It Has Been Awhile

Well last week Cole had his third birthday. All I could think of how fast the last three years have gone by. It feels just like in the movies when they show "some one's life flash before their eyes." Several minutes in the movie play by with a nice theme music and they flash several images from over the years. That is exactly how I felt the other night while watching Cole blow out his candles. Many images and memories rapidly flashing by in my mind, I was left there just wondering where did all the time go.

Cole and I decided to put the tree up early this year. I took it out of the box and carefully placed all of the branches in their proper places. Cole had lots of fun put the branches on and not so much fun actually putting things on the tree. I found him either playing with the box or aligning up the train ornaments in a neat row on the floor. I took some convincing that they needed to be "parked" on the tree.

Cole has had this puppy for longer than I can remember. I know last year I tried to get him to play with the puppy but he would have nothing to do with it. The other day he found it under his bed and now I can't keep it from him. This puppy goes everywhere with him now. I thought I would take a few pictures of him while he was sleeping.

Happy Halloween Everyone

Happy Halloween to Everyone out there. Pretty sorry I didn't get really any good pictures of Cole tonight. Oh well, maybe next year.

Keeping Up With Tradition

Well Steph, Cole and I would have loved to have been part of the Smith Family Tradition at your place. Plus if Cole and I were there I would have been warned by several people that if you carve a pumpkin too early you will be throwing it away before Halloween. Where were you on that one Rich? Since the competitive nature doesn't fill all of the Smith children I decided not to compete in this year's annual pumpkin carving contest. However if I were competitive I would be tempted to maybe post pictures like the one on the left. Or maybe toss out insults to my fellow competitors during the competition like..."Nice clothes, did your mommy lay them out for you?" But since this horrible characteristic doesn't run in my veins I am not going to do any of that. However Cole and I will continue to sharpen our skills for when that day comes. I will post pictures of Cole's pumpkin when he finishes it. We ran out of time before he had to go to bed.
<-------------This is the picture of the second pumpkin I carved this year. The first one is below in another post. I do have a third pumpkin that is scheduled to go under the knife sometime this week.

I thought I would put up some new pictures since I haven't in awhile. On Monday I finished up my solo time by flying the exact same cross country flight that I did on Friday, why make it difficult, right? And yes Jen you would be surprised that the plane really flies itself once you trim the controls out. If you look at the first picture you can see my hand on still on the "steering wheel." The second picture is of the clouds, I know it isn't a very good one but if you look at it, it sort of looks like a hand that is curling its fingers inward. (Fingers are on the left). But as for flying, I am two flights away from being let lose on my own for good. That should scare some people.

Lately I have been trying to get Cole interested in cooking and making things. I figured it would be a great idea because he is always interested in what dad is doing. So I thought I would let him make his own pizza. I took some video so that he can tell you what he made in his own words. You have just got to love the serious face he makes at the end of the video. For some reason it makes me laugh every time. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3aTMnhexN4

One more Step

I just finished up a flight today that consisted of a few hours in the air by myself. This was my longest cross country that I have ever flown alone. I flew from Grand Forks to Fargo to Park Rapids and then back to Grand Forks. I was in the air for 2.8 hours. This is one of the last steps that I needed to get my license. Now I just have to build about another 2.5 hours of solo time, a 1.0 hour final flight with my instructor, a ground briefing, and then my final check ride. I will let everyone know when I get my license and I will also let everyone know where I am at if I am flying so that they may avoid the area at all costs.

PS - I did get a couple of pictures that I might post later on. The weather wasn't very good so I didn't want to divert my attention for very long.

It is that time a year again

Here are some pictures of Cole playing guitar hero. I tried to get a good picture of him playing the guitar with my glasses on but he caught me off guard by putting them on. It is really cute while he plays, every so often he will say "Rock Out."

I thought I would get Cole a pumpkin this year for him to help carve since last year all he did was color on some small pumpkins with markers. I cut open the top and Cole didn't want anything to do with putting his hand in and gutting the thing. He did how ever pick out the pattern we used and spent about 10 minutes helping dad cut the thing out. He lost interest in the pumpkin until it was all done and dad put a candle in it.

I feel the need...the need for speed! (going really fast, not the drug)

Update: I am not sure who Jusgirl is but the question was posted about what type of plane I fly. It is a four seat piper warrior. Here is a picture of one. http://flightops.aero.und.edu/airplanes/warrior.asp

Well I finally got to get back into the air today. I had to do a cross country with my instructor that was to three different airports and back. The weather was a little windy but good enough to proceed. We flew from Grand Forks to Fargo to Crookston and then back to Grand Forks. It was a pretty event less flight. We took off burned some fuel (money) and then went home. I was going to go on my long cross country to night but found out that I didn't have the correct number of night landings to be considered current to fly at night. You have to have 5 (UND policy) while the FAA only requires 3. Well I have my 3 but couldn't go. The flight was also on the border of my limitations because of the cross wind component. Oh well, rescheduled the flight and I am now looking forward to next week.

