Friday Funday

Not really. I spent most of the day working on the communications and knots and scheduling problems I've got. 

A guy who wants me to do two T-6 checkouts but I'm expired in the CAF and I don't want to do a CAF T-6 checkride and so I emailed HQ and asked for an extension based on my currency in T-6s.  Another guy who wants to finish his checkout.  Heck, a bunch of stuff.  But here's the long one: The Novel of the 19th.

Originally I was to fly to KISM (Kissimmee, FL) with Kevin and family and Steve on Sept 19th and we stayed until the 22nd and all came home together and had a fun little Disney vacation.

Then Andy wanted to go to Marco, so I told Kevin I couldn’t stay in FL. Forgot that I still needed to GO to FL. Told Andy I could take him on the 19th.

Then MBros said he wanted me to fly his family to Knoxville the 22nd from 1 pm to midnight. Since I wasn’t staying in FL, I said sure, I could do that.  Forgot I still needed to GO to FL on the 22nd to pick up Kevin.

Enter me remembering, and panicking and putting off contacting everybody to tell them I screwed up.

Today I ask Kevin to leave at 8 am so I could be back by 2 pm. Andy had wanted to leave at 1, so that’s close.  Kevin agreed. Andy agreed. Two trips to FL, one after the other, two different airplanes.

I get home tonight and Kevin calls. He can’t go at 8 am, he can’t go until 1:30 or so, because someone works and their dog sitter is a problem too.  I call Andy back. He can’t go in the morning, he can’t go until after noon.

I ask Kevin how many people are going. I ask Andy how many people are going. We discuss all going together.  I ask Andy if they’re okay all going together.  They all agree. So now there’s ONE trip, leaving Kokomo around 1-1:30, stopping in Frankfort and picking up the other two, going down to Kissimmee, where I drop off round one, take round two over to Marco, then home.

And that’s the Novel of the 19th.  ONE of the scheduling things I was working on.  For the 22nd, I'm going to have to leave Kokomo at like 6 am to get down to FL in time to get home by 1-ish to take Dustin to Knoxville, but I think it'll work out.

We were also working on Marion's fly-in tomorrow, with the weather being iffy and a guy coming from Terre Haute and checking weather and going back and forth with him and us. 

And then there's the SMA thing.  I was just contacted by a mom with a kid with SMA, they're behind on their accessible van payments, and they're behind on their car insurance payments, and they're about to lose both, as of Sept. 3rd and 5th. If insurance cancels they lose insurance on all their vehicles which is required to legally drive in their state, and if they lose the van, they can't take their son anywhere, including to appointments. Insurance is easy to have canceled on you, the van would require a little more effort to get away from them, but still. They sent me the documents on them, so I can see the notices of cancellation, etc., and send money on directly to the place under that account number, so money doesn't go directly to them. But I don't have time to send the companies an e-check, so I spent a few hours tonight trying to get through to make a payment on one of them. The other one I can't until business hours, but the first one I can. But I was honest and said I was making a payment not as the account holder and they got all weird. So second time I said I WAS the account holder, I had all the info, and made the payment no problem. So the van won't be under threat of repo right now, but the insurance still cancels on the 3rd unless I can get to that in time. Might have to be Monday, with one day to spare. 

I've spent three hours dealing with some Kaylee stuff, nothing major, but she talked to me off and on for hours, going back and forth.  I'm Tired of Communicating.

I worked on all these things until about 9 pm here. Now I'm tired in every way.  The best part of my job is definitely the flying, not the scheduling, the paperwork, the...everything else.  lol

Tomorrow is Marion, T-6 rides, hopefully with good enough weather. We shall see.

Summer Day

I don't know how Kaylee's doing, but she's been calling every night and talking for about an hour, so I'll probably hear before too long.  lol

I spent all day completing aviation missions of one sort or another. At 8:45 am I was at the airport, flying right seat in the RG over to Toledo International with Cameron left seat, and Hannah in the back. Hannah is our admin person who is also taking lessons and has a checkride coming up to be scheduled soon. She was gone for two months over the summer doing her master's and an internship, and when she came back, she said she'd really missed flying. She said she loves to fly alone, and when I mentioned "freedom" and "air therapy", she lit up, and was like...yeah, exactly that!  She's not one of those who only likes to fly if someone is with her, or is scared and working through it. She really enjoys it, and I have good thoughts of that one.  So anyway, I took her along to fly back with me in the Conquest.

