Flying IFR - Lesson Flying IFR - Lesson 56 - More Pre-Checkride Practice

Wind out of the west, sky clear, nice and hot out, time to go flying.

This time I actually got N8570F and did the preflight and we then were off to the the Troy-Pontiac IFR loop.

Did the approach and circle at Troy pretty much perfectly, didn't go too high nor too low, and would have nailed the landing no problem.

Then back to Pontiac for the RNAV 27L with the hold at GUZVY.

Which aside from the hold procedure I did perfectly.

The hold I then proceeded to f-up nicely.

I was about to enter the hold and figured it for a teardrop, when the 430W announced it would be a direct and gave a course heading that was weird, which was weird as it should have been a teardrop.  Rocky said that wasn't right and while we were discussing it I got in the hold and we figured on doing it as a via teardrop, but I dropped almost three hundred feet while futzing around, talking to him, seeing his iPad which showed the course (mine isn't allowed to show position for the test, because really stupid reasons)  turning, and trying to figure out what was off with the GPS and then got back to altitude.  Not good.

Need to watch the altitude constantly as the second I get distracted something always happens. I do scan for it, but this time I got distracted and it was a mess.

Carried on and did the rest of the approach just fine.

Then I did the Back Course 27L and did it very well if I say so myself without issue, probably my best back-course approach yet, everything was pretty darn well perfect.

Then we went out and did the RNAV 27L again, this time without a problem.

So, I need to go back Saturday and get another lesson in as that one wasn't acceptable due to the altitude loss.  FML.

Victory Is Mine

Had the continuation of my trial in Downriver today.

In short, Plaintiffs lied through their teeth, got caught lying through their teeth, and had no evidence of any wrongdoing by my client, a company, because there wasn't any.

In short, the whole case was a scam on their part to try and get my client to pay them money to go away.

Notably, one of the two plaintiffs didn't even testify.  Because she couldn't.

Had she testified, I could have brought in evidence of her prior felony fraud conviction.  

Stupidly, she hadn't told that to her attorney and he learned of it through me when I disclosed all my exhibits, including her fraud conviction, before trial.

Her attorney was really not happy to hear about that from me.

So finished presenting my side of the case today and the judge granted a verdict in my favor of a no cause of action and a dismissal their case with prejudice. 

Plaintiffs were not happy to lose and having their scam fail, and were cursing at us in the parking lot afterwards yelling they hope we all die in a traffic accident.

Not very nice people.

My trial record is still without a loss so far, with one tie due to a jury screw up after a verdict in my favor that led to a retrial that ended in a win for me.

Top Gun: Maverick - Go See It If You Haven't Already

I took Leah to see Top Gun: Maverick yesterday to celebrate her end of the school year that ended Tuesday and her first day of freedom.

Amazingly, we had the whole theater to ourselves, which was kinda strange, so we had the choice of seats.

To say the film is absolutely excellent and a joy to watch is to understate it. 

The film hits all the right notes throughout, and was highly enjoyable with a perfect homage to the original, while not being solely a look back or depending on the greatness of the original to be great itself.

A perfect summer action movie that is a truly fitting sequel to the original.

As the theater was all ours, we did get some of Leah's running commentary.

Best commentary of the night was during the make out scene between Tom Cruise and Jennifer Connely:  "You're too old to be making out like a couple teenagers, knock it off and grow up, seriously!".

To say I choked on my beverage while laughing at the time would be an understatement. Ah, youth.

Leah loved the film, and to celebrate asked if she could drive home and before she did so could she do some doughnuts in the rather empty movie theater parking lot.

So I put on the Top Gun theme in the car and let her celebrate accordingly.

While what she did weren't technically true doughnuts, she made a series of extremely tight and fast circles to celebrate and was rather pleased to do so.

Summer has officially begun, and Top Gun: Maverick is the movie of Summer 2022.

Nobody Cares Because The Bad Orange Man Is Out of Office

Charlie Duff asks a rather prescient question in the Detroit News today:

LeDuff: COVID deaths climb; does anyone care?

LeDuff notes that COVID deaths are higher this year in Michigan from June 2021 to June 2022 than the last year of lockdowns from June 202 to June 2021, yet there is interestingly no urgent action from our dear governor. 

There's been no call for lockdowns, no arbitrary high-handed restrictions from on high, no restaurant shut downs,  no orders for masking in public.  Nothing.

Yet more people have died from or with Covid than before.

Of course, some of these deaths may be back-filling and accounting and reporting for the nursing home deaths that were under-reported when Governor Whitmer ordered nursing homes to take in Covid-positive patients, but that won't account for all of it. 

