Looking at the above picture (not mine) I landed at runway 1 near the road.

I flew to Sulphur Springs, TX with an instructor today! It was a good flight, though the winds (18 knot gusts, 39 aloft) made the ride bumpy, bouncy, and thrilling as all hell. My landing at Sulphur Springs was beautiful. (My landing at Addison was less than 100% but not terrible.) The instructor kept testing me on my preparations asking if that body of water over there was where we were going. No, I'm positive it's that one. My heading was spot on the whole way, my timing was close enough and my pre-flight prep was good. I had radio & VOR frequencies and a folded map readily available.

My one big thing to work on is level flight. I was consistently ascending or descending. I couldn't seem to fly more than a few miles before dropping or climbing 500 feet. My plane does have "auto pilot" which can hold my position and altitude, but for some reason I tend to resist using it. Part of it is stubbornness to get better at holding altitude on my own instead of relying on that. And part of it is... I can't think of another reason. I'm just stubborn.

If I can show up next week Wednesday morning fully prepared for another trip to Sulphur Springs, I should get endorsed to fly there and back solo. I'm so there!

I drank 2 glasses of wine recently then took a practice exam. I passed with an 81%. The day prior, sober, I passed with an 86%. I think I'll be ready to take the written by next week or so.



For a third time, my plans to fly a cross country were squashed by weather. Last time it was encroaching low clouds in the area. Today it was winds gusting to 20+ knots.

I'll try again on Friday morning for a flight. I thought February would be a boring month to fly, but apparently it's more restrictive than I expected. I REALLY want to finish in Spring, before the high winds of summer sit on us.

I snapped this picture of "Fifi" today from the taxiway at Addison. I did landings at Mesquite airport during my lunch break.

The clouds were reported overcast at 5000 feet from the surface but there were some smaller clouds floating around 3000 feet. I stayed clear of them, but it was neat see those wisps of cloud so close. There was a line of fluffy clouds moving West (I was going East) but I stayed below them at 2000 feet, more or less.

My patterns at Mesquite were alright but I was consistently high on final approach. In all, I did 4 landings at Mesquite and one beautiful, damn-near perfect landing at Addison.

I told Patrick (owner/manager guy) that I was batting an 80% average on practice tests for the FAA written exam. I feel I'm ready enough to take the test knowing I won't ace it. But he insists I continue striving for a 90% average before attempting the test. I'm not in a rush so I'm not going to push the issue. But now once I've done a couple cross countries, I'll be (hopefully) more than ready to take the test.

In other news, Joshua got a part in the school play Aladdin. He's the part of an apple peddler and some character named Yogi. He worked hard to memorize the line that earned him his spot. We're proud of him. I guess I'll rent Aladdin so he can get the big picture idea of the story.

Also in family news, Rusty was diagnosed with having stage 3 osteoarthritis in his right knee and a torn meniscus. In addition to pampering his knees, he will likely need knee replacement in the next 10-20 years. He's been having knee pains leading up to the doctor's visit. Now we know why and that it's not going away. :-(

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