nothing interesting, and we take off.  We're in the airplane on the taxiway still when I pull up a broader view of radar and see a big line of storms out there.  I pull the weather back up, nothing says it's supposed to hit ARR.  Well, it lied.  When we landed, they got the plane out, and this front came through with these wicked looking clouds.  It was cool.  We skirted out from underneath the clouds (didn't fly through any rain) and back into the clear before the actual line of storms moved through, and it was clear the rest of the way home.

Kaylee got a part in "Arsenic and Old Lace" being performed at Eastern.  She is Officer Klein.  You know, I've never seen "Arsenic and Old Lace"?  I know it's a classic, but I haven't seen it.  I hadn't seen "Bye Bye Birdie" before Eastern did it, either.  I don't mind seeing these classics in this manner.  :)  She had tryouts yesterday, and parts were posted today.  I'm glad it was over fast and that she got something.  She's wanting bigger roles now, and at least this one has some lines, so she's moving up there slowly but surely.  :)

I'm glad to be sitting here having a glass of merlot and relaxing.  Tonight I picked up Kaylee at band at 6 pm, took her through to get a shake, took her to CVS to get a birthday card she was needing for a party she was going to tonight, then went out to Kokomo for a lesson that was supposed to go from 7-9 pm.  Except when we got out there, he said he was too stressed and tired to fly, so we talked for about 30 minutes instead, I picked up some stuff for tomorrow, and then I went to Hobby Lobby for a plain white T-shirt that Kaylee told me tonight at 6:30 that she needs by tomorrow afternoon for a tie-dye thing she's doing at a party tomorrow evening, and then I went to Victoria's Secret to pick up a shirt that she wanted to get for a friend for a birthday.  Because this is how life works--whenever space opens up, something comes in to fill it, and in the space of the 40 minutes I was with her, she told me about these things we needed to do right away.  Fortunately the kid canceled, otherwise everything would have been closed by 9, and I am down in Westfield tomorrow and wouldn't have had time.  In fact, I was in trouble picking Kaylee up from band tomorrow because of our commitment to Westfield.  Fortunately Judy Rider has agreed to drive all the way out there and get her.  For which we owe something to Judy!

 Thursday I got to fly in a five-ship formation for a fly-over of an event down by the Noblesville area.  That morning it was fogged over again, up here and down there.  The flyover was scheduled for 12:30.  I was supposed to be down there at 11:45.  As of 11:30 it was JUST good enough to leave.  I made it there right on time.  So I flew down in the T-6 and met up with two more T-6s, a Yak (technically a CJ-6), and a P-51.  We took off, rejoined, flew around for a few minutes, and did three passes.  Over something.  I don't know what.  It was good practice as he did some tight turns to keep us in close, had the Mustang break off and do some high speed passes while we circled around opposing him.  After our three passes, I broke off to the north, another guy broke off to the south, a third guy landed at the grass strip there, and the two others flew off together.  It wasn't a long flight, but there was a lot of maneuvering and tight turns, and by the time I landed I was sweaty and tired.  That seriously takes some concentration, people, especially if you don't do it all the time.  That's part of why I like it.  I was flying along a couple times thinking about this or that and I remember telling myself to Shut Up (and I don't like that phrase at all) and just focus.  It's hard to shut down the brain sometimes, and I think that's part of the fun of that exercise.  I'm sure it's like anything else, once you get good enough you can do it without much effort.  I'm not there.  ;)  But at least I was in position most of the time no matter what he did, so that was better.  I like formation.  And I like these guys.  I'm not having to chase them around to try to convince them to let me fly with them. That's much more relaxing and enjoyable.  :)

The rest of Thursday I ran Kaylee around.  I picked her up at school.  I ran her to get some food.  I dropped her off at voice lessons and went and got gas and sat in the car for half an hour.  I ran her to Kokomo for a bank run and to kill time then took her right back out to Greentown for her play audition.  Sat in the parking lot for almost an hour, where I actually fell asleep with the rain hitting the roof, to be woken up by a ding on my phone.  I then ran her home.  By the time I got home around 8 pm, I was done running.  But the job(s) got done.  :)

The Tipton Tribune had the funeral (and a snap of our fly-over ) on the front page of the paper, which is nice.

Line up of 4 of the 5 airplanes for the formation on Thursday.

This is blurry but I was sneaking the picture quickly.  Mustang taking off with J.  Wood, T. McCord in the next T-6, then Larry J, then me, and the CJ met us in the air.

