A few weeks ago, my rather elderly (Athlon 2500+) desktop PC went bye-bye, in a rather big way--there's still an evil black stain on my wall that was once the guts of its power supply. Worse, the dying PS took the motherboard with it (ouch...)

I finally got around to replacing it... with a core i7-920 based machine. All I can say is, given my typical usage pattern, this is a serious case of overkill... but at least I won't have to worry about replacing it for another six years. :)

I voted, and for neither McCain nor Obama. I disagree with McCain on way too many issues to ever be able to vote for him with a clear conscience. As for Obama, words cannot express how low my opinion of that man is.

That said, it appears almost certain that he will be our next president.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried... my "best case scenario" for the near future looks like the Jimmy Carter years all over again. I'd love to be wrong about that--politics is not personal to me (though the results of it might very well be) and if the next four years are Pax Americana, I'll be pretty happy about it--but I'm expecting to be right.

Tags: election
Current Mood: worried

So, within the next two days or so the Supreme Court is probably going to speak up on the 2nd amendment for the first time in a very long time. It will be interesting to see the outcome--I m personally expecting something like 6-3, or even 7-2 in favor of the "individual right" position, but I think it will be attached to a ruling that is so narrow as to be virtually meaningless outside of DC.

Still, it'll be a start, and the foundation for further legal challenges to federal infringement of the 2nd amendment for years to come. Then, maybe, we can get on to other important issues like the brutal raping the 1st, 4th, 5th and 6th amendments have taken over the last couple of decades.

Not like anybody is actually reading this, but apparently I was too dumb to hide the couple hundred lines of text from the previous post inside an lj-cut. It's fixed now.

In other news, my wife is apparently addicted to mango sorbet. This pays dividends for me because the stuff she likes only comes in a two-pack with a pomegranate-berry sorbet that she does NOT like. Earth shattering news, I know, but the subtitle of this blog IS "polluting the web," after all, and I don't think I've been doing my fair share of it.

Maybe that should be the goal I shoot for, to encourage myself to blog more: turning the web into the electronic equivalent of a super-fund site. Hey, a man can dream, can't he?

Current Mood: tired

I'm sure anyone reading this is aware that Charlton Heston died yesterday. I think I'll always remember him not for his acting, or even his civil rights work (in the 60s, with the civil rights movement, then later with the NRA) though both of those were his defining characteristics, but for the last thing I can recall him saying publicly, when he announced that he had Alzheimer's disease:

"I'll insist on work when I can; the doctors will insist on rest when I must," he said. "If you see a little less spring in my step, if your name fails to leap to my lips, you'll know why. And if I tell you a funny story for the second time, please laugh anyway."

He was a classy, interesting, and inspiring man, and the world is a little bit darker without him in it. Most people see him as either Moses or Ben-Hur, or that "famous actor guy" holding up a flintlock rifle shouting, "from my cold, dead hands!" but that really fails to capture what he was about. I found a link to a speech he gave at Harvard Law School a few years ago, and I'm reposting it here as my own tribute, insignificant as it is. Rest in Peace, Mr. Heston.

( Winning the Culture war )

Tags: civilrights, heston, nra
Current Mood: sad

Over the years, I've written many things. Most of them are one liners on message boards and the like, usually humorous, sarcastic, or otherwise not worthy of saving (or even remembering.)

Still, it's often interesting to read what you've said in the past, to see how your writing abilities or your opinions have changed, so I occasionally google myself to see what's out there. Most of the time, I groan inwardly ("well, that was naive," or, "damn, I could really use a proofreader in my life!") but once in a while I come across something else, something that makes me happy to have written it. The below is an example of the latter:

In our system of checks and balances, the final check is the people. The tools the people have available are the four boxes: the soap box, the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.

The soap box is the ability to get the word out that something is wrong. It's protected by the first amendment--freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly. In an ideal world, the words of the people are heard, and government reacts accordingly. Usually, they don't--which leads us to the next box:

The ballot box. Your right (and responsibility!) to vote. If the government doesn't change itself, then throw the bastards out. As another poster noted, we have a built in "overthrow" of government that takes place every two years. This right is defined is several places in the constitution, and modified several more times via amendment.

The jury box. Can't get the legislators out of office (rigged voting machines, maybe?) Can't get those laws repealed? Then don't enforce them! The jury is THE last word is both civil and criminal cases. Juries are responsible for determining both the facts AND the law of the case (despite what most modern courts tell juries in their instructions, they DO have that power.) This is protected by the sixth and seventh amendments.

The cartridge box. When all of the above fail, there is still the tool of absolutely last resort. The militia. When I say militia, I don't mean those yahoos up in Michigan, I mean you, me, every citizen of this nation. It is impossible to subjugate an armed people--this is exactly why the militia is "necessary to the security of a free state" and why the right of "the people" to keep and bear arms is protected by the second amendment.