Get to Toledo, I had told them I was coming, but the plane was still buried in the hangar when I got there. I did the preflight in there, and I flipped on the batteries to check fuel, and they were dead. I had sent Cameron on because I was going to beat him anyway, and I thought "oh no", because if the batteries were dead, if they left the switches on and drained them, I wasn't going home in it today, that's for sure. But fortunately they had deliberately disconnected the batteries, and once I hunted someone down, the reconnected them, and all was well.  Whew.

Hannah and I flew home, and she hand flew, her first time flying something that wasn't a C-172, so it was challenging for her, and fun.  At the end I did a super steep turn, and pulled up pretty high, floated it over to the right, and she just loved it, sat there with a smile the whole time.  It was in Toledo for autopilot problems, so I then went to shoot an ILS and an RNAV approach, after I passed Cameron in the air.  The autopilot did fine, held both of them pretty well.  

When I landed, Ethan asked me if the autopilot had problems in heading mode, because my track wasn't very straight. I laughed out loud and told Hannah that Ethan had just roasted her without knowing it. I told him no, a student pilot was hand flying it at that point, and he laughed too.

I met Steve, and took Morgan, Cameron, and Dan P who had come out to the airport, out to eat a late lunch at Half Moon, then I went up with Cameron with him in the back seat of the Champ to do some instruction, so he can become a tailwheel CFI. He did a great job flying from the back seat, but it was pretty calm, so we need one more flight with some wind. I did a couple where I would mess it up and he had to save it, which he did well. We just need a little more practice before sending him up with a helpless student, but he did great. His wheel landings were roll-on. I told Steve tonight I'd hate to do a contest with him or Morgan on Champ landings, because they both are greasing these things on, and I usually do too, but I'd hate to be beat.  lol

From there I was headed home, when the 172 came up to the maintenance hangar with Morgan and a student who heard a banging noise coming from the back. So after a thorough walk-around where nothing was found, Steve and I took it up to try to find it, and it wouldn't do it with us.  Of course. 

I ran through the car wash to try unsuccessfully to get all the bugs off my grill, ran through a chicken place to get dinner for later, and then came home to work on the usual billing and logbook stuff. Tomorrow is a Conquest trip to nowhere far away, hopefully with decent weather. And I have two scheduling problems I HAVE to work out, but I've been avoiding working out because I'm the one that goofed it up and I'm not sure how to un-goof it up. *sigh*

Hannah flying us home

Are those FALL colors already?

Be Real

Cameron flying me around from the back seat

Heat's On

Kaylee informed me that you can't get an LSW without being an MSW, so it's redundant to say them both and you can just say LSW.  So I have changed thusly. ;)

It's hotter and muggier up here than it is in Florida right now, Always love that.  My business flights didn't happen as planned today and tomorrow, but it was too hot to do any other flying, so I just stayed home. Did laundry, cleaned up, took out recyclables, dishes, trash, a couple new house bills that came in, the usual Sunday stuff.

Steve had a couple of important meetings and money transaction things himself today, which is more fun when it's coming in than when it's going out, but hey...