I was a passenger today in a comfy bonanza, with a student pilot at the controls (okay, and Steve up there.)  The student has an Albert Einstein on his control yoke you can see if you blow it up.  He says flying is all science so who better to help him out.  I told him flying is as much an art as it is a science so maybe he needs to find a bobble-head Picasso too.  Or maybe not a crazy artist.  If there is one.  ;)

Check those clouds out.  That is so cool.  I didn't make them look that way in Photoshop, that's how they looked.

Wicked, man.  A front moving through Aurora, IL.

Back In

I needed the last couple days--in fact I kind of wasn't ready to go back to work today, but I only ended up with one student because of the weather, so I was eased back into it.  ;)

Kaylee has a sore on the back of her throat that hurts her like crazy when she yawns, swallows, talks, or sings.   It's slowly healing up, but for a little while she couldn't talk at all, and it's driving her nuts.  It's in an awkward spot, where you can't put much on it, and you can't not eat, swallow, etc., so it's taking awhile to heal.  Yuck.

Steve and I took the Aerostar and my 4 pm student and went over to Muncie for dinner with a group of pilots.  It was a beautiful evening for it, so Chuck flew over in the Citabria with someone in his back seat, Ty flew over in the Super Viking with at least AE, not sure who else, Scott Post flew in with his C-150, two Champs flew in with four people, A Cherokee 180 with a couple guys, the Aerostar with three of us, and I'm probably forgetting somebody.  But it was a smooth, calm, clear, beautiful evening to aviate.  I asked for chicken stir fry, got shrimp stir fry, figured that was close enough.  It was good.

I finished the evening in the parking lot of Kaylee's school watching the sun go down while the band members practiced their opening of their new routine.  It's "The Giving Tree", which is a very sad and depressing story, and hopefully it makes for a good marching band routine.   Kaylee can't play the sax right now because of her throat either, so she was marching around holding it and looking like she was playing it without actually playing it.

Today would be my Grandma Snider's 90th birthday, and is my friend Stephanie's 43rd birthday, and my friend Kim's 20th wedding anniversary.  Busy day, was Aug. 17th!  :)

Tomorrow I'm supposed to do a 4-5 ship flyover in the T-6 down in the Noblesville area at noon, but the weather is looking a little foggy.  Have to see...also need to get to Aurora to pick up the 340.  I have to get there and back before 3 pm if possible because I also need to get the kid home from school, to voice lesson, then back to school for a drama club audition, which will be difficult for her considering her throat hurts.  Nope, that's not gonna work.  The flyover at noon means I get back to Kokomo by 1, and I need 3 hours round trip to get to Aurora and back.  Guess it'll have to sit there another day.  The rest is a go.  Aren't you glad you know that?  ;)

 I should have taken pictures tonight.  It was such a pretty evening...oh well.

Rainy Days

Did I mention we painted (had someone else paint) our dining room and guest bathroom?  Lighter colors, makes the space look bigger, brighter, still warm, and we like it.  We need to get a new shower curtain though, as we have a hot pink shower curtain in a bathroom that now has nothing else resembling matching that.  :)

It was raining yesterday and today.  Yesterday I read a novel, a whole one from start to finish, and messed around on the internet watching a pilot have a meltdown on social media, which started off kind of humorous at what he was saying, but ended up just sad as it became clear he really has mental issues. He reported himself to the FAA and to his medical examiner and swears they're his friends and it will all be fine...after he threatened self harm, suicide, and mentioned that he could have posed a hazard to hundreds of innocent people when he got his ATP and flew innocent people around.  This was after he called a Cirrus hotline for them to help him when he was upset, and then called weather briefer to talk him down from flying because he knew they'd tell him if he was unsafe for flight.  Umm, for those of you not pilots, that's not how this works.  That's not how ANY of this works.  He's been spinning up and melting down in public, posting crazy things, over a bunch of different places, then deleting his account, then opening it back up, ten, fifteen times a day, posting 20, 30 posts at once.  He needs someone in his life to get him some immediate assistance.  It's been...odd.  I feel for him.  I can't stand talk shows like "Jerry Springer" where you see someone's life falling apart on stage; even if some of it is staged, it's still hurtful to people.  This felt like that by the end.

I'm a little annoyed that even though we had the day off from flying, the whole day passed really busy and noisy anyway.  I won't bore you with what and why, but we stayed busy running around until late afternoon.

