And now we're home. What a long, exhausting trip we've had. And 2/3 of our luggage is still in Flint. We've been assured, however, by Harlan in the baggage office, that our duffels will be delivered to us sometime tomorrow. Here's hoping the shuttle can find our apartment with no help from anyone else on campus... since there is no one else on campus until Tuesday.

And now here we are. In 25 and a half hours, we'll be getting off a plane in Flint. It'll be our first time in Michigan in 5 months. That didn't really seem like so long to me, until an acquaintance called it "half a year". That makes it seem like ages. We're packed and ready, just waiting for 9:00 tomorrow morning to get here so we can hop in the car and go. When I get done fooling around on here, I'll go to the American Airlines website to check us in and print our boarding passes. How truly strange it all seems to me.

We're now only barely two days out from our trip to MI. I did most of my packing earlier and we just spent some time reading the American Airlines website to learn as much as we can to prepare for our flight. Not a whole lot left to do now except get all anxious and lose sleep. Big fun!

Last call

Does anyone want some Mexican Kool-Aid? Seriously. We're bringing some back to Michigan for my sister's family and Kara and Casey's gang. It's actual Kool-Aid brand, but there are 4 flavors you can't get in Michigan (at least you couldn't 5 months ago), and underneath the Kool-Aid logo, it says "Aguas Frescas". The flavors are pineapple, mango, tangerine, and one called Jamaica which, near as I can figure, is based on the juice of a certain flower (it tastes a bit like tea). If anyone in Michigan wants some, please let me know before Saturday so I can get it for you before we head for Tucson.

On the verge

We're now only 4 days away from our trip back to Meeeeeeeeechigan. People keep asking me if we're "going home" for Christmas, and it's really starting to get to me. Since July 13, our home is Douglas, Arizona, so we're not going home for Christmas; we're going to Meeeeeeeechigan for Christmas. And yet, bother me though it may, I find myself occasionally slipping up, too, and saying things like, "I can't wait to eat at Panda Express while we're home." Annoying. I guess I'll really be in a state of confusion when we move to Africa. "Excuse me. Excuse me, sir? Can you tell me where my home is?"

Tis the season

Here are some pics we've taken over the last week or so. The bears are what Jen and I decided to buy Mady and Jack for Christmas. It's a little bit hard to tell, but the bears' shirts say "Cochise" and "Cochise College" on them. The green sleep pants are one of the presents Jen gave to me for Christmas (please ignore the pink shirt I'm wearing, as I have a hard time seeing the value in matching my sleep clothes). Moving on, the cloth thing with a chicken on it is actually the cross-stitch project I'm giving my mom for Christmas. I just finished it maybe half an hour ago (I started it in March). And finally, the pic of Jen being cute is... well, it's just Jen being cute, and I really like it. This being my blog and all, I decided all of you should like it, too. You're welcome. And enjoy!

Mady

Jen and I got a Christmas card from my sister today, and inside was our niece Mady's school picture. Seeing as she's the most beautiful 4-year-old in the world, I decided to share the pic with you. Enjoy!

Got this in an e-mail

A lady wrote the best letter in the Editorials in ages!! It explains things better than all the balderdash you hear on TV.

"Let's Say I Break Into Your House"

Recently large demonstrations have taken place across the country protesting the fact that Congress is finally addressing the issue of illegal immigration. Certain people are angry that the US might protect its own borders, might make it harder to sneak into this country and, once here, to stay indefinitely. Let me see if I correctly understand the thinking behind these protests. Let's say I break into your house. Let's say that when you discover me in your house, you insist that I leave. But I say, "I've made all the beds and washed the dishes and did the laundry and swept the floors; I've done all the things you don't like to do. I'm hard-working and honest (except for when I broke into your house). According to the protesters, not only must you let me stay, you must add me to your family's insurance plan, educate my kids, and provide other benefits to me and to my family (my husband will do your yard work because he too is hard-working and honest, except for that breaking in part). If you try to call the police or force me out, I will call my friends who will picket your house carrying signs that proclaim my right to be there. It's only fair, after all, because you have a nicer house than I do, and I'm just trying to better myself. And what a deal it is for me!! I live in your house, contributing only a fraction of the cost of my keep, and there is nothing you can do about it without being accused of selfishness, prejudice and being anti-housebreaker. Oh yeah, and I want you to learn my language so you can communicate with me. Why can't people see how ridiculous this is?! Only in America....

Stitcheroo!

As I mentioned in my profile, I like doing counted cross-stitch. I find it very relaxing to bring the focus of my perpetually over-active mind down to a tiny little hole and the point of a needle. The only really crappy thing about counted cross-stitch is that it's hard to find decent patterns at stores, unless you go specifically to a craft store. If you do that, though, you end up paying $20+ per pattern. On top of that, we haven't found any craft stores around here, so even if I had $20 to drop on a craft, I wouldn't be able to.

Last night, I was sitting around thinking about what I want for Christmas, and I remembered that there's computer software out there that will convert photos into cross-stitch patterns. I decided to do a little price-checking online, and discovered PM Stitch Creator 3.0 has a free 15-day fully-functional trial you can download. So I downloaded it, and wound up spending 3 or 4 hours last night learning how to make my own patterns. It's not a flawless system, as it has trouble converting detail in photos sometimes, but it's a heck of a lot better than having to stitch Dogs Playing Poker because that's all I could find at Wal-Mart. So far, I've made a Yoda pattern, a Spider-Man pattern, a me-and-Jenny pattern, an MAF pattern, and a pattern based on the Thomas Blackshear painting Forgiven. Will I actually stitch all of these pattern at some point in the future? Probably not. But it's fun to make them, all the same.

We just got home from our Sierra Vista Thanksgiving adventure. We had Thanksgiving dinner at Belinda's (assistant chief flight instructor) house, with her husband and kids, and some of their church family. We had turkey and ham and stuffing and all the normal Thanksgiving foods, and we ate in their backyard. It was really sunny and warm out. We had a very nice time.

After dinner, we weren't quite ready to go home yet, so we went to Fry's instead. Fry's is a grocery store that we had never been to before. We decided to check it out, since it was one of very few places open for business today. We discovered that it's sort of the Western U.S. version of Kroger. In fact, they sell Kroger brand products. And, upon close inspection of Jenny's Kroger card, we found out we're able to use our Kroger cards at Fry's rather than having to obtain Fry's cards. Very cool. It's always refreshing to discover something familiar when you're far away from what you've known. Our plan is to go to First Baptist of Sierra Vista (Belinda's church) on Sunday, then maybe stop at Fry's and do some grocery shopping.

Yeah, we're still trying to find a good church around here.

My wife is the most wonderful wife in the world, far as I'm concerned. Not for any one particular reason; she's just all-around wonderful. She's also unspeakably adorable. That being the case, I'm done speaking.

A Private Pilot by Thanksgiving

I just got home from my check ride. By the grace of God, I passed it. I am now a Private Pilot. What that essentially means is that I can now legally fly a plane by myself, without an instructor or an instructor's endorsement whenever we have the money to rent an airplane for me to fly. It also means that if we do rent an airplane for me to fly, I can now take Jenny up with me. This will most likely result in higher quality aerial photos in greater quantities, again assuming we find money to rent a plane.

Just like I did after my last stage check, I need to make sure the glory for this is all directed toward Almighty God. This isn't anything I'm achieving on my own. I'm here, both in this place and in this flight program, because God desires it to be so. The skill in my body and the knowledge and wisdom in my mind are gifts from God and answers to prayer. The successes I enjoy are also gifts from God, and also happen solely because it is God's will that they should. Without Him, I'm unable to do any of this. Without Him, I'm nothing.

How do you study for a test when you have no clue what the questions will be about? I just want the stupid thing to be over and done with, so I can move on with my life. Stupid anxiety.

Have you ever spent so much time and effort studying for a test, that you end up not even caring whether you actually pass the test? That's sort of where I'm at right now. Since yesterday afternoon, the majority of my time has been spent studying for my practical test on Tuesday. A few minutes ago, I finally had to put the study guide down and decide to call it a night. My head hurts and I'm about studied out. Tomorrow looks to be another exciting day of study, though. And Monday. And probably the time on Monday night when I'm too anxious to sleep.