When I ran a couple errands outside the house, I stopped at Smoothie King to get a smoothie bowl, something Kaylee got me hooked on. They're really good, fresh fruit and a smoothie blend. I've gotten about a dozen of them over time, they make for a cool, refreshing lunch on an ugly hot day. Well, today I decided to look up how much fiber and protein are in these things, as I was going to look for maybe a healthy option.  Ho-Lee-Shit.  These things have sometimes as much as 100g of sugar in them, 100g of carbs, and 60-80g fat.  I can't properly use the swear words I actually thought when I read those. There is not one of those bowls that isn't a bomb of fat, carbs and sugar to your system, fruit or no fruit. It's like eating a salad with all the good stuff and a pile of dressing on top of it and it having 3 times the calories of a filet.  It was RiDONKulous.  That's a worse dessert than almost any piece of pie or cake.  Why did it have to taste so good? No WONDER it tastes so good.  Acai, berries, cocoa nibs, coconut, bananas and strawberries, sure, sounds great, and healthy. One of my two favorites (the other has almost identical numbers) has 104g Carbs, 21g Fat, 60g Sugar and 51g Added Sugar (didn't want to just say 111g sugar apparently), and who cares that it also has 11g of Fiber?  With those kind of numbers, might as well take my pancreas out and replace it with an insulin pump right now.  So...I won't ever be blissfully enjoying those any more. If I get one I'll know up front what I'm doing and that will probably suck a lot of the enjoyment out of it. Ignorance is bliss, but it's a good thing they provide that info or a person might not know why they're trying to eat a "healthy smoothie" every day and ending up with Type 2 Diabetes and progressively bigger pants.  Sheesh.

My first Shingles shot doesn't seem to have negatively affected me much. Sore arm, as to be expected, but even that is only sore if somebody hits me in it or I push on it, otherwise, you forget about it. I woke up feeling a little warm and draggy and thick but I think it was still a little dehydration and sun and heat exposure from yesterday, because throughout the rest of today, after much water and air conditioning, I felt pretty good.

Not much else going on tonight. Tomorrow I am to retrieve the Conquest if the weather will hold out. Otherwise, quiet week while we melt here in the Mid-West.

Converse

And the heat wave moves in.  Wheeeew.

I wasn't able to get to sleep until after 2 am, mind was just going. Fortunately I didn't have to be up super early this morning.  I got up at like 8, did some things, and then around 10 am left to go out to the airport to catch a ride with Morgan and Brennan over to Ohio to pick up the MBros 340. He did a great job flying as a student instrument pilot.  I picked up the 340, had Morgan fly us home. The plane did well, one pressurization problem that it always seems to get every year, and one split throttle situation. Other than that, it seems to be in great shape, fortunately.

Landed, and Morgan and I ran into town and got some lunch at McCallister's, sat and talked for an hour or two, had a BLT and some tea, cooled off from the previous flight, then went back up in the Champ, and we went over to Converse Airport, the old military navy octagon that still has one runway left on it, surrounded by broken concrete and huge weeds.  It's 40' wide and 1850' long, and you have to stay on it, so it's good practice, especially with the crosswinds we had today. She did fine, and we stopped the plane, shut down, got out, took some photos, and had a little fun with it. :)

Back to Kokomo, it was late now, so I left and headed to CVS, where I got my first Shingles shot. Steve had gone out to dinner with Jeff P, so I stopped in there, did my first shot, which I had to pay for out of pocket ($300) because our insurance didn't cover it. But I really don't want shingles, so I'm getting two expensive shots to avoid getting it, hopefully.

Home and paperwork and logbook and scheduling and yadda yadda. Tomorrow hopefully getting the Conquest back in the next day or so.

Me showing Morgan my multi-colored leg

Hair tornado in the back of the Champ

Shots of Converse

Runway 25

Middle of nowhere Converse

Off the runway is not so great

I like this one. Runway behind me, shadow of our airplane

Me and Morgan

I was behind this guy. I think I found who is meowing on Guard

Check out these clouds outside of CVS!

Wild...

Nuthin'

Kaylee was here for awhile, she joined us for dinner last night and spent the night, and she and Steve went next door several times to look over some things and move some things around in the house next door for her to move into in a few months here.  They're both excited about it, and that's good. It puts some new life into the house, new memories, new look, and frankly, Ann would have absolutely *loved* having her there making it her own. The REAL Ann.  And we think that's cool.  I just went over to take a look at how they're coming along. It'll be nice, and Kaylee will like it. Lots of space, lots of natural light, she can even start working on the garden some, since she's so big into plants now. She's also trying to get us to let her get a cat, a grown one, to keep over there. She wants a dog but even she knows she can't manage that right now with her schedule, work, etc., at least not fairly. But cats can take care of themselves for a lot time.  We don't want a cat over there, but Steve will let her.  I'm not taking care of it, however. I'm all done with that.

