The Silence is Broken!
I haven't used my journal in so long, but after reading a couple past entries I realized it's a good history book. I seldom remininsce on the past and think back to good times in my life. I don't like to linger in the past though like my grandmother, she basically lives in the past and it is very very aggravating to say the least.
Anyway I haven't updated since January? My last entry was about flying to North Hampton, MA on a cross country flight. Well as you may have guessed a lot has happened since then. Where to start? Well I guess I can start with I AM NO A REAL PILOT! I earned my wings on April 21st, 2006, which was also the same day my Macroeconimics professor passed away. Rest In Peace Professor Fagan. He was an awesome awesome professor. Shortly after I attained my private pilot's license school ended. Not even 2 weeks home I had to get my wisdom teeth out, so that wasn't fun. I also did some subsitute teaching back in Rochester. It's not really my cup of tea, but it was some money to put in my wallet.
OH! How could I forget! As some of you may have known my father is a commercial airline pilot for Delta Airlines. Well on one of his trips from Boston -> Bermuda a man came up to the cockpit while they were still boarding. It was an 84 year old man who was a private pilot himself and was interested in the panel of the B737-800. He and my father got to talking and mentioned me going to Daniel Webster College for Aviation Flight Operations and that I had just attained my private. Unfortunately at this time my father needed to get back to work finishing checklists so the old man had to go back and sit down. After they arrived in Bermuda the old man came back up to the cockpit again to talk to my father again. He comes up and says to my father "If you son ever wants free flight time in a complex airplane have him contact me." Well well well...just to give you an idea of how big of a deal this is down at Skyhaven, the airport in Rochester, to rent a regular single-engine airplane that only has 160 Horsepower and that has wheels that don't retract, it's $119/ hour. $119!!! Now the old man's airplane, who we later come to know as Bart Bratko, has a Beechcraft Bonanza F-33A. Google it if you want to see what it looks like. Well this airplane has 285 horsepower and retractable gear!!!! SO IT'S HIGH PERFORMANCE (any aircraft with an engine that exceedes 200 Horsepower) AND COMPLEX (wheels retract)! So I got in touch with Bart over the summer and I went for a couple flights with him. I have yet to receive my High Performance and Complex endorsement, but hopefully this weekend he will sign me off. That was one of the highlights of my summer.
At the end of June beginning of July the Rochester Recreation Camps started and I was a counselor over at Gonic School with Katie Billings. It was a good summer let's put it at that. Good times all around. Some stressful, but nothing we couldn't handle. Except that I some how contracted Shingles on my right knee and shin...so says the doctor. It was blistering up and oozing. That wasn't pretty. Oh yeah...and I also swam into a wall head first. So I think I left my frontal lobe of my brain back in the Gonic pool. But other than that it was a good summer!
After the summer ended there was nothing much to do but to get ready to go back to school. So while we were doing that I had my mom make a doctors appointment for me to get my head checked out because I was having these intense pressure pains behind my left eye. Sometimes they were so intense that my teeth would go numb...weird I know but it happened. So about a week before I had to go back I went to the doctor, and he looked up my nose and said I had a deviated septum...so that will have to be fixed, and also he wanted me to get X-Rays at Frisbie to see what is up my nose in my sinuses...so we did that too. Went back to the doctors 2 days later and he looked at me and said he was really really surprised my head hadn't exploded yet and that I was still breathing. Comforting huh? So he said I'd need surgery done...and soon! I did not want surgery, not now at least becase I was about to go back to school and start flying again. If I get the surgery that would put me out of commission from 4-6 weeks. That's a lot of time not to be flying. So I asked him about the possibility of doing it over Christmas break. He said I would be risking it. The consequences for flying in my condition were that I could pop a blood vessel and start bleeding from my nose...or worse...my tear ducts in my eye. So I immediately agreed to the surgery. The surgery went down Sept. 5th. Took me about 3 hours to get out of the recovery room because I wasn't getting enough oxygen in my lungs by myself. But after it was all set. I went home sat around slept...it was good. 2 days later went back to the doctors office and they pulled two rubber things out of my nostrils...which was like giving birth to a large worm through the nose...I hope any of you have to experience that. What was worse is that I had to go back the next day and get the gauze pulled out of my nose...that was nasty. You know it's bad when the nurse is telling you to keep breathing, and breathe like a pregnant women. So after all that was over I got to go back to school...but still unable to fly.
Also I was in a triple in an old dorm which was very small. But after a couple weeks Don (my roommate from last year and good friend) and I decided it was wise to get out of the room and the situation we were in with our 3rd party. So we moved out of a small crappy triple into a humongus elegant room. It's a 2 person triple in a very very nice dorm which is the newest on campus. So that's all good.
As of a couple weeks ago I was cleared to fly again! So I have been trying to fly my butt off since then while keeping up with classes. It can be stressful at times, but I'll make it through. When I first started flying I was flying a motorglider (a glider with a volkswagon engine on it). It's a Grobe G-109B. Very cool airplane. So I did a couple flights in that as well as do a max effort. :) What a max effort is is a maximum effort landing with the glider. Since you're unpowered when you land you want to be well assure you have the runway made. I'm sure everyone has seen a plane land where it slowly comes down to the runway and touches down smoothly. Well a max effort is a little different. This is where you are 1,000ft. above the ground until you're directly over the end of the runway. As soon as you get to that point you pull out the divebrakes and put the nose full forward. You are now at 1,000ft. above the ground at a 90 degree angel perpindicular to the earth. It's awesome.
Here is a video to show from inside the cockpit what a max effort is! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBA8rPxU5Pw
Oh, and also I got to see The All-American Rejects in Lowell, MA on November 1st. Awesome show! :-)
Anyway that's about it for now. I'll make sure that my next entries aren't as long, I just had a lot of catching up to do!
