First up with a long IFR cross country. It took three hours, and we went to Champaigne, IL, down to Terre Haute, IN, then back to Kokomo, shooting an instrument approach at each place. I ended up running 30 minutes late for my next student--I knew we'd be tight but then we got delayed a couple times anyway. So I landed at 12:30, and my next student had the airplane out and ready for me. I hit the bathroom, and hopped in the Champ to do 3-point landings with the deaf lady. She's regressed again, and has been having trouble getting any kind of consistency. She'll do one okay, one really bad, one good, two really bad. Just over and over. It's frustrating for both. She said it took her a ton of landings to get her Private too. She just has very poor basics, in consistency, pitch attitude, airspeed control, knowing if she's high or low, seemed confused at the thought of using power to fix a bad landing, no idea when she's ballooning too high and needs power or it'll come crashing down in an accident. Kinda hard to sign somebody off for a tailwheel endorsement when I wouldn't solo them. She wants to be an instructor, a Sport Pilot instructor. She has a ways to go to get there, we're doing our best! After her was a Cirrus pilot working on his tailwheel endorsement. I think he's about got 3 points down now. Super close. He's excited and enjoying the flying. About 6 hours of flying for me today. I wasn't sorry my last guy canceled, I was pooped.
On the way home, Steve went via downtown, and said there was a protest going on. They were encroaching on the street, but it was peaceful thus far. Then just after Steve got home, I saw on the Scanner that two pedestrians at the protest had been hit by a vehicle, which may have been why they were out of the street after that. There's a video of all the cars stopped at a green light with a group of protesters walking across the street with signs, and then a lady in a pickup truck decided she wasn't having any of this and she went around all the cars, and through the protesters. She hit two, though I haven't heard how badly they were injured, and then she kept on driving. She was arrested shortly thereafter.
So how do I feel about all this? I think that what the officer did to George was pretty much murder. Even other police are saying it's wrong. Yes, I saw what the autopsy said, but I think you can clearly admit he wouldn't have died if a man hadn't kneeled on his neck, for minutes even after he became unresponsive. I also support an American's right to protest. I support their right to protest peacefully. And then your right to protest ends where my personal property begins. They have the right to protest. They do not have the right to destroy nor steal that which is not theirs. The stealing doesn't even have anything to do with what they're protesting, it's just them taking the opportunity. Again, they destroy local businesses, homes, people in low income housing there went without power, in fear. The community is burned down, and I saw an article defending it say "They'll be fine, they have insurance." So that makes it okay? So if you have insurance on your house, it's no big deal if I come destroy it, right? That's now what determines if something is right or wrong? Ugh. Also, the Minneapolis mayor claims that none of the people arrested there for violent crimes were even from there, they were all from out of state. Other protests talk about big matching van vehicles that pull up and dispense organized protesters in groups. There's more to the story than people just protesting. Some of this is organized and deliberate, not heart-felt. I think the people in Kokomo were locals who wanted to be heard. I think they have that right. I also think if the protests turned violent and they started down the side streets looting and burning and destroying, that anyone who came onto my property with intent to do harm would be met with an awful lot of ammo. We would not just stand by and let them. So if I ended up in the national news, now you'd know why. Also, I have a video of a white man who was killed in the streets of Dallas by the same thing--smothered in the street, basically. By a cop using excessive force. It got as much attention as a hang nail, because he wasn't the right color for his life to matter. It's not just about race. It's about the Blue Line sometimes doing the wrong thing and needing to address it and be accountable. And I think that the protesters turned the focus off of where it should have been, on a cop using excessive force, and turned people into either defending violent riots or only talking about the riots and not the man. It's a shame. There was an opportunity, a brief moment where most of the country was on one side. Now it's all just as divided back up as ever.
Also, anybody notice that nobody is discussing social distancing with all these huge gatherings of protesting people? If we get a big spike in cases, especially in certain communities, they'll yell "We opened the states too soon!" Otherwise, it's suddenly okay to now gather in large numbers, to not socially distance, this "deadly global pandemic that we all need to stay inside for or you care more about money than lives" Covid is suddenly not an issue any more.
What a year 2020 has been.
Ending on a better note, I have a leather purse I got in Oshkosh last year for $19. Real leather, smells great, lots of compartments, and I like it. My purse is so heavy though with everything I keep in it now, that one of my straps broke. So I have it cleaned out and sitting on the deck so that a friend can stop by and pick it up and sew the strap back on it. Well, Dulcie has decided she loves my purse, and she won't get off of it. I left the house at 8 something this morning and she was sitting on it. I came home at 7 pm and she was sitting on it. Kaylee texted me that she went in and out of the house 4 times and Dulcie was always sitting on it. It cannot be that comfortable, an empty leather purse with pockets and zippers, but yet she keeps...sitting on it. It's weird, man. But kind of cute. I told Steve we may need to buy a leather cat bed or something.
Tomorrow is supposed to be my day off, but my calendar failed to block it off, so someone scheduled me, and now I have two things to do. The student and running a guy to Sheridan to pick up an airplane. Oh well, it looks like a nice day. I wish the T-6 was up. Or the Aerostar.
Dulcie on her throne.
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