Ohhhhhkay

I didn't do much over the weekend. I didn't really go anywhere except out to the airport to get the Aerostar ready. Steve and Kaylee went on a short 2-mile hike on Saturday and enjoyed that. She was testing her stamina as her first hike back since being sick. She did well, but was worn out by the end of it. So it was a perfect first trip back out. Steve painted the back wall of our deck, and that took most of the weekend. Today he's working on TSA stuff for our upcoming annual inspection. He always hates those. Turnover is so high in the TSA that he gets a new guy/gal every year, they aren't consistent, and they are typical government employees with badges with little power trips and egos who enjoy trying to make you squirm, be uncomfortable, whatever. They like it. They want to find something they can tell you you're doing wrong, and Steve always, ALWAYS ends up arguing with them, getting his blood pressure up. Once he told a TSA guy that he knows they aren't allowed to carry a gun, and how that's too bad, because HE can.  He's gonna get in trouble some day. Anyway, they're coming this week. Should be...great.

Am tired. Or Tarred if you’re from southern Indiana. 

Up at 5:30, drive to Frankfort, pull out the 340, fly it over to Delphi, pick up Jim, fly over to William’s County, OH, drop off the 340 for maintenance, pick up a Cherokee Six, fly over to Toledo. Jim takes Cherokee Six back home to Delphi where his car is. I go up in the Conquest and we do a bunch of post-maintenance tests. NTS checks, idle checks, manual settings, computer settings, torque and RPM tests, temp tests, at 5,000’, 10,000’, 17,000’ and 26,000’. Shut down and fully feather both engines, er, one at a time, all the required tests. Everything went great until the end. It went downhill on the landing power settings, and we went backwards, and it's going to need more work. I ended up bringing it home anyway, but it’s going to need to go back over, again, in a couple weeks, while they swap out a prop governor, for $16,800, or $30k if the fuel computer is bad too, and then I get to redo all these test flights all over again.

It’s why I liked using the Colorado shop, because they had their own test pilots who would go up after maintenance. So all I had to do was drop it off, and when it was done pick it up and fly it home. I don’t really like being a test pilot, so much effort, and I’m not a mechanical expert in this plane. I do have a mechanic on board, and I do trust him, but…and think about it from his point of view. He’s not even a pilot, up there bombing around doing shit like that with some random person he doesn’t know, hoping they don’t boff it up.

He appreciated that I went slowly and would verify out loud what I was hitting when one engine was already shut down. “LEFT ONLY, turning off this…” Because accidentally shutting them both down at the same time would be embarrassing, now wouldn’t it. “Sorry Toledo/Cincinnati, we’re gonna need a block altitude for a bit here, hopefully.”

But it’s home now so I can at least use it for a trip to Western Oklahoma on Wednesday, which will take me 3.4 out and 2.1 home, or 5.5 total there and back, and would have taken me 6 hours ONE WAY in the 340 including the fuel stop I’d have had to have.  I'm so glad to have it back for some of these trips, man.

Landed out of that, put the plane away, hopped in my car, and drove to my last dentist appointment down in Indy, where they took an x-ray, checked out my tooth hole/stud, declared it “perfect”, and cut me loose for good to get my new implant put in. Again, I drove two hours round trip for a four minute sit in the chair, literally 4 minutes, and I was in and out of there. Next week I have an appointment with my dentist to make the mold for it. Only two appointments to go and I’ll finally have a tooth there again and not feel like an old lady with a holey/gappy smile!

Now tomorrow I’m running to the eye doc to get more contacts ordered (in Indiana anyway they force you to have an actual exam every year before they’ll allow you to purchase more contacts, which grates my grits, as it’s a money grab, but…), and then I’m taking Tre in the Aerostar to Waukegan, on Lake Michigan, where it’s going to be good and low IFR again, and rain, both here and there, close to minimums, hopefully not below them. The Aerostar has had a couple of avionics issues, so I am hoping it behaves itself for these two flights. I'd really like it if the weather would be higher than 300' all the way here and there, but...beggars and choosers and all that.

Ethan's guys are having a “push up” contest that lasts a month. I am in no way competing with a bunch of 20 year old construction workers on push ups.  But at least they were impressed when they heard I could do 10 of them. They said their wives couldn’t do even one, so I won some sort of brownie points. :D

Kaylee said she didn’t remember the last time she jumped up on me and I held her, it’s a Tik Tok thing I guess, and she asked if I could still do it. I said yes, so she tried it, leaped up on me. I caught her and held her for awhile without us falling over or dropping her, so I won that one too. I’m not as strong as I used to be, actually not at all, and I need to start working on that so I don’t lose it lose it, but at least I’m not a weakling yet either. ;)

My new blue nail polish in front of Gumby

God's Paintbrush this morning