So, like I was telling you about before, today I got the email from a lady at the CAF who said she is messaging a group of core people she would like to have join her in forming a WASP Squadron of the CAF.  It would be "Rise Above: WASP" and you can see a website on it HERE.  The goal is to tell the story of the Women Air Force Service Pilots of WWII, and to "provide young people with real world examples of how courage, confidence and perseverance can allow them to triumph over adversity they face in their own lives."   They also mention it as a tribute to the WASP, to be an example for young women, and to represent women in aviation.  They kind of lose me on that last one, I'm not looking to represent women in aviation, never have been.  But the WASP...like I said, those women deserve to have their story told.  I STILL don't know what exactly that means to me.  I know it's a new "Squadron" which means I get to add more membership dues in.  ;)  It says "What can you expect?  To Fly, Represent and Lead."  Don't know what or how yet, but I presume details will come in soon.  Steve guesses that it'll be a "fly what you bring" kind of thing, that they'll use the airplanes we're already flying in our own "Wings" to represent.  Could be, as I doubt they have several spare airplanes just sitting around needing flown.  One lady I know is a B-29 pilot, which is pretty cool, and I can't imagine they wouldn't have her fly that even though it's in a different "Wing".  So for our Wing that would be the PT-26 or the Twin Beech whenever it gets done.

Okay, this is terrible humor.  Moms, I'm sorry.  This is bad.  But I couldn't stop laughing so I'm going to say it anyway.  Steve and I were talking about this and what it might mean.  I was commenting that in the Texas Flying Legends, they have them fly across and then dog fight.  I said "Well, the WASP were mostly ferrying aircraft from factories to the front lines.  How would they represent that at an airshow?"  Steve says "The women fly all the cool planes in...then get out, and the men get in and go dog fight and put on the real show while the women go make sandwiches."  That is so rude I truly could not stop laughing.  Anyway.  So no, I don't know what's we're looking at yet, maybe it'll be like "Red Tail" and just have one airplane they take around.  But whatever it'll be, I do look forward to learning more, and I hope they don't say "Okay, and that'll be $10,000 to sponsor the aircraft and be part of it."  Because it very well could be, and if it is, I'm out, not because I'm not interested, but because I don't have that kind of wallet.  :)  We'll see...

Working Day of Rest

Fortunately I woke up earlier than I was intending on, because 1) I had a headache and needed to fix it and 2) I needed to get gas which meant I needed to get out to the airport 30 minutes earlier than originally planned.  The headache took past lunch to kick, but the fuel I got taken care of.

I took off from Kokomo around 9:15 this morning, into about 500' overcast, and flew up to Pellston, Michigan, where I got to shoot another ILS down.  This time it pretty much felt like business as usual.  I broke out a little higher than last time, no problems.  Picked up a little fuel and five  passengers, then headed back for Kokomo.  It was a little bumpier on the way home, but not terrible, and I had to do another ILS back into Kokomo, and that makes three in two days, easy enough.  I got a text from one guy who said "You hooked him with this one.  Good job."  A five hour plus drive reduced to an hour in the air of smooth, calm flying--everyone on board was happy.  ;)

There was a band of weather just south of Kokomo still.  They canceled the Metro aviation day because of it, but they still wanted me to get the T-6 down there if at all possible.  By the time I went to go, Kokomo was reporting marginal VFR, and one airport down there was reporting 700 overcast while the other was reporting 3500'.  My airport doesn't have weather reporting so you didn't know which way it leaned.  So I just went ahead and looked.  It ended up leaning at the 700 overcast range, so I stayed down under the clouds, not choosing to go IMC in the T-6, let alone without a working generator, and with good visibility ran in Class G airspace all the way to Metro.  I was on the ground there awhile as I figured out how I'd get home.  Steve driving down and back for a two hour round trip?  Or a kid offering to take off and come get me, but it's low ceilings and I don't want him to push a thing.  So we waited a bit, then eventually it got a little higher and he came to get me.

When I got back, I stopped at the post office and mailed out all our airport billing, stopped at CVS to pick up something for Kaylee, ran Kaylee to a church youth group event (and will be going to get her in an hour here at 9 pm).  So...not a very restful day, but productive none-the-less.  Tomorrow looks like it's supposed to rain.  I have no flights until the afternoon.  I doubt I'll be able to sleep in, because I haven't been able to in quite awhile, but I don't plan on doing anything important tomorrow morning.  I hope.

The Cheyenne looks a little mean sitting there like that.

"Just" up at FL280.  Funny how 28,000' up seems kind of low now.

Two beautiful airplanes tucked in together.

I think I like the back/tail view better.  

Running back to Metro, with at least good visibility.

Honor

Three things from today to fit the bill.