Tonight is my second night flight, this time a cross-country to Tucson for some touch-and-go's. Finishing it will mean that I've completed nearly everything I need to complete in order to take my check ride on the 21st. I also discovered, last night, that I own the "practical test study guide" which will be really helpful when I start studying in earnest for the practical test (fancy term for check ride). See, the bookstore bundles a bunch of private pilot stuff together into a flight bag, so when a new flight student goes over to get their stuff, they can just buy the bundle and not have to try to pick up each individual thing. The problem is that there's too much junk in there, and I just tossed mine up on my bookcase and pulled out each book and item as I needed them. Well, Erin kept mentioning a study guide they sell in the bookstore so I went to the store to try and get one, but they didn't have any. So, later on last night, I looked over my bookshelf o' flying and found a crisp, new practical test guide. I plan to spend the weekend reading it to prepare myself for Tuesday. I'm so ready to be done with my private cert.

Another solo pic

Here's another pic of me soloing this morning. I'm mostly just posting it so I can use it as my new profile pic. Enjoy!

I'm back from my long solo flight. It was exhausting. I took some pictures. I'll post one now and the rest later. Very tired.

Spontaneous final exam

I'm supposed to be taking my Aviation Weather final exam right now. I don't remember if I've mentioned it before, but my Aviation Weather class was a mess right from the get-go. It was being taught by a guy who has never taught before and, by his own admission, has never scored higher than a 78% on any test. That said, his "lectures" were, almost without exception, either him reading from a book or him just throwing random weather-related facts at us. Often, he would either be unwilling or unable to answer weather questions his students asked him. It was bad. Anyhow, fifteen minutes into class yesterday, he looked at his watch and said, "Well, that's 16 hours of lecture. You guys wanna take the final right now instead of waiting til tomorrow?" So we did. He based the entire final on a handout packet he'd given us a few days prior, and he allowed us to use the packet during the final. So, ultimately, it was just a matter of looking up each answer and copying it onto the test. I'm guessing I got an A. In fact, I'm guessing everyone in the class got an A. I would be bewildered if anyone DIDN'T get an A.

Tomorrow morning, bright and early, I'm flying my long solo cross-country. I had mentioned previously that it's to Silver City, Safford, Willcox, Sierra Vista, back to the college. I was mistaken: there's no Willcox leg. It's just Silver City, Safford, Sierra Vista, and home. I'm allowed to fly the route either way; either Silver City or Sierra Vista first. I would love to go to Sierra Vista first, since it's the only towered airport on my trip, and I'm required to make 3 stop-and-go landings there. However, since tomorrow is Veterans Day, the tower isn't in operation until 8:00. Since my flight begins at 6:45, and Sierra Vista is a 20-minute flight, I'm forced to save Sierra Vista for last.

Great scott! I just noticed that if you read the "random facts" part of my profile in a certain mindset, you could draw the conclusion that we're trying to get pregnant. I feel an overwhelming need to clarify as immediately as physically possible. Jen and I are most certainly NOT trying to become pregnant at this time. Please don't read more into the profile than is intended to be conveyed. Yes, I write messages to my future child. Yes, I'm secretly (I guess not really secretly anymore) envious of my friends who have kids. Yes, we would very much like to be parents one day. But that day is not today, or any day in the near future. It's probably more like a "someday between finishing college and moving overseas" kinda thing. Now you know.

Holy crap! I passed my stage check! I gotta testify. My short-field and soft-field landings have been consistently bad since I started doing them. Even yesterday, I attempted 10 landings total (a mix of short and soft), and only managed to pull off one decent soft-field landing. Today, I asked God (repeatedly) for skill, for knowledge, and for His will to be done in this. Belinda had me do one short-field and one soft-field landing, and was so pleased with both of them that she didn't make me do any more. I also did very well on all the other exercises I had to demonstrate. In fact, Belinda only critiqued one thing I did, but after I explained my reasoning to her she agreed that my decision was valid.

The other thing I asked God for this morning was the humility to continue to give Him all the glory for my flying and keep none for myself. I'm telling you very plainly that God worked a miracle this morning in that He enabled me to do far better than I really expected to do. He gave me that skill and knowledge I asked for, and His will was done. The flight was His, and I praise Him for His goodness.

Quick update

Thank you everyone who wished me a happy birthday. I really appreciate it.

I passed the oral portion of my X-C stage check this afternoon, without too much difficulty. Tomorrow morning at 7:30 I'll be flying the practical portion of it. I'm a little nervous. I'm going to have to demonstrate a few things that I've been having trouble with in my daily training sessions. God willing, I'll muddle through somehow.

Run

There have been times in my 8 years in Christ when, out of the blue, I've been staggered by a sense of conviction regarding some area of my life. No warning, no train of thought leading up to it, no particular reason at all, save the Holy Spirit moving within me. I had a moment like that today, somewhere between walking home from class and folding laundry. It was one of those moments that stops you in your tracks and takes the breath out of you, where you're astonished by the fact that something could so suddenly cut you so deeply, when you've lived with it so long without it ever really bothering you before. A moment that derails whatever mood you'd been in two minutes prior and breaks your heart. And here I am.

Verge

Erin and I scheduled my cross-country stage check this morning. I'll be doing at least the oral portion of it, and possibly also the practical, on Tuesday afternoon. Belinda was going to try to find room in her schedule for it on Monday, but I asked for Tuesday. I don't know why, but I really want to do this stage check on my birthday (biological, not spiritual). I suppose if I pass, it'll be a huge birthday present to myself. If I fail it... well, I'm going to focus on not failing it. To that end, Erin is going to try to find time in her schedule for us to do an afternoon flight sometime this weekend, since I've never really flown in the afternoon and I could use the practice before the stage check. We're also going to do some night local at 6pm on Sunday.

Assuming I pass the stage check on Tuesday, I'll be preparing for my long solo X-C. And when I say long, I mean long, no pun involved at all. It's a flight from the college to Silver City, NM, to Safford, to Willcox, to Sierra Vista, back to the college. The minimum time requirement on it is 4 hours. I've never spent that much time in a single-prop plane before. Should be grueling!

After that X-C, I'll have a night X-C to Tucson and a couple hours of review with Erin, then the check ride for my private pilot certificate. I'm actually on the verge of doing this thing. Wow. How else can a person possibly describe the feeling of drawing one step closer to their very God-given destiny? Just wow. Just wow.

Doo doo doo, lookin' out my front door...

Here's a couple pics I took last week, of the view from our front door. (If you click on them, you can see the bigger versions.) They're not anything you probably haven't already seen, but I was feeling particularly awestruck by the mountains that day. I'm hoping to head back to the airport park this weekend, so I can take a few pictures of the mountains up close. I also want to get a picture of the D. You'll just have to wait and see.

Tucson, Part II

Today was my second flight to Tucson (to make up for my first flight to Tucson), and I had a back seat passenger this time. Selena (the girl with the photos from my last post) rode along with us, since we used her flight time in addition to my flight time. Unfortunately for Selena, Erin's comm box wasn't working properly, so Selena's headset didn't work. Apart from that, I'm very glad to say that this trip went much better than the last one. I got to talk to ATC and make my own landings. And, amazingly, my landings (we did a couple touch-and-go's) were pretty smooth. A problem student pilots sometimes have is flaring too high on wide runways, which causes them to drop down pretty hard on the landing gear. The reason is that we subconsciously memorize our perspective on roundout and defer to that perspective any time we land. Obviously, if we're landing on a wider-than-normal runway, it's going to seem like we're lower than we actually are, causing a premature roundout. Today, though, I really concentrated and managed to make 3 decent landings.

The trip back to Cochise from Tucson was really smooth. In fact, Selena fell asleep for a while. I remember someone once saying to me that one of the best compliments you can get on your flying is to have a passenger fall asleep. Mission accomplished, I guess.

Tomorrow, I'll probably find out which day I'll be flying my cross-country stage check. I've still got pretty good odds of finishing my private before the semester ends. Please, God, enable me to finish my private before the semester ends.

Disgusted...

I walked into class today, sat in my usual seat, and was almost instantly handed a stack of photographs by one of my just-out-of-high-school classmates (coincidentally, it's the girl who will be riding back seat on my X-C tomorrow). The photos were of a party she had at her friend's house this past weekend, and starred 5 or 6 of the students in the Cochise College aviation program. And every single person in every single picture was heavily intoxicated. In fact, several of the photos were of one of my under-aged classmates passed out with his head resting on a toilet seat. Apparently, puking took so much out of him that he had to cuddle with the porcelain for a nap.

