the microsoft lawyers would not let this air, but this is definitely an original commercial...
Monday, January 30, 2006
>change is near
this week i will be giving my two week notice to my current employer.
i will inform the company that i will be leaving this career to begin the full time pursuit of my dream. they will be shocked, dissapointed and possibly angry.
it is an exciting, yet amazingly scary time. how can i continue to provide for my family on next to nothing for the next year? what kind of lifestyle change will this transition be accompanied with? so many questions about the unknown.
but, i thrive in conditions of ambiguity, change and adventure. i learned how to do that in the army.
i will find a way to make it work, because this is my dream...
i will inform the company that i will be leaving this career to begin the full time pursuit of my dream. they will be shocked, dissapointed and possibly angry.
it is an exciting, yet amazingly scary time. how can i continue to provide for my family on next to nothing for the next year? what kind of lifestyle change will this transition be accompanied with? so many questions about the unknown.
but, i thrive in conditions of ambiguity, change and adventure. i learned how to do that in the army.
i will find a way to make it work, because this is my dream...
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Dallas Swat - Home
Dallas Swat - Home
i am not sure if anyone has had a chance to check this show out yet on A&E. strangely enough, i know a couple of the guys profiled on this show.
Rich and Andre both live in my apartment complex and are our courtesy officers.
The show is great and fun to watch, especially since there is rarely a national syndicated show that profiles anything going on in Dallas. Needless to say, these guys have gotten a lot of attention since the show started, so it is kind of funny to see how they are dealing with their new-found "celebrity" status. both guys are single, so they are milking it for all it's worth...hey i would do the same thing...
i am not sure if anyone has had a chance to check this show out yet on A&E. strangely enough, i know a couple of the guys profiled on this show.
Rich and Andre both live in my apartment complex and are our courtesy officers.
The show is great and fun to watch, especially since there is rarely a national syndicated show that profiles anything going on in Dallas. Needless to say, these guys have gotten a lot of attention since the show started, so it is kind of funny to see how they are dealing with their new-found "celebrity" status. both guys are single, so they are milking it for all it's worth...hey i would do the same thing...
>commercial checkride part III
as we climbed into the cockpit and settled in, i started going through my checklist. we taxied out (i remembered my brake check) and took off. i was required to make it to my first point on our route within 2 1/2 minutes of what i originally told him it was going to take. we made it to our first point within one minute. he diverted me to the south and we entered the traffic pattern for a tiny, overgrown field. our first landing was a power-off 180. i knew this might be a little tricky with the winds gusting at the surface 20 knots. good judgement and planning would be critical to the success of this landing maneuver. i nailed it.
we taxied back and he asked me to do a soft-field takeoff. we remained in the pattern and he asked me to do a soft-field landing. after that we did short field takeoff and a short-field landing.
after the short field landing, joe looks at me and says, "son, my wife has come down with something and i think i might be catching what she has. i'm not feeling real good right now. let's head back to addison. i've seen all that i need to see."
WHAT??????
"when you have flown as long as i have you know if pilot has it, and believe me son, you've got it."
i couldn't believe it.
"so this means i passed, right?"
"congratulations, son you are now a commercial pilot, unless you screw up your next takeoff and landing at addison."
we headed back to addison and i must have been in a state of shock, because i don't remember much about the flight back.
when we got on the ground. he wrote me my temporary commercial license and took my old private pilot license. i really didn't want to probe too much into why he decided so quickly that he had seen enough, but i really wanted to know what his thinking was behind letting me off the hook from doing all of my maneuvers. i obviously came into the whole experience wanting to learn all i could and i think he liked that i asked him a lot of questions and genuinely had an open, learning spirit. he had previously failed a multi-engine instructor applicant as well as another guy i knew working on his multi-engine rating because they both wanted to argue and thought they knew more than he did.
in my life in general, i approach everything with curiosity and wanting to learn as much about something as i can, and it definitely paid off during my checkride.
oh yeah, the skarrow. not two days after my checkride, the flight school allowed a guy to fly it (happens to be the guy i talked about above who failed his multi-engine checkride) and he experienced a rapid decrease in oil pressure and power. although he was near an airport and still had enough power to get to that airport, he elected to put it down in an open field. yeah, the skarrow was definitely on its last leg and is now permanently retired.
it's been a ride...but i'm ready to make this flying thing a career. i start my cfi/cfii training on february 9th and should be completed in a month. i have a verbal promise for a flight instructing job after that with a school that is also starting to pick up a lot of part 135 business in a couple of king airs, a citation and cessna 206....this is going to be fun!!!
we taxied back and he asked me to do a soft-field takeoff. we remained in the pattern and he asked me to do a soft-field landing. after that we did short field takeoff and a short-field landing.
after the short field landing, joe looks at me and says, "son, my wife has come down with something and i think i might be catching what she has. i'm not feeling real good right now. let's head back to addison. i've seen all that i need to see."