I've had a trend of naming this blog. In the beginning, well, the first one I remember, we were "Two Pilots and a Princess". Then she got too old for that so I made it "Two and a Half Pilots" because she was taking lessons and progressing relatively quickly for awhile there.  Then it was "Two Pilots and a College Student", I think it was.  Now I've changed it to "Two Pilots and An MSA, LSW". I debated between "A" and "An", but it depends on how you say it.  lol We'll probably leave it like this for awhile, maybe until she becomes a full-on therapist.  Then I'll probably change it to "Two Pilots and a Therapist".  And thus it'll probably stay for awhile.  ;)

I'm not doing a damn thing today. I didn't even put my laundry away. I paid two house bills. I did take a shower. Needed that one after yesterday. It's 90 degrees again outside, and muggy, and I don't want to play in it. I'm positive that the extreme humidity/heat gives me headaches. I had one yesterday, and I woke up with it again today, and it's getting worse. Not today's headache, that's gone. The tendency to get them in the heat. I don't know how long I can do the extreme heat flying stuff any more. It's killin' me. I don't know what more to do, I hydrate, I try to take care of myself, but when I start sweating hard, I can feel it like a trigger going off, and I know I'm toast, and how do you prevent that? Stay out of the heat. How do I stay out of the heat in un-airconditioned airplanes and events? I don't. So...  Is it weight related, physical fitness related, would those things help? Or is it just age and exposure related and I'm hosed?  I dunno...

It's gonna be in the 90s the next few days. I don't even want to mess with it again. I want to take advantage of the sun and clear skies and nice winds, but...I just recovered.  *sigh*

Westfield Aviation Days

Steve was out of the house by 8 am, which is when I got up. I leisurely wandered out to Kokomo, where I saw the guys had cleaned the T-6, topped it off, topped off the oil, removed the catch can, gotten the cushions set up in the back seat, and positioned it in front, but they forgot to put my helmet in the front and another headset in the back.  Pshaw!  lol  I pulled it out and flew over to Westfield Airport for their aviation days, which started at 10 am and went until 4 pm. We were going to leave at 3. Morgan brought over one 172, Harkcom brought over a second 172, and Cameron brought over the Cherokee 180, and we offered Discovery Flights all day.  $99/pop for up to 3 people, with the front seater getting a flight lesson/discovery flight, and the back seaters who could just go along if they wanted. We did those rides all day, until first the Cherokee went "Bingo Fuel" (there's no fuel at Westfield), then Morgan's 172 did, then the third did, and we had shut down flights anyway because it was already going to be 4 pm by the time we got done, which is an hour later than we wanted to stay.  I stood up on the wing of the T-6 for a long time and put kids in and out of the plane, took photos, let them sit in it.  Eventually Brennan came over to relieve me, and Justin Harris came over to relieve him, and Shelbe relieved us for awhile, and we took turns. I was up there 3 or 4 times for awhile, and you cook in the sun, when it's over 90 degrees, and that's why having helpers is good.  Then Harkcom needed a break, so I took over his Discovery flights, and I did three rides in the 172, before taking the T-6 back home.

We met up with 10 of us for dinner at Pastarrific, including Kaylee who just met up with us, and we bought dinner as a thank you. Can't really afford it, but they all volunteer for that long, hot day, so that's just what we do, and it's appreciated by the ground crew.  Morgan had a nasty headache. So did I. Kaylee didn't feel well either but she wasn't outside all day so we're not sure why. The guys all seemed to be fine.  lol

Now it's only 9:52, but I've been ready for bed for an hour. Waiting for a reasonable time to pass out, and then I shall sleep in tomorrow morning, I hope.  Nothing on the agenda for tomorrow.

