Zoo Boise

I haven't been to Zoo Boise for awhile now. I was actually impressed with some of the new things that are there. I was a little disappointed that a good portion of the animals were hiding. They do have a new lion exhibit that is home for three lions. They have a good section of glass that is right up against the cage so you can basically go toe to toe with the male lion that has no problem strutting back and forth in front of it. It is much like the tiger exhibit pictured above but bigger. Ry kept getting close to the glass and then jump away as the lion got closer. All in all it was a fun little trip down memory lane.

Bad Boys - Whatcha going to do?

In honor of my heroic encounter last night you are going to want to make sure your speakers are on. Are they on now?? Seriously you are going to want to make sure you can hear the background music. If they are on, read on.


Now to the juicy details of how I had to dodge bullets and single handedly take down Boise's most notorious criminal.


Time: 12:30 AM


Date: April 19th 2009


Location(s): My house - Driveway
Boise Streets - SW Boise & I84





Sitting in my car on in the driveway after just getting home from work, I was finishing up a phone call when I noticed someone standing in between my car and my parent’s car looking in the windows. I quickly bolted into action and did the very first thing that came to mind. That's right, I laid on the horn. The suspect then turned around and looked at me (just before he wet his pants) and proceeded to run. I then sprung to action. I jumped out of the car and chased after the suspect on foot. That's right; I walked after him at a steady pace before I had to stop just two houses down because I was winded. I then dialed 911 and walked back to the house at a much slower pace this time (I didn't want to pull a hammy). I jumped in my car and went around the block to where the suspect ran to. After just a few minutes of driving around the neighborhood I gave up and head home. Just before arriving back at the house I noticed a white car driving fast around a corner just ahead. The chase was on! I pulled behind the car and followed them up to a stop light when I pulled up next to the vehicle. I looked inside and saw the suspect in the car. The light turned green and the suspect made a quick left turn after being in the straight only lane. I too broke the law and made a left turn from the right turn only lane. I wasn't about to let this guy get way. I quickly dialed 911 again and this time acted like the eye in the sky relaying detailed directions to the police. While following the suspect I noticed him driving all over the road and what appeared to be him desperately trying to change his clothes. The chase thne leads onto the interstate where at that point I was passed by some members of Boise's Finest. After they pulled the suspect over I slowly pulled in behind the police vehicles. The police were going to arrest the guy but they needed my parents to permission to file charges. I call them on the house line. I call them again on the house line. I call them again on the house line. I call them again on the house line. I call them again on the house line. The police informed me that they will not be able to arrest the guy unless I get hold of my parents. I explained to them that I would drive home and wake them up. Just before leaving the scene I was asked to identify the suspect. They brought the suspect around the police car and I identified him. After getting just over the Eagle exit my parents answered. I told them what was going on and they gave the green light. I called the officer back and then head to the Chevron to finish filling out my statement. The officer called me back a short time later and explained to me that I had to tell the suspect that he was "Under Arrest" so that it would be legal. They placed the phone up to his ear and I said you are Under Arrest. I had to do it twice because he "didn't hear me" the first time. The officer then told me after picking up my statement that the car was full of stolen goods.


Take that crime.

One More Week?

Well I am wrapping up on what I hope is my very last week in North Dakota. I have a few flights this week to finish up and after those are complete it is goodbye frozen tundra. I went ahead and got some more flight time today since I haven't flown since Halloween. My favorite part about flying in the cold weather is getting to scrap off the inside of the windows with a credit card so that you can see out them. It is so cold here that when you start you car up there is no ice on any of the windows. But instead once it gets a little bit warmer inside the car ice then forms on inside of the windows, my favorite.

Thought I would post a few pictures from Christmas. Cole and I ate most of the candy before we even got it on the house ;-)

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.