Flying out of Grand Forks you don't get to see many commercial airplanes or airplanes that are not UND's. Here is a couple of pictures of a Citation Jet that ATC decided to cut me off with. The last picture is of Grand Forks at about 4,500 ft. I love loving in the winter because the haze appearance with be gone when it gets colder outside.

Warning the propeller in the videos doesn't appear to be moving really fast because the camera isn't high tech enough to pick up the speed of it so it looks as if it is standing still at times.

This first video is a Stop and Go at Crookston. There is a heavy cross wind blow us to the right

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1QbKyMsRf8

This second video is of my landing at Grand Forks after everything is said and done.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGYQ0yBzlq8

If you listen closely you can actually here me "grease the tires" on the runway at about 3:44 on the right side and 3:45 for the left.

Term of the Day: Greasing the tires is aviation slang for having a really soft landing that the tires spoil up really fast as you gently touch down.

High Alert

I feel like Owen Wilson in the movie Behind Enemy Lines. At the beginning of the movie there is an alarm and everyone on the ship scrambles to the area to launch two fighter jets. The planes are in position and the engines are blasting at full throttle. You see Owen looking out the cockpit window at the guy on deck with the trigger to release the catapult. And then you hear the alarm to stand down.

I was all set to ago on a quick cross country flight this morning. The weather the previous night was a little rainy and I didn't have any real worries for this particular flight. I get ready for bed, place all of my flight gear by the door. I make some last minute corrections for the route of flight. I watch the rest of the Angles game ( they won in 12 ) and proceed for bed. I look at the clock and set the alarm for 6:40. I roll my eyes realizing that I have to be out at the airport at 7:45 am. That is way too early for me.

The alarm goes off and I hit the snooze button. As you can tell I am a real go getter early in the morning (yes anything before 9 is early in the morning). I finally get out of bed at 7:15 after calculating the exactly number of minutes it will take me to get ready, shower, eat, and drive to the airport. I glance at the weather channel to get a quick idea of the weather. I check my phone and noticed I had received a text message from my instructor telling me that it was dual IFR conditions until noon.

I spend the next hour or so getting back into bed and trying to fall asleep. What a let down to be ready for a flight just to get cancelled because of weather. This is like the third or fourth flight in the last two weeks.

Despite the fact that I had to cancel my flight today there is one thing for sure. The sunset after a rainstorm looks pretty cool.

Here are a couple of pics of Cole from last week. For some reason he wanted to watch 101 puppies (as he calls it) in his room on his rocking chair. Something very different from the norm with him.

Late Night Vistor

I woke up last night to hear somebody in Cole's room at 2:30am. By the time I got there who ever it was had already left and Cole was scared and crying. You guessed it just got a visit from the puke fairy. They came, they left a little something, and vanished not without leaving a trace. Need less to say I was up with Cole for the next hour and half and an additional hour doing laundry. It amazes me that puke can get in so many different places. I had to wash his pillow case, sheets, blanket, two sets of PJ's (I was smart enough to put another pair on him right away), bath room rugs, and several towels. What a night. And without even setting the alarm somebody wakes up at 8:00 am. Where is the justice in that?

Two Lessons Down

The weather was finally good enough to go on my two cross country flights to knock out two of my lessons. I choose to go to Park Rapids, MN which was 106 NM away from Grand Forks. Here are some pictures from these flights.

First picture is Crookston, MN at altitude of 5500. Next picture is Fertile, MN same altitude. The next picture is of some foliage 35 NM outside of Park Rapids.

Here are a few pictures of the sunsetting on the horizon, we are about 20 NM from Park Rapids.

The first picture is on the ground at Park Rapids. The next two pictures didn't come out very well but there are of Grand Forks at an altitude of 1600. And the last picture is sitting on the ground at Park Rapids.

I took some video while I was flying and uploaded them to YouTube. The first video is my take off at Grand Forks. We were doing a soft field take off, so we took the airplane off the ground as soon as possible and flew above the the ground until we had more airspeed then climbed out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnJWlf7d6tk

This next video was take off at Park Rapids, the landing light went out and we had to flip it off and on again while taking off.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q3gIBtgO_Y

No Go

Well after hanging out on my computer all day long and watching the weather like it was news coming in for WWIII, the weather ended up winning the battle. I had to cancel my two cross country flights because of the forecast of thunderstorms in the area. Well yes there were some storms moving through the area and the closest they came to Grand Forks was about 30 miles to the West. My flights were planned for going to Cedar Rapids which is southeast of Grand Forks. I am not too happy to put it nicely, I would have loved to have gotten those two flights done and over with but I guess I will just have to get them done another day. Pictures of these two flights will be posted as soon as they are available. Here is a shot of Cole I took this weekend. I really need to get him a conductor hat but he is pleased with just wearing his hard hat.

