Getting the Infamous "Pink-Slip" and sayoonara Princeton 39N! Hellos from 2 UCSB profs!

So I went back last Friday for the rest of the checkride with the examiner.  All was not well.  Got stuck in traffic on 206, and got off late.  Climbed into 971 which was recently re painted white but they forgot to repaint the wings and has a weird splochy snow leopard look to it.  Also the left brake kinda half works.  We departed to the north west towards Binghamton.  He asked for a short field takeoff which is done at a steeper angle to achieve best angle of climb over any obstacles.  The manual calls for a speed of 54 knots (60 something mph).  I had to demonstrate that I could hold it at that speed in the climb with a +10 -5 deviation.  I didn't, and let it get slow to 45 knots.  We still had 10 degrees of flaps out which lowers the stall speed but it was still beyond the -5 deviation from the practical test standards.  Strike one.  Examiner didn't like that. (I should not have allowed it to get slow.)  But in hindsight with input from the examiner a speed of 60 knots would have been just fine.  I keep whispering 'speed is life' in my head like a mantra.....

Time to climb was roughly what I had estimated and we leveled off at 3,000ft.  Since I could see my first checkpoint (round valley reservoir) and got the actual time enroute close enough to the estimated time enroute, the examiner told me to terminate the hypothetical flight to Binghamton and begin our airwork of ground reference maneauvers, power off/on stalls, slow flight, steep turns, and emergency procedures.  No problems here.

Then came the 'under the hood work' or the simulated flying on instruments.  I grabed the the plastic blinders and put them on to block my view of everything except for the gauges on the instrument panel.  The examiner then told me close my eyes as he took the controls and put the aircraft into unusual attitudes for me to then recover from.  Eyes open, took the controls and tried to return the plane to straight and level flight.  No problems here.

Then came the fun stuff.  VORs.  After about half hour of sitting in the little two seater right up against the examiner who's 220lbs and I'm sweating bullets becuse I'm scared shitless of not doing something right; now I had to think to use the onboard radio navigtion systems and fly the plane whilst wearing the blinders.  VORs are really very simple when you're on the ground and can draw nice pictures of points with 360 lines radiating out from their centers.  I was supposed to fly direct to a VOR station.  So I tuned the radio to the Yardley VOR and spun the omni-bearing selector until the needle in the VOR gauge centered giving me the exact heading to fly in order to stay on the specific radial towards Yardley.  Only problem was, the needle was centered but we were northboud, the oposite direction of where the station was.  I spun the omni-bearing selector to center the needle at the reciprocal heading and was reverse sensing.  It was indicating 'to' instead of 'from' but we were flying the wrong way.  So I caught myself and tried to make a 180 degree turn and correct the problem.  Keep in mind i'm still wearing the blinders so all I see is a cluster of 8 instrument gauges.  As I was turning, I couldn't get the needle to center up and it just swung from the left to the right and I had made a complete 360.  Strike two. 

Examiner made me turn back towards Princeton to make simulated engine out landing and then a another short field take off and landing.  No problems there either but since I failed to initially on the short field take off.  He couldn't pass me.  No big deal really.  He even told me not to stress too much about it and just take a couple more lessons with my instructor to iron out the two issues and reschedule another 'ride' for the following week.  (Hey I faild my first driver's road test.)  The re-checkride he would only be testing me on VOR navigation and short field take offs.

Here's where the proverbial hits the fan though.  I was the second student of the day to fail with the same examiner and something like the 6th or 7th student to fail a checkride at the Raritan Valley Flying School at Princeton in the past 6 months.  Hmm what does that mean?  Either we all had very bad luck and just suck or the quality of training at Princeton is sub par.  Now I don't think my instructor is sub par in any way at all.  He's got over 1700 hours total time and is good at what he does.  I began reschduling additional lessons with him and managed to get 2 in before I was subject to verbal abuse by the airport manager, let's call her "Marge."  Marge (who holds no pilot ratings whatsoever) wouldn't let me just take a couple more lessons and reschedule with the examiner.  Marge cliamed I was an unsafe pilot and should either be grounded or forced to repeat another Prog. 26 flight with the cheif instructor and additional lessons with my primary instructor.  It would be two weeks before I could reschedule another checkride. 