Today is SMA Awareness day, the Saturday when SMA families light a candle at 7 pm in their time zone, in honor of SMA kids here and passed.  I used to collect everyone's photos and put up a web page of them all each year.  I don't do that any more, but I don't forget.  My candle is lit. 

Today was also the funeral service for Lt. Robert McIntosh.  I can't remember what I said here already, so, he was a 23 year old fighter pilot in a P-38 who disappeared in Italy after a mission.  His family never knew what happened to him.  Recently his remains were discovered and recovered.   He had hit a mountain, during probable poor weather.  His remains were shipped back to Tipton for burial with his remaining family, and it was a pretty big deal locally.  It meant a lot to the family.  He was driven to the plot with a cavalry of horses, which is cool.  The family requested a fly-over.  Nathan put together five folks with T-6s, and today's weather was being a bit uncooperative.   One of the T-6s couldn't make it because he'd just learned of the death of a friend.  A second of the T-6s, down by Indy, tried to get out, but the heavy rain and low ceilings just pounded his home airport.  Nathan and I were north where it was clearer, but a line kept moving towards where we were going, supposedly to hit right about when we were to be there.  The last guy was from Terre Haute, and weather was all along that path, and I figured there'd be no way he'd make it if the guy from 20 minutes away couldn't get in.  I was wrong.  He came landing in just in time, unsure of whether we could even get the flyover done or not with the weather, flew an hour or more round trip on his own dime to help out.  We were happy to see him.  That made three of us, which is good.   We were a little rushed because of the weather and timing.  Steve was on the ground as air boss, helping us time it.  When he got to the funeral at the time he was supposed to, they were already well under way, and he was behind.  They had no good way of giving us more than 1 minute 15 seconds of warning.   So we took off, were flying around, Nathan checked in, and then Steve said "GO GO GO GO NOW"  And off we went.  They did the 21 gun salute, then played Taps, and as the last note was fading, we hit the top of them.  As we flew away, the bagpipes started playing.  It was more luck than skill, but apparently it hit at a most excellent time and went very well.  The Kokomo Tribune put up an article about the services, and included a picture of us as we went overhead.

I tried to then take the T-6 down to Metro where it belongs, but the owner texted me right then (he must be psychic) and said "Don't come back here, see you tomorrow if it quits raining".  I said "I'm in the air now, was going to see about working my way into there."   He said "Heavy downpour of rain and thunder here.  Don't worry about getting it here, we can do it whenever."  I said I wouldn't mess with thunder and heavy rain, and turned around and went back to Kokomo.

Steve drove up from Tipton then, and brought with him a pair of diamond earrings and a nice purple dress shirt that Kaylee had given him to give to me to wear when we went out to eat tonight.  He'd made reservations down at Cicero on the Lake, because I was supposed to fly the T-6 down there and he was going to drive down and pick me up.  Well, I didn't end up flying in there, but we decided to go down and go to the restaurant anyway.  Why not.  And Steve was dressed in a nice shirt from going to the funeral, so he wanted to bring me a clean shirt so I wouldn't come out of the T-6 all sweaty and rumpled and in a Glenndale shirt when he was dressed nicer from the funeral.  So Kaylee picked out what she wanted me to wear and gave it to him.  I was originally going to bring a different shirt than that to change into, because it's a little snug right now, but when I combed my hair, put in the earrings, touched up the face, and put on the shirt and showed Kaylee, she lit up, got a huge grin, dimples and all, and said I looked beautiful, and I just couldn't sneak another shirt and change after that.  So I wore the ensemble and we had a nice dinner down there on the lake . :)

I was actually leaving the Kokomo airport when I got a text from a lady at the CAF. She said "Laura.  We are putting together a core group of CAF women pilots to start a WASP unit.  D. K. is rounding everyone up.  Don't worry, not an all girl club.  We need your email address."  I'm not sure what they are planning on doing, what it means, what it will entail.  She knows me well enough to know I'm not a big fan of all girl groups in general, particularly not when they get bent out of shape over all male groups, because you can't have it both ways.  But in this case...the WASPs were unwanted but needed, put through the wringer, used, dropped, ignored, and largely forgotten, while doing a duty to their country.   They weren't even allowed military honors until most of them were dead.  I'd never heard of them until way later in my own life than should be, and I'd been interested in flying for a very long time.  They deserve to be remembered and honored for their service.  The Tuskegee Airmen finally saw the recognition they deserved, and men of color usually come before women in the rights department in history.  (Right for black men to vote: 1870.  Right for women to vote: 1920.)  Well, it's the WASPs turn.  I look forward to learning more about what they want to do, and how I can help, if I can.  It would be an honor.