Our three trusty steeds

Me helping the current last little dude in line up into the airplane

Our T-6 and Larry Jacobe's Stearman

Shelbe on the wing of the T-6 for awhile

I just thought this was a cute little dude

Hannah at the sales desk, T-6 in the background

You know who in you know what

Friday

Slow day, and that's okay. Picked up Steve in Tipton after he dropped his Jeep off for some maintenance, and brought him back to the airport. We hit a late lunch, then I took him back to the airport, hopped in the Citabria and flew to Frankfort to get my headset out of the 340 there. Came back in for some landings at Kokomo, mission accomplished.  Hit dinner with Steve, Chuck, and AE at Harvey Hinklemeyer, before the guys came over for Friday night around the camp fire. 

Kaylee's degree was conferred today. She was super excited. It's finally, officially, all 100% completely done and in hand. She can officially start her therapist job, she's licensed and done and good to go. :)

She's also definitely going to move in next door, so she and Steve have been discussing how to arrange furniture, what to get rid of and what to keep, how to move it around, etc. They're both a little excited about it, and it will be good to have someone living there and put some new memories in there.

Citabria action

Not straight and level

Thursday

I sort of took the day off. I slept in until 7:30, had a 10 am appointment, did laundry, took out the trash, picked up the house a bit, bedding, usually stuff I do on Sundays but hadn't done lately I guess. I didn't go to lunch with the guys, I didn't go out to the airport on this beautiful day to go fun fly, although I considered both. I stayed home, in silence, and I read a book for awhile, and did light house work. I was fatigued, and I don't know if some of it is still catching up from the time zones and huge amounts of flying, or if it was emotional baggage from lawsuit stuff, or what, but I was weary today, so I didn't do much today, and in today's lingo, they'd probably call that "self care". ;)  No news from the lawyer yet on a settlement, on where anyone is, on if our "offer" will be accepted or if it's going to trial, or what.  So we wait (and continue to pay the mediator for time when we're not even there). Tonight Steve and I met Ethan, Amber, Tell and Atlee at the Angry Donkey and had a really good dinner. Deviled Donkey Eggs, steak, wine, and I had angel food for dessert.  Good stuff, good company, and we had a nice time. 

Now it's 9:45 pm, back home late, tomorrow I've really only got two things. One, Steve wants me to pick him up when he drops off his vehicle for maintenance, and two, I'm running Nathan and Tre down to Knoxville in the Aerostar and dropping them off, and coming home.  So it should be a pretty easy day there, too. Maybe when I get back I'll fly the Champ or T-6 or something.  Should be a good day.

Suits and Suitables

So today was the lawsuit mediation or negotiation. There were four of us in separate rooms in the building. The plaintiffs and their lawyer, and then three of us remaining defendants. In my room, in the basement, it was just me, Steve and our lawyer, Jeremy, and then the mediator would come in for ten minutes and leave and we spent the rest of the time staring at each other.

Me and Steve are, as I think I said, actually defending 6 remaining organizations or people. Me and him both individually personally, my charity SMA Support, the LLC that the plane was in (no additional assets), the LLC that is our flight instructing business (no assets), and the kids' flying program non-profit organization (no assets). The lawyers agree there are two, really only one, that could potentially have anything at all that could be argued against it and even that is a stretch. I learned a lot about why they didn't just go for a summary judgement to dismiss us a long time ago and why it would be better for us to "settle out" of it, so they can't come back on us later.

However, because it was just us in the room, he let us know that nothing we said could be used against us, juries wouldn't even know we met, he couldn't disclose anything we said to anyone else, etc.  I wasn't told I couldn't talk about it.  The plaintiffs are going for $45 million. They've already settled with two other insurance companies, amounts of which is NOT allowed to be disclosed, they're hoping for one more big one who was there today, and they've left us and our 6 in the suit too even though there's no insurance to be had. I laughed.  