This absolutely disgusts me. After all the emphasis our instructors have put on being responsible and acting professional, and how important those qualities are, here are half a dozen of my fellow student pilots drinking themselves stupid at a party. And they weren't all private students, just starting out, either; one of them is almost done with the program, and another one is working on his commercial. How very pathetic.

Another Long Flight

I flew with Erin again this morning. We went up and practiced a couple in-flight diversions. Basically, it's preparation in case we're ever faced with a situation where we're not able to go to the airport we'd planned on landing at. For instance, if a squall line moves in over our destination, we're not going to be able to land there. And, assuming our trip has been longer than a simple local flight, we're not going to want to go all the way back to where we started from, so we divert to an alternate airport. There are some calculations that have to be made and some figures to jot down, while still flying the plane, and the point is to make sure we know where we're going, make sure we know how to get there, and make sure we've got enough altitude and enough fuel to make it.

We did two diversions today. Erin said I did fairly well, in that I maintained some control over the plane while doing my calculations. Some students just let go of the yoke and focus solely on their paperwork, which can spell disaster if they ever do that on a solo. I tried to split my attention between the plane, the paper, and my flight computer. It wasn't necessarily pretty; there was alot of turbulence today, so everytime I let go of the yoke for any amount of time at all, the plane would bounce all over the place. But I got the diversions done and would have been able to get to an alternate airport had it been the real deal, so I'm happy.

Unfortunately, the turbulence made for some ugly traffic patterns on my part, which makes Erin hesitant to let me solo again. She wants to see that I can make pretty patterns and put the plane on the ground in a competent manner before she'll let me go it alone again, even though I have Joshua's endorsements and Belinda's approval. It's probably just my pride that makes me chafe at that a bit. Erin is just trying to make sure I'm safe and that I'm doing my very best, and with the right measure of humility, I'm grateful to her for that. She did tell me, though, that if I can show her good patterns on Monday morning, she'll step out and let me go up alone again.

We're still going to shoot for Tuesday as our Tucson day. Erin is going to try to rearrange things a bit so her 9:45 and her 8:15 switch times. Her 9:45 is a very light little twig of a girl, so having her in the back seat will most likely not overload us. And that's the goal, baby! Here's praying it pans out right.

Speaking of light little twigs, Joshua (former flight instructor) came over for dinner and card games last night. It was really alot of fun. (We had worried that we wouldn't be able to watch game 4 of the Series, but it was called on rain anyhow, so no loss there.) Jen and I tag-teamed on a crockpot of turkey chili, and Jen made a loaf of wheat bread, since she knew Joshua prefers wheat to white. And we had some frozen brownies for dessert. If you've never eaten a frozen brownie, you really should. They're amazing. After dinner we sat and talked and joked around for awhile, then we played a brutal game of Phase 10 (brutal because I lost, hard). After Joshua schooled us in that game, we moved on to Quitch (thank you, Phil and Cathy, for giving that to us) which was a hilariously good time. Then we had a short time of prayer and sent Joshua on his way. It was a really good evening.

Long Flight

That title is sort of a pun, since Erin's last name is Long. Get it? Like, I flew with Erin Long today, so it was a Long flight? No. *sigh* Never mind.

So I flew with Erin for the first time today. And I feel like the time was well spent. She's not as nitpicky as Joshua, but she also didn't micromanage my flight or take the controls away from me, either. We went up and she basically put me through my paces. I did slow flight, turns in slow flight, power-off stalls, and steep turns. We simulated an engine failure and made a power-off landing at the college, then did a short-field takeoff, a normal landing, a normal takeoff, and one more normal landing. She gave me some feedback on my performance, and everything was great. And we're (very) tentatively shooting for Tuesday for my X-C redo. We talked a bit more about it, and I guess it won't truly be a redo. We're going to fly to Tucson, do some touch-and-go's, and come back here. We're cutting the Safford leg right out, since there's no benefit to going back there. That's fine by me. I just need to get it done so I can fly my stage check. The sooner the better.

I just can't resist these ridiculous things

The cans:
Can you blow a bubble? Yup!
Can you do a cart wheel? Nope!
Can you tie a cherry stem with your tongue? Yes. In fact, I can tie two together with my tongue. I'm not kidding.
Can you touch your toes? With what? A yard stick? Then yes. Yes I can.
Can you whistle? Not very well, but yes.
Can you wiggle your ears? Yep.
Can you wiggle your nose? Yes. Unaided by my finger? No.

The dids:
Did you ever get in a fight at school? Several, but none of them lasted more than one punch. Seriously.
Did you ever run away from home? Not really, no.
Did you ever want to be a doctor?: Yes. In fact, I was still considering becoming the PhD version as recently as three years ago.
Did you ever want to be a fire fighter?: Yes. But I was one of those kids who wanted to be everything.

The do's:
Do you believe in God?: Definitely.
Do you know how to swim?: I can keep myself from sinking and/or drowning. My "technique" would probably make a real swimmer laugh, though.
Do you like roller coasters?: I've never been on one. I don't intend to ever change that.
Do you own a bike? Unless my parents have sold mine in a yard sale.
Do you like summer or winter more? Summer.

The does:
Does hair loss run in your family at all?: No. The men in my family just develop very stately foreheads.
Does your car get good gas mileage?: Not too bad at all.
Does your family have family picnics?: We have before.

The haves:
Have you ever been on a plane?: Oh, once or twice.
Have you ever asked someone out?: Of course.
Have you ever been asked out by someone? Yes.
Have you ever been to the ocean?: Saw the Atlantic once.
Have you ever gone fishing?: Yep!

The hows:
How much money do you have on you right now?: Not a penny.

The lasts:
Last person you hung out with?: My lovely bride.
Last thing you said out loud?: I was singing along to Andrea Bocelli's Romanza. Does that count?
Last thing someone said to you?: I'm not sure. Jen said something to me as she was walking out the door to go back to work, but I can't remember what it was.
Last person you met? A fellow flight student named Gabriel.

The whats:
What are you listening to?: Andrea Bocelli's Romanza.
What is the temperature outside?: I'm not sure. It's kinda cool out today. AZ cool, not MI cool.
What radio station do you listen to?: The three english stations we get here are all kinda lame, so I usually stick to Napster or CDs.
What was the last restaurant you ate: Huh. I don't think I've ever eaten a restaurant. I came pretty close once. See, there was this seafood restaurant in Mackinaw City, and they were serving all-you-can-eat crab legs. Well, I tend to like a good crab leg, and I sort of went on a bit of a feeding frenzy... y'know what? It doesn't matter. I'll just say "none" and move on.
What was the last thing you had to drink? Diet Coke w/lime.
What was the last thing you bought? groceries, I think.

The whos:
Who was the last person who imed you? A former coworker from MI.
Who you talked to on the phone with last?: <--- Horrendous grammar. Anyhow, the answer to the poorly-worded question is Jenny.
Who was the last person you took pictures with? I took a pic of/with myself earlier. Does that count?

New pics

I decided to post a few new pics. One is me grilling. One is me being snuggly in a blue blanket. One is me playing with the digital camera again. Enjoy!

Breakfeast. Wow!

I love that commercial.

Anyhow, you're probably waiting with bated breath for another update about my instructor situation (yes, Helen, I'm talking to you). I had my first flight period with Erin today. We didn't go up; we just sat in her office and practiced diversions and ATC communications, but I already like her way better than Darren. She's very knowledgeable and she communicates clearly. The only downside is that she may not be able to fly my X-C redo until next weekend (Nov. 3-4). If that's the case, it's going to mean I only have a little over a month to finish my private certificate. Is that enough time? Yeah, probably. But I liked it alot better when it seemed certain I'd have my certificate by the first week of November. Plus, when I talked to Belinda yesterday, she told me she wanted me to get my X-C stage check done sometime in the next week. That's not going to be possible if I'm not flying the Tucson X-C for another almost two weeks.

But, on the plus side, Erin and I are going to fly a dual local tomorrow, to practice diversions in the air and knock some of the rust off me. Like I said in my last post, I haven't landed a plane myself in over a week. I need to get back up to speed. And Erin said she would at least try to figure out a schedule change that would enable her to fly the X-C with me sometime this week. She's willing to work me into the schedule, and she knows where I'm at in the syllabus. Two more reasons to prefer her to Darren. Things are really looking up!

In other news, I got an e-mail yesterday, informing me that there's been a schedule change for our December trip to Michigan. Now we're going to have an almost 3-hour layover in Chicago on the way to Flint. And on the way back to AZ, our Chicago layover is only going to be 60 minutes. Guess Jen and I had better figure out how to navigate O'Hare during the long layover, so we'll be able to survive the short one. I'm sure it'll help when we finally get our gate information. No reason to worry.