Here's a video clip from today.  We're just a quick go by, but...

Tre and Nathan contemplating the T-6 getting ready to go. 

You can sort of see both T6s there.  

I'm on Lead's Left, or photo right.  Nathan is Lead, JP is #3.

These first three were taken by another guy near Kokomo. 

This was taken by the Kokomo Trib over the funeral.

What.

What did we do yesterday?  I really don't know.  Oh yes.  I flew all day until 3, and then worked on checkride prep crash course stuff until late.  Long story I don't feel like reliving, but kid got his checkride scheduled but could only get it in today, next day.  The plane wasn't ready for a checkride, the kid wasn't ready for a checkride, the weather was iffy, the paperwork wasn't done, it was just all a serious kerfluffle.  We got it all done and all ready...he even stayed up until 11:30 asking me verification questions on his weight and balance.  The day arrived, and I walked in to the hangar, and he was looking at his cross country pointing at an airport and said "I'm trying to remember what airspace that is."  What?!  If I'd have heard that the night before, I'd have just called it off.  He was ready on the flying, and the ground guy said he was about 65% good on passing and 35% not, so even though I usually want better odds than that, we let him try.  It took hours of my life and a couple other people's lives that we won't get paid for or back, too, but that's the name of the game.  The game ended about an hour into it when he didn't pass the oral.  I had a feeling.  We did paperwork, I talked with the examiner for awhile, the kid left and left the plane outside in front of the terminal, so I hiked up there, taxiied the plane back, pushed it away, locked up, and walked back to my car.  It was only 91 today I think, so that was still fun.   I missed lunch while going over the failed checkride, and also had a flight today to Michigan in the Cheyenne coming up.  Weather was still questionable.  There was supposed to be a line of storms coming through here, and up there it was IFR and hanging on to fairly low IFR.  The airport we were going into only has non-precision approaches because it has trees, hills, poles and various obstacles off both ends.  It's also 4100', which isn't normally short, but you have to drop in on it from on high because of obstacles, so it's not long, either,  The plane was going to have six of us on board, which meant it was pretty heavy.  The clouds were at to slightly below approach minimums there off and on.  I only recall flying one actual instrument approach in there for real before, and it was in the right seat with Nathan in the left.  I'd practiced a couple, maybe three or four.  I wasn't feeling super relaxed about this flight.  The weather was my last straw, so instead we went to an airport not very far away that has a 6500' runway and an ILS approach.  That made me feel much better.  ;)  I did have to do the approach, and I broke out around 500' or so.  I had a bit of a tailwind, but the RNAV approach into the wind had a 600' minimum which wouldn't have worked.  I'll take the precision approach any day.  I landed, and happened to accidentally really roll it on super smooth, as in you about couldn't feel it touch down, and they all applauded.  One of the girls back there said that flying usually scares her, airlines scare her, and she was afraid she'd freak out, but this was great and she loved it.  I'm glad she didn't freak out too.  ;)

I pulled a stupid move on the way out though.  I got everything checked, got in and started and  pulled out my iPad to get my clearance...couldn't find my iPad, actually.  I'd left it on the counter inside.  So I had to shut everything back down and hike across the ramp and go get it.  I grabbed it, held it aloft to the other pilots in the room, said "This might come in handy", they all burst out laughing, and I hiked back across to try this again.

When I took off there, I had less than half fuel, and just me, and when I added power, I started laughing, because it was leaping.  It's been awhile since I felt it that light, and it just went screaming down the runway, and was past rotation speed before I stopped looking outside to keep myself straight and glanced in at the airspeed indicator.  Made me smile.  I popped right into the clouds, hand flew it until I broke out, then turned on the tunes and autopilot, ate a granola bar, drank a water, and relaxed for the first time in awhile.  It was my first actual solo in the plane, ya know.  I've either had Nathan or Dustin in there with me until today, and I do enjoy and actually appreciate both their company, but today it was an empty row of seats, single pilot IFR action.  That was probably good for me to do too, just to remove any helpers or potential helpers.  It felt pretty good, no problems, I'm getting faster with the button pushing on the autopilot too.  When I got back to Kokomo, I thought about practicing another approach, an RNAV this time, but instead I canceled IFR, flew over my house where Steve was sitting outside with his friends, and then came on in to end the day around 9 pm.