When they said we needed to offer something to be bought out of the suit, basically, our attorney put forth a number and asked if that was okay. Steve said "Are you asking me, or her?" So since they said I could say whatever I wanted, I said "I find this absolutely repugnant. I am a logical person, and I will be smart, but I find it disgusting and I don't want to give them a dime even if it costs me more in the end to 'win'. You and they know darned well we don't belong in the suit, but until we throw money at them, we're not allowed out." So the lawyer said that we could make it so that I paid $1, SMA Support paid $1, etc., and Steve had to pay all the rest, so it wasn't me paying them anything.  I did laugh at that.

Interestingly, the big fish who is left, by the time we left, is not negotiating well with them. They lowballed it big time and are not moving up much at all. So at the end of the day they sent us home.  We  did make the guy laugh once when he came down and told us what the others were offering and basically had to ask if we were going to up our offer to try to further the negations along.  Steve said "Let me check my accounts and see if we can bump it up another $xx million here to get this moving.  Oh, no, sorry, can't quite cover it.  No, we're going to stay right here on our 'offer' (cough blackmail cough)." 

I know this is a game. I know it's not personal. I know it's how it's done. But I don't like this game, and I don't want to play, and it IS personal to a lot of us.

After this is over I am shutting down my SMA organization. After almost 30 years of families mostly with very little to their names scraping together and doing fundraisers and farmers and workers and pilots coming together and donating money to help other families whose children have died or are paralyzed and dying, this other family wants to take it all out of some sense of entitlement because they lost their kids too.  So the legacy they are leaving of their kids' memory is to shut down and destroy everything around them in the quest to get rich, as if that is some sort of "justice".  I hope they choke on it.

Re-reading that, I don't have a problem if they or their lawyer finds and reads this. I didn't disclose anything I was told not to. Actually I asked today if this "settlement" comes with an NDA on our part, and he said we'd have to see if they requested one, or we could request one. He didn't know why I asked but Steve did. I don't want one. I want people to know why the kids' program is almost gone, why we don't take people for rides without making them sign waivers, and why a charity organization for terminally ill children is shut down.

Like I said. Choke on it.

That took a big chunk of the day.  Oh, and not only do we get to pay our lawyer a large hourly fee, but we also have to split the large cost of the mediator guy with the other two defendants remaining. But there's only one big fish left, and it's not us, and yet we have to pay thousands of dollars for the big fish and the big negotiator to go back and forth with the plaintiff.  They didn't come to terms today so they'll keep going, who knows how many more days. So glad to be a part of it all.

After we left there, I went out to Kokomo and went up with Cameron in the Citabria. He wants to practice some landings from the back seat, get ready to be a tailwheel instructor, so we ran around for 1.2 and got some practice in, and the fresh air and sunshine after spending the day in a basement with a lawyer was...refreshing.  Then Steve and I went down to Sheridan and met the airport people for pizza at Greek's Pizzaria.  Home by 8:30 or so, and off to work on a few things for tomorrow. 

So you keep going.  What else ya gonna do?

Colorado

It was a little more eventful yesterday, but not terrible. I definitely have a flat spot on my butt from sitting on it so much lately. I did a little check, and I've flown 32 hours in the last 7 days, and 67 hours in the last two weeks. That's a lot!

The Conquest won't be ready for awhile, as the autopilot people lied about how long it would be before they even LOOKED at the servos. So now we run into not having a plane for two more long trips of theirs to FL and back after I already used the Cheyenne to Colorado twice and Vegas once. Stinking S-Tec is doing terrible at customer service and satisfaction, and it seems to be a theme with companies dealing with turboprops for some reason.

Kaylee started her new job Monday while I was gone, and I haven't talked to her and I have no idea how it's going! I'm going to text her now while I type this.