Pyrrhic victory...

This morning, I got up, got ready, and made my way to the aviation building to fly the local solo flight I had cleared with Darren on Friday. When I got there, Darren was in his office with a student, so I just went to the briefing room and checked the computerized weather info. Then I grabbed some keys and started to head out to preflight my plane. I actually made it outside before I stopped and turned back. I haven't made a landing on my own in about 10 days, so I'm a bit nervous about doing it again on my own until I've had a chance to do it dual. And there was some wind that had me a little uncomfortable. So I hung up my keys, took my name off the board, and went to tell Darren I'd reconsidered. Only Darren wasn't in his office. I hung out for maybe 15 minutes to see if he'd come back, but he didn't. I think he went flying with the student who was in his office when I first got there. If that's the case, then he obviously forgot about dispatching me, which means I wouldn't have been able to fly today, anyhow.

On that note, I got my chance to talk to Belinda today. I told her about my experiences in Darren's class and how those experiences had left me without much faith in Darren's ability to instruct. Then I told her about the X-C on Friday, and how my lack of faith in him had only been reinforced. She just sat listening and shaking her head for a considerable portion of my monologue. At the end, she asked me if I'd noticed her sitting in the back of the room during class on Thursday. I told her I had noticed, and she told me she'd finally had to leave the room because she just couldn't take it anymore. She thanked me for bringing all this to her, because most students would have just tried to muddle through. Muddling through, though, doesn't make the higher-ups aware of problems that need to be dealt with, so she was glad I let her know about Darren. She told me I'd never fly with him again, that she was going to have a talk with him this afternoon, that I was going to go back to being Erin's student, and that I should try to get with Erin later to work out a schedule.

Just as I was about to leave, though, Erin came knocking on Belinda's door, so Belinda let her in and we decided I would just be in Erin's office at 6:45 tomorrow morning. Turns out that Erin's original 6:45 student had decided to switch instructors to free up Erin's schedule a bit, and she'd never bothered to fill the time slot. So not only did I get a new instructor and manage to hold onto the time slot I'm used to, but I'm also Erin's only student at that time, so she'll be able to focus solely on me. Before my chat with Belinda, I couldn't imagine how God would make it all work out, and now I'm completely in awe of how He did work it out.

The only grey spot in all of this (and the reason for the title of this post) is that Darren probably got in some form of trouble for what I told Belinda today. Maybe she gave him a verbal smack-down. More likely, she probably just let him know how unhappy I was and how unhappy she was. I think Darren is a really nice guy. I've probably said that before. He's friendly and funny and personable, and I'd love to be his friend. I don't like thinking I got him in trouble. In fact, it makes me pretty sad. But it had to be done. I don't regret going to Belinda. I tried to be as mature and objective as I could about it. In fact, she commented on how kind I was being, considering the circumstances. But I do regret that it had to come to that, and that an otherwise great guy had to be "talked to" by his boss. As Belinda told me, "Sometimes God uses us to be the fire." And as I told her in reply, "I just hate being the fire."

The dilemma continues to grow

I finally got to fly my cross-country to Tucson with Darren today. Oh, how I wish I could tell you it went well. How I wish I could just chuckle and say, "Boy, was I silly to worry so much about flying with Darren." Instead, I'm forced to sit here and confess that today is the first day since moving to Arizona, that I've seriously wondered if I misunderstood God's will.

I should start by saying that an hour of dual instruction costs me a little over a hundred dollars total. The cross-country took 3.3 hours. That's somewhere in the neighborhood of $350-$400. And I've got a very strong suspicion that that money was wasted and I'm going to have to redo the flight with another instructor. See, I'm at a point in my training where I can get in a plane, fly around to pretty much wherever I want to go, and land it again, all safely. I've already learned how to do just about all I need to know for my private pilot certificate. All I'm really missing is 3 hours of night flight, some experience with Air Traffic Control communications, and a handful of day flight hours. My point is that I don't really need to be taught anything on a dual day cross-country flight, except for ATC communications. I know how to take off. I know how to taxi. I know how to land. I know how to fly the traffic pattern. I know how to determine pattern altitudes. I've already spent the time and money learning how to do those things. On the flight today, Darren insisted on teaching me everything EXCEPT ATC communications. He treated me like I was a first-hour student. Everytime I was just about to land, he took over the controls and landed for me. He tried to tell me I didn't know how to fly the traffic pattern. He made all my frequency changes and all the little things I'm supposed to be learning to do myself, in order to learn to manage my workload. And he made all my ATC radio calls for me. I did not say a single word to Air Traffic Control today. Not one word.

So I finish up with Darren, and I come back home, and I open up my syllabus to see what the completion requirements were for this flight, and it turns out that the big completion standard is being able to operate in Class C airspace and communicate with ATC WITHOUT ASSISTANCE!!! So basically, I just spent $350 on a flight that meant very little regarding my training and failed to meet the completion standards of the lesson. And what does that mean? (Everybody now!) JOSH IS GOING TO HAVE TO REDO THE FLIGHT IN ORDER TO COMPLETE THIS LESSON! On top of that, I'm not eligible to fly the cross-country stage check with Belinda until I've completed the standards set for this cross-country flight.

So now I have to wait til Monday and try to catch Belinda in her office so I can let her know what's going on. I don't want to get Darren in trouble, but this is all much too serious to have him airheading his way through my training. The icing on the cake was when I was sitting in Darren's office and he asked me, "Now, you already have your private certificate, right?"

I'm so afraid, right now, that I'm not going to be able to finish my training here. That I wasted mine and Jen's lives by moving us here. That I misunderstood God's will and brought us across the country for nothing. That we're going to have to move to another flight school to complete my training. That I've failed.

Frustration

As the title implies, I'm getting very frustrated with my education. I haven't flown in a week, despite two scheduled night duals this week, thanks to weather and availability of planes. Class continues to be a lesson in exasperation. We took a test today. Darren told us to study printed weather reports, so I did. And 10 out of the 11 test questions were actually about decoding weather reports. But the very first question was one involving a formula we hadn't previously discussed in class and had no way of knowing. Maybe you see it as nitpicking, complaining about 1 question out of 11, but that's the way this whole class has been so far. I feel like I'm constantly getting caught unprepared, despite my best efforts to stay up to speed. Thank God this is only a one-credit course, and that it's only 16 lecture hours total. If I can just hang on for a couple more weeks, it'll be over and I can get on with my life.

My frustration with the class is causing me to rapidly lose faith in Darren's abilities as an instructor. I'm supposed to fly a cross-country with him tomorrow, and I'm getting really nervous. I dread the thought of trying to learn what I need to know for the practical exam, from a guy who's having trouble teaching a one-credit weather theory course. I've already begun to try and come up with a really sly way to switch back to being Erin's student, just in case tomorrow's flight leaves me wanting to beat my head against the plane. I'm so worried I'm not going to be able to meet the exam requirements and learn all I need to know, before the end of the semester. Granted, if worse comes to worst I can continue with my lessons next semester without much difficulty, but I can't help seeing that as a failure on my part. I'm way ahead of almost all the other private students. I was moving along at a really good clip before Joshua took ill, and now I'm not even able to average one flight per week. It would be like walking a mile, only to die of thirst five steps away from the drinking fountain.

I realized, a few days ago, that if my attitude is right then all my studying and flying and X-C planning can be acts of worship to God. And it seems like since I first realized that, Satan has been working hard to drive me to despair and make my attitude anything but God-honoring. I really need to keep in mind that not only can I worship God with the things I do in school, but I can also be a missionary here and now, reflecting Jesus to Darren. After all, being a missionary is the point of all this. It's not flying the plane or getting good grades. The plane is just a tool. The classroom is just a tool. Sharing the Gospel is all that matters.

Please pray.

I'm almost at a point where I don't want to post updates anymore, because things are so unstable here. For instance, yesterday I was excited about being Darren's student. But today, I sat through one of his lectures in class, and now I'm wondering how this guy ever got hired as a teacher. It's not that he doesn't know his stuff; it's that he gets nervous or excited or anxious or something, and he talks a mile a minute without composing this thoughts. So half of what he says is wrong until he realizes it five minutes later and tries to correct himself. I've got the almost-photographic memory thing going for me, so it's not too big a deal for me, but I'm kinda starting to feel sorry for the other people in my class. And if he's like that standing in front of a mylar board in a nice, steady classroom, what's he going to be like in a moving airplane? I'm hoping that he was hired because he's an excellent flight instructor, and that teaching class just makes him a wreck.