It has been a long and stressful couple of days.  I was glad that it ended so nicely, that the Cheyenne flight didn't end up being as 'bad' as it started off looking like it would.  After they were out of the plane and I was just ferrying it home, I finally relaxed and enjoyed.   :)  When I relax, I take photos.  ;)

Two line guys, two fuel lines, one truck, getting me some go juice very efficiently.  I'd never seen this before.

On the ramp, nice low-ish clouds there for my first official solo ILS in it.

Climbing out nice and steep, on top of the deck by 20,000'.

Hey, lookie there, six empty seats and an empty bench back there.  ;)

Finishing the climb up to FL280

This was a storm system I was trying to beat in.  I made it. 

You can't really tell, but storms from a distance are cool.  You can see the blue sky, then the darker blue/gray storm area, just above the regular cloud tops.  This one wasn't huge, but I still don't want to fly into it.

You can sort of see the edge of the cells off the wingip.

Weather is interesting.

Moisture

Kaylee is probably sweating to death at band practice right now.  It is HUMID out there.  I saw the heat index at 97 before I quit looking.

I had three flights today, and that was enough for as muggy as it is.   My glasses fogged over when I got in the first airplane.  Talk about a moist day.  ;)

My last guy was a checkout in a new to him Cherokee that he'd bought at the aircraft sales place.  It didn't have toe brakes on either side, and you had to recycle the master switch before it would start charging.  That was all known.  He did a great job with the airplane, I was kind of impressed, as he's a low time pilot, but he handled everything smoothly and well.  That's always a nice surprise.  He was supposed to go with Steve but I did it at the last minute in his place.  I was wearing my lime green Oshkosh t-shirt that has a quote about pilots on it, and he sure looked at me funny at first when I walked up there.  I eventually worked him into a conversation about how long he'd been flying, and he asked me, and when I told him he quit looking at me quite so funny.  lol

I saw a commercial on TV for make-up that doesn't come off with sweat, humidity, or supposedly within 24 hours.  I thought, hmm.  I always sweat my foundation off within the first two hours on these hot days.  It sure would be nice to have it stay on.  So I bought some.  Advertising for the win on that one.  I got to test it out first thing this morning, standing in a hangar with no air flow, 80% humidity and climbing temps.  I felt my face break out into a sweat, but when I wiped it, no make-up came off with it.  I found this to be both slightly thrilling and somewhat creepy.  How does that work, exactly?  And if it doesn't come off with water, am I going to have to scrape it off tonight?  Fascinating stuff, but let me tell you that as of 8:15 pm I think it's still on there just fine.  :D  I used to wonder how the models did that under hot lights and out on the ramps at Oshkosh in the broiling sun, without melting their faces off, clothes sticking to them and their hair limp.  Well, I can't solve the hair or clothes yet, but apparently make-up is like teflon, and I feel like I just found the cheap (well, relatively) drug-store version of the secret.  ;)

Steve and I are on a quick mission to have an extra healthy week.  So as such, it probably wasn't a terrible thing that the fly-out to Muncie for dinner was canceled for weather.  We were all going to meet there at the restaurant, but boy it's tough to eat out with a group of friends and just get a salad or something lame.  ;)

My young student came through today and is learning very rapidly and working very hard to be ready for a checkride this coming week.  I wasn't sure he could do it; most young men really struggle with the ground work.  After today's ground session, he still isn't ready, and normally I don't let them schedule until they are.  But he puppy dog eyed me and said he was confident he would be ready, and to please give him a chance and let him schedule and try.  I remember when the head of VU told me he didn't think I could finish my instrument rating in the summer session two weeks after it started, didn't want to let me jump into it starting late. It had taken me awhile to finish my Private.  I told him I could and asked him to give me the chance to prove it.  He did, I did, I crammed it in, flew every day for hours, and made it with time to spare.  I even said "I told you I would".  So I told this kid to call the examiner, which is taking a chance for both of us, but if he keeps learning like he did in the 24 hour period from yesterday to today, he maybe can pull it off.   I'm rooting for him.  :)

Walt's T-6 is still being repaired and will hopefully be up in time for Saturday's fly-over.  Nathan's leading a formation fly-over of a WWII pilot who was killed in combat in Italy.  His remains were just recovered and sent back to Tipton for burial, and we will be doing a 4-5 ship formation in his honor at his funeral services.  The weather is looking a little sketchy which is bothersome, so I hope it works out.  I also hope Walt's T-6 will be flyable for it as I'd really like to participate in this.  I won't have a generator by then, but at least there won't be problem melted wiring, and with a fully charged up battery I'll be okay for the one flight, then leave it down at Walt's after that.