So Sunday I got back home around 6:30 pm. I went to bed at 10 pm, and then woke up at 6 am, which is 3 am Vegas time, where I spent the last three days. Went to Kokomo and pulled out the Cheyenne, and had a really hard time with it because our tug isn't aired up properly right now.  All my time flying back from Frankfort to Kokomo, and now back from Kokomo to Frankfort, meant I didn't have enough gas on board to get back to Colorado. But Kokomo was closed when I landed and before I took off, and Frankfort was also closed. But they have a self serve pump. So I left early and landed over there and parked and tried to use the self serve pump only to have it not pump. I had to wait until 8, I was supposed to leave at 8, and now I'm late. I'm picking up a photographer lady there, and when the guys come in at 8 I have them top me off. They forgot to open a valve on the self serve pumps so that's why it didn't work. Cool. She loads up, and we head to Colorado, uneventfully. She rides in the back for 2 hours, up front the last hour, I go around a batch of weather as usual, and we land at Gunnison no problem.

Ethan picks us up, we load up the plane, I give the fuel order, and then we go out to their trailer where the photographer gathers clothing and picks up Amity and Clay and takes them out into the mountains to do an engagement photo shoot. While they do that, we go into "town" (Pitkin) and I get a killer BLT sandwich, and we wait for the love birds to be done. While they're doing that, I'm watching the weather, because storms are supposed to start firing up that afternoon. Sure enough, around 2-3 pm, here they come, and I tell people that hey, we need to get going here before we get trapped. We load up, race out to the airport, I pay for the fuel, file the flight plan, and I go to start, and the right engine won't start.  There is an IEC (Computer) fail on the right engine, so it won't start like normal. I have to remember how to do the manual start, which I attempt twice, and then on the third attempt I get it, and it fires off.  Whew.  Away we go, but I have to manually monitor all the torque, temps, EGTs, etc. on the right engine, which we pay attention to anyway.  Off we go heading in between storm cells and behind others, to get behind the line and get out of there.  Up at 31,000', after that round of storms, all was well.

Two hours and 45 minutes later, we get to Frankfort uneventfully, and I go to shut down, and the right engine won't shut down, either. The Stop button doesn't work. So I had to shut down the right engine by shutting off the fuel with the feather function. That means the right engine is feathered, and it won't start again that way. So after I unloaded everyone, I had to manually unfeather the prop, and then I reset all the circuit breakers, and tried firing it back up, and it worked.  I was able to start up and shut down normally again, at least. 

When I took off out of Frankfort, Ethan texted and said they were expecting a steep climb-out, so when I took off, I climbed it out like a bat out of hell.  Good ole Cheyenne. I asked him if they were glad we didn't do that with them on board, and he said no, they expect to do that themselves next time they're on the plane.  lol

Oh. That morning when I left Kokomo to go to Frankfort, it was IFR. It wasn't just IFR, it dropped down to 1/4 mile and fog at Kokomo. If it went that low at Frankfort I wasn't going to get in, so I had to get out of Kokomo as fast as I could and get to Frankfort before it tanked. Fortunately it didn't tank, it stayed at 500' overcast, and I was able to hand fly the approach in, which was good practice with nobody else on board.

I finally got the plane put away at Kokomo around 9 pm. I had a hard time getting the plane on the tug, but finally I got it done, and got home around 9:30 pm. We watched a movie for a couple hours, but then I was too tired to be sleepy, so I watched ANOTHER movie, and I couldn't get to sleep until 2 am. My schedule was just all messed up.

This morning I slept in until 10 am because of it, so that was nice. Met up Ty and others for lunch, came home and brushed my teeth and flossed and then had a dental appointment at 3 pm. Got my teeth cleaned, which I hate doing. I hate the feeling, I hate the polishing most of all. But I got a clear bill of dental health, so yay for that.

Came home, worked on my schedule, which takes a lot of time, and then at 5 pm drove out to Kokomo to pick up Steve and Cameron, and I drove us down to Noblesville Airport for the CAF meeting. I was going to fly down until Steve invited Cameron and now we didn't have a 4 seat airplane to fly into the grass strip, so we drove from one airport to another, which just seems wrong. IS wrong.  We didn't get back home until after 9 pm again, after dropping Cameron and Steve off at the airport to pick up their own cars.

Tomorrow is a meeting with the lawyer on the lawsuit. We'll see how that goes. It's scheduled for the morning, 9:30 I think. When that's over with, I may fly with Cameron in the Citabria for him to practice some back seat stuff again. We'll see.

