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!!!