Signing out.
Anyway I haven't updated since January? My last entry was about flying to North Hampton, MA on a cross country flight. Well as you may have guessed a lot has happened since then. Where to start? Well I guess I can start with I AM NO A REAL PILOT! I earned my wings on April 21st, 2006, which was also the same day my Macroeconimics professor passed away. Rest In Peace Professor Fagan. He was an awesome awesome professor. Shortly after I attained my private pilot's license school ended. Not even 2 weeks home I had to get my wisdom teeth out, so that wasn't fun. I also did some subsitute teaching back in Rochester. It's not really my cup of tea, but it was some money to put in my wallet.
OH! How could I forget! As some of you may have known my father is a commercial airline pilot for Delta Airlines. Well on one of his trips from Boston -> Bermuda a man came up to the cockpit while they were still boarding. It was an 84 year old man who was a private pilot himself and was interested in the panel of the B737-800. He and my father got to talking and mentioned me going to Daniel Webster College for Aviation Flight Operations and that I had just attained my private. Unfortunately at this time my father needed to get back to work finishing checklists so the old man had to go back and sit down. After they arrived in Bermuda the old man came back up to the cockpit again to talk to my father again. He comes up and says to my father "If you son ever wants free flight time in a complex airplane have him contact me." Well well well...just to give you an idea of how big of a deal this is down at Skyhaven, the airport in Rochester, to rent a regular single-engine airplane that only has 160 Horsepower and that has wheels that don't retract, it's $119/ hour. $119!!! Now the old man's airplane, who we later come to know as Bart Bratko, has a Beechcraft Bonanza F-33A. Google it if you want to see what it looks like. Well this airplane has 285 horsepower and retractable gear!!!! SO IT'S HIGH PERFORMANCE (any aircraft with an engine that exceedes 200 Horsepower) AND COMPLEX (wheels retract)! So I got in touch with Bart over the summer and I went for a couple flights with him. I have yet to receive my High Performance and Complex endorsement, but hopefully this weekend he will sign me off. That was one of the highlights of my summer.
At the end of June beginning of July the Rochester Recreation Camps started and I was a counselor over at Gonic School with Katie Billings. It was a good summer let's put it at that. Good times all around. Some stressful, but nothing we couldn't handle. Except that I some how contracted Shingles on my right knee and shin...so says the doctor. It was blistering up and oozing. That wasn't pretty. Oh yeah...and I also swam into a wall head first. So I think I left my frontal lobe of my brain back in the Gonic pool. But other than that it was a good summer!
After the summer ended there was nothing much to do but to get ready to go back to school. So while we were doing that I had my mom make a doctors appointment for me to get my head checked out because I was having these intense pressure pains behind my left eye. Sometimes they were so intense that my teeth would go numb...weird I know but it happened. So about a week before I had to go back I went to the doctor, and he looked up my nose and said I had a deviated septum...so that will have to be fixed, and also he wanted me to get X-Rays at Frisbie to see what is up my nose in my sinuses...so we did that too. Went back to the doctors 2 days later and he looked at me and said he was really really surprised my head hadn't exploded yet and that I was still breathing. Comforting huh? So he said I'd need surgery done...and soon! I did not want surgery, not now at least becase I was about to go back to school and start flying again. If I get the surgery that would put me out of commission from 4-6 weeks. That's a lot of time not to be flying. So I asked him about the possibility of doing it over Christmas break. He said I would be risking it. The consequences for flying in my condition were that I could pop a blood vessel and start bleeding from my nose...or worse...my tear ducts in my eye. So I immediately agreed to the surgery. The surgery went down Sept. 5th. Took me about 3 hours to get out of the recovery room because I wasn't getting enough oxygen in my lungs by myself. But after it was all set. I went home sat around slept...it was good. 2 days later went back to the doctors office and they pulled two rubber things out of my nostrils...which was like giving birth to a large worm through the nose...I hope any of you have to experience that. What was worse is that I had to go back the next day and get the gauze pulled out of my nose...that was nasty. You know it's bad when the nurse is telling you to keep breathing, and breathe like a pregnant women. So after all that was over I got to go back to school...but still unable to fly.
Also I was in a triple in an old dorm which was very small. But after a couple weeks Don (my roommate from last year and good friend) and I decided it was wise to get out of the room and the situation we were in with our 3rd party. So we moved out of a small crappy triple into a humongus elegant room. It's a 2 person triple in a very very nice dorm which is the newest on campus. So that's all good.
As of a couple weeks ago I was cleared to fly again! So I have been trying to fly my butt off since then while keeping up with classes. It can be stressful at times, but I'll make it through. When I first started flying I was flying a motorglider (a glider with a volkswagon engine on it). It's a Grobe G-109B. Very cool airplane. So I did a couple flights in that as well as do a max effort. :) What a max effort is is a maximum effort landing with the glider. Since you're unpowered when you land you want to be well assure you have the runway made. I'm sure everyone has seen a plane land where it slowly comes down to the runway and touches down smoothly. Well a max effort is a little different. This is where you are 1,000ft. above the ground until you're directly over the end of the runway. As soon as you get to that point you pull out the divebrakes and put the nose full forward. You are now at 1,000ft. above the ground at a 90 degree angel perpindicular to the earth. It's awesome.
Here is a video to show from inside the cockpit what a max effort is! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBA8rPxU5Pw
Oh, and also I got to see The All-American Rejects in Lowell, MA on November 1st. Awesome show! :-)
Anyway that's about it for now. I'll make sure that my next entries aren't as long, I just had a lot of catching up to do!
Signing out.