Posted by mstroud in Movies
I just finished going to the theater (what!?!) to see The Bourne Ultimatum with Steve, April, and Steve’s dad, and man does my head hurt afterwards. Evidently the new “in thing” for movies is to shoot them hand held guerrilla style and make the moviegoer dizzy or sick. Another great example of this technique shown this summer was Transformers, a Michael Bay epic that was full of robot vs robot fighting (yay!) that would have looked great, if only the camera would have been still for more than 3 seconds.
While this is the 3rd and last in the series of movies, it More >
Posted by mstroud in Flying
It’s true, I’m sorta, kinda, afraid of solo flying. Not the “normal” flying stuff, but anything new. This poses a bit of a problem, since at this point in my learning to fly I need to be doing the flying all by myself virtually all of the time.
On Saturday and Sunday this week I flew solo. Saturday was just laps around the pattern, landing, takeoffs, taxi backs, the normal stuff. That is fine and I’m comfortable doing it for the most part. Sunday my CFI pushed me to fly out to the coast and do some “air work.” This is More >
Posted by mstroud in Flying
It’s been a month and I’m still pounding out the daily work schedule and trying to sneak in some flying where and when I can. Along the way I’ve slowed down my corporate travel, but that ends this week, as I start hitting the road to see customers wherever they may be. That can only mean less GA flying and a lot more bad airport experiences.
At least I’m still employed, right? I could have ended up like these poor hosers.
Posted by mstroud in Flying
Today I soloed in the Citabria for a second time. It ended up being no small feat, thanks to the ever increasing winds. This puts me within just a few flights more of being able to fly regularly on my own, even if it is only around the airport and practice areas.
I’m glad to have hit this milestone but I sure wished it had come sooner.
Posted by mstroud in Flying
It seems that I’ve been on the road constantly, and that I’ve done very little general aviation flying. Upon looking back at my schedule since January, it does appear that most every week and weekend I’m in another city or country, talking to a different customer or partner, eating at a new or similar restaurant and staying at another hotel chain. I certainly have the flight miles (and nagging cough) to prove it.
I also have started lacking in my ability to get to the local airport and fly, and when I do get out to the airport these day my More >
Posted by mstroud in Flying
After a lot of travel and very, very few continuous days at home I have managed to get the first solo process completed at Palo Alto Airport. This is, I’m told, a pretty important milestone in my flight training, and I’m glad to have finally done it.
However, as part of this process, I was nearly landed on, twice, by another student flying the pattern. The infraction was bad enough that the tower started asking planes in the pattern to land full stop and clear the traffic so that they could concentrate on the problem pilot. I was also asked a More >
Posted by mstroud in Flying
In between flights all over the US, I managed to sneak in a few more flight lessons. #30 was to get me back in the swing of things again, doing another flight over to Livermore and some pattern work. #31 was all about doing some ground school learning, something I don’t do often enough. #32 was a bunch of touch and goes in the strongest wind (nearly 18 knots) I’ve seen so far.
I’m told that I’m nearly ready to solo, again. Now I just need to study up and be in town long enough to actually do the check ride.
More >
Posted by mstroud in General
I’m going to try this new theme for a bit and see how it works for me. Maybe more photo’s will slip into the design if things are easier (and more fluid) with this layout. We’ll see.
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Posted by mstroud in Flying
I managed to sneak in a couple of hours of flying this weekend, between downpours and crazy work scheduling. The net-net of these flights were that I’ve now picked up a bad habit or two: flying the pattern too fast and loose at times, and under-rotating at touchdown. Needless to say both are bad and I am working to correct both.
What was really rough, however, was flying in 14+ knot winds with low clouds and crummy visibility. My instructor loved it as it pushed me about as far out of my comfort zone as I could be at the home More >
Posted by mstroud in Flying
My two most recent flying lessons were proof of what happens when I spend a long time away from the cockpit. On lesson 26 I spent the entire time bobbling around, blowing landings, and generally being a mess while flying. It was as if I had erased several months worth of flying skills and had regressed to a much earlier phase of flight. I knew I’d be a bit rusty, but this was bad news.
On the 27th lesson, after around 5 touch and go’s, some of the old flying skills returned. It was truly maddening to think that the effort More >