I'm supposed to fly with him tonight, but it's really windy here and I'm not sure I believe the winds forecast that says it'll die down to manageable levels within the next 90 minutes. I might have to reschedule for tomorrow. All I really want, right now, is to get a chance to fly local with him before Friday morning, when I have to fly a decent-length cross-country flight with him. If he's not up to snuff on flight instruction, I'd like to know about it now instead of when I'm halfway to Tucson. *sigh*

Jumanji!

Hey! Here's the pics I told you about earlier. Enjoy!

Yup. Blogger did it again.

Well, figs. Blogger's not letting post pics again. I guess I'll try again later. Sorry.

... And now some more updating

Here's the latest on what's going on with my edumacation. (Yeah, I know.) I took the FAA written test today, which is one of the three tests I need to pass in order to obtain my private pilot certificate. Actually "written test" is a bit of a misnomer, since it's all computerized. In reality, I sat in a little room in front of a computer (with 4 cameras watching me from different angles), and clicked on the answers to 60 multiple choice questions. I only missed 3, earning me a 95%. Sweet! One test down, 2 to go.

After the test, I was fortunate enough to catch Darren in his office. He told me he'd been talking to Erin about my training, and he seems to have a better understanding of exactly what I was asking of him last week. He's booked solid during weekdays, but he's got nights and weekends open, and is basically willing to give me his free time to finish my training. We're going to fly local dual tomorrow night, sort of my intro to night flying. Then, probably sometime this week, we'll fly a dual night cross-country to Tucson and do some landings there. Then, at some point this weekend, we'll fly a dual day cross-country to Tucson, Safford, and back here. I had feared that whichever instructor I wound up with would just say something like, "I'll be here at this time; be ready to go," and not really give me any ground instruction or anything. What I really appreciate about Darren is that he's cool with sitting down after class this afternoon to answer some of my cross-country planning questions and make sure I'm confident planning a cross-country flight. He's also going to teach me some more about ATC and hopefully give me some confidence in flying into and out of towered airports. Thank God!

Jen and I have been married 2 years today. Go us!

We're officially heading back to Michigan for Christmas. In fact, we're heading to Michigan for about 13 days in December (16th - 29th). I bought our airline tickets yesterday. Anyone who might want to bask in the radiant glow of our presence during that 13-day period should leave a comment on this blog post, and we'll try to work out a day/time. Also, if anyone should want to take us out to dinner during that period, we've formulated a pretty extensive list of restaurants we really miss and want to eat at. List available upon request. Note: requests for the list will be considered invitations to dinner, at the expense of the requestee.

I'm kinda geeked by the fact that Weird Al's new album is called "Straight Outta Lynwood". Granted, my hometown is spelling Linwood, but still. It's only one letter.

Oh, and finally, I took a couple pictures of the campus while I was flying a local solo last week. They were taken from the downwind leg of my traffic pattern, at about 900 feet above the ground. I blew one of them up a bit for greater detail. And you can see the leading edge of my left wing in the other one. That's kinda cool for the ground-bound, I guess. Enjoy!

Orphan

I flew a local solo today, staying in the traffic pattern and working on some takeoffs and landings. After I got back on the ground, I sat down with Erin (my new instructor) and talked to her a little bit about where I'm at in my training. Since Darren is going to be flying my dual cross-countries with me, Erin is only really my instructor for dual local flight. But to finish my private certificate, I only have about 6 hours of dual instruction left. I still have a couple dual cross-countries and a couple stage checks, but my X-Cs are with Darren, and my stage checks are with Belinda or Mr. Perry (chief flight instructor here). When it comes down to it, there's not much for Erin to do, in regards to my training. So she suggested I just ask Darren to try to work me into his schedule, instead of splitting my time between the two of them. And soo, in the course of a week, I seem to be on my third instructor since we moved to AZ (my eighth since I started flying). I went and talked to Darren about it, and he seemed a little confused about what I was asking of him. Erin was planning to talk to Belinda about it, and we're going to compare notes this afternoon before my class. All I want is some kind of set schedule and one instructor. For what I'm paying to be in this program, I don't think that's too much to ask.

Update

I left for my 3:15 final exam at 2:30 today, so I'd have time to go talk to Belinda about the instructor situation. And before that, I got a chance to talk to Darren about cross-countries. As it stands, I'll be doing my dual X-Cs with Darren, and my local stuff with Erin Long, who was actually in my short list of instructors I wouldn't mind working with. Turns out all of Joshua's students got split between Erin and a guy named Jorge Sosa (who was in my list of instructors I didn't want to work with), and I got Erin. And even before Joshua's collapsed lung, all the instructors were overbooked with students. So basically, all of the Erin and Sosa flight times are now double-booked, which equals maybe 2 flight periods per week for students who haven't soloed. Since I and Erin's other 6:45 student (Brandon) have both soloed, we're hoping it works as follows: On any given day, at least one of us will be able to solo, which frees Erin up to fly with the other one, should they need dual instruction. If this works as well in real-life as it does in theory, both Brandon and myself will still be able to get our normal number of flight periods per week. Which, in turn, would mean that we'd stay on track and I'll still be able to finish my private certificate before the end of the semester. I feel sorry for those students who haven't soloed yet. This may well result in alot of them getting Incompletes for the semester.

Unexpected twist

Joshua called me last night to tell me he's had a medical issue come up, making him unable to fly for at least the next 2 months. In practical terms, this means he's no longer my flight instructor, and that I don't even have a flight instructor for the time being. So I didn't fly this morning, even though I'm supposed to fly my first solo cross-country tomorrow morning. Joshua suggested I find Darren (the flight instructor who lives downstairs from me) and ask him to do my dual cross-countries with me. He also suggested I go talk to Belinda sometime today to find out what to do about the fact that I no longer have a flight instructor.

This really really sucks, but God knows it's happening and will no doubt use it for my good and His glory. I'll admit, I'm mighty curious to see how He pulls it off. And, to be fair, I was going to have to get a new flight instructor next semester, anyhow, since Joshua hasn't met the currency requirements for instrument instruction. I just thought I'd be able to finish my private certificate before then.

SOLO!!!!!!!!!!

I finally did it!!! After several days of frustration and impatience, I finally made my first solo flight! Joshua and I went out and did 2 takeoffs and landings so he could make sure I knew what I was doing. Then, as I made my second landing, Joshua said, "This is going to be full-stop." That means that instead of adding power and taking off again, you taxi the plane off the runway. For just a second, I thought I'd done something wrong and he was ending my flying for the day. Then I realized he intended to get out of the plane. Such an unspeakably surreal moment, I can't even tell you. Wow. I went up on my own, did 3 takeoffs and landings, and taxied back to the ramp, all the while trying not to let my heart jump out of my chest. What made it all even better was the fact that Jenny got to be here to witness it all.

So I'm over the hump, in a sense. I have to do two more solos just like today, with Joshua riding along for the first part, then I'll be able to take a plane and head out to the practice area and, in essence, do what I want... as long as it's legal. All the glory and praise belongs to God, and Him alone. Thank you, Lord. This calling is more than I could have imagined.

The pictures are of me flying the plane after Joshua bailed out. Enjoy!!!

Heavy wait...

It seems Douglas has replaced Chicago as the "windy city". This morning brought more wind, so Joshua didn't see much point in even going up today. It would have been a waste of time and money, since I don't need to log any more dual local time. I need to get this solo done so I can focus on cross-country work. We're going to try again tomorrow, bright and early.

Flying high...

After my last post, you might be wondering why I was in such high spirits. Well, what you're wondering is really immaterial because I'm going to tell you the reason for my high spirits whether you want to know or not. See, I passed my stage check. Yup! I finally did it. I went up with Joshua at our normal time to practice some takeoffs and landings. I got back on the ground at 7:50, then hung out for 10 minutes, then went out to preflight the plane for my time with Belinda. Belinda's response to my first landing was, "Excellent! Two more like that one, and we'll be done." Two more landings later, and I was back on the ground, grinning like a monkey.

