Flight To Mansfield For Dinner

After work, I headed up to the airport for a short hop to Mansfield (61nm) for some Turtle Cafe with some fellow SP'ers. Lenny and Columbusgal78 flew up from KOSU in a C-172. (Nice panel and interior!)

I was averaging about 140-145knots on the way there at 5500'MSL. We ate and checked out the airplanes. We headed out after sunset and it was a nice, smooth ride home in the dark. I remember why I missed flying so much. Night flying is awesome.

Coming back, I did my three landings to be current once again. Here are a few photos to mark the occasion.

Dayton Children's Museum

Laura and Kaden went to the Boonshoft Museum of Discovery in Dayton, OH with some of our family friends today. They left early in the morning while I was on my way back from San Diego.

Laura said COSI was probably better, but it looks like they sure had a blast playing with all the stuff there.

Check out all of Lora's photos by clicking here.




(All photos taken by Lora.)

California 2006 - Day Four

I was up and moving at 4:15am today to make it to the airport by 5am to get on stand-by. I made it there by 10 til and found out I could get on the stand-by for 7am for $100. Fine.

I got on that flight, made it to Houston, got bumped to first class (thank you, OnePass Elite) and made it to Columbus by 5:15pm.

Laura met me there with Kaden and we went to eat at PF Chang's in Easton. Good eats. Here's a few of Kaden there getting into the veggies and then running around outdoors afterward.

California 2006 - Day Three

Today was a relatively slow day. We went to the show again and visited with some customers and prospective customers. After a meeting with a supplier, we headed to the Hyatt to meet a couple of others. We saw one guy from Seagate on the way to the show and the other guy was already there. At least it was a nice walk in beautiful San Diego.

After getting back to the Holiday Inn, we hit up the Red Lobster and then watched "My Super Ex-girlfriend".

California 2006 - Day Two

Jason and I grabbed some breakfast this morning at Denny's and then headed over to the ASIS trade show at the Convention Center downtown. We spent a few hours looking through the many, many aisles of stuff. After some Starbucks milk shakes, we met with one of our manufacturers in their suite at the Hyatt. Nice.

We headed back to the Holiday Inn, changed and headed over to get some Mexican food at Santanas. Man, that was a tasty burrito.

We're now watching some MNF with the Saints back in their dome after the Hurricane Katrina repairs were made.

California 2006 - Day One

Jason and I headed down to the Columbus Airport today around 2:30p to catch the evening flight to Houston and then on to San Diego, CA. I happened to book a ticket that was first class there and coach back. Weird.

Anyway, we ended up in San Diego after two uneventful flights in first class around 11p and then watched some Sportscenter at the Holiday Inn by Sea World.

Tomorrow we hit the ASIS trade show.

Wilson Garage Sale

Today was the ninth annual Wilson Garage Sale that takes place in Ada, OH. They put up a huge tent and bring out all their stuff that was either overstock, made wrong or just hasn't sold. There was a LOT.

I ended up buying about four footballs, baseballs, golfballs, softballs, umbrella and golf shoes. What a steal!

Matt, Jason and I were there. I woke up at 4:30am and was in line around 5am. (We were about 10th in line after some folks who got there at midnight.) We stood there for three hours until they opened at 8am and then we were on our way to Bob Evans by 8:30am. Not bad!

Archer Checkout Flight

After getting rained out on Monday afternoon, I finally was able to go up with Clem today in the Archer II. It's a 1978 PA-28-181 Archer II. It has the 180HP O-360 with dual nav/comm, GPS-196, DME, ADF and Piper III auto pilot.

We went up, did some steep turns, slow flight and then some stalls. After that we did about four T&G's at Lima and then another four in Bluffton. After a quick refuel, we were out of there.

I finally have wings again!

POTW Second Place - Again

Every now and then, I submit a photo to AvWeb for the Picture of the Week (POTW) section they put out. This is the second time I've made it to their page and is the second time I've been in second place. Bah.

Maybe next time I'll win the elusive hat...

Click here for the page.

Eating At Chipotle

Ay! I was watching "The Biggest Loser" on NBC and got to thinking about eating at Chipotle last night and the HUGE burrito I ate. I found a site that lets you "build" your burrito and it shows you all the stats.



Yikes!

As I am working on losing weight (I'm currently down about 22 pounds), this is not a huge help. While I'm a fan of eating well now and again when I'm doing good, this might be a bit overboard. I have been trying to stay at or below 1500 calories per day.

Anyway, I just thought I would post this for posterity sake. Here is the site I used: Chipotle Fan.