Tags: constitution
Current Music: Younha - Houki Boshi

Gary Gygax passed away today. Most of the positive memories of my early teens revolve around D&D, and ALL of the people that I consider myself closest too (other than my wife and other assorted family) I met through gaming--tabletop, and internet.

Thanks for the joy, Gary--here's hoping that you're headed to a better place.

Current Mood: sad

My wife is far more creative than I could ever hope to be. The following made me laugh my ass off:

I'm not here right now--I've set up this post via LJ's post

by email features, and the "delay send" functionality

of my Exchange server.



Where am I? My wife and I are actually on vacation in

sunny (hopefully) Florida, celebrating our first wedding

anniversary (and our tenth anniversary overall.)



So why am I taking the time to craft this message? Time

that I SHOULD be using to pack bags, and otherwise prepare

for the trip?



Because I want to apologize to my wife for

being rather insensitive--see the entry two down from here

for details, but to sum it up in a nutshell: I didn't say

anything here about the wedding, other than to note (a

few months later) that we did indeed get married, but oh,

by the way, I'm a pilot now.



In retrospect, that was a pretty messed up thing to do.



So here we on, one year along, and I just want to tell

my wife, whom I love very much:



"I'm sorry. I love you. And Happy Anniversary."

is this working?

I am not a big fan of memes, and do my level best not to propagate them, but this one is actually pretty cool--I found the line, "If you are from New York City you may be one of the types who people never believe when you say you're from New York" to be amusingly insightful.

A few weeks ago when I was preparing for my check ride, my wife (despite the lack of update, we DID get married, and it was a beautiful ceremony with a wonderful honeymoon) jokingly told me: "You'd better not blog about flying--you haven't even posted about the wedding yet!" Err... sorry, dear. :)

After fourteen long months, I've finally gotten my Private Pilot (Airplane, Single Engine, Land) certificate. I'm pretty darn happy about it, too--it was a surprisingly large amount of work.

Some notes from my logbook:

First flight: 10/12/2005.
First solo: 2/1/2006 (at 11.4 hours.)
First solo x-c: 6/4/2006 (at 27.1 hours, 6.1 hours pilot-in-command.)
Long solo x-c: 9/10/2006 (at 39.1 hours, 12.0 hours pilot-in-command.)
Total time at check ride: 48.2 hours, 15.7 hours pilot-in-command.
Total spent (the only important number): just under $4500 including all books, supplies, headset, landing fees, etc.

Current Mood: ecstatic

I actually felt compelled to post today--alot is going on right now, and, of course, there's today's date.

The wedding is two weeks from today. I'm actually starting to get nervous about it--not because I have cold feet about the wedding (I've pretty much considered myself married for most of the last decade, so have no fears of "losing my independence" or "commitment") but because of something akin to performance anxiety. I feel like we're going to be on display for friends, relatives, etc, and the whole thing just kind of weirds me out--and I hate being the center of attention. It's worth it, though... and despite what the above may indicate, I really am looking forward to it.

I (finally!!!!!!) got my long (and I mean long, coming in at 3.7 hours and over 300nm) cross country done. This is no small feat, having been trying to get this flight in for at least two months (weather, aircraft problems, scheduling problems, etc.) My planned route was KGCY -> KCHA -> KCSV -> KTYS -> KGCY, but the transponder in the aircraft died (again) and thus, Knoxville ordered me to "remain clear of the class charlie airspace." Luckily, the controllers at Chattanooga weren't particularly busy, and allowed me to enter their airspace and land. Other than that, things were pretty uneventful, though visibility was never more than about eight miles due to haze, and my flight from Crossville to Greeneville had me dodging lots of clouds. Other than some test prep, this was pretty much the last thing I needed to do before my check ride. Over the last 11 months, I've made 115 landings in 42.8 hours (27.1 hours dual, 13.5 hours PIC) and have about three or four hours to go before I'm ready for my check ride. There's another nervous feeling for you.

Last, but not least, I need to mention 9/11. More eloquent people than I have spoken about the loss of life at great length--I believe that there is nothing that I can say on the topic that would be anything more than a poor rehash of the words of the last half decade. Still, I hope those whom have lost loved ones have managed to go on with life despite the hardships, the loneliness, the fear, and the pain. Today we mourn the fifth anniversary of the loss of three thousand lives but, as horrible as that is, part of me thinks that in the decades to come September 11th will become less a day to mourn the death of our countrymen than a day to mourn the death of our republic. Perhaps I'm way off base with that one, and I would dearly love to be wrong... but I fear that I am not.