This morning, Joshua endorsed my logbook and my student pilot certificate, so I can officially fly solo. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing this morning (we never have early morning wind here) and it made a mess of my traffic patterns, so Joshua wasn't comfortable letting me go it alone. Fine by me; I wasn't totally comfortable with the idea, either. But we're going to try it again tomorrow morning, bright and early. I'll go up with Joshua, do a few takeoffs and landings, and if he likes what he sees, Joshua will have me drop him off on the ramp and go back out to do 3 takeoffs and landings on my own. I've been told that I should be nervous to the point of losing sleep about my first solo, but I'm more just excited and eager to get it over with. Far as I'm concerned, the redo with Belinda was the nerve-wracking part of this process.

I'll let you know if it happens tomorrow.

Oh, and the two pictures: First is me right after my failed first attempt at the stage check. Second is me right after my successful redo. Enjoy!

The product of endorphins meeting free time alone with a digital camera.

Here's a couple pics of me flying a Piper Cherokee while wearing my new Flightcom headset. Enjoy!!!

Happy landings!

Okay, I know I haven't posted since the "I failed my stage check" post. I'm still not very eager to discuss the details, but I will say that my biggest problem was that my landings just weren't up to snuff. This was something I sort of knew going into the stage check, but I was hoping to do them well enough to get past Belinda so I could work on them by myself. Well, that didn't happen. She told me I needed to work on landing, then get back with her to redo the takeoffs-and-landings portion of the stage check. For a couple days there, I was pretty upset and had no real desire to fly anymore. I actually called Jen and told her to let me know whenever she was ready to go back to Michigan, and we'd pack up and go. I was frustrated and disappointed and feeling pretty crushed. In retrospect, that was a natural way to feel, but it certainly wasn't the most productive mood to take with me to my lessons. I'm sure Joshua was about ready to strangle me a couple times. I just felt defeated and it seemed, at the time, like every critique he offered was just another attack on my already-broken spirit.

Things sort of came to a head a couple days after my stage check. God ended up convicting me about my attitude and I eventually went to Joshua and apologized. I recommitted myself to learning to land and made it known to Joshua that I wasn't really interested in doing anything else until I'd gotten my landings right. He was cool with that because he gets obsessed with challenges, too. So we spent a few days just flying the traffic pattern. Takeoff, downwind, base, final, land. Takeoff, downwind, base, final, land. Over and over and over. And this morning I finally did 6 really decent landings in a row. So I talked to Belinda after class (she teaches my ground training class), and I'm flying my landings redo at 8:15 Wednesday morning. It's not a great time, since it means I won't have much of a break between practice and the real thing, but it's the soonest time she had available, and I want to get this done!

In other news, my headset came in the mail today. I bought it on e-bay last week and have been waiting eagerly since. Well, it finally showed up this afternoon. I'm excited to take it to my lesson tomorrow and try it out. Here's hoping it doesn't suck!

Stage check

Didn't pass. Don't want to discuss it.

Oh! I suppose, since I'm on here, I should say something about flying, too. I mentioned the stage-check already, right? Well, Joshua and I went and scheduled a time with Belinda (the assistant chief flight instructor) this morning. I will be flying my stage-check on Monday at 9:45am. I could've done it this Thursday, but I wanted the extra day to polish a few of my maneuvers, so I can be confident Belinda will O.K. me for my first solo. Gadzooks!!! Seven days from this moment might find me a survivor of my very first solo flight. *faints dead away*

My New Friend, or The Most Horrible Thing I've Seen Today

Here are some pics of the new friend I made on my walk home from class today. Enjoy!!!

The post that's bound to stir fear in the hearts of loved ones.

I was given some frightening and exciting news this morning. At the end of my lesson Joshua very matter-of-factly informed me that I should expect to fly my stage-check with Belinda sometime next week. That means that on that incedible and horrifying day, I'll fly with Belinda (the assistant chief flight instructor) instead of Joshua. She'll put me through my paces and if she likes what she sees, she'll give her approval. Then, the next time I fly, it will be solo.

In case it didn't sink in for you just then, let me put it another way: It's very possible that sometime next week I'll be making my first solo flight! Holy cow!!! I called my dad to tell him and asked him to tell my mom, too. But he says if he tells her now she won't sleep til after I solo, so he's going to wait til the day before. Probably not a bad idea... unless she's reading this. Hi, mom! You should really try to get some sleep.

Hey! Blogger has graciously decided to let me post pictures again. So here's that pic I promised yesterday. Enjoy!

Monday: great news, good news, and bad news.

As I was preflighting my new favorite plane (2143Y) this morning, I got a phone call from my lovely wife. It seems she got the financial aid job she's been trying to get since we arrived in AZ. So, bright and early tomorrow morning, she's driving out to Sierra Vista for her first day of training. Excellent.

A short time after I got off the phone with Jen, while I was still preflighting the plane, Joshua came out to have a brief word with me. It seems a new student is starting to fly, and for reasons unknown to either of us, he MUST fly at 8:15. The problem, of course, is that I'm Joshua's 8:15. So I've effectively been bumped to 6:45. Yup. A.M. I'm not thrilled about it, but I almost got bumped to the afternoons, and I'd much rather fly mornings, so I can't complain too much. Plus, since Jen and I both have to walk out the door at 6:30, neither one of us will have to worry about getting ready quietly so as not to wake the other.

So there's the great news and the bad news. The good news is that I finally made a really good landing this morning. As I mentioned previously, I've been having trouble with the flare. I finally got it today. Granted, it was only one good landing out of 4 attempts, but it's still one good landing! Plus, I might have a valid excuse for not doing better on my other landings. See, the new student who got my 8:15 flight time showed up this morning and rode back seat on my lesson. I did some calculations after my lesson, and it turns out our weight and balance this morning were not exactly kosher, so the plane wasn't handling the way the manufacturer intended. It would explain why Joshua kept warning me about being too fast on my landing approaches, when I've never had that problem before. The fact that I actually managed to pull off a good landing this morning is probably very significant in light of this, but I'm not sure exactly how. I'll let you know if it comes to me.

And, just because I haven't posted a picture in a while, I'm going to root through my files and see if I can find one to post. Enjoy!

Update: Apparently, blogger isn't letting me post pics right now. Reckon I'll try again later. I had a good one picked out, too. Sorry.

The week's lessons

Shame on me. I haven't been posting regular updates/summaries of my lessons. Frankly, there hasn't really been a whole lot to share. I've been flying the plane more smoothly, holding headings, altitudes and airspeeds much better than I was. And I've started doing my own landings. In fact, that's all we did yesterday. The problem is that I can't seem to grasp the concept of the flare. The flare is when you're just about touched down on the runway, so you slowly and smoothly pitch up to sink slowly and touch down gently. I stink at the flare. I either don't flare and land hard and flat, or I over-flare and drop like a rock. There's nothing wrong with a little over-flare, per se, but it's not good form and Joshua is unwilling to let me learn to be sloppy. So I'm stuck on a flare plateau; I'm not improving, but I'm not getting any worse, either.

On the plus side, my traffic pattern is more or less good, and Joshua told me my S-turns today were looking better than they have been in the past. So there's some progress being made, just not with the flare.

Lessons 10 through 12, and some kinda Friday.

The best reason I can give for not blogging about Lessons 10 through 12 the same days they happened, is that this wound up being a difficult/discouraging flying week for me, and I wasn't eager to rehash my last couple lessons so soon. But I figured, for posterity's sake, I may as well say something about them. So here goes.

Lesson 10 involved more hood work. It was better this time, but that's like saying losing one leg is better than losing both legs. Still not terribly pretty.

Lesson 11 had me back in the simulator. It also went better the second time, but it still wasn't too graceful. I felt like an imaginary rhino charging through an imaginary sky in an imaginary plane.

Lesson 12 didn't involve the hood or the FTD. That instantly made it the prize lesson of my week. And it actually wasn't too bad a lesson. I did a couple of really nice stalls and recoveries after a takeoff that was so good it earned me a compliment. But I also did some not-so-great S-turns (they were, however, quite possibly my best yet), and a few ho-hum turns about a point. I even had the benefit of using a round field as my "point" and I still made a mess of it. Downright stinky. However, and this was really the high point of my flying week, I made my own landing, for the very first time in AZ. And it didn't suck, and no one got hurt!!! Was it textbook? No. Was it a gorgeous landing? No. But it was mine, and it was, in Joshua's (apparently, he prefers JoshUA) words, "pretty good". I'll take it!

After my lesson yesterday, I invited Joshua to come over and play games or watch a movie whenever he wanted. I told him just to give us a call if he ever got bored, because we're ALWAYS bored. He seemed enthusiastic about that, and told us he wanted to have us over for dinner and games next Saturday night. Sweet! He also followed me home after my lesson, to meet Jen and see where we live. Aww, how cute. Josh made a friend.