We will note the true scandal in all of this was that nursing homes accounted for over 37% (likely much more once the true number is known) of all Michigan Covid deaths, and the state then undercounted at least 42% or more of those deaths.

I guess the fierce urgency to destroy the economy and immiserate the population is for some strange reason no longer so urgent.

He asks the rather important question:  

Is there an acceptable death rate in Michigan, now that Gretchen E. Whitmer — and not Donald J. Trump — is up for re-election?

Funny question, that.

Back Home Again

Spent Monday and Tuesday at a legal conference, in Dunedin, near Tampa which was kinda a hot spot in June but still very nice to be there.

Learned a lot, met some really good folks and spent two days in a conference room with the evenings spent socializing and doing a bit of bar hopping, eating at restaurants, chatting with people, etc. 

Not a bad time at all, next time I need to take some extra time off and hang around a bit, hit the beach, etc.

Overall, the hip was pretty good.  Walked everywhere but did smartly (per doctor's orders) bring the cane along for the quarter mile walk into and around the town from the conference center, and it was needed.  So, I'm still not quite 100% yet.

Tampa airport is exceptional, flows well, great layout, efficient security lines, and what an airport ought to be.  Detroit's airport, well, not so much.

So yep, I really, really, felt the hip last night after arriving back at DTW.

I arrived back at Detroit Airport's North Terminal (now the Evans Terminal)  at 11:20 pm.  Of course, they had closed and blocked off the closest entrance to the level down to the baggage claim nearest the plane's gate. So I had to walk all through the North Terminal to the very front, then down to baggage and back to where the closed entrance was to get to the baggage carousel.    This annoyed the hip rather a lot.

But got to the baggage area.  They stated the bags would come out of Carosel number 2, and the markings on the display for #2 matched the flight so we stood around number 2.

Out cameth the baggage and many people got their bags and they were happy.

Mine did not come out, nor did a number of other passengers, and we were getting perturbed.

Then bags stopped coming out and we grew a tad more perturbed.

No, it turns out our bags for some unknown reason instead went to baggage carousel number 3.  

Why?  Who knows, it's Detroit airport.

Bag found, I then walked over to the exit of baggage claim to head to the shuttle to parking.

Went to the escalator, went up the escalator, walked across the long bridge, down the escalator and then out to the shuttle pickup.

Lots of walking ensued.  Got to my car and then back home without incident. 

So, I'm rather beat today, and have a really full schedule.

Father's Day 2022

Father's Day started with coffee being brought to my bedside so I could human.

It then got even better with breakfast in bed of homemade Eggs Benedict. Much yum.

The kids' present to me is apparently on order and yet to arrive, so it will get here when it gets here.

Meanwhile, the dogs chipped in to get me a Father's day Gift.

Apparently, never forgetting to feed them gets you good dad points.

Drat - Not Flying Today

Today, I had planned to head out to KBTL, Battle Creek, for the first time with Leah to go to the Waco Kitchen and meet up with Mr. B and Midwest Chick.

Was really looking forward to it, as I had never been there, was looking forward to meeting up with them, and they currently only have their large 10,000 foot runway open so it would have been neat to land on it.

Winds were potentially going to be a bit sporty coming back with an Airmet for turbulence and with a direct 20-knot crosswind but doable, pretty comparable to what I dealt with yesterday so I wasn't too concerned overall, and the weather seems to have matched the forecast pretty much.

So, we headed out to Pontiac Airport, got to the hangar, and found there was no power at all.

It turns out that all of the hangars were out of power and DTE (our local power utility) had no estimate on restoration.  So we couldn't get the hangar door open.

The airport did have a generator on a truck to open the hangar but it was a long wait for it indeed.  I did the preflight in hangar with the personnel door propped open so we had some light and got ready to go if the truck showed up. But, after waiting a couple hours for it, we decided to pack it in as Leah was starting to get a tad hangry, and justifiably so.

So we headed to Copperstone's, a local diner close to Pontiac Airport for a very late breakfast instead.  I had never been there before but it turns out to be quite busy and popular local place. 

On the upside the service was great, the food arrived quickly, was insanely plentiful for the price - The Country Fried Steak came with three over-easy eggs, hash browns, and toast for all of $10 so yes, the food was impressively amazing and tasty, and it fixed hangry quite nicely. 

On the downside, we didn't get to head out and meet up with friends as planned.

 There will be a next time for that though.

No, Really Don't Do That During A Traffic Stop

A client of mine from out of town got a ticket.

He stated the police officer was a bit of a jerk at the time.

When asked for details it turns out he was pulled over for a driving offense that he clearly did do, but nothing major and a fully lawful stop by the officer, and I got the following story:

It was raining so he kindly thought he'd make the officer's life easier by getting out of his car and going up to talk to the officer and apologize for driving while dumb.