For fucks sake I've got just about 90 hours total time now after 14 months of training in 5 different aircraft.  The FAA only requires a minimum of 40 hours total time to get the license.  I was being forced to take at least another 7 to 10 more hours of instruction at $115 per hour.  All because "Marge" was pissed that I was number 7 to get 'pink-slipped.'  I took my Prog. 26 flight over a month ago with an instructor who wasn't the cheif pilot (because the chief pilot was all booked up.)  This guy signed me off.  "Marge" authorized him to give me the flight even though he's only a 300 hour pilot.  Less experienced than my primary instructor.  I did everything by the book with these people and they signed me off as proficient to take the checkride.  And when I failed they got mad at me for tarnishing their record.  This really pissed me off since I had already spent more than my target ammount of money to spend to finish the license and they wanted more. 

So Fuck them!  Fuck Princeton! Fuck "Marge" and her ridiculous little pilot shop where they are still trying to sell sim software on floppy disks for $40 and still using paper spread sheets for scheduling in end of 2009!  (They're selling fucking airband handheld two way radios for over $100 more than retail price and wondering why nobody buys their shit.)

I found another airport 10 miles north of Princeton called Central Jersey Regional 47N.  It's smaller and the flying school there is run by a nice Tawainese guy who helps train pilots from Taiwan to get their comercial license so they can fly profesionally back home.  They've agreed to just give me a few more lessons and I've already schedueled with the same examiner I had last week for next Tuesday.

Central Jersey Regional has the same model of aircraft that I was using but better.  A Cessna A152.  Their version is fully aerobatic just like the A150 that I was flying out of Penn Yan, NY last year.  Rated to +6/-4 Gs.  (Same airframe, differnt engine, 8 more hp.) It's a little bit more expensive to rent but it's in much much better condition.  For starters it actually has functioning fuel gauges.  (Which in theory makes it airworthy, unlike the 3 Cessna 152s at princeton.)  The seats are not broken and don't feel like they're going to fully recline if you lean on them too much.  The guys at 47N have installd a very nice Garmin 296 color gps and a traffic avoidence system along with a DME (distance measuring equipment.)  All the instruments work too!  The first time I flew it two days ago, I was about to taxi and anticipated giving it some gas (the same muscle memory I was used to in Princeton's planes) and it really tried to take off (dind't actually take off on the taxi way but felt like it, a good jolt.) So I had to be a little more subtle with the throttle.  The compression in all the cylinders is higher and up to factory specs unlike the planes at princeton.  Also both left and right wheel brakes worked too.  Unlike Princeton where one of the 152s left brake has air bubbles in the hydraulic lines causing the left rudder pedal to flip all the way to the floor and requires manual pumping to get the pressure back.  Nothing like a brake that half works (also not really safe.)  On my intial flight in this new machine, the bird took off like a rocket.  Something that I wasn't used to in the the same aircraft at Princeton.  It took what ever I gave it and performed much better.  Didn't feel sluggish and was very crisp and responsive on all control surfaces. 

Had another flight in the like-new A152 yesterday but ended very shortly as low ground fog started to roll in.  Went in today and had an hour in 47N's full-motion simulator (very cool indeed) to work on chasing VORs.  I've met 2 new instructors who seem very confident and cool.  One of them has a wife in Hong Kong and is building time to be able to apply for an airline job in the far east.  The other instructor is a pretty funny dude and had some funny stories about his father who used to fly KC-135s (Boeing 707s refitted as airborne refueling tankers) in Vietnam.  There's a standard safety procedure that is to be respected at all times: no drinking (alcohol) within 8 hours of flying, and no smoking within 50 feet of any aircraft.  Back in 'Nam' it was no smoking within 8 hours before flying and no drinking within 50 feet of the aircraft.  (Yes pilots have sad jokes.....) 

Oh and UCSB's deadline is Monday.  I've contacted two professors in the Geography department and they've both contacted me back and they like my CV.  One of them told me not to worry too much about my GRE scores.  Magee and King have both let me know that my LORs are on their way.  I'm still waiting for a confirmation from D'angelo.  He responded to one email but I haven't been able to get him to pick up the phone yet.  Still a little nervous though.  

"

Back to test prep basics, the ride [and loosing the love handles.]

((Answer the question)+(review the answer)repeat)=better score. 

Managed to run 5K under the half hour mark now.  Of course it's a treadmill and not the real thing but It's showing some results.  Lost another pound.  Almost back to what I weighed in high school.  This is fantastic.

Had the checkride today.  Jeez it's been a long time since I started (late Aug '08).  Was only able to complete roughly 2/3 of the examination.  The oral exam, flight planning (hypothetical trip to Binghamton,) preflight then departure.  About 6nm out I chose to turn around because I could not see my first checkpoint due to decreasing visibility and rain.  No complaints so far from the examiner and will continue the rest of the 'ride' on Friday morning.  This is also pretty fantastic. 