Well, time to leave and pick up a sweaty kid from band.  Wish me luck.  ;)

Tuesday

I only flew twice today, I think, and it was one of the last nice weather days we are going to have for awhile, supposedly.  Bad timing as I have a kid who has to get some flights in and get ready for a checkride within the next 7 days, all of which are calling for rain.  Gah.

Mostly I went from one thing to the next to the next until about 11 pm.  Kaylee even got swamped and wanted moral support on her homework, so I helped her come up with a terrible story for her Spanish class and answer questions in World History about civilizations, trade, etc.  It took us almost two hours to finish once I started helping at 9:30 at night.  *sigh*

It was actually a pretty long day and I'm tired and don't have a lot to report unless you want me to say "And then I went here and then I went there and then I went here" from 9 am until now, just before bed.  I moved Kaylee's voice lesson because it interferes with band this year.  I ran multiple errands.  I signed off a student for a solo cross country.  I worked with Mavrx to get an uploader working.  I picked up some stuff Steve needed.  I picked up the kid from school and ran her home.  I flew.  I talked on the phone to two different people against my will.  I tried to find information out for a couple people.  I answered messages I was behind on (have more to go).  I picked up parts at the airport and made three different store runs.  And other stuff.  End of the day-I'm tired and need a little introvert time to myself.  :)

At lunch the waitress was rubbing my shoulders, and she said "Good grief, girl, I rub a lot of shoulders and I don't rub even many men's backs who have as much tension in their shoulders as you do.  You are TENSE.  You should go see a masseuse!"  I think some day I should, if I can get past the whole concept enough to enjoy it.  :)  A deep tissue massage was recommended, said it would work out knots and do more good than just "tickle" (which would NOT work for me), but when I go to their website, they say you shouldn't do that unless you've already had massages before and are ready for something more violent, basically.  I'm not sure about the whole thing.  Nor am I sure I want to do it in Kokomo.  There are a few people I wouldn't care to run into in the middle of Kroger or the gas station.  The OBGYN is one, and a masseuse would be another.  ;)

Eh.  We'll see.

Up Up and Away

Another gorgeous day. I think those are coming to a close right when I need them not to, as I have two guys trying to finish up for a checkride, one of whom MUST be done within the next 8 days.   Yowza.  Pressure.

I had two students today, and the rest of the day I just got stuff done.  Bills paid, banking done, new shoes now that Oshkosh wiped out my old ones as usual, yadda yadda.  

I have a semi-amusing story about sausage and our garbage can outside, but I'm too tired to write it up.  I wouldn't suggest lifting the lid of our trash cans any time soon though, particularly since it'll be Thursday before they even come by to collect trash again.  I could hide a dead body in there and nobody would know the difference in the smell, though.  Just sayin'.

Kaylee went to a friend's house this evening to do some studying, and the rest of us went out to Kokomo, where the Citabria went on its first two test flights.  Nathan took it up first, to make sure all was well, and then Chuck and Ty went up and around for a bit.  I took a video of its first takeoff and posted it on Facebook, and Jon took several photos too.  She looks good.  Still has a couple things to work out, but it flies again.  Four years and I believe two months later, the Citabria rises again.

Quick

Kaylee's first progress report came through--all A's for the first week.  One week down, 25 or so to go?

I was planning on staying home and reading a book today and taking the day off.  Instead I was wide awake and up by 7, and ended up needing to be out at the airport from 11 until about 4 while a mechanic came to look at Walt's T-6.  He found some definite problems, overheated wiring, etc., and will be back tomorrow to look into it more, try to find the cause.

A guy some of you don't know named "Hollywood" posted this picture today, and it made me smile.  The family has a new to them plane, and they have matching shirts with it on them, which you can't see here but it's cute, and then they're mostly all turned and looking at me.  I saw them down there, but I didn't see whoever else was apparently there fast enough to get a cellphone out.   I thought it was kind of a well-timed shot though.  :)

Indy Exec

I woke up at 6 something this morning, and went to get Kaylee up at 7 for Band.  She was up, talking, etc.  Steve asked me like three times if she was up and getting ready, and I kept saying yes, last I left her she was up.  I drive out to the airport for the event today, and I get a text from Steve at 7:40 that says "Your daughter was asleep in bed!"  She'd gotten half dressed and fell back onto the bed and passed back out.  So she was a little late to band, and Steve was too late to help me move all the planes around, but all in all no big deal.  I don't blame her for being tired.  I am too!