Tags: 9/11, flying, marriage
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: pensive
Current Music: Rewrite - Asian Kung-Fu Generation

Today at 10:00am, I took my private pilot written exam. I got a 93%, so I'm happy about that. Unfortunately, the FAA doesn't tell you what questions you got wrong (just "subject matter codes" which tell you what KIND of question it was) so I really don't know what I messed up.

After that, we went and picked up our wedding rings. Kristen's is 14k gold and channel set diamonds, while mine is 18k gold and platinum. Amazingly enough, they actually do match. This is no mean feat, as we spent five weeks visiting over 35 jewelery stores to get to this point. Huzzah!

Current Mood: happy

I really can't condense everything I'm feeling into a clear concise post, so I'm going to make this one short (and very, very sweet.)

Kristen and I are going to be married on September 25th, 2006.

I'm happy beyond belief.

Current Mood: happy

So today Sir Paul McCartney turns sixty-four years old. I have just two questions:

Is he still needed?
Is he still being fed?

Current Mood: amused
Current Music: Chingon - Malaguena Salerosa

Talk about your ups and downs... yesterday our cat passes away, and today... well...

This morning my log book showed 11.0 hours of dual recived, 0.0 PIC. It currently shows 11.4 dual, 0.3 PIC.

I had butterflies the size of dobermans all day long, just waiting to get to it. Left work at four, at the airport by ten till five, in the air with my CFI at about ten after, and soloed right around five thirty. No wind, temperature 11C, altimeter 29.92 (go figure), scattered clouds at 12,000, a beautful sunset over the Great Smokey Mountains, and the six best landings I've ever made. In short, the perfect day.

I did get a little concerned when, while on base during my second circuit, someone announced "Eight Eight Victor, we're gonna take the active and see if we can't scoot out ahead of you," and then promptly did so. I admit this one had me a bit confused as to what to do: If he had done this while I was on downwind, no problem--I'd just have extended it. I was supposed to stay in the pattern, so I was hesitant about leaving it, flying out and returning to enter on a 45... I realize I could have done this if I thought I needed to, but decided to leave it as a last resort. I could have (and maybe should have) executed a go-around, but that would have left someone I didn't trust below me and probably out of my line of sight.

What I ended up doing was extending my base leg a little bit, waiting long enough to ensure that he was actually going to make it off the runway, and then doing my best to get lined back up after overshooting the runway.

Before cutting off my shirt tail, my CFI asked me what I was doing, I told him the above, and he didn't mention it again. I plan on bringing this up next week and getting a better idea on how I should have handled this, but in the mean time, any suggestions from the peanut gallery on this one?

Tags: flying
Current Mood: ecstatic

Tonight at 7:40PM, our 11 year old cat, Duma, was put to sleep. He was our "oldest" pet (our African Gray is older, but we've only had him a couple of months.)

Kristen found him at about 6:30 in the laundry room, unable to move, and drooling. She took him to the vet, who told her his back was broken. We don't know what happened, though we suspect one of our dogs might have done it. I'm not a cat person--I mean, I like some of them, but I really don't care much for the species as a whole. Duma, on the other hand, was different... he was more of a furry person than a cat. He was a good pet, a good friend, and we'll miss him.

Current Mood: sad

To anybody that reads this--friends, family, random strangers, little green men, etc--I wish you and yours a Merry Christmas.

So today I was supposed to go flying twice, once at 9:00am and again at 3:00pm.

Unfortunately, it didn't work out that way--my instructor had to cancel on the afternoon because of a Christmas party he had to attend. He's also out of town from the 23rd till the 26th, so unless I can sneak away from work this week, I won't be flying again until next year--01/02/06 to be precise.

While I'm disappointed, I'll live. I understand that some instructors will purposefully drag out a student's training, because a longer training period generally results in more flight hours--padding the instructor's wallet, and if he's a time builder, his logbook, at your expense. My instructor isn't one of those guys. When we're in the airplane, it's all about making the most efficient use of my time as possible. He's yet to charge me at all for any time spent outside of the airplane, and that sort of thing adds up quick--today we spent about 20-30 minutes talking about what we were going to do, and when/where/how we were going to do it. My invoice says 1.0 hours of Hobbs time, 1.0 hours of instruction. When you're talking $75/hr for the plane, and $22/hr for the instructor (and that's cheap compared to elsewhere in the country--when I was in NJ, prices were at least 50% higher for both) and an average of 60-70 hours until you get your license, every little bit helps.

Anyway, the reason I'm writing this is that I hit a milestone today--albeit a rather arbitrary and pointless one. I finally filled the first page of my flight log. Total time: 7.3 hours. 15 landings made at a total of four different fields. Loving every second of it.

Tags: flying
Current Mood: happy
Current Music: Green Day - Holiday