Joshua also gave me a disk with Microsoft Flight Simulator '98 on it and showed me where to download the files necessary to fly a Piper Cherokee on it. So I spent a couple hours flying a virtual plane around a virtual Cochise College last night. You're probably asking how, exactly, that's different from the FTD. Well, the biggest difference is that I get to see where I'm going, versus flying by instruments only. Another nice difference is that I can fiddle around with it as much as I want, with no flight instructor sitting over my shoulder making me nervous. It just may prove useful in practicing the traffic pattern and things like that.

And now, about today. Today I called State Farm in Bisbee (the closest one, but they have a part-time satellite office in Douglas) to talk to them about how their rates compare to Bay City State Farm. Well, that wound up being a fiasco. I think the guy helping me was new, because he was a little jittery and kept forgetting to get info from me. Then he said he'd get my Michigan agent to fax over our premium info so he could tell me what the AZ version of it would be. While I was waiting for him to call me back, I remembered that it's illegal here to drive with an AZ license when your title and registration are out-of-state. Like mine. So Jen and I hopped in the car to go get that taken care of. The guy at the MVD (Motor Vehicle Division) was just about done getting my info in and about to hand me my new license plate, when their computer system crashed. And stayed crashed. This was at around noon. He told me I could leave and he'd call my cell phone when the system came back up. He also told me that the crash was state-wide, and that it sometimes goes down for a couple days at a time. So Jen and I came home and ate lunch. I called the MVD an hour and a half later, and was told the system was still down and please try again in an hour. So Jen and I left for Sierra Vista, so Jen could pick up her prescription at Walgreen's (the closest one). I tried the MVD 3 more times before their scheduled closing time, and the system was still down all 3 times. So I guess I have to go Monday morning after my lesson, to pick up our new plate and all that. Meanwhile, State Farm guy never called me back, presumably because he couldn't get needed info from the MVD because the system was down. So I guess I'm expecting their call on Monday morning, as well.

Oh, and on top of all that, I seem to have picked up a cold or sinus infection or something, pretty much out of the blue. It's got me pretty fatigued. At 8:30, I woke up from a spontaneous nap, and I'm thinking about going back to bed soon. Let's hope I'm fully recovered before Monday morning. Lots to do!!! On the bright side, I have an amazingly compassionate wife who is bent on nursing me back to health. Thanks, Jen! And thanks, God!!!

Lesson 9: Under the hood.

Today, I had my first taste of flying under the hood. The hood is a training device that restricts your vision so all you can see is the flight instruments. You're completely unable to see outside the cockpit. I had assumed that this would be relatively easy for me, since I have the bad habit of spending most of my flight time looking at the instruments anyway. I was wrong. It was hard. I didn't like it much at all. It was like flying the simulator, in that I had to fly completely by my instruments. It was different from the simulator in that I was forced to realize I was flying a real-life plane and mistakes could have very real consequences. For instance, at one point I put the plane in a considerable dive, without intending to. I know it was considerable because when I pulled back on the yoke, I could feel the G forces pushing me into my seat. That's not really good. And then Josh made me do a power-on stall without being able to see outside the plane. That went almost as well as the rest of my instrument time. So my experience under the hood was unimpressive, and it earned me a C in Instrument Reference.

After I took off the hood, things didn't improve too much. Josh has a sadistic obsession with making me do slow-flight, which means you're flying the plane at about 55kts (that's about half its normal cruising speed) with your nose pointed up in the air. And today was no exception. "Okay, Josh, you can take off the hood now. Hey, let's do some slow-flight." I shouldn't gripe. Josh is just trying to make me the best pilot I can be, and he's trying to help me polish my slow-flight so I can impress my examiner when I do my stage check.

Toward the end of the lesson, when it was just about time to land, Josh had me get involved in the traffic pattern and landing. It was a little nerve-wracking, but we got through it... And then he made me take off and do it all again. And we got through it the second time, too.

All in all, today was frustrating, but it's one more step on the road to me picking up the knowledge and finesse I need to really be the best I can be.

Days go by!

Holy smokes!!! Today is our one-month anniversary in Arizona! We arrived here on July 13th, after 3 1/2 wearying days of driving. Man, it seems like so much longer sometimes. Anyhow, to celebrate, we're going to Burger King for lunch! I know, you're envious.

Lesson 8: Gel.

First off, I need to make a note about the absence of a post for Lesson 7. See, there are certain "briefing" requirements my instructor and I need to meet. Lesson 7 was one of those times where we basically sat in Josh's office for an hour and talked about things I need to know about flying and the plane and paperwork and stuff. No flying involved. And, talented writer though I may arguably be, even I struggle to catch my readers' interest when it comes to relating a story about an hour's worth of talking.

So on to Lesson 8. I subtitled it Gel because I really felt like things were starting to gel for me today. Stuff is just starting to come together, and that's very exciting. When I walked into Josh's office for my post-flight briefing, after closing my flight plan and putting the plane keys back, he started by saying, "You did really good today." That's the kind of pat on the back that makes me feel like a million bucks!

My flight time started with my best takeoff yet; a good rotation followed by the proper climb angle. After we got up to our cruise altitude (6500 MSL), Josh taught me a little bit about which mountains were which out there. It was cool because our visibility was almost unlimited, so we could see a couple mountain ranges over in New Mexico. The goals of today's lesson were steep turns, slow flight, and more stalls. I admit that my steep turns were ugly. I couldn't get the bank angles I needed to keep my altitude constant. But, since it was really my first introduction to steep turns, I guess I did okay. Slow flight has, in the past, been difficult for me, but today it was good. In fact, it was so good that Josh complimented me on it. Maybe it was just my imagination, but he sounded almost surprised by my improvement (I know I was).

My stalls were pretty fair, too. Mostly we did power-on stalls, and I was introduced to stalls in a turn. Basically, you set up for a power-on stall, then bank the plane a little. Piece of cake. At the end of the lesson, Josh had me demonstrate a power-off stall. In the past, these have given me a bit of trouble, because there are 3 steps you need to do almost simultaneously to properly recover from the stall, and I always have trouble doing them quick enough. Today was no exception. We flew a little longer than usual today, and I could feel myself growing fatigued, so my already-messy power-off stall technique wound up being even messier than usual. It was bad enough that I flat-out said, "That was messy. I apologize." Josh agreed and asked me if I wanted to try another one, but I had a feeling that any other maneuvers I attempted would just grow progressively more sloppy, so I let him know I was at my limit. He respected my decision, and we headed for home.

Overall, it was a fantastic lesson, and it left me a little bummed that I would have to wait until Monday to go back up. I need to give all credit and praise to God. I prayed this morning that He would give me ability and knowledge, and He clearly answered with an almost-miraculous improvement in my takeoff and slow flight. I feel really cool after a lesson like today's, but so little of it is really me. I couldn't do this without Almighty God making it possible.

Takeoff!!!

And here's the pic of me taking off. It's not as good as the taxi pic, but it's still more than I had before this morning. Enjoy!

Follow that cab!!!

Here is one of the pics I mentioned in my last post. It's me taxiing the plane to the end of the runway. Enjoy!

Lesson 6: Redemption, after the crow-hop.

This morning brought my very welcome return to the real-life airplane, after yesterday's disappointing encounter with the FTD. And today went great! My preflight inspection was textbook and I filed my flight plan with ease. My preflight briefing with Josh went well. It also went long because I spent some time asking questions and trying to better understand some things. Josh seemed to appreciate that I was trying to fit things together better in my mind; he mentioned it in his pre-takeoff prayer, thanking God for my determination and desire to understand.

After we got in the airplane, things started to go wrong in a way that wasn't my fault. My seat back wanted to remain in a partially-reclined position, and that caused me to not be able to see well over the engine cowling. Then, just before takeoff, we discovered that I was incredibly loud when I transmitted on the com, despite out inside-the-plane voice being a little quieter than normal, even though we had our volume maxed out. Just goofy electronics, I guess.

