Re: Aviation Aggrivations
Seeing as a number of aircraft have GPSs these days, the distance out from the airport shouldn't be all that off.
Furthermore, if you're paying attention (which you ought to be) and know someone is approaching, you should be looking for that person, and should also state your position. For example, a few weeks back on a flight I did, a Cheyenne was on the ILS inbound when I was ready for takeoff. Center advised me of it when I picked up my release, and said to communicate with him. I would have anyway. So I get on, pick him up on frequency, and ask how far out he is and if I have time for takeoff (I knew I did, but I wanted to get his OK first since he's the one in the air). He said they were still a few minutes out, I had plenty of time. Since I was ready for takeoff, I took off and went. I stayed far off the ILS course until I made visual contact with him. All was well (visual conditions).
The point is, y'all can talk to eachother, and it's a good idea. You make estimates to the best of your ability. Identifying a fix is worthless to a VFR pilot, and whenever I'm at an uncontrolled field I try to make sure I'm giving as accurate as possible locations in terms of rough direction and number of miles out. Seems to work well and give everyone the best idea. If I'm on an approach, I'll state that as well, but that's about it.
Oh, and I absolutely HATE listening to 122.8 at any time. There are so many frequencies out there, why do they have to assign the same one to so many airports, all within radio distance of eachother? Seems like it shouldn't be that difficult to give them different frequencies, but I could be wrong. When I'm going to an airport with one of the popular frequencies I'll call in on it 10 miles out, but when I'm leaving I just try to get high enough above the airport that I'm not a factor as quickly as possible, and then switch over to whatever approach/center/etc. So I can get on a frequency that bothers me less and pick up my flight following/IFR.