Thanks for dinner Tony. I'd love to come back to Stearman with Karen sometime and see you guys again. It was nice to meet Leah too!
Karen is nicer than I am. Haha.
Spike, I definitely agree. Good folks here!
Somehow I never even noticed that Arc was "backwards". Looks like a bird.
Tony, I missed saying goodnight because work had been calling on the cell. They didn't get the new on-call schedule for this week or something. I ended up having to explain how I was "in Nebraska" on vacation but was actually in Kansas. Ha!
Flying was a bit better. Starting to realize one problem is not being fast enough at briefing the approach, spending too much time heads down trying to interpret the plate.
Then I either try to speed it up by staying heads down too long or I never get it done and I'm trying to read it one step at a time while flying the approach which leads to also being unstable too much.
Even plates I've now flown multiple times I'm really slow reading them.
Jesse worked with me on the way back to get more practice at it.
But I'm getting ahead of the story. Ahh new things... Transitioning to cruise and dealing with trimming at the level off and speeding up a whole lot. This was the second time for that since we've been mostly local here at LNK due to the possibility of icing.
So in the 182... You trim. Then you trim some more. Then some more. Then some more. Heh. I do it automatically VFR but IFR it's... Different.
Both going down and coming back the controllers kept offering vectors direct. Lots of handheld GPSs out there for - ahem - situational awareness, apparently. They seem a bit shocked at "we will continue on own navigation if that's ok. We're slant Alpha". I'm, of course, flying with Location Services turned off on the iPad. Really. It's practice I need. I can see where it'll be GREAT later on, but it's interesting the controllers are surprised by it.
Flight down was good. Jesse pulled up his FARs on his iPad and quizzed me for oral questions all the way down.
We filed to KAAO because there are only RNAV approaches to 1K1. Controllers were great when we explained we wanted to go missed, stay IFR and land IFR with a Visual to 1K1 and cancel on the ground. Said they would prefer we file that to 1K1. Okay fine. I get it.
Missed off of AAO and we're quickly at 1K1 and way too high. Some creative maneuvering and we land. Taxi up along the ridiculously narrow taxiway to the restaurant where friends await. Thanks for coming out so late you guys!
Somehow it didn't click that 1V1 is the airport in the AOPA article a while back about the renovation until Tony mentions it. We talk gliders and flying and what not and I step outside and work calls. Dinner was over and I missed the goodbyes. Oh well. Jesse is hunting for me a few minutes later.
Fuel up at the self-serve and instead of dealing with the tiny taxiways in the dark, we back taxi 35 and depart.
Controller again offers a heading that would have basically been direct to LNK so we initially accept it thinking its a shallow intercept to the airway, but another teaching moment was set up. Jesse realizes before I do that we'll never intercept or it'll be past one of the doglegs in the airway. I get some practice figuring out where I will intercept. Thank goodness for real DME. Jesse could have failed it and made my life harder. He was kind.
Got back here and did a full power descent keeping the speed up. We typically saw only about 110 knots coming back due to the headwinds so a little speed was good. Problem was, trimming that got me behind on briefing again. So I ended up chasing a bit on the Localizer 18. Crud. Better but not how it should have gone.
Okay. Missed and out to the VOR and the full procedure to the VOR 17. Better but still a little behind. Circle to land 35.
We got in so late here tonight we called off tomorrow morning and will fly again tomorrow night.
I'm going to spend some time completely finishing up the logbook catch-up (it's close now! Just need to enter things that are only electronically logged - and yes, I've given up my dream of only keeping an electronic log...), then looking at random plates tomorrow and trying to imagine looking down, reading a bit, looking up like I'm checking the instruments, looking back down reading more, looking back up.
My old brain just doesn't process as fast as Jesse's. I've got a 386 up there I think, judging by how slowly I read approach plates.
It'll come around with more practice. When I know what's happening next, my flying is acceptable. If I get behind, I'm hosed. Flying an approach one thing at a time with your head going up and down isn't right. Need to visualize and get ahead better.
Learned something else tonight... I know my glasses prescription is right but maybe seeing that first twinge of presbyopia? Dunno.
Jesse was demonstrating how to look down, look up, look down and wanted me to follow along, but I couldn't read the small print on *his* iPad on his left knee. Brighter helps. Sigh.
It sucks getting old.
And I know that's just the tip of the iceberg... I have nothing to complain about, it was just odd that a) I couldn't read tiny stuff at three feet and b) that I noticed ... Oh well.
Pulled up the plate on mine and was fine reading it in *my* lap, of course. But it ate up time Jesse was trying to show me something. Hmm.
I also want my panel lights fixed. The red overhead is fine but I miss my dial lights. More light is good.
I tried turning on my headlamp on white on the panel once which I actually kinda liked (usually its on red), but I knew it was obnoxious for Jesse and asked, "That too much?" "Yeah, that's a bit much." Heh.
Maybe he could wear sunglasses. Hahahaha!
Oh and a side-note... That wonderful FAA PMA Approved #*=%#+=