Mentors may Come and Mentors may go, But Malcolm taught me Soul Cruisin'

I know I know I havn't been posting. I got so damn busy. How can an old retired guy get busy? It's because I only do one thing a day. If I go to the store, that's the day. Mow some grass? That's it. I had this court appearance for a really nasty speeding ticket. It was way down the peninsula in Exmore, Va. Had to appear, couldn't just send in the fine. It's over now and all OK. Also had to gather a lot of paperwork and see bunch of Docs for a Special Issuance for my FAA medical. My 3rd Class is only good for one year. Took the M-10 on about five great day trips to Fly-ins, parties, local hops, dinner with wife at GED. And one three day trip to the Outer Banks. Been too busy to write to you my friends, and I have missed you. I have this friend Malcolm. I need more than one post to describe him, or any of his stories. He tells the stories way better than I. He's been to all the continents and all the seas. He's flown land and sea planes in more places than you or I could ever visit in a lifetime. He's the kind of guy that everybody loves. He could sell anybody anything. When I was 14 I guess he was about 17. Thats when I first met him. I was just a kid. But Malcolm was... well he was older and knew what was going on. He had a Corvette! Which he still has to this day! He had a job, a cool job. He could fly planes! His dad had a plane. The second time I ever went up in a plane was in Malcolm's dad's plane. Oh yes, and Malcolm knew about girls. I knew girls were very exciting, but I didn't exactly know what you precisely did with them or to them. Malcolm knew all this and a lot more. I was a Cadet in the CAP. I was the newest, lowest Cadet in the Squadron, and Malcolm was the highest ranking, and best Cadet in the Squadron. But Malcolm never bossed me around like the other high-ranking cadets did. He was always cool. Sharp and cool. After the high school days I didn't really hang out with Mal for about 40 years. I kept track of course. Mal and his brother Steve are kind of famous in General Aviation. One Thanksgiving I was between airplanes, and didn't have anything to fly. I had sold my old Cher OH kee to help raise a downpayment for the farm I have now. Malcolm's brother Steve worked at the same airline that I did and he said I could use their family 172 over Thanksgiving. I wanted to take my wife and son to South Carolina. So I was up at Frederick and it was time to gas up the plane and give me the keys. "Hey Lloyd when's last time you flew a little airplane?" says Steve. "I have no idea. Whenever I got rid of 33J". "We better get Malcolm to ride around with you." "Yea OK" So Malcolm and I take off and fly around the pattern. All planes fly the same-from a cub to a 747. I hate it when people say that. Corporate pilots always say that. So I seem to be flying the Skyhawk OK and we line up to land. I'm pointing it pretty good anyway. But I seem to have trouble getting the airplane slowed down. I get the flaps all the way down without exceeding the flap speed. Then I settle into a nice stabilized approach at about 100 mph. This brings me into a nice smooth flare at about 100 ft. I have no idea where the ground is. Malcolm doesn't say much. He was mostly curious I think. As we settle to touchdown, he does get concerned though. Being used to a larger airplane I had kind of picked up a little habit. Sometimes when the flare was paying off and you were just floating an inch or two above the runway, you could just ease in a little aileron and put one wheel on the ground, maybe get it rolling without compressing the shock strut. The drag from this action would be enough to land the other wheel and you would "roll it on". A check out in a 172 was not the time to be using this technique. Especially when you're 30 mph too fast and fifty feet off the ground. Malcolm simply said, "Stop doing that" Finally we settled to the ground, and I was pretty good at taxiing. So Mal said we should take the plane back to the ramp. And I said oh no "your giving up on me?" "No , you're all checked out and I'm out of time". "After that, you don't want to see one more?" "No Louie, you're fine. Just promise me one thing". "Yessir" "Don't do that thing (he wiggled his hand like a plane banking) anymore, ever, ever again". Gen Av Informal