Came across an interesting book in the princeton airport library lounge.  "The Sensuous Man" by 'M.'  It's a hilariously almost dead-on save for pickup lines, guide to making love to females written in the 1970s. Everything you could possibly want to know about the process in 70s cheesiness.

"Down to the wire....."

.....and I just donated another one-five-zero dollars to the infamous ETS.  It's not Kaplan's fault I suck at standardized testing.  I can remember all the way back to those horrible 'Iowa' tests that I had to take at HKIS in middle school (Hong Kong International; very nice but screwed up Lutheran international school.)  Then the 'ERBs' when I first moved to Japan.  Then there was the NMSQT PSATs, what a disaster....along with several rounds of the SAT and SATIIs, which miraculously got me into HWS, Ithaca, Rutgers, and kinda sorta not really into Gettysburg.  Shit 4 out of 12 is sad.  Somebody somewhere had a kind heart.  (I think it was David Gage.) 

Ok well if I'm horrible at this and managed to get a BA, where's the proof that this measures my ability to perform other than in a quiet room and uner a time limit to crunch numbers and jumble words?  It doesn't.  It can't, and it never will and I'm always going to be at the mercy of some ivory tower bureaucrat.  Fuck my life!


"How do I stop myself from being just a number? How do I hold my head to keep from going under?"  Shame on anyone who doesn't know where that's from.


At least my checkride is tomorrow and I feel fine.  I've planned a flight from Princeton to Binghamton but we're not really going all the way.  Just to the 1st checkpoint at Round Valley, NJ and then it's air work, diversions, emergency procedures and everything else. 

Tinsche arrived today safe and sound from Germany today! 

another post...

November was uneventful except for thanksgiving. Mother arrived with furniture, picked up dad from Newark airport. My brother is back from his first semester at Union College. Got 2 more job application rejections. Corresponding with Profs. Magee, King and D'Angelo (who is incapable of using e-mail and the telephone. Prof. Cowles described him to me as "being old as fuck!") for LORs. A program I was going to apply to: UC Davis Geography Graduate Group or GGG for short decided to die when I checked the site last week. They claim that they're doing curriculum revisions but a facebook group claims that the department's funding was cut. Nice. California is broke such as life. I heard about the student protests on the news and have mixed feelings. The cold harsh reality of economics unfolds once again.

At least Hawai'i isn't broke.....

Other than that I've got my GREs in 2 days. Not sure how I feel. Better prepared than I was last year that's for sure but I'm horrible at standardized testing and have always had a tough time. Want to keep an open mind as to get the best score possible. I'm aiming for at least a 1200. Would really like to get higher but 1200 would make me happy.

Last weekend I volunteered to ferry and aircraft for the flying school. A student who was signed off to make a solo cross country flight from Princeton to Reading, PA (a controlled airport) messed up and didn't talk to approach control or the tower and just came in and landed unannounced. Scared the shit out of the controllers and when he taxied to get fuel they wouldn't let him fly back to Princeton. His instructor asked me to hop in the backseat of another aircraft to pick up the plane and the student. So I did. I got a free flight and got to log the time as well. Total time to date now is 80 hours.

My private pilot checkride is in 3 days. Strangely not nervous at all. A couple other guys I fly with say that I'm cold as ice, meaning that I have no anxiety or fear whatsoever. Not sure if this is a good thing or not. This could mean that I'm situationally aware and cool under stress or I leap without looking. I hope it's the former.

Have to drop my brother off at Newark on Wed so he flys to Tokyo for a couple of weeks. I'm still stuck in NJ. There are a few things I'd like to accomplish by the end of 2009. Run faster and farther, break through 150lbs (hovering around 164 now, down from something like 185 in May '09). If I don't land a job by Jan 1 '10, I'm buying a plane ticket to Vietnam and just getting the fuck out. It's cheaper to live there than here. Teach English, or freelance photography whatever doesn't matter.

First grad app. deadline is coming up. UC Santa Barbara Dec. 15th. Then a bunch in Jan and Feb. Merced, Hawai'i at Manoa (dream choice I think.) and then some more CA state schools.

I'm halfway through Uncle Carl's (Carl Sagan) "Pale Blue Dot." The sequel to "Cosmos." It's very very good. Carl talks about the conflicts of religion and science and humanity's insignificance in the universe. (If you believe in a God, and are offended by freethinking and skepticism, this book isn't for you.)

Changed my mind....