So today was the 10th annual Down Syndrome and Air Race event held at Indy Exec airport.  Last year we gave rides until two hours past when they closed, but this year we only ended up giving two rides total.   It was fine, though, because it was a nice day, we had lots of people come by and ask questions and look  the plane over, and we had a nice time, actually.  The two I did give rides to were neat and worthwhile in and of themselves.  One was a gentleman whose father was a pilot who owned a P-51, and had crashed and died in it.  I asked if he was a pilot, and he said no, he'd flown a lot with his dad, but never pursued it, and wishes he had, and hadn't been in a small plane since his dad died in the 70s.  Ever.   So today was his birthday, and he went up in the T-6 with me.  AFTER he asked me how many hours I had and how many hours I had in the T-6.  ;)  I let him fly it, and he said it was the best birthday present he remembers having, and that it put a big smile on his face, and he was really thrilled.  As I was on short final he said "You fly this thing really well."  I said thank you, but I wanted to say "Wait until we're down before you say that".  ;)

The second paid rider I had was a boy with Down.  He was pretty quiet, but eager to go.  His mom then asked if there was anything back there that he might be able to get to that could hurt the plane or us if he should "freak out".  The dad kept saying "He'll be fine!"  My eyebrows go up and I leaned over to one of the Justin's and asked him to pull the stick out of the back seat, please.  But the young man did great.  I started off easy, straight and level, said I was going to make a turn eventually, he said 'ok', I turned and he really like it.  I asked if he wanted me to do a steeper turn and he said "yes", so I did a bigger bank, and he growled out "FUN!"  So I did some more. I ended up cranking him around pretty good, and he was whooping and laughing and having a fantastic time.  He kept saying "That's FUN!"  He did have a little trouble when we landed and he wasn't able to get out right away, but he didn't have any trouble in the air, and I enjoyed flying with him.

We had lots of people asking questions, lining up and looking in the airplane, and asking us how to get a helicopter ride (the helicopter stayed super busy today).  One guy, when told it was $250 for a 20 minute ride, said "I've never paid a woman $250 for 20 minutes for anything in my life!"  I told him there was a first time for everything.  A Mexican family came up and asked who the pilot was, I said me, and he said "YOU?" and then looked at his wife who looked at me with open mouth and eyebrows up and big eyes.  I said "Yes, me."  And they both said "Wow" and walked away.  One guy asked me how long I'd been flying, and when I told him, he said "What, were you 10 when you started flying??"  I asked if he was trying to sweet talk his way into a free ride.  ;)  I had a long talk with a retired ATC guy from Indy who actually remembered two N Numbers of airplanes I fly IFR.  Thought that was wild.  I got a hug from the first rider, who also said I had pretty eyes when I took off my sunglasses to see the phone screen to take his photo in front of the plane.  Another sweet talker.  The weather was nice, winds were calm, it wasn't TOO hot until the end, the food was good even if not comped this year like it was last year I think, and all in all it was a really nice day.

At the end I took one of our helpers' daughters with me in the T-6 over to Westfield to meet her dad, who was picking up his truck to pack up the tent stuff, just to make some noise, and because I felt like it.  Funny girl, quiet, sweet.  After I dropped her off with her Dad, I went back to Exec and got some gas, picked up Justin, and we came on home.  I realized my phone wasn't on me, but assumed I'd left it in my flightsuit pocket where I had it most of the day, and I'd taken my flightsuit off.  I get to Kokomo, look in the flight suit, and no phone.  I dig through the plane and my purse, nothing . Bummer.  Justin thinks he remembers seeing one on top of a topper on the back of other Justin's truck.  I text other Justin on Steve's phone, and sure enough, it had ridden on top of his topper all the way from the airport to his house, without falling off.  He had it in his hand.  So Justin took the RG and flew back down to Exec to pick up my phone for me (thank you Justin) from other Justin who went back out to the airport to deliver it (thank you other Justin).  I hadn't done it though.  I'd left it on the table when I flew the young lady home and it got packed up with the rest of the stuff.  But I'd sure forgotten where I last had it and I'd have NEVER thought of his pick up truck, since I never went anywhere near it myself.  Glad the phone didn't fall off the top.  All is well.

Photos from me, Justin G, one from Justin P, and Christie B.

The young lady who went with me in the T-6 to Westfield.

The young man with Down Syndrome going for a ride.

On our way there that morning.

Early morning getting set up.

Me being sociable. 

Family taking their photo in front of the airplane.

Checking it out.

Justin giving tours...

The T-6 at Westfield.  Isn't that a neat airport??

Westfield.