I continued to pursue my quest to swim in as many Texas rivers as I can this summer by playing in the Blanco river. So far we have hit the Frio, Guadalupe, San Marcos, Comal and the Blanco.
Practiced Kung Fu on Saturday morning with my wife and son. We all came out of class dripping wet and physically spent; it was great.
Went home, showered. Opened a bottle of wine, then:
- Tried, with modest success, to de-virus and de-spyware our computer
- Did a ton of laundry
- Read *The Ogre’s Wife * by Richard Parks
- Started *Good Omens * by Neal Gaimen and Terry Pratchett
- Updated our church website
- Planned our son’s college campus visits
- Planned our daughter’s camp supply needs
The wine lasted until Saturday evening; The Ogre’s Wife made it into Sunday afternoon. Still working on Good Omens. The son and I are off to Earlham college in a few days.
I spent the weekend with my wife and friends at a trackday . It was awesome!
Went out of town to visit friends. Got drunk. Came home. Found out my alcoholic grandma got drunk and was horrible to my teenage cousin. Now she doesn’t understand why everyone is pissed off at her. All hugs and rainbows over here.
Brief killing spree. Nothing unusual.
Oh, all right. Friday night the missus and I went to go see Fantastic Four and then went out to dinner. Saturday, did a little shopping for her birthday, went to the pool, dicked around aimlessly, finished reading the Essential Iron Fist, started reading the Essential Dr. Strange. Sunday, went to the pool some more, then went with the missus to go see War of the Worlds. I can’t remember the last time I saw two movies in one weekend, but for the first time in months, there were actually two movies out that I wanted to see. I made dinner (turkey burgers, IIRC), we watched a little TV, and then we went to bed.
–Cliffy
Saturday.
Had a flight to do down the coast from A to B, got almost all the way to B when a part of the aircraft’s fuel system failed and we had to fly back home to A because B did not have any engineering support and once we landed, the aircraft would be grounded. Ended up flying for six and a half hours, very tired.
Sunday.
Take-two on Saturday’s aborted trip. Aircraft problems fixed but weather at B is bad, bad enough that we are legally required to have enough fuel on arrival at B to allow us to get to an alternative destination © in case we are unable to land at B. We end up getting to B with the bare minimum of fuel. Enough for just one approach to land and then enough to get to C if we can’t land off the first approach.
At the end of the approach, we were still in cloud and I was about to power up and start heading off to C when I caught a glimpse of the runway through a gap in the cloud. A couple more breaks appeared and we managed to do a circuit and land.
A following commercial jet missed their approach and had to have another go at it.
Five and a half hours that time but with more concentration required so more tired than the previous night.
Spent that afternoon snorkelling on a reef, swimming with turtles, clown fish, sharks, rays, and various tropical fish that are very beautiful but I don’t know the names of. Great way to wind down.
Monday (I include Monday because it’s all merged into the one trip in my mind):
More flying. This time the weather is good, really good, in fact the only bad thing about the weather is that it is conducive to fog, however, while there is no fog, the sky is wonderfully clear and blue and the air is warm.
Today we’ll be landing back at the same place we’re departing from (B from yesterday’s trip). The forecast is for a chance of fog in the morning but fine weather afterwards. Our scheduled landing is about three hours after any forecast fog has gone so that didn’t concern me.
That is until ATC call to advise that the forecast has changed and that there is now a chance of fog occuring right up until our arrival time. This means that, once again, I need to have fuel to get to C in case B is closed in with fog. Problem is, the forecast was updated while I was already flying, and I hadn’t planned to have the extra fuel. I didn’t know if I had enough and had to do a few quick calculations before realising that It would be prudent to go straight back to B NOW and that I still might not have quite enough fuel.
While cruising back to B I did a more accurate fuel calculation that worked out in my favour and I also got forecasts for D and E, both airfields that I wouldn’t normally consider using, but might have to if B was closed and C ended up being out of range due stronger than forecast winds or something. I tried not to think about the fact that all of the crew’s “away” gear was on the ground at B and that if we had to divert to anywhere else, we’d be stuck for the night in our uniforms with no clean underwear or toothpaste and toothbrush!
We arrived at B to discover that it was still a beautiful day there and that the fog hadn’t eventuated. A relief to say the least.
Wound down again with more snorkelling, turtles, sharks, coral, colourful fish etc.
Woke up in the middle of the night to watch delayed coverage of the American MotoGP at Laguna Seca. Well done to Nicky Hayden for a flawless race, well done to Colin Edwards for beating Rossi and coming close to Hayden, and finally, well done to Valentino Rossi for being competitive on a technical track that he had never ridden on before.
Tuesday:
An uneventful trip home and well out of the bounds of “weekend” anyway.