Those are buffalo burgers out on Catalina. And there are buffalo out there on the Island. I'm not sure one is made from the other. Update: January 2006. Adam and I have now flown to Catalina's little Airport in the Sky over half a dozen times. There is a small herd of buffalo kept on the Island by...

Before I flew up to take my check ride I looked at my logbook: I had sixty-eight hours of time in flight. That seemed rather amazing. Less than two weeks of full time work. The time away from my regular job over six months (April to October) was less than a two week vacation. Easily accomplished in...

Alex summed it up when we taxied into the jet center at Santa Maria to find our rental car waiting with doors open... "I feel like a sheik." The day seemed foggy from the home base, but a check of the computer revealed VFR everywhere but my deck. We piled into the car and headed to Zamperini Field...

The hardest thing, by far, has been learning to land the airplane. Part of it is the pressure to do a good landing. When I flew by myself to three different airports in a little over four hours I was mostly concerned with getting the plane onto the ground safely. I knew I no longer had to worry...

The weather is nearly perfect and tomorrow I am going flying. Mom and Alex are being very good sports about the new obsession. When they land from their commercial flight they are making me (and a few guests) a nice dinner then trundling off to get enough sleep to head out to Catalina for breakfast...

I should have kept a blog as I was reading these books, but I didn’t know how long my interest in aviation was going to last and certainly didn’t know that I might want to share my musings about it with an audience larger than Adam. Free Flight is the story of two airplanes and the system that NASA...

I played hooky today. I was supposed to work on the kitchen, putting in the moldings, end cap for the dishwasher, kickplate all around, and other really rewarding tasks. These are the worst sort of home improvements because they take a really long time and no one notices unless you screw them up....

I was foiled in my attempt to get a check ride in a 172 today by a need to be at work. The itch to fly was exacerbated by Colin having a flight lesson in Irvine in the Diamond DA40. When I woke up a beautiful solution popped into my head: I would go ride the back seat in the DA40 all morning while...

Well here is a fine kettle of fish. I do not own a plane. I must rent other people's airplanes. Unsurpisingly, especially if they have read a word that is posted here, these people wish to have some concrete demostration of my flying ability before they will rent me the airplane. While my brother...

The withdrawal symptoms are bad. Apparently there is something about air breathed at altitude while hearing loud engine noises that causes endorphins to flow. In any case I am not only acutely aware that the last time I flew was Saturday, but like any good junkie I am even more aware that a fellow...