boss the plane!

Did you folks see the new "Aerocar"? It flew for the first time the other day. I got a e mail from Av Web about it. And one from AOPA on line. And one or three forwards from friends. It's called the tierra firma, or tiera fuego, or tierantula or something. It is the first true air car because the wings aren't trailered. The wings fold up into three pieces per side and everything stays on the car. Then you can drive on four wheels. When you fly you don't use the steering wheel. A stick pops up from the floor! With all the new innovation going on with composites and light sport and ultra light, maybe the Aerocar can finally happen. I've been hearing about an airplane in every driveway since I was in grade school. I love the idea as an engineering challenge. I have mixed emotions about the rest of the idea. Remember that car from the sixties that was also a boat? It really worked and it was really cool. And now they're a collector's item. Remember what everyone said about them? They were neither a good car nor a good boat. See where I'm goin here? Did you see the video of the new air car? It rolled for five thousand feet before it took off. Then it flew along in ground effect for a long time. Good news: it flew! Bad news: back to the drawing board. Gen. Av. Informal.

it's always about me

I always do everything in spurts. When I'm active and doing, I feel like doing everything I like. If I feel like flying, I also feel like writing here. Or talking to friends. Or playing guitar. When I'm not active, well I guess I don't feel like doing anything but eating, and perhaps watching TV. Why is it that when I'm down I want to eat? Anyway, I climbed out of the walls I'd built around myself to spend the weekend in Frederick. I call it Fredrock, or Fredneck. I was visiting my mentors, the VanKirk brothers. See the post about Malcolm. We moved an Aeronca Champ in pieces from their barn to the airport. We worked on their hangers. We worked in their storage sheds. We watched helicopters fly. And gliders. And Gyroplanes. We played with Steve's 1970 Bonneville street rod. When evening came on Saturday we had a nice long jam session in the hanger. We had drums, amps, bass, dobro, keyboards, guitars. Beer, Cokes. Video cam. Then on Sunday, another day at the Frederick airport. And a two and a half hour drive home. And my weekend was over. Now I'm back in my cocoon. Now the list of things to do to spool up the farm for spring grows longer each day. I do almost nothing. I'm back in hiding and I don't have to be sociable. Maybe by the weekend I'll come out and play again. I worked pretty hard before and I earned this nervous breakdown. I'm gonna continue to enjoy it. If I'm writing to you, I must be getting better. I'm going to get my guitar. I will try to find a pick. I will play and sing. But only prairie songs. Then we'll see about those chores. Gen Av Informal.

Shelley Fabares

Have you ever heard of a Fantasy Camp? It's when you pay some folks a whole bunch of money to be a real pro at doing something that you love. Except you are an amateur. I think the classic example is the race car driver thing. They give you ground school. Suit you up. Put you in a real car on a real track. I have to admit that that would be a gas. "Is that your crash helmet"? "Oh I hope not". Then of course aviation wise, you can pay to be in a dog fight world war two style. Sort of. I have a buddy who used to work doing that. You have two piston powered T-34's. Each plane has a pilot and a customer. They dog fight and the customer gets some training and they stage a dog fight. Unfortunately, they tore the wings off of a few T-34's and the FAA grounded those operations. My buddy in the business told me it was no fault of the venerable T-34 Mentor. Maybe the classic is the baseball fantasy camp. You get to play with the old retired players who are quite famous. Actually, every tandem parachute jump is a mini Fantasy Camp. After all, you're jumping just like a pro on your first and only jump. Long free- fall and everything. I had a kind of home-made Fantasy Camp experience. It was maybe three or four years ago. A pretty autumn day. There was this music concert being held at a private farm. The band was one of the best groups in the Baltimore-DC area. It was actually a combination of two bands that were combining for a tour through Tennessee and Texas. They were raising money for that tour. The price at the "gate" was whatever you wanted to contribute. Minimum $5. This was a wonderful party. Anyway, my friend Clark and myself were definitely going. And inspired by the "contribution" aspect I was hatching a plan. As Clark and I drove from the shore to Western Maryland I insisted that we play the Bob Dylan song "Love Minus Zero" over and over and nothing else. Clark thought it strange that I had my harmonica rack and one harmonica in my hand the whole time. He kept asking me what was going on but I wouldn't tell him, because maybe nothing was going on. We get to the concert. The opening band is playing and they are wonderful. My good friend Malcolm is there and he knows the guys in the featured band. I know one of the guys "Billy" who is kind of famous. I tell Malcolm I have a crazy idea. I'll pay $100 at the gate if they will let me be front man and sing a song with them. They want to raise money right? Malcolm says "wait here". I go and get a beer, and they havn't said yes yet and I'm nervous as hell. Then "Billy" Kemp himself appears. "Lloyd, what's this all about? You wanna do a song for $100." I say "Yes, and I want you to hand me your Martin D-45 in regular tuning so I can just play at the front mike and be all set up. I know nothing about stage equipment. Also, I have no rhythm, so the band will have to follow me." He says "What song?". I knew he was game. So I got to play with some really great pros. I did my harmonica break, they did a lead break, and I got to play Billy's guitar. On a real stage. Here I thought I had invented the folksinger fantasy camp. But no. It turns out the "Kingston Trio" were going around with two of the original players. The other guy had died. So they were selling a Fantasy slot and the buyer could be the third guy in the trio for a once in a lifetime song. I saw it on YouTube. If I never do anything more as a folk singer, I'm happy. I had my Fantasy Camp. Gen. Av. Informal.