Went up solo today to practice ground reference maneuvers (S-turns over a road, circles about a point), steep turns, and stall recovery. I'm nailing altitude at last! Well withing the +/- 150ft margin. Took my new PCAS (portable collision avoidance system) along for the ride and was surprised at how will it was able to pick up other traffic. Of course It's just working off of other transponder equipped aircraft which is legally required withing the 30mile radius of the New York class B airspace. (Transponders, not the PCAS....) Whatever keeps me safe.

Then It was off to Allentown for my first GRE prep session with Kaplan. Learned some new tricks that are supposed to buy me more time by not thinking too much and getting the correct answers. Hope it works. Stopped in for some Hibachi next door at a place called "Ichiban's" (Number 1 in nihongo). It was worth it.

I rethought something I posted earlier. I'm staying friends no matter what. One has to grow from experience and I'm slowly making progress. And who knows what the future holds? :)

back down again...

The 4 miles was great. Only able to sustain 6mph after doing the first mile at 7mph. Was still within 90% of VO2 max but it feels fine. I need a better means of holding sweaty earbuds in.

Woke up this morning to too many blackberry facebook messages. Some people always have it their way in life and things come to them effortlessly. Others try and try and try and still end up empty handed in the end. Life continues to be unfair. Feel like shit again. Will try and run it off tonight.

Got done with another lesson today. Need to fine tune everything. Going up solo early tomorrow morning to iron those things out. Was more difficult today due to winds being 25 knots out of the north, a little bumpy but nothing I haven't encountered before.

Skimmed through the Feb/March '09 issue of Air & Space yesterday and found an article on a band called "Max Q" where all members are active duty NASA astronauts. Pretty cool albeit not superstar talented but with their schedules who could be anyways? Their name comes from the aeronautical term for maximum dynamic pressure aka maximum noise. I've listened to a few of their covers on youtube and they're not bad. The band formed in 1987 shortly after the Challenger disaster as a means to boost morale. On a side note I've been giving this a lot of thought to possibly work for NASA. Geographical sciences and an aeronautical background is desirable. I need to actually get into grad school first. I can dream can't I?

Starting the GRE self diagnostic test in preparation for kaplan tomorrow afternoon.

Moving right along...

Been flying daily with instructors critiquing my maneuvers trying to stay within the practical test standards. It's a lot harder than it sounds. But I'm getting there. I'm going up again tomorrow to do it all again. The more I do this, the closer I will get to the check ride.

GRE prep begins this weekend in Allentown for 4 hours on sat and sun. I pick up my mother from Newark sat evening.

Other than that, I've been spending lots of time on the treadmill. I'm actually starting to enjoy it. (never thought this day would come.) I started last month just trying to run 2 miles a day at a pace that wouldn't hurt the left ankle after having used the pool, elliptical and stationary bike in Tokyo for about two weeks in Sept. Now I've been running 3 miles a day at a modest 6mph. Roughly 10 minute miles but I'm keeping within 75-80% of my VO2 max of 198. I've noticed that it's getting easier to run faster and farther. This evening I'm going to attempt to run 4 miles at close to 7mph. We'll see how that goes, may wind up turning the speed down to 6mph. Good news is I've lost more than 12lbs since July. My goal is to loose another 10lbs before I turn 23 in December. Maybe a little too optimistic but it's worth a shot. I'm also playing with free weights every other day and have been seeing some improvement there. Throw in crunches until it burns and that's pretty much my daily hour to hour and half workout.

I've adopted salmon and tuna as my primary protein intake in the form of lox bagels and chunk light in water. The rest is granola with Greek yogurt, raw veggies, and fresh fruit and unsalted nuts. It's pretty bland but I don't really care for once. I haven't really missed the bad stuff i.e: pizza, Mexican food, and all the other crap that you really shouldn't eat.

On the topic of job searching. Well I still haven't found one. I do get contacted every week by somebody at American Income Life where they want me to apply to a sales position but I'm really not interested so fuck em! I sent my resume to a contact I know in Singapore in hopes of swinging something for 6-9 months. And if that doesn't bear any fruit, then there's always teaching English in Vietnam. I missed spring in Vietnam when I studied abroad so I didn't get to witness Tet, the Vietnamese new year. Nothing can really happen until after Dec 1st when I take the GRE for the second time.

Singapore would be fun. Haven't been there since late '98. I've heard that it's changed a bit. I still remember the best and I do mean the absolute best Mexican restaurant in the world: Cha Cha Cha's in Holland Village. Not to mention great Malaysian satay and katupat (steamed rice cakes in pandan leaves) at Newton Circus. It's been too long I think. Hopefully Chin can get me a job or at least another contact.

Anyways got to run literally....