I’m afraid that there will be several more posts about Everest over the next couple of weeks because I’m just so damned captivated by it. I think that I might have figured out why though.

So, except for a few days around the May Long when it was nice enough to roast weenies and ride my bike to work, this has been a God-awful spring for weather. I'm sure I'm not alone in being sick of the rain.

My last two flights have (amazingly) been good flights. Both my upper air work and my landings have vastly improved due (I think) to the hours I spend reviewing written material as well as sitting at my desk memorizing every move in the cockpit.

However, I am still weeks behind (maybe even months) where I actually wanted to be in my training.

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

I've not written much about flying lately as I've gone through a rather frustrating couple of months. I've had six different instructors in the last six months and I'm finding that trying to schedule flights in between shifts at my job is sometimes an impossible task.

If I could go back in time to when I started flying, I would change a few things. First, I would have gotten my Category 1 Medical Certificate right off the bat rather than assuming that I was never going to be eligible and settling for my Cat 3. Second, I would have made a much firmer commitment to fly as often as possible.

Now, more than ever, I want to fly as much as possible. I have goals in mind and the money to see them happen. Of course this means that everything else seems to be conspiring against me.

I had a terrible flight the other day and it's entirely my fault.

Today, during my flight, I found myself thinking of how different the flight would have been 90 years ago, over the fields of Vimy Ridge. When I was doing my walk around it was daunting to think that compared to the “kites” of the The Great War, the Katana is a wildly advanced and high-performance aircraft.

My goal, since returning from vacation, has been to fly twice a week. This week has been the first in a month that I have actually reached that goal. If the weather hasn't been foggy, snowing, raining or rime icing it's been a beautiful Chinook day with winds somewhere around 30 to 40 knots. In my aircraft that means that I can reach the IAS for take-off sitting on the ground, pointed into the wind, not moving. It also means that it's too windy to fly.