March Madness

Sunday before last it snowed nine inches here at my place. The last gasps of winter. We had no snow up to that point, except a few dustings that didn't stick. So it snowed for a day. And there was a deep freeze. Three days in a row below 15 deg. The day I want to tell you about was Thursday March 5. This is the day that it went from a real Winter to a real Spring in about nine hours. I had been watching the forecast so I knew what was coming. I got up at 4:30 AM. I was too excited to sleep. It was going to go from a dark 12 degrees to a sunny over 60 thru the course of the day. I made some coffee. I tuned in the weather channel on the little kitchen TV. I checked the faucets and the pipes were not frozen. I had left the water on and a radiator below the sink. The downstairs was pretty cold and I fired up more portable heat. As I had a bite to eat I searched out the window for a glow of dawn. There was a kind of false glow. I got my boots on and wandered out to the deck, then out to the back yard. The snow was squeaky. It was a cold winter morning. Yes there was now a sort of light in the east. I went back in the house. I got on gloves and hat and parka. Jake, my dog had appeared. He and I went out to play in the snow. We walked out to the hangar. The wind sock. The picnic table. I started up the Jeep. Jake jumped in the back of the Jeep. He thought we were going for a ride. We were, but only a few hundred feet. I pointed the Jeep east and parked with the heat on and my coffee still hot. We watched a beautiful sunrise. According to my thermometer outside the hangar it was 9 degrees. A few cars were starting to appear on the county road out front. So I guessed it was OK for me to drive around without waking anyone up. So Jake and I started driving up and down the airstrip. We were beating down the snow and checking the runway. The radio in the Jeep doesn't work, but the old cassette does. But there is only one tape. The Beau Brummels. I love the song "Laugh Laugh". Remember? We go back to the hangar and park. The dogs are all out now running around barking. So wife is up. Is it getting warmer already? We wander back to the house. The professor is up too and he's making breakfast. He's always making a meal. He has been living here about two weeks or so. His plane is snowed in here and he's been commuting with the Jeep and a rental car when he can't fly to work. Yes he flies to work. And lives in our man-cave in the back of the hangar. Q. What do you call a Profesor who has broken up with his girlfriend? A. Homeless. (and car-less). But it's been nice having him here because he's the cook and does the shopping and buys the food. And he's entertaining. And I call him "Dupree" and he hates that. I tell him that now is the time to fly the plane out. It's gonna get sloppy after 60 degrees today. But he has the rental car and things to do in Bmore and DC and he will drive the ninety miles one way. After a fine breakfast he dons his corduroy sport jacket. He packs up his book bag with his manuscripts and notes. His tobacco. His brown bag lunch is raw vegetables. His laptop. His wool muffler. He will forget his phone charger, as usual. He'll be back tonight with groceries. And if we're not too tired we'll have a campfire. I'm already tired. While wife hangs out in the barn with her horse, I fall asleep in front of the computer. At noon I'm out shoveling the wet snow away from the hangar doors. It's bright and sunny and 45 degrees! I'm thinking I'll get the Cher OH Kee out and try to taxi out on the snow and go flying in this bright snow-sunshine. I call up Eric. He is my neighbor who has llamas. And sheep. And cows. I owe him a flight or two in return for labor. He rebuilt my garage roof. But the real reason I call him is I want him to take video with my camera of me. So he says he'll be over soon. So I get the hangar doors open and get the airplane rolled out. I do a few little chores for wife in the barn and house. I want to get in good with her because I need a favor. Eric shows. And we give him two fresh bales of hay in return for the video I want him to shoot. Then we get the airplane all pre-flighted and it starts up nice. It ought to. It's 50 degrees! We taxi out. It's getting sloppy. Stretches of bare grass. Slush. Packed snow. Turn around at the end and take it rolling. I try every trick in the book, and a few that aint in the book, to unstick her. But halfway down she still isn't flying. So I abort and take her back in and put her away. Then we start on the video. It's a music video. So we just shoot tape of me walking around in a cowboy hat, trying to look cool. But I'm 59 years old, so how cool can I look? Now it's 60 degrees! Eric goes home with his hay to his llamas. The sun is starting to set and its now getting cooler again. I go in and see wife in her office. I give her my audio CD. And I give her the nine minutes of raw footage of me in the snow with the cowboy hat. I tell her what I want. I expect her to edit it. Create it. Capture it. Encode it. Upload it. Download it. Etc. And I want it ASAP of course. She says, "A few days". Now the sun is setting. Jake and I are back in the Jeep. This time facing west. I'm having a nice bottle of Sam Adams. It's the most beautiful sunset ever. I can see the professor's rental car a half mil e down the road approaching. We walk to the house to meet him. He has groceries. He has wine. Jake and I go back to the sunset. I have another beer. Then a new plan arises and I am to follow Dupree to drop off the rental car, and drive him back. So wife does another favor. She's a saint. She drives because I'm exhausted from watching the season change. It's like jet-lag thru time zones. We have a great meal at the Cambridge Diner. I have eggs which makes no sense. When we get home Jake and I go straight to bed. Thursday March 5, 2009 is over. When I awoke at dawn on Friday, I was in the same position as when I fell asleep. Next: the Holy Holidays. The Ides, St. Pat's, and the Most Holy.....The Equinox. Gen. Aviation Informal. PS......... if you want to see the video...... it's easy......go to YouTube.....then search n98009..... then click on "as tears go by"