Friday - lots of work at work. Boy, I hate that.... I did
some work with a CAD tutorial today. I am a bit embarrassed to admit that
I've never really learned to use modern computer CAD software. I learned
my drawing at what was about the last gasp of old style T-squares and Triangles,
in the late seventies and early eighties. I wasn't particularly good at it,
and it isn't, until recently, something I needed. Modeling entire aircraft
requires more than a hand calculator and intuition however, and I have set
myself to learn CAD, in particular, three dimensional CAD. Along with everything
else going on.
Looks like things are going well in Iraq - though the battle is not along
the lines suggested by many. Particularly no "Market Garden" type assaults
- with things going as well as they are there is no real need for dangerous
parachute assaults, I guess.
Tonight we are going to see "The Irish Rovers" at the LPAC. Fun stuff...
I was told by my friends' daughter that I didn't have enough images on this
page (hah!). So I've added her birthday card to me, from last fall. Click
to open the card...
Boats, cats, and fish....
Thursday 20 March 2003
Thursday - we went out to dinner at "Fresco's", or perhaps
"Al Fresco's". It's a new Italian place, and serves good food with large
portions (I took half of mine home!) Afterwards spent time with my friends
- watched war tv, read to the children, and I fell asleep on their couch...
The AAW had problems of some sort, so no flights until next week. Fortunately
our visiting student got a nice taste of flight test yesterday, with the
preflight briefing, a stint observing in the SAF, and then the flight debrief.
Also a tour through the hangars....
I was talking to someone who had gone to see "Gods and Generals". He felt
that the last battle scene was awesome, but that the romance portions were
unnatural and unneeded - not organic to the movie as it were, probably just
a sop to convince women to go with their spouses to the movie. Overheard:
The Missus: " An intermission - when did they come back?"
The Mr.: "Well, it is a four hour movie."
The Missus: "WHAT?"
It went downhill from there, according to my reporter...
Looks like the war has started in Iraq.
Wednesday 19 March 2003
Wednesday - still supporting flights. What with preflights,
climbs to speed and altitude, testing, and then return and debrief the day
is pretty much full. I did have time for lunch.
Late in the date we managed to get together with our visiting expert for
some training and exposition on some software improvements he has brought
along. Things proceed along...
As of early evening, no real news of war, despite the deadline of Monday having passed.
Tuesday 18 March 2003
Tuesday - supporting some AAW flights at work. We continue
to do the supersonic clearance, and are also collecting data for the control
law designs in the future. We are also using IADS, which my brother Mike helped write. Very nice, though I'm still on paper strip charts for the most part...
Monday 17 March 2003
Monday - well, it looks like war. I don't like it, but there isn't a lot of choice now.
We have a visitor in at work, and a lot of AAW flights, so I'm going to be the one-armed paper hanger for a while...
Sunday 16 March
2003
Sunday - did a bit of yard work, planted
some bulbs. Also mowed the lawn, hurriedly, because I could see a storm coming
in. And, sure enough, it rained! No complaints here - we don't get enough
rain in the Antelope Valley.
Watched "Children of Dune" part 1. Not bad - I think they are trying hard
to get the book(s) right, but it's hard to display on a small screen the
relations between politics, religion, ecology and science that Herbert put
into the books. But they did capture the essential idea that predicition
can be a trap - if you can see, experience almost, the results of any decision
that you make, action that you take, you become constrained to do what is
best.
Picture of the Week
Photo Notes: A Tall Ship at dockside, in San Francisco. I'm not sure, but it may be the U.S.C.G. Eagle.
Travels and Images