Flyboys - The Movie

Jason, Matt and I went to see "Flyboys" in Columbus this evening thanks to Lenny. He was able to score us some screening tickets to the AMC on 315. We stopped in for some Chipotle on the way down and then made it to the theater right on time.

The movie was good, in my opinion. There was a lot of computer animation and Hollywood stuff in it, but there was a lot of airplane action which is a soft spot for me. It also would make a good date movie since there's a love story (of course) intertwined with the real story.

So, I would recommend seeing this movie. Again, it isn't quite Saving Private Ryan or any other movie that will thrill you with how real it looks. It's a good "grab popcorn and just watch" movie.

Grilling-out at the Redmonds

This evening we ended up heading over to the Redmond's for some brats and hot dogs on the fire outside. There were about 12 people total including all of our friends and such. We threw the football and ate. It was pretty standard.

Enjoy the photos!

Family Photos & Volleyball

Today was a busy day of family photos in the morning with my family and then volleyball at P's house in the afternoon for about 4 hours in the beautiful (and hot) sun. We did the photos at JC Penney's and had a total of 8 people. It was a bit cramped.

Volleyball at P's house was fun, as usual. There was lots of family and we got quite a few games in. Once the sand started to get hard, the muscles and joints started getting more and more sore. I was pretty well burnt and sore by the end. I just ended up drowning my pain in brats.

It was a fun day!

Casting Crowns concert in Findlay

It was a last minute thing, but we were offered some free tickets to see Casting Crowns in Findlay, Ohio. Well, since it isn't a far drive, the price was right and we needed an evening out, we dropped of the Kadenator at the grandparents' house and headed up.

We ended up eating real quick at Jack and Do's pizza joint. The pizza was SO greasy, but tasted good. It still isn't Fat Jacks, Padrone's or Pizza Hut, but it was good. After that, we headed to the UF rec building for the concert.

Three plus hours and one headache later we left and hit up some Cold Stone Creamery for ice cream and smoothies.

Fun night!

Joined A Flying Club

I just got back from a small meeting at the Bluffton Airport (5G7) where I met with a couple members to officially join the Bluffton Sky Pirates. They are a 60+ year old flying club that has an Archer and an Arrow.

I'm hoping to have my first lesson on Monday with the club CFI. I can't wait! It'll be nice to start flying again.

Here is a photo of the Archer:


Here is a photo of the Arrow:

$250 For A 4 Year Old Video

Just about four years ago, I went to my bro's HS football game. I ended up taking my video camera and filming a bunch of the plays. I went home that evening and put together a little highlight reel.

Fast forward four years and after uploading the video to Break.com, I get $250 in my PayPal account from them to post it on their site. Woohoo!!


You can watch the video by clicking here.

I'll post the video on Break.com when they have it on the front.

Colorado Trip - Day 5

Well, I'm home. After a good night's sleep and then some lunch at D'Corazon in Denver with Sam, I headed to the airport and hopped the 3pm NWA flight to DTW. After a rainy drive home, I'm ready to get back to life.

It was a great trip and I can't wait (as usual) to get back to Colorado!

And here's a photo of the lady that sat next to me. I guess she may have had SARS or something?

RV-4 Is Gone

The new owner of N721JK picked up the RV-4 today. Before I left for Colorado, I went over and took the broken prop off so I would have a little memento of the airplane since I have no logbook entries of it.

Here are some photos of the process. I sure wish I had the chance to fly (or ride) it.

Colorado Trip - Day 4

I was up early again this morning and had some coffee with my mom. I headed out and ended up in Greeley to hangout with Jeff and Don for a few hours before going to Denver. We loaded some mags with ammo and sat outside chatting while it rained a little bit.

We headed out around 3pm for some Red Robin. After enjoying a Royal Red Robin (the one with the egg), I headed down to Denver and checked in to the Magnolia Hotel in downtown Denver.

I showered and headed to the Paramount Cafe to meet up with Sam and Mark - a couple more buddies from SP.com. We had a couple beers and some grub. I went back to the hotel to watch some MNF and went to bed early - 1030p or so.

Colorado Trip - Day 3

This morning I got up at 515am to shower and leave Loveland at 6am. I drove down through the fog and rain to Leadville, CO to meet up with a buddy I met on StudentPilot.com. He offered me the chance to go up in a 172 and check out the valley from the air. It was beautiful!

The weather was very nice - mostly cloudy, but high enough to fly around and get some good photos. We cruised around the valley for about 30-45 minutes and then landed back in Leadville. We had some lunch and then had some lunch in Frisco while watching some Broncos football.









This evening, we went to eat in downtown Loveland at a chophouse. Good chicken!