Half Way Done

My last flight on Monday had put me over the half way mark with getting my private license. There are 17 lessons that I have to take and I am currently on lesson number 10. It has really gone by quickly and I am looking forward to getting it done and over with so that I can have more time to spend on my other classes.

My last flight was a little bit interesting. I haven't really flown in high wind conditions since it really isn't ever windy in the Idaho area. I was watching the wind speed and direction the majority of the flight and noticed it got up to around 41 knots. Just for fun my instructor turned us into the wind and slowed the airplane down to around 55 knots. We were trying to see how slow we could get our ground speed. Well we got our ground speed down to 27 knots. That means it would take us roughly one hour to travel 27 miles. It felt like we were just sitting in the air not moving.

He told me about a story when he was getting his private down in LA (the state not the city) and there was some bad wind. His instructor actually got the plane to fly backwards. If you can't picture this think about trying to swim upstream in a fast current. Same thing.

I will really try to take pictures of my next flight. We are going to try and combine the next two lessons together. There are a day cross country and a night cross country. So I will have nothing but time to take pictures. This flight will be on Monday so I should have some cool pictures on Tuesday or Wednesday, if the weather is good.

The Women and Children Are Safe

Well I didn't get to fly solo on Wednesday because Cole woke up in the middle of the night and didn't want to go back to sleep...so I ended up flying solo today. The last time that I was up in an airplane by myself was August of 2001, so it has been a little while. I took a couple of pictures while was waiting to take off. I didn't take any airborne pictures because I am pretty sure I would have gotten into trouble if they found out. The first one is of a Warrior on a short final, and the second picture was just a picture outside of the airplane.

And since I am still waiting on a CD from someone I decided to put up a video of Cole feeding the ducks on You Tube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzHKWUXhuzk

Solo Tomorrow

Well tomorrow is the big day, it is time to fly or not to fly. I will be going solo for the first time in about 5 years. I will be honest I am a little bit nervous but nothing I can't handle. I will be going up and working the traffic pattern in Grand Forks for about 30 minutes, like an all star of course. Since I didn't get to take any pictures this flight on Sunday I thought I would at least post some pictures the college has. The first picture is a picture of a piper warrior (the plane that I fly). The next picture over is the what the instructors commonly call "the round eye." This is the cockpit of the warrior with the old round dial instruments. The final picture is the newer cockpit of the warrior with the two display screens. I get to fly the newer cockpit commonly called the "glass." Thank God, it is much easier to fly with all of the instruments on one screen. It really cuts the workload down and allows you to fly the airplane more efficiently.

Another Week Down

Man time flies. I am not sure there is any other way to put it. It feels like all I did this week was blink and it has all gone by. School is keeping me way too busy. I liked it better when I didn't have to study anything or really do anything out side of class. Those days have come and gone. One thing that I really like this semester is that they are making me take a flying class. Before I didn't want to spent the money and the extra time that it was going to take for this class. Last Monday I got back into the air with the UND fleet for about 2.5 hours. I forgot how much fun it can be. I am flying a completely didn't plane than I have before. It is a Piper Warrior. Like I posted earlier, this plane has everything you can think of. I will be going up into the air on Sunday afternoon if the weather is good and I will be taking my camera. Expect several pictures in the days following Sunday.

Why hold pretzels in a bowl when you have all of this extra space between your toes that you are just not using? Cole and I have come up with a homemade version of sumo wrestling. I will list what you need below.

1. Two Feather Pillows - Large Enough to cover all critical areas of the body (Hint: This is for your protection not your child's. You don't want to catch the ever popular "Flying Knee")
2. Two Over Sized Belts
3. Clear Area - Large Enough to move around but small enough that they can't get a real big running start for the "Flying Knee")
4. One Ice Pack or Bag of Ice - This is for you...after you catch the "Flying Knee"

School's in Session

School is back into full swing and I am trying to adjust my mind and body to come into terms with that. This semester is going to be really challenging for me and I hope I rise up to the task at hand. I realize I am just 8 classes away from being done with this college experience and look forward to the next stage in my life.

The class that I am currently taking include: Private Pilot (both ground school and flight time), Aviation Safety, Tower 3, Tower 4, Interpersonal Comm, and Information Systems (Computers class) along with Econ and Spanish 2 online.

I will post some pictures up once I get going on the flight portion of my training. I will be in a Piper Warrior that is less than 5 years old with ever bell and whistle you could think of in this plane. The FAA is testing out a brand new technology and UND is one of the testing zones that it is being tested. The technology allows planes to send information to each other and then it is displayed on a GPS map. Basically a high tech traffic warning system with advanced capabilities.

Since my source hasn't been able to get me a video editing program I decided to post a few pictures of Cole's summer vacation on here. Once I do get the program I am going to make a slide show and put it up on youtube for your viewing pleasure.