Yeah, don't do that.

The Officer immediately yelled at him through the car speaker to get back in his car.  Client thought that was rather unfriendly.

You do NOT get out of your car when pulled over unless the officer asks/tells you to do so - and then you do so in a carefully non-threatening manner.

Apparently, in the town/state he's in, it is considered friendly to do so, especially with you getting wet instead of the officer.  

Here, it is really not considered friendly, and is instead considered a potentially threatening move towards the officer.

Client is now suitably enlightened as to how to handle traffic stops properly in the future:

Pull all the way over to the side of the road, keep your hands in view and don't be flailing around the interior of your car, shut the car off, have the window down, and if at night your interior lights on.  

Much more likely to get a friendly result that way.

Flying IFR - Lesson Flying IFR - Lesson 55 - Pre-Checkride Practice, Now With Lotsa Holds

Had N1689H this morning as they switched me to it form my much preferred N8570F (the plane I'm taking the checkride in) so it would a been nice to actually, you know, practice in it.

Instead I get the fargin' seat slipping (yes it did again), misrigged, mis-throttled, beast of N1689H yet again.  If I can fly that crate, I can fly anything.

Sky was clear, sun was bright, and it was bumpy and windy AF as the kids say.

Serious gusts out of 300 degrees and lots of bumping around at altitude including uncommanded ascents and descents and a really strong tendency to push the plane around, and we did end up flying sideways at times.

Flew to KVLL first and did the full procedure approach and did that well.

Then back to Pontiac and did the Localizer BC 27L partial panel.  Wind busily blew me off as I was trying to get established which really made it interesting.  Once established I was copacetic and did it fine.

The then did the RNAV 27L with a full procedure at Guzvy and it sucked.  Got way, way blown off the procedure turn hold, but again, once I lined up on the approach it was then ok, but that's not good enough. Figured out what I was doing wrong, and we did it again - but better, yet there was a catch.

So went to do it  again,  but Detroit Approach had other ideas.  They first had us fly north and then do VFR holds at LEHRA due to heavy traffic.  Then they had us do VFR holds at GUZVY due to heavy traffic.

And then they shifted controllers and seemingly forgot about us completely.

So I got a lot of hold practice in and got the wind correction down which is a good use of time while flying in interminable race track patterns.

After awhile, We called in to Detroit Approach and then they had us head right in once they remembered we were out there. 

Came in and did the approach like it was on rails.

Just as I was landing I got blasted by a gust right as I landed so landing while soft and smooth ended up a little undercrosswind corrected and side-loaded landing.  Drat.

Overall it was yet another 3.6 Roentgen flight, but not good enough to pass had that been the checkride due to getting blown out of the hold, but otherwise ok.

So 2.2, 1.8 simulated, 3 good approaches, 1 not good, a lot of holds, and 1 meh of a side-loaded landing.

Gun Banners Show They Are Not About Reducing Crime With Guns

the Progressive Gun Banners keep talking about banning guns, ostensibly to reduce crime committed with guns,  but at the same time refuse to enforce already existing firearms laws against criminals using guns in crime.

Let's take LA's prosecutor George Gascon for example.

While he's all in favor of gun control  - read gun bans and disarmament of the law-abiding, he's been very open and vociferous about not prosecuting criminals who actually use guns in their crimes.

He eliminated enhanced sentences for using firearms in crimes, leading criminals using guns to get paltry sentences that let them out to commit crimes again.   

He eliminated the enhancement for being in a gang and committing crimes, thus allowing gang violence to flourish.

He eliminated cash bail, allowing criminals to speed up the already quick-moving revolving door form arrest back to the streets.

This has consequences: Gunman who shot dead two cops at motel near Los Angeles was on PROBATION for carrying a gun and has been banned from owning a weapon since 2011: Woke LA DA George Gascon is slammed for 'soft-on-crime' policies

The deaths of those two police officers on June 14, 2022 is on two heads - the scum who shot and killed them, and the scum George Gascon who made sure the killer was released and free to commit murder when he should have been locked up with enhanced sentences for his multiple felonies - includign his beign a felon in possession of a firearm -  laws already on the books to incarcerate dangerous criminals using firearms in crime applied.

Gun banners are demonstrably not acting in good faith when they seek to disarm the law-abiding, yet go out of their woke way to release criminals actually using firearms in crimes back onto the streets to commit more crimes. 

Gun control is demonstrably not about a reduction in crime or crime control. 

Instead, it is about disarming the law-abiding and leaving them at the hands of criminals constantly allowed to commit crimes, often using guns that these progressives claim they want banned.