When I got home, I had a box to open, and it had a birthday present from my mama. That was fun! It is a P-51 pillow for my 51st birthday. Get it? I think it's great. And I thought the shape of the bill was a plane at first, so you were mostly successful anyway! Thanks Mom!
Yesterday was really cold and windy in Florida. The wing on BOB was wet, and the wind was blowing. I had to take rags and wipe down the wing enough that I wouldn't get soaked when I climbed up there. Here's how my days down there went. I'd wake up around 7 am usually, sometimes earlier. Get ready, go downstairs, eat some oatmeal or eggs or some protein. Go out to the airport by 8 am. Get the ladder and set it up, get the rags/paper towels ready, climb up, wipe down the wing. Climb in and get the dzus tool, and the oil funnel out of the oily trash bag. Unscrew the oil catch cans, take off the lids, put the oil funnel in it, climb up the ladder with the 2.5 gallon jug and funnel, climb up onto the wing without falling off. Open the oil door, check the level, add in the residual oil from the catch can, check the level, if need be, climb back down, get a full 2.5 gallon jug and add whatever I need. Clean up the now empty oil jug, put it into a trash bag, and put it in the back. Go to the other side and do the same thing there. Check the mags, pull both props through, take off pitot covers and plugs. Now the plane is ready to go. Next up, wait for the gates to open at 9 am, and once people start coming in, talk to them. Be by the plane, answer questions, try to hawk rides. Go up by the rides desk, talk to people up there, try to sell rides. Go back to the plane, convince people they want to ride on it. Convince one, need to convince another. Make deals. If you pay an extra $30 I can cover the cost of the plane and we can go ahead and go with just us. Yes your 5 year old can go along, but no, not by himself. Walking back and forth, on your feet most of the day. Finally sell a ride, yay! Put on the flightsuit, get the group of people up in the plane. Climb in front of them, help them get belted in, give them the full briefing. Go to the back, pick up the stairs, secure the door, climb up front, strap in, start up, get marshalled out. I'm in super busy airspace at every stop. Class D in a Class C in a Class B with Restricted and Alert areas. I have six frequencies I have to go back and forth on, clearance, ground, tower, departure, approach. It can take up to 30 minutes (a couple times more) to get off the ground, and it's hard to get a word in edgewise on all of the frequencies. I'm trying to provide a fun ride while dodging airplanes and ATC. You end up with crazy crosswinds as they pick a runway and you just deal with it, and it was windy just about every day we flew. Landing on the ground, you unload everybody, thank them, take photos, chat, take off the flightsuit, wipe down the oil from the plane with a rag, and do paperwork. Fill out two separate sheets that track a bunch of data including start up time, take off time, landing time, and shut down time, hobbs time and watch times. That takes about 10 minutes to do. Then go back to talking and answering questions, walking back and forth between the ramp and the rides desk. Usually at some point they have lunch delivered and you realize you haven't eaten yet and it's 1:30 pm so you go do that. If you're lucky you get another ride or two, and you do the same thing a couple more times. End of the day, you wipe down the airplane, lots of oil. You get the oil cans back out of the oily trash bags and hook them both back up. Put in the control lock and close up the windows. Get out the rickety ladder and dzus tool and climb up, call the fuel truck, unlock and fill up the fuel tanks, without falling off up there. Both sides. Put the ladder away, steps, plugs and covers, and the plane is secure. Now go over to the PX tent and help them close up and secure for the day, or tear down if we're leaving that stop. That's about an hour's worth of work. Get to the hotel, change shirts, go out to eat with either the group, or one-on-one. Get done with that around 9 pm or so, come back and do laundry maybe, and definitely do paperwork. Arrange my receipts, food, airplane fuel, rental car fuel, and the two tracking time sheets from the plane, and send an email out with an update to the wing. Go over a few emails and see what happened since then, and then go to bed. Wake up in the morning and do it all over again. If we're moving locations, you check out of the hotel with your stuff, and fly the plane to the next stop, and set up Rocky's PX, which takes a couple of hours. It's hard to remember which hotel room you're in, which way to the elevator, sometimes which way to the airport. lol It's also tricky knowing the local operations there. The taxiways at these major international airports, and I can't hold my phone and taxi and write down directions at the same time. So you're going off your memory and hoping you see what they're talking about as you get close. You get used to a place after a day or two and then move on to another new large international airport. You also get new crew in and out with the rest of the airplanes there, so new tour leader, new people to interact with. You're surrounded by people all the time. You're "on" all the time. On my three days 'off', the transitions days, I did C-45 training with two different guys. So I spent the whole day instructing in the plane while everyone else was off watching a rocket launch in person, going out to eat, etc. I got a lot done and I worked hard. You're a salesperson, a crew member person, aircraft maintenance/crew chief person, loader, briefer, instructor, and oh yes, actual pilot, from about 8 am when you go downstairs to about 9 pm when you go back up to your room. It's physically and mentally tiring. It can also be rewarding, and fun. But it's definitely a lot of work, it's not a vacation, and nobody better call me "Princess" for awhile.