WHAT??????
"when you have flown as long as i have you know if pilot has it, and believe me son, you've got it."
i couldn't believe it.
"so this means i passed, right?"
"congratulations, son you are now a commercial pilot, unless you screw up your next takeoff and landing at addison."
we headed back to addison and i must have been in a state of shock, because i don't remember much about the flight back.
when we got on the ground. he wrote me my temporary commercial license and took my old private pilot license. i really didn't want to probe too much into why he decided so quickly that he had seen enough, but i really wanted to know what his thinking was behind letting me off the hook from doing all of my maneuvers. i obviously came into the whole experience wanting to learn all i could and i think he liked that i asked him a lot of questions and genuinely had an open, learning spirit. he had previously failed a multi-engine instructor applicant as well as another guy i knew working on his multi-engine rating because they both wanted to argue and thought they knew more than he did.
in my life in general, i approach everything with curiosity and wanting to learn as much about something as i can, and it definitely paid off during my checkride.
oh yeah, the skarrow. not two days after my checkride, the flight school allowed a guy to fly it (happens to be the guy i talked about above who failed his multi-engine checkride) and he experienced a rapid decrease in oil pressure and power. although he was near an airport and still had enough power to get to that airport, he elected to put it down in an open field. yeah, the skarrow was definitely on its last leg and is now permanently retired.
it's been a ride...but i'm ready to make this flying thing a career. i start my cfi/cfii training on february 9th and should be completed in a month. i have a verbal promise for a flight instructing job after that with a school that is also starting to pick up a lot of part 135 business in a couple of king airs, a citation and cessna 206....this is going to be fun!!!
>commercial checkride part II
i received a telephone call on tuesday, december 19th from my instructor, martin. the tone of his voice immediately told me that he had some dissapointing news. sure enough, the skarrow had encountered a massive oil leak on a flight on monday. the plane had to be grounded until the mechanics could figure out why it had lost nearly four quarts of oil during a two hour flight. he tried to assure me that they could still figure out what was wrong with the plane and get it fixed by my checkride day (the next day), but i knew the likelihood of that happening was almost non-existent. he told me that he would keep me posted on how things looked with the plane.
on wednesday martin called to let me know that there were seals that had ruptured, resulting in the engine losing oil. the mechanics were going to have to strip the engine in order to fix the source of the leaks. however, they would try to use a sealant that would be a temporary "fix" just for my checkride, and then would permamanently ground the plane and give it back to the owner, because the skarrow is a leaseback. the other option was to call up the flight school at rockwall municipal airport, the only other flight school who had an arrow for rent, and get checked out in time for my checkride and use that airplane for my checkride. so, my options for my commercial checkride were:
1) fly a nearly-dead airplane on its last leg; the airplane that I had spent 40+ hours training in for my commercial checkride
--or--
2) get checked out in another arrow, with different handling and performance characteristics and instrumentation and demonstrate commercial maneuvers to the FAA in a way that looked like i had flown this airplane for years.
mmmm......great options, not to mention i had to postpone the flying portion of my checkride twice already and this was the only thing standing in the way of me becoming a commercial pilot.
work was also starting to pick up. i work in distribution for a major retail corporation (not Wally World, i.e. "the dark side,") but the other well-known, higher quality merchandise retailer whose logo is the most recognized logo in the world, yet is not an international company (yet).
anyway, i had been assigned to manage this year's inventory of our 1.3 million square foot distribution center; and somehow i knew that if i did not get my checkride complete this week, i would have to push it off until after the completion of my inventory project in late january (ironically, three days after the date of this post). i was concerned enough before all of this with whether or not my maneuvers would pass a checkride in the first place, now all of this was weighing heavily on my shoulders.
i called joe, the examiner, on wednesday and explained to him the situation and asked him if we could use our backup date of friday.
"son, i'm not going anywhere. you do what you need to do and just let me know if you can't get the other airplane on friday. i'm not going anywhere."
my next call was to the flight school in rockwall, tx, a growing community on the east side of lake ray hubbard on the east side of the d/fw metroplex. i got one of the instructor's voicemail and explained to him my predicament and asked if there was any way between now and friday before my 9:00 am checkride that i could be checked out in their arrow. i asked him to please call me back as soon as possible.
later that night he returned my call. his name was dave and he informed me that he couldn't check me out in their arrow until early friday morning because he was flying to mexico to deliver christmas gifts to needy children all day thursday. he wasn't even guaranteed to get back by friday. but, nevertheless, he would try to be back in time to get me checked out on friday morning....WHY NOT?????