And, since I'm taking a moment to acknowledge things that went wrong, I should mention my takeoff. It wasn't my best takeoff. It was, however, quite possibly my best impression of a hopping crow. See, when you're rolling down the runway and your airspeed indicator hits 50kts, you're supposed to gently ease the yoke back, thus lifting the nose (rotating) and getting ready to leave the ground. When your plane leaves the ground, you're supposed to get the angle of your plane all set up for your climb speed and attitude. Now, I know what my climb attitude looks like, but when I see it immediately after lifting off, I always assume that the angle is too low. So I pull back more which, if you're not very careful, will cause your plane to stall. Stalling immediately after takeoff, when you're still very close to the ground, is bad. You only have so much runway to roll on, before you go off the end and find yourself conducting an Arizona wilderness safari. So you have to get off the ground and establish a positive rate of climb sometime before you reach the end of the pavement. Stalling your plane will only increase your takeoff roll... sometimes considerably, sometimes dangerously. Well, I didn't stall today, but I did pull back too much, which made me panic and push my nose down, which made the plane sink back to the runway, which meant I had to sort of take off all over again. Not a great move, and it earned me a C for takeoff on my daily grading sheet.

After my hopping-crow impression, things went much better. My climb-out was good, despite a little bouncing around from the wind. I remembered my headings, I remembered my altitudes. Overall, I handled the plane pretty well. And I made a point of being much more vocal today: "Okay, I'm having some trouble finding my pitch attitude. What can I do to make it easier?" And other questions like that. Questions that helped me get a better feel for flying and fine-tuning, and helped Josh see that I really am trying my best and want to learn. And the questions helped me feel more keyed-in to my instructor. I felt like he was there to help me, not like he was just there to judge me and tell me I'm doing things wrong. He gave me several compliments today, little comments on how I was improving on some things I'd been having trouble with. I felt good inside.

The focus of today's lesson was refreshing my ground reference maneuvers, specifically S-turns and turns about a point. S-turns mean you're turning back and forth over a straight line (like a road), making even half-circles on each side of the road. Turns about a point are pretty self-explanatory: You pick a point, like an intersection or the middle of a field, and you fly in a circle around it. One of the keys to these maneuvers is correcting your bank angle for the wind. For instance, you have to bank pretty steeply on your initial turn, or the wind is going to push you away from your point or road, and the maneuver is pretty well ruined right off the bat. For some reason, the fields here in southern Arizona are mostly all round, versus the standard square or rectangle I'm used to seeing. This is very good for the pilot (namely, me), because it makes turns about a point VERY easy. All you have to do is make sure your butt is always on the edge of the field. Josh demonstrated one for me, then it was my turn. My first try wasn't too impressive, but my second attempt was flawless. In fact, Josh made me do a third circle, just to make sure the second one wasn't a fluke. And I stuck the third one, too. So, just to make a point (no pun intended), he made me leave my nice, round field and try flying a circle around an intersection of roads, where there was no circular visual aid to made it simple. And I flew something between a trapezoid and an elipse. Not good. But my perfect turns over the field earned me an A in Turns About a Point.

My S-turns weren't as good. That's not to say they were bad, necessarily. They just weren't that great. I'm still having a hard time finding the right amount of nose-up attitude when I'm doing steep turns. See, when you bank the plane steeply, some of your lift (the force that's keeping you from falling out of the sky) gets turns sideways and helps make the plane turn. So, if you give up some of your lift, you need to pull back on the yoke to bring the nose up, so the wings will generate additional lift to keep you from losing altitude. My tendency is to not pull back enough to compensate for the angle of bank, so I lose altitude during the turn but then, as soon as I level out, my nose is too high (the wings are generating too much lift now) and I start to climb. So I need to work on getting my nose up more during the turn, then releasing my back-pressure as I'm rolling out of the turn. Suffice it to say, my S-turns weren't as graceful or pretty as Josh's.

After the ground reference maneuvers, the lesson was over and it was time to head back to the airport. For the first time, I was able to figure out where the school was without Josh's help, and get us there, and make the right radio calls, and get down to the correct altitude for entering the traffic pattern. It was pretty, and it was all (well, mostly) me.

All told, this lesson was definitely a keeper. I enjoyed flying the plane today... except for that little hop in the beginning. And, as a bonus, Jen took a couple pics of me taxiing the plane to the runway, and taking off. However, blogger isn't letting me upload them right now. So, as soon as I manfinish sweet-talking the website, I'll get those posted for your enjoyment.

This is a test, to make sure I know how to post pics. This is my lovely wife hiding in our gaudy bedsheets.

Lesson 5: The FTD.

FTD stand for Flight Training Device. It's a simulator, which means you're sitting in front of a pretend flight panel, all your instruments staring back at you. But when you start "flying" you have no sensation of gravity and no view outside the "plane". So you really have to be watching your instruments, to make sure you're not climbing or descending or turning, unless you actually want to do those things. Then you have to watch your instruments to make sure you are doing them. It should also be noted that the simulators here at Cochise are probably at least 30 years old, are spring-loaded, and are not very responsive. All that said, here's how this morning went down.

I began my day a little bit excited about the simulator, because I wouldn't have to fly the actual airplane today. It would be a bit of a take-it-easy day. No stress... or so I thought. I found Josh in his office, we went over instruments a bit, then made our way to the simulator room. I sat down, fired up the old heap of garbage, and quickly discovered that "flying" the simulator makes flying the airplane seem downright easy. The machine being old and the springs being... well, also old, there's no such thing as a small correction. So as the simulater drifted left, as it's apparently prone to do, it's necessary to apply a small amount of right bank to correct for it. But, again, there are no small corrections in the simulator. So the tendency is to grossly overcontrol. "Oops, I'm turning a bit left. I'll just correct with a little right aileron... oop! Now we're banked right. I'll just correct that by easing off that right aileron a little... oops! Now I'm drifting back to the left." You get the idea. On top of the inability to make small corrections, there are no armrests in the simulator. That may not seem like a big deal to the uninitiated, but when you're holding your arm bent slightly in mid-air as you grip the control yoke for 30 minutes at a clip, you begin to notice that you really want to bank to the left, since your big, heavy arm is starting to droop. This, coupled with the simulator's inherent tendency to drift left, means you find yourself banking left alot.

In the post-flight briefing, Josh told me I did really well in several areas of simulator "flight", which surprised me alot. Maybe I'm still being way too hard on myself. Maybe I'm just not used to not instantly understanding things. Maybe I need to learn to just be patient and struggle my way through this colossal learning curve. On the bright side, though, after today's tango with the FTD, I'm actually looking forward to being back in the real airplane tomorrow morning, where gravity makes itself known and helps me understand the consequences of my flight-control deflections.

Tribal Air

In an hour, Jen and I will be leaving to go visit New Tribes Mission Aviation, or Tribal Air. I've seen it from the air a couple times this past week, since they're pretty close to Cochise's practice area. But today we'll be on the ground, getting a tour and meeting some missionaries. And that's a very cool thing.

Lesson 4: The one where nothing really went right.

Today was my fourth flight lesson here at Cochise. It was one of those lessons where I started out feeling really scattered and disorganized, and it just never got better. It all started when I went to grab "my" plane (Cherokee 6121H), and someone had already taken it. I call 6121H my plane because I've used it every day this week. In fact, all 4 of the VFR Cherokees were already in use, and there was only one IFR Cherokee left (the school has 3). So I wound up flying Cherokee 39954 today. Being an IFR plane, it has slightly different equipment than the VFRs, and some of the equipment I'm used to wasn't in the place I'm used to finding it. On top of that, I kept forgetting things on my preflight inspection, despite the fact that I have a fairly detailed printed checklist to follow. And then the plane had a low tire, so I had to use some of my training time learning where to get an air compressor and how to fill an airplane tire.

After we (my instructor, my passenger, and I) finally got in the plane and I got us off the ground, I had the hardest time just trying to get the plane to do what I wanted it to do. Straight climbs were like scaling Everest without oxygen. Simple banks were as elusive as bigfoot. Attempting slow flight may as well have been attempting to fly by flapping my arms. What probably made it all worse was the fact that during yesterday's lesson I felt like I had no problem rising to whatever challenge my instructor placed before me. Today I may as well have been trying to fly with my eyes closed. Josh (my instructor) assured me in my post-flight briefing, though, that there's alot to be learned in days like today. So I guess it wasn't a total loss.

On the other hand, I had my first test in ground training this afternoon. It took me 11 minutes. Seriously. Twenty-three multiple choice questions, and I was out the door. Even better, the instructor who graded my test lives downstairs from me, and I caught him as he was coming home to see what I'd gotten. 100%. Sweet! Never mind the fact that I already took this class 3 years ago; I really needed a little morale boost after this morning's flying, and I'll take what I can get.

Pics are coming soon!!!