Updating, as requested

It's been a little while since I last posted, my wife has helpfully reminded me. She's also requested that I take a moment or two to update. So here goes nothin'!

It's been windy here. Exceptionally windy. Keep-all-the-pilots-grounded-every-weekend windy, which means I haven't been able to knock out a required cross-country in a while. That may very well change this weekend. As of right now, the forecasted winds for tomorrow will allow me to get up and get an X-C done in the morning. I've been pretty bent on flying the Silver City-Safford-Willcox trip, but the winds in New Mexico are supposed to be pretty intense tomorrow, so I've got another trip in mind. It's the Globe-Holbrook X-C, and it will be the first all-Arizona X-C I've flown in a very long time. If God really decides to make my weekend rock, He'll make the winds manageable both tomorrow and Saturday. If that ends up being the case, I'll do Globe-Holbrook tomorrow, and head for Silver City on Saturday. It sure would be nice to get those flights out of the way.

Speaking of cross-countries, the other day I asked Erin when I would get to fly the new plane (3154W), and she told me we might be able to take it when we fly our night cross-country to Tucson. 3154W is a 2006 Piper Warrior III that the school bought last year. It has a glass cockpit. That means the panel of "steam gauge" instruments has been replaced by two screens on which the pilot can call up all sorts of information. Glass cockpits are sort of where general aviation planes seem to be headed, and the Quest Kodiak incorporates the glass cockpit into its design, so it seems like a fantastic idea for me to get familiar with the glass now.

As Jen mentioned in her blog, we got to see Glory Road for free in the campus theater last night. That was really fun. What Jen failed to mention is that the Douglas theater has worked a deal with the college, so if we show up at the Douglas theater this Monday, we not only get into a movie for free, we also score free soda and popcorn. We've heard some less-then-encouraging reports regarding the Douglas theater, so we haven't really wanted to spend money to experience it for ourselves. So this is a great opportunity to go check it out, and have some fun off campus while we're at it. Jackpot!