Pilot's Log

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"Take Algebra--now. You'll like it more than Practical Math, and you'll be able to get in the cool Science courses."

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I would have my younger self take Algebra in 6th or 7th Grade--if not earlier. That way I probably would have gotten myself on a track to Graduation in High School, at the very least.

Sagittarius Horoscope for week of June 16, 2011

The coming weeks could be a Golden Age for your perceptiveness. If you're even moderately aligned with the cosmic rhythms, you will be able to discern hidden agendas that no one else has spotted, catch clues that have been hidden, and be able to recognize and register interesting sights you've previously been blind to. To maximize your ability to cash in on this fantastic opportunity, say this affirmation frequently: "My eyes are working twice as well as usual. I can see things I don't normally notice."

I hope I don't become like the Kid Who Saw Everything Twice in Catch-22 (the novel). Didn't work out so good for him.

From the commentary on today's Wonderella:

My comics hero, Steve Purcell, once got a cartoon deal with FOX in the 90s. He quickly learned that censors didn't dislike violence so much as they disliked accessible violence - the sort of violence kids could easily mimic. Thus the more exaggerated it was, the safer you were. If your knife fight doesn't work, simply replace the knives with atomic bombs. It's a good rule to live by.--Justin Pierce

You know, censors, it doesn't work. Kids will learn violence from the real world, not TV. How I found out. Didn't need help from Bugs Bunny or Mighty Mouse.

FP

Sagittarius Horoscope for week of January 6, 2011

"The heart is forever inexperienced," said Thoreau. He believed our feeling nature is eternally innocent; that no matter how much we learn about the game of life, sadness or lust or rage or joy hits us as hard the thousandth time as it did in the beginning. But is that really true? Are you as likely to plunge into mind-exploding infatuation with your fourth lover as you were with your first? Are you as susceptible now to having your world turned upside-down by flash floods of emotion as you were at age 15? Over the years, haven't you acquired wisdom about your reactive tendencies, and hasn't that transformed them? I disagree with Thoreau. I say that for the person who wants to cultivate emotional intelligence, the heart sure as hell better be capable of gaining experience. What do you think, Sagittarius? If you're aligned with my view, 2011 will educate and ripen your heart as never before.

In theory I'm still working on Love #1. Yes, there was that girl named Helen back in Grade School--but that was Grade School. Nobody understood anything and a lot of that foolishness was peer pressure and trying to be "cool". When I had to move I gave up on her and didn't even feel bad about it because I was beset by a multitude of new traumas and disasters.

And again I should repeat that my later growing-up years were completely devoid of the romance that pop culture mythos usually lavishes on them. From then on I was living in places where there was nobody I wanted to go out with...and now I'm at the age where most prizes are already taken and I'm no prize myself.

Mum last week told me about two of her married relatives and how much they loved each other and I told her back how much I wish I could "understand". But what right do I have to ask for it now?

Or, more to the point, my lack of physique flunked me. No matter how well I do on the classwork or how diligently I try, I just don't have what it takes to be a mechanic, and at my age I can't exactly grow ten kilos of muscle, can I?

I'm grateful for the experience and the opportunity but I'm very disappointed that I couldn't capitalize on it in full.

Meanwhile, I should look for something else to do while the economy recovers. Something tells me I won't be looking long.

THIS COMPANY'S facility in Piney Flats near Johnson City. No pictures allowed so there aren't any. :/

PS: THIS WHIRLYBIRD was there today. Santini Air, or Team America?--You Decide!

Today was taxi practice, and I got behind the yoke of an operational aircraft for the first time in eighteen years. Took the instructor and myself from the school hangar parking area to the fuel tank farm about two-thirds of the length of the runway away, so the plane could be refueled for all the other students in my class and their practice. And then I taxied us back to where we started after fill-up was done. Probably all of two or three tenths of a Hobbs meter hour.

This autumn has been the season of breakdowns at the school. Before break two weeks ago, the tug tractor got sidelined with contamination of the brake fluid and it's still being fixed. Meanwhile, the vehicle door to the hangar also malfunctioned, and so it had to be repaired today as well.

Tomorrow/thursday is the 101st ("tenthy-first"?) birthday of Evelyn "Mama Bird" Johnson, the founder/still-current CEO of the Morristown airport and a living legend in the world of aviation. The school hangar is hosting her birthday party, so in addition to all the fixing up and learning, we students had to do a lot of tidying of the hangar space nearest the taxiway/runway. We hid the broken tug behind a very large sign; since all four wheels had been removed it would have been impossible to put it anyplace else. Chairs and tables were brought in and moved, the floor soaked and squeegied, the trash cans emptied and re-bagged, loose pieces of aviation hardware relocated to locker rooms and closets. We'll finish the job early in the morning...

...And probably take a test on all the stuff we should have been learning this week. The scholastic life.

Hey.

Amazon.com is currently having a sweepstakes through to December...every week, to get an entry, you have to find something on another website and add it to your Universal Wishlist. The Grand Prize--everything on your Wishlist, up to $100,000 in value.

Incredible, isn't it?

Now I know what you're thinking--get a house! Get a car! Get a frikkin' AIRPLANE! And so forth--which would be nice, but I have to figure I'd still be on the hook for taxes, and for somebody like me I'd likely be hit pretty darned hard if I won.

Not to mention that if I did win, my income would probably knock me out of eligibility for the Federal Education Grant money I've been receiving for Tech School.

So, so far my Wishes have been relatively modest ones. Tho' it's more of a challenge just to find stuff that Amazon.com DOESN'T sell--yet.