Yesterday was cold and windy. They didn't open the tent up because the wind was whipping through it and everyone was freezing. I hadn't packed a coat because it wasn't supposed to be cold in Florida in March. But when they opened the gates, I went out by the airplane and answered questions, talked to people. I ended up with a ride, a dad and his daughter, John & Vanessa. I'm the only person who got a ride that day because I was the only person out there talking to the customers. Vanessa was scared once she got in the plane, but she sat up front with me and I could talk to her the whole time, and show her stuff. Coming in to land, I asked for the runway into the wind, they just said "Unable, expect right base 25R". It was just a crosswind this time, not a tailwind, so I could do it, I was just hoping for a smooth landing for the scared 12 year old. Fortunately I ended up rolling that sucker on, so all was well. ;) She was brave for being scared and shaky up in the air. I landed, we froze the rest of the day. I sat in the plane some out of the wind and answered questions of people who wandered up. I also answered questions about the T-6, as that pilot didn't ever talk to anyone. He'd just show up and give a ride and go back and sit and eat. So I put little kids in the cockpit and went back and forth between my airplane and that one which is also my airplane. ;)
The end of the day, I secured BOB, paid my last fuel bill, and Nathan and I headed for Orlando International to go home. I was really ready to go home. Really really. It was a cluster. The traffic was a disaster, we were stopped. There was no good signage, so we missed the area to turn our car in and had to go around the area in stopped stalled traffic. We get the car turned in and it takes us 1.5 hours to get through the checkout line. We hike to security, and now, even though we got there almost 3 hours early, we are stuck in the security line while our flight says it starts boarding. It takes another hour to get through security in total. Nathan had more than 3 oz in his bag so they pulled it and had to search it. We have 15 minutes before they close our gate and we miss our flight. We run to the gate but you have to take a train to get there. The train had just left when we got there so we had to wait on it. Five minutes to go. We speed walk to our gate, at the end of the thing. No time to eat, or drink, or pee. We hadn't had food since noon and it was now 8:30 pm. And suddenly the thing flashes "Delayed to 8:45 pm". So we took turns going to the bathroom and holding our place in line. Then I walked all the way back to the main terminal to get some food and a drink. Nothing was open but two places, and they had giant lines. No way did I have time. So I hiked back to our gate. We finally get on board, and we have to buy a Diet Coke and a mini can of Pringles for dinner for $10. We land around 11:30 pm, and I have to go get my bag that I had to check in because it's Spirit Airlines and I could only have one bag. Hiking to baggage, waiting for it, and then Steve and Chuck are there to pick us up. We stop at Arby's because we haven't eaten, and then get home around 1 a.m. That was a long, long day, full of uphill battles and no food or drink, and Orlando was a stupid nasty airport. I never want to see that place again. Everything went wrong, everything was hard, everything was backed up, everything was grumpy. I'm so glad I'm not an airline pilot dealing with people all day in hoards like that. I cannot.
So this morning I slept in until 8:30 for the first time in weeks, and I needed it. I felt like I'd been a tennis ball in a dryer, just banging around in there. It took me all morning to get ready, until it was 10:15 and time to leave to go pick up
My Car!
Even that didn't go smoothly. We were there for over 2 hours. There was a misspelling on one of our paperwork things and they had to redo it. We spent a lot of time with the salesman, and then I downloaded an app that will let me start my car from anywhere, and lock it, and track it if I lose it or it gets stolen, and turn my heated seats on from afar. :D We went out and played with the car, the features. Went in and signed all the financial documents which took awhile. Then Steve left while the salesperson finished showing me the car's features, until I drove off in my new car. Went through the carwash first, as it was a little spotty. Then through McDonald's to get lunch and take it out to the airport and show it off a bit. It drives great, it's comfortable, it's fast (top speed is 196 mph by the way, not that I'll probably ever find that out), and I think it's purty. Steve and I had dinner tonight, and were seated by a window where we could see my car. In bright sunlight, it's brighter, and as the light fades, it gets dark and metallic. It's a really pretty color and I dig it. It has lots of cool features, and we're over here still digging into the manual tonight. I love having the remote app start so I can start enjoying a warm car in the winter again coming in from restaurants or out at the airport. Heated steering wheel, heated seat, and remote start from wherever I am, not having to be close to the car at all, will make winter a lot more pleasant for driving. I of course can bluetooth in my phone, for navigation, music, phone calls, texts, etc. One of my favorite parts is the sunroof. I drove around with the cover open all day, love the extra light in the car, and I drove around with the window open for awhile even though it was cold. Seems funny, but I've never had my own new car, never had a car with a sunroof or a computer or heated anything or stuff. So this is fun for me, and I like it. :)
Kaylee texted me today that she has 5 tickets for her graduation April 29th, Saturday. She would like them to go to me and Steve, Cathy, and Mom & Ernie, if those three would be able to and would like to go. They don't offer nearly enough tickets. One of her friends has a huge family and can only have five of them go. People can't have their family AND friends from other grades come see them graduate. Doesn't seem quite fair. But...limited space. I told her I was getting a ticket one way or another, and after that it can be everyone for themselves. ;)
The cat is still alive, and Ann still recognized me after being gone two weeks. So I guess Steve did pretty well--and he's happy I'm home too. lol
My last ride on the Spring Tour. John & Vanessa
Nella getting worked on
Finally winging my way home
Diet Coke and Pringles. Dinner of champions.
My pillow!
My new ride.
Me likee.
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