4/8/06 Back From Sun 'N Fun - I had a great trip to Florida with Ted and Dale in the Piper Archer from Thursday, March 30 to Wednesday, April 5. We enjoyed great flying weather except for a pesky headwind on most of the trip. We got to see the whole country from here to Florida and took a side trip to Cedar Key before going to Lakeland. I logged almost 25 hours of flight time. It was a wonderful experience and I hope to write more and post some pictures here soon. Right now I'm back to work and busy trying to catch up with some things.

4/10/06 To Dubuque for my 500th Hour - I flew from Neenah to Dubuque for the UD Flight Team fly-in breakfast yesterday and flew back this morning. It was great to see old friends. I hadn't been there since I left in June 2005. I reached 500 hours of total flight time during the trip.

4/11/06 Young Eagles Article - I just noticed that the story of my student Chris Turke made it to the EAA Young Eagles web site. Chris was my first student and I soloed him on his 16th birthday on March 18th. Read the article here.

4/13/06 Speaking at Carl Traeger Middle School - Today was career exploration day at Carl Traeger Middle School in Oshkosh. Back at the Wisconsin School Counselor Association conference I was invited to speak at this event. I gave a 20-minute presentation five times in a row to groups of about 35 eighth graders at a time, plus their teachers, for a total of about 180 people. I spoke about pilot careers using a PowerPoint presentation with some statistics, and I answered questions at the end of each session. The students were pretty interested and had some good questions. More than one person asked me if I have ever had an emergency, and they all wanted to know how I got involved in flying.

4/27/06 My Next Airplane Building Project - When I was still in high school I helped build three RV-6s at Pioneer Airport in Oshkosh. It was hard work but a fun time and I miss those days. Well now at Brennand Airport, Ted has been tossing around the idea of building a kitplane, maybe a Sonex. Yesterday he came into my office with an old EAA magazine in his hands. "You still interested in helping build an airplane?" he asked. "Why?" I asked. Then he showed me the magazine, which featured a homebuilt airplane called the Sidewinder. He said he bought one. Not complete, but in pieces. It was started long ago by someone who passed away before the plane was finished, then the parts were handed to someone else, where they just sat. And now they're all with Ted and we're going to put this thing together. I don't know how often Ted will work on it or how much I will help but it will definitely be fun. I'm excited about it.

The parts are all covered in dust and grime after sitting in someone's garage for so long. But the workmanship so far looks really nice. The fuselage frame is mostly finished. But there are no wings-- just a wing spar. We've got tires, wheel pants, and a disassembled engine with brand new cylinders. You can see in the picture below that there are a few big rolls of aluminum.

The Sidewinder is supposed to cruise at about 160 knots and have a 55 knot stall speed. It looks like a cross between an RV-6 and a two-seat Grumman, with a cooler-looking tail. It has a steel tube fuselage covered in aluminum, and aluminum wings and tail. It has a fiberglass cowling and a sliding bubble canopy. According to one web site there are only 30 of them flying. See an info page - click here.

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