so....friday morning rolls around and the forecast for the day is beautiful, except for gusty winds up to about 20 knots. there is a high pressure system sitting directly over dallas and the forcast calls for clear skies all day long. i head out to rockwall, leaving my house at 5:00 am to ensure i get there by our 6:30 meeting time. when i get there, i do my preflight and just like the skarrow, this one is not a beautiful plane to look at. this is a 1969 model, however the engine is in top shape and the avionics have all been updated, including a brand new gps receiver.
we taxi out, takeoff and within three minutes of being airborn, dave states that i shouldn't have any problems passing my checkride in this airplane (i'm not sure if he was saying this just to boost my confidence, or if he really meant it---either way, it worked). i felt very comfortable and confident in this airplane-it was solid, powerful and everything worked!!! we did a soft field landing on his private strip at his farm and turned around and flew back to rockwall.
after the required endorsement nd admin was complete for me to take the airplane on my own. i left for addison (a 15 minute flight).
joe met me at the flight school at addison, bringing in a box of donuts for the instructors. (has anyone ever heard of an FAA examiner doing this?) we sat down had some donuts and coffee as i explained to him what i had been going through that week. i also explained to him some of the changes in performance that we could expect in this airplane, versus the skarrow.
the time had FINALLY come for us to get into the airplane to complete my flight portion of the checkride.
on wednesday martin called to let me know that there were seals that had ruptured, resulting in the engine losing oil. the mechanics were going to have to strip the engine in order to fix the source of the leaks. however, they would try to use a sealant that would be a temporary "fix" just for my checkride, and then would permamanently ground the plane and give it back to the owner, because the skarrow is a leaseback. the other option was to call up the flight school at rockwall municipal airport, the only other flight school who had an arrow for rent, and get checked out in time for my checkride and use that airplane for my checkride. so, my options for my commercial checkride were:
1) fly a nearly-dead airplane on its last leg; the airplane that I had spent 40+ hours training in for my commercial checkride
--or--
2) get checked out in another arrow, with different handling and performance characteristics and instrumentation and demonstrate commercial maneuvers to the FAA in a way that looked like i had flown this airplane for years.
mmmm......great options, not to mention i had to postpone the flying portion of my checkride twice already and this was the only thing standing in the way of me becoming a commercial pilot.
work was also starting to pick up. i work in distribution for a major retail corporation (not Wally World, i.e. "the dark side,") but the other well-known, higher quality merchandise retailer whose logo is the most recognized logo in the world, yet is not an international company (yet).
anyway, i had been assigned to manage this year's inventory of our 1.3 million square foot distribution center; and somehow i knew that if i did not get my checkride complete this week, i would have to push it off until after the completion of my inventory project in late january (ironically, three days after the date of this post). i was concerned enough before all of this with whether or not my maneuvers would pass a checkride in the first place, now all of this was weighing heavily on my shoulders.
i called joe, the examiner, on wednesday and explained to him the situation and asked him if we could use our backup date of friday.
"son, i'm not going anywhere. you do what you need to do and just let me know if you can't get the other airplane on friday. i'm not going anywhere."
my next call was to the flight school in rockwall, tx, a growing community on the east side of lake ray hubbard on the east side of the d/fw metroplex. i got one of the instructor's voicemail and explained to him my predicament and asked if there was any way between now and friday before my 9:00 am checkride that i could be checked out in their arrow. i asked him to please call me back as soon as possible.
later that night he returned my call. his name was dave and he informed me that he couldn't check me out in their arrow until early friday morning because he was flying to mexico to deliver christmas gifts to needy children all day thursday. he wasn't even guaranteed to get back by friday. but, nevertheless, he would try to be back in time to get me checked out on friday morning....WHY NOT?????
so....friday morning rolls around and the forecast for the day is beautiful, except for gusty winds up to about 20 knots. there is a high pressure system sitting directly over dallas and the forcast calls for clear skies all day long. i head out to rockwall, leaving my house at 5:00 am to ensure i get there by our 6:30 meeting time. when i get there, i do my preflight and just like the skarrow, this one is not a beautiful plane to look at. this is a 1969 model, however the engine is in top shape and the avionics have all been updated, including a brand new gps receiver.
we taxi out, takeoff and within three minutes of being airborn, dave states that i shouldn't have any problems passing my checkride in this airplane (i'm not sure if he was saying this just to boost my confidence, or if he really meant it---either way, it worked). i felt very comfortable and confident in this airplane-it was solid, powerful and everything worked!!! we did a soft field landing on his private strip at his farm and turned around and flew back to rockwall.
after the required endorsement nd admin was complete for me to take the airplane on my own. i left for addison (a 15 minute flight).
joe met me at the flight school at addison, bringing in a box of donuts for the instructors. (has anyone ever heard of an FAA examiner doing this?) we sat down had some donuts and coffee as i explained to him what i had been going through that week. i also explained to him some of the changes in performance that we could expect in this airplane, versus the skarrow.
the time had FINALLY come for us to get into the airplane to complete my flight portion of the checkride.
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