P51!—I’ve been meaning to ask you—have you ever been in a situation up in the air where you really doubted that you would get safely back on the ground?
I’ve been watching a lot of uTube videos about folks getting in trouble for a variety of reasons and wind up crashing, sometimes fatally.A lot of time the less density of air and too much weight on board were a factor
I didn’t do any mountain flying; just a bit around Michigan. I took my wife up once and she decided it wasn’t for her. That eliminated any practical travel, so it just became a very expensive way to kill a few hours. There were two situations, both safely handled.
I flew into an open-house at an uncontrolled (no tower) Army helicopter base. When I finished there was a long line of planes waiting to depart, while others were still arriving. My turn came and I waited while a nice twin landed. He was rolling far down the runway, so I announced my departure and started down. Instead of turning off the runway into the grass to taxi; the twin turned on the runway and started back-taxiing. I didn’t wait to see how he’d react to my approach, I immediately chopped power and applied brakes. It was never even close, and he did pull off to the grass. I then pulled off and let the next in line go.
I went up for touch-&-gos on a somewhat challenging wind day: 18kt 30° off runway heading. I carefully taxied out and took off. As soon as the wheels left the pavement I was pushed violently sideways; way more than the reported winds would account for. Trying to keep a normal, rectangular pattern was proving difficult; every time I adjusted for the wind, it seemed to change. The final approach had me sweating gallons. At one point my 65kt approach speed had dropped to only 45kt, almost stall speed. The wind had done a near 180° making my air speed suddenly low (it’s why I was trying for 65kt; normal final would be 55-60kt). I hit the throttle, kept the nose down and recovered speed, just in time to try to lose it and land. I slowed, pulled up flaps and applied power to go around for another touch-&-go. I was so totally occupied with controlling the plane I hadn’t considered that maybe touch-&-gos weren’t a good idea that day. After wrestling the plane back around the pattern and landing again I got the updated special weather bulletin for winds 20kt gusting to 28kts and variable direction. I never in my life felt more invincible as I did walking from the plane that day.
I know the resolution is bad so the text is unclear…. but i can’t remember ever seeing Google tools do such a terrible job as when I tried to use them to translate this.
I know some French and some Spanish, and almost no Italian… But I think I kind of get the gist of what it says, better than the translation I got, anyway.
The illustration helps too, but of course not in the translate app.
A brave Italian something… maybe teenager?… saves a train in America that’s about to cross a burning bridge.
Hullo Cleo family…. and thereby adoptive Clevelandites.
I was having trouble with the site last night… I don’t really think it was WordPress, but a slowdown of my already snail-paced DSL.
Web pages, including this one were taking several long minutes to open, and only partially loading.
Here I could see half the poster, I think 2 of the videos, and none of the images in the comments.
I waited and waited till I guess I dozed off … I mean till I got distracted… OK, OK, yeah… distracted by my bed calling me…. and gave up.
….
Today is another scorcher… Not as bad as some we’ve had, but it’s now 95° F and supposed to hit 98 (37°C) before it starts dropping.
Luckily we have much cooler nights.
I finally roused myself enough to show up here…. just so nobody would send the hounds looking for me.
Especially if one of the hounds might be a certain basset whose idea of looking for someone might involve a bazooka.
I mentioned adoptive Clevelandites because I was wondering if it had occurred to anyone among us that there was now, or ever, any vice in Cleveland…
Not counting maybe Cleo Clifford dynamiting a few squirrels, or a couple of Grandmas making their mahjong games more interesting with a handful of quarters.
I lived in Cleveland in the… in….a long time ago. Grade school.
Cleveland was Grandmas… and 5pm casserole dinners, and for girls older than me, 7pm movie dates, never on school nights, but still home by 9:30 or Daddy wants to know why.
…
But here’s a show about illicit kibble manufacture, sales to minor pups… trafficking out-dated flea collars… lady dogs forced into harnesses and sold on the street….
Who woulda thunk it?
Stylish dog clothing and hip music?
in CLEVELAND??? I would have said you were crazy.
Just shows you what I knew.
…
I didn’t watch the show all the time, mostly cos I was working late, and not seeing a lot of TV…
But suddenly, all the most fashionable bassets, and later, copydog humans, were wearing white jackets….
something we had associated around here with sleazy Florida types.
But even now, a white belt and white shoes is called a “full Cleveland.” Um… I think that’s related.
…
And sunglasses, too. Whoever had seen so many bassets in dark sunglasses?
Or wearing t-shirts under their suit jackets, instead of white shirts and ties… in colors like lavender and turquoise.
Here in the Northern CA land of bearded men in Pendleton shirts, and heavy socks with Teva hiking sandals… (Be quiet! Who asked you?)…
we suddenly saw bare feet(!) in boat shoes, emulating the bassets.
…
The music, too, was everywhere… a different sound from either the punkish rock n’ roll I listened to, or the 80’s hair bands in the clubs…
The cool sound of urban Saturday nights…
where hip bassets with two-day stubble picked up their dates in fancy sports cars.
