Laura's first time eating sushi!

Well…today’s flight was deifnitely productive. I thought that I was able to perform adequately so that I feel comfortable for the up coming events, but I wouldn’t of liked to have 5 days off between now when I’m feeling good till my pre-rate. I’m sure that it’ll still go well, I’ll just keep on chair flying and going over the maneuvers more and more. It’s exciting to know that I graduate in less than 10 days, but its scary not knowing what lies ahead.

I just found a flight for China just shy of $500 bucks! That’s exciting. Too bad I didn’t know about the program that my friend Andy is going through earlier. It’s called the Konall Culture Exchange (KCE). You can check out their services at http://www.gatewaychina.net/ Check it out! $14K for a great year in the program with food, shelter and schooling. Now, that’s an educational experience. Mine was an excellent program but it did cost just a little bit more.

I had Sim #12 this afternoon and it definitely went well…at least for the first half. We took a class picture today and then finished up my lesson. Things just didn’t start off on the right foot with a tail windshear on takeoff. It wasn’t necessarily my fault but still, things just didn’t work out. We tried it again and then once more before I made it out of there. In the air around 29000 feet, we had an explosive decompression scenario (my first) and I thought that I would be able to do well, but I got into a Dutch Roll with the initial blow out and was never able to recover. I did the following next times, but it just stunk. We did it over and over again and then my time was up.

I have a sim session at 5:00AM and as I’m writing this its alread 1:10AM. I did fall asleep at 1900 this afternoon and got a good 5 hours, but since then, I haven’t been able to fall back asleep. It’s frustrating but I’m just going to study and rehearse what my sim will be like for tomorrow. It is my last chance to iron out a few items before the pre-rate ride and the checkride. I will have a day or two off until those two events, but it going to get crazy and hectic. Wish me all the luck you can!

Here’s out class pic from left to right:
Kevin Lubic, Kurtis Buffington, Manoj Osuri, Ryan Nay, Forrest Foust, Elijah Nicolas, Greg Farlow, and Laura Pigott. It will be a total of 15 months for some and 13 for the others who all started ab initio.

Being Flight Riddle 410 wasn’t easy today with me trying to rush to checklists, not being able to hold wings level while trying to fly a raw data single engine ILS, and just being all over the place. It’s pretty crazy what we are going through everyday but it is coming down to checkride day. I’ll keep on saying that until the day, but its crazy stuff. You look at everything that pilots prepare for and then you actual do it, it’s ridiculous. I’m loving every moment of it, and still when I stand the throttles up, even though it is a sim, I get ansi in anticiaption that something will go wrong. I guess that its a good thing but it does take the “fun” out of it, unless you consider that all the emergency procedures are fun. Don’t get me wrong, the flights wouldn’t be anything but boring if nothing happenend. Every flight is exciting. You come to learn the famous quote that everyone should know: “If you ever experience a boring flight, you’re pilot is doing his/her job well.” I didn’t word it the exact way, but you get the gist.

Checkout the trelijah blog. I’m telling you, you can only see it in Daytona Beach.

Only in Daytona Beach.

Definitely not a good time…after the first half of the session (someone flies for two hours then we switch seats for another 2) where I was Captain first, I felt very disappointed and depressed on what just transpired. I felt like crap! During the intermediate break, I went straight to the briefing room, sat down and just contemplated why they heck I was all over the place. I really felt bad. I didn’t know what to do or say or I don’t know. Just wasn’t happy at all. I gathered some thoughts, got back into it (this time in the right seat) and the second half was rather amazming. I’m able to do the right seater’s duties well (at least I think that I can) but when it comes to the left seat, I’m just thinking about too many other things. I spoke to Adelle and she brought up a good point that I’m sure will help. I have to stop thinking about both jobs. I need to be Captain when I’m in the left seat and be the First Officer when I’m in the right. I’m not necessarily doing both jobs, but the tasks are going through my mind as if I am flying both seats I guess.

We’ll see tomorrow. It should be fun…hopefully. I need a damn good flight to get me out of this failure feeling mode. I mean, a damn good perfect never been better type of flight. I am hard on myself, but I only have 4 flights until the pre rate then comes the checkride! I need everyone’s prayers from here till graduation and of course afterwards so that I find a job quickly.

Well, I woke up a little later than when I would have liked, but I got up, went to the bank to deposit some checks, picked up some Bonus S Lawn Fetilizer, fertilized the lawn both the front and the back, checked out the sprinkler system to see that everything was checking out (not that I knew off the bat on how to fix a broken on) but that was all good, played some piano, studied for a very short time, watched too much television and just sat around. I think about it and I can say that it was a good day. I have to definitely relax a bit and take this time off seriously! It’s going to be some crazy times coming up with a checkride coming up in the next 10 days. Then graduation and everything else! Nutty!