I'm pretty worn out. It's been a long, difficult several days. The winds were too strong two days in a row to do anything with the T-6 or the J-3. So you're on hold all day long, hanging out, watching the weather, entertaining, doing ground, going to lunch as a group, etc. Then when the weather does cooperate, I've got to try to get everyone in all at once.
So yesterday was that day. I flew in the morning in the T-6, and we did the air work, steep turns, slow flight, power off stalls, power off stalls dirty, power on stalls, turning stalls, then came in for some takeoffs and landings. Then I hopped in the 172 and flew to Huntington, to fly in the J-3 with Job. 1.3 flight time there, and back in the 172 back to Kokomo. Grabbed a sandwich then back up in the air with Jim in the T-6. That round didn't go very well, and we had one landing that got both of our attention. When I gave him the controls back after barely catching it by the edge of the runway, neither of us said much, didn't need to! He was pretty disgusted, and we quit to regroup another day.
Today I had a cross country with a student in the 172 at 8:30 am, and then I flew the T-6 with Jim again. We went over to Marion and did takeoffs and landings there, and it went a lot better. The winds blew up again around 17 knots, and it was a 70 degree crosswind back at Kokomo. He did that, which went okay, though not great, and we stopped after just that one back home, and the winds blew back up over 25 knots. My head was hurting, and it was growing, and I came home and took some magnesium, allergy med, tylenol, and closed my eyes for a few minutes. Fortunately it faded enough for me to go back out at 5 pm, and we had one more round of T-6 flying. This one went really well. We had a decent crosswind, but he was nailing it now. Consistently, safely, nice landings, and by jove I think he's got it. So that was good news.
I gave him some advice on takeoffs, mentioned that he needed to start with the stick further forward instead of pushing the tail up after he was picking up speed, that it would lesson the gyroscopic precession and would make less swerving on the takeoff. He said he thought it was the crosswind pushing his tail. I didn't say anything. He did what I suggested, and had a really nice smooth, straight takeoff. I didn't say anything. He says "Damn it, I hate it when you're right." Made me laugh. :D
Afterwards I sat out at the fire in our back yard with Steve and Kenny for a few minutes and enjoyed the nice evening, before coming in and catching up on my logbook and stuff.
Tomorrow is another long day. I start with him at 8:30 am. Then I go to Huntington and have pretty strong crosswinds in the J-3. Then back to Kokomo to hopefully grab a late lunch and then fly in the T-6 again. Then I have a Champ flight with Ana, until almost 8 pm.
I'm not sleeping well. I keep waking up at 2:30 am, 3:30 am. I even took sleeping pills and melatonin both, and I fall asleep fine, but a light bulb goes off in my head in the middle of the night and I wake up, and can NOT go back to sleep. So I'm exhausted. Last night I slept until 5 am after taking two sleeping pills and 10 mg of Melatonin, and felt like I won the lottery. I don't know what more to do to stay asleep. Once I wake up, my brain kicks in and it's over with, I can't get back to sleep, and then I'm up early at 7 am every morning to deal with all this, and then I'm running all day. I need a day off, and I don't know when I'll get it. Even Sunday I may have to fly with both of these two. And I've got to get a T-6 back to Huntington, and I've got to fly with Paul in Terre Haute in their T-6. And I've got students who need time. And I've got a guy who wants 5 hours and needs me to send him a digital syllabus but I don't have one in digital form. And and and. I'm tired, I'm worn out, I'm over-socialized, I'm tense as heck from the difficulty level of the instruction in these planes in these conditions, and I need A Break. Mostly I just hope I sleep enough tonight.
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