Oh. And Westfield Airport, the EAA Chapter there, we donated a T-6 ride to for a raffle for them to raise money for their chapter. They sent an email out that they had to cancel it because of some legalities. The owner of the airport came on and sent an email through saying this event is supposed to help neighbors not protest having the airport there and "The family will not allow gambling of any kind. Please clear all activities with me before planning such future activities on our airfield."  That was such an asshole move. The lady setting it up was just trying to do something fun and cool, and nobody was trying to do any kind of illicit gambling. We donated the ride out of our own pocket, we're not making money on it. And he just slapped her and sort of us across the face with that little line. So as far as I'm concerned, he can take his airport and shove it up his ass. What do I care if your neighbors don't like the airport any more, if you're going to be a jack wagon about people who are there trying to do a good thing for it?  I wrote him back and informed him that even churches use raffles and nothing untoward was happening, like I said, we paid for it ourselves, so stuff it.  He didn't respond to me yet if he's even going to. But I do feel bad for Amy who tried to set it all up and just got smacked down.  Guy was a jerk.  

Anyway. These photos are from Colorado.  So beautiful. A much better way to end a post. ;)

Foggy Morning on the way to Frankfort

View from Pitkin, CO

Such a cool place

This is a warped view of the trailer they lived in

Me, Ethan, Atlee, Erika, Amber, Tell, and behind those two, Clay and Amity

Sunset on the way back from Frankfort to Kokomo

Cheyenne at Sunset

Such a big tail you have.

Home

"The Awakening" was pretty, and interesting. Great stage, good technology, still Vegas weird but not as weird as the Circus Du Soleil stuff.  It was a story of light and dark that broke the rules and were separated, and a hero who had to go gather these crystals from the realms of sea, fire, earth and air, and bring it all together to break a spell and bring light and darkness back together. But each world was filled with some pretty cool visual spectacles and we were in the 2nd row, so we had a good show of it all.

This morning we were up early, out the door by 8 am, and wheels up out of Vegas by 9 am their time. We were able to make it non-stop because of the tailwinds, had a little weather to work around but not much, and I landed in Frankfort at 4 pm. Got topped off there, flew back to Kokomo, and we hadn't eaten all day yet because of the long flight and early start.  Put away the Cheyenne, drove through Hardees where it took us 15 minutes to get chicken strips for dinner.

Got home, ate, Ethan starts texting me about tomorrow, so I had to dig into the weather and see about tomorrow's trip to Colorado. Looked like some storms happening in the afternoon, and I'm bringing a photographer with me to take engagement photos of Amity and Clay, and we're just hoping we don't all get stranded the rest of the day by the weather and get home after midnight.  So I'm leaving at 8 am from Frankfort. Which means I have to land at FKR by 7:45 am, which means leaving OKK by 7:30 am, which means getting there by 7:15 am, which means leaving the house by 6:50 am, which means getting up at 6 am, which by the way is 3 am Vegas time, where I've spent the last three days.

I got my receipts sent to three people for three different recent trips, got the billing organized and sent out, and my logbook updated, and then started planning for tomorrow's trip to CO.  I'm going to try to go to bed soon here so I can get up early enough tomorrow and hopefully be awake.

Yesterday Steve and I ubered over to FlyOver and did a couple of those. We flew over Iceland, and over the Canadian Rockies.  Beautiful, beautiful scenery. You're right there, in a moving seat, with a huge screen that makes you feel like you're right there. So much so that if a person is prone to motion sickness I'd be wary of having them do this. There's a lot of swooping and diving and turning and climbing. They HAVE to have had people barf in there before.  lol  But it's cool. We had a drink at a bar downstairs, had dinner just before the show, went to the show, and filled up our day in Vegas with things we were interested in.

Pueblo gave me a bottle of wine for buying so many gallons of gas.  lol

A giant pile of crab legs just waiting to be devoured

The next bath are from "The Awakening"

The stage

Fire nation

Sea

Earth

Air

A cool Phoenix that rose

The Wynn's lobby

On the way home....