“What? We’re playing! We’re just playing! It’s pretend.”
What a pretty husky.
P51!—I’ve been meaning to ask you—have you ever been in a situation up in the air where you really doubted that you would get safely back on the ground?
I’ve been watching a lot of uTube videos about folks getting in trouble for a variety of reasons and wind up crashing, sometimes fatally.A lot of time the less density of air and too much weight on board were a factor
I didn’t do any mountain flying; just a bit around Michigan. I took my wife up once and she decided it wasn’t for her. That eliminated any practical travel, so it just became a very expensive way to kill a few hours. There were two situations, both safely handled.
I’m thinking that’s a German shepherd.
The coloring makes me think of huskies; but I’m not expert enough to be sure.
Our former neighbors had German shepherds like that back in the day.
,
I know the resolution is bad so the text is unclear…. but i can’t remember ever seeing Google tools do such a terrible job as when I tried to use them to translate this.
I know some French and some Spanish, and almost no Italian… But I think I kind of get the gist of what it says, better than the translation I got, anyway.
The illustration helps too, but of course not in the translate app.
A brave Italian something… maybe teenager?… saves a train in America that’s about to cross a burning bridge.
,.
Klaatu Barada Nicto!
,,
SQUEE!
..
It’s for you, Dear…
,.,
Don’t know where this is… But it should be near Fort Ross!
Michigan State Parks are posting these signs.
see the cat?
Found it. Looks to be big one judging from what is visible…
Yes!
Not without blowing it up.
Don’t hurt the kitty!
I didn’t see it till now…
But once you do, you wonder why you didn’t before.
Ouch!
Must be deliberate, she keeps doing the same dive. 😉
Not how they draw it up.
I prefer Barsky and Fetch.
SUSSSSSSAAAAAAN!
where ARE you?
I know it’s not your B-day, but I may not get another chance to post this little animation
OMG! OMG!
Did my doctor tell you something that I don’t know???
Or …. Wait…
Did your doctor tell you something we need to know?
If you just mean you’re shutting Cleo down before April… Please don’t!!!
Ps… You know I love this one!
I’m here! I’m here!
I wrote the next post explaining… not that it’s a good excuse🥺
Hullo Cleo family…. and thereby adoptive Clevelandites.
I was having trouble with the site last night… I don’t really think it was WordPress, but a slowdown of my already snail-paced DSL.
Web pages, including this one were taking several long minutes to open, and only partially loading.
Here I could see half the poster, I think 2 of the videos, and none of the images in the comments.
I waited and waited till I guess I
dozed off… I mean till I got distracted… OK, OK, yeah… distracted by my bed calling me…. and gave up.….
Today is another scorcher… Not as bad as some we’ve had, but it’s now 95° F and supposed to hit 98 (37°C) before it starts dropping.
Luckily we have much cooler nights.
I finally roused myself enough to show up here…. just so nobody would send the hounds looking for me.
Especially if one of the hounds might be a certain basset whose idea of looking for someone might involve a bazooka.
Anyhow, I did want to comment on Cleveland Vice.
I mentioned adoptive Clevelandites because I was wondering if it had occurred to anyone among us that there was now, or ever, any vice in Cleveland…
Not counting maybe Cleo Clifford dynamiting a few squirrels, or a couple of Grandmas making their mahjong games more interesting with a handful of quarters.
I lived in Cleveland in the… in….a long time ago. Grade school.
Cleveland was Grandmas… and 5pm casserole dinners, and for girls older than me, 7pm movie dates, never on school nights, but still home by 9:30 or Daddy wants to know why.
…
But here’s a show about illicit kibble manufacture, sales to minor pups… trafficking out-dated flea collars… lady dogs forced into harnesses and sold on the street….
Who woulda thunk it?
Stylish dog clothing and hip music?
in CLEVELAND??? I would have said you were crazy.
Just shows you what I knew.
…
I didn’t watch the show all the time, mostly cos I was working late, and not seeing a lot of TV…
But suddenly, all the most fashionable bassets, and later, copydog humans, were wearing white jackets….
something we had associated around here with sleazy Florida types.
But even now, a white belt and white shoes is called a “full Cleveland.” Um… I think that’s related.
…
And sunglasses, too. Whoever had seen so many bassets in dark sunglasses?
Or wearing t-shirts under their suit jackets, instead of white shirts and ties… in colors like lavender and turquoise.
Here in the Northern CA land of bearded men in Pendleton shirts, and heavy socks with Teva hiking sandals… (Be quiet! Who asked you?)…
we suddenly saw bare feet(!) in boat shoes, emulating the bassets.
…
The music, too, was everywhere… a different sound from either the punkish rock n’ roll I listened to, or the 80’s hair bands in the clubs…
The cool sound of urban Saturday nights…
where hip bassets with two-day stubble picked up their dates in fancy sports cars.
It all felt way out of my league.