Wow. 2011. What a year.  Going into it I had some expectations.  I’m not one to have too many expectations as I’m always surprised what a year brings, but 2011 I went into with one — to get back into flying.  And I did.  It took a little more time than I thought.  I think it was about 8 weeks for me to get things lined up and get my third class medical (with restrictions for colorblindness that I didn’t have previously).  Then there were a few more weeks as I went through re-familiarization and a flight review (and getting checked out in plane models I hadn’t flown previously).  I don’t have my exact hour tally here, but I flew close to 50 hours this year and it’s been amazing to be back at it again.  The Cessna 162 I put a lot of that time in even has a glass cockpit.

Technology like that has really changed aviation.  My first experience with using a GPS for flight navigation was last year in a G1000 equipped Cessna 182.  I was amazed.  It was like I was on the Enterprise.  Well, in getting back to flying this year, the two planes I’ve been flying (a Cessna 172S and a Cessna 162) both have GPS.  To top it off (and for when I’m in something else eventually) I got my iPad setup with ForeFlight for geo-referenced electronic sectionals and AFD.  Honestly, I like that setup better than the built-ins on the planes.  I remember cross-countries used to be nerve racking for me as I was sure I’d get off course and mistake landmarks resulting in me getting lost.  No more.  Now it doesn’t take nearly as much concentration and leaves more attention for the flying and scanning for traffic tasks.  One more nice bit of cockpit convenience is my Bose A20 headset.  Past experience had left me weary of noise canceling technology, but enough positive reviews led me to bite the bullet and give them a shot.  I can happily say that they work amazingly well.  Noise fatigue is nothing to mess with and I’d like to keep my hearing, so I consider this a great investment.

One last bit of technology has changed my flying and non-flying life — lasers; specifically LASIK.  I’ve thought about it for years, but finally went for it.  I’m still recovering, so I won’t be flying for at least another couple months, but if everything stabilizes correctly I’ll be able to get around without my glasses.  It sounds innocuous enough, but without my glasses I was totally blind.  If something ever happened to them while flying there would be no possible recovery as I wouldn’t even be able to see the instruments.  Hopefully, I’ll be back in the air this spring.

Being out at the airport I’ve had the chance to see, hear, and feel some beautiful old warbirds and it sparked a desire to get some experience with them.  I decided to make it a goal to fly in as many old aircraft as I can before they’re gone.  I’m not limiting myself to warbirds, but that’s the typical implication.  So, I had some success with this too.  I got 0.7 hours dual in a Boeing Stearman.  That was amazing.  We did basic familiarization maneuvers and a whole series of different stalls (some of which I had never done before).  I’m hoping to get some more time in it.  It gives me the desire to go get my conventional gear and high performance endorsements.  I also got rides in a couple of WWII bombers that came through the area.  First was a Boeing B-29 Superfortress “Fifi”.  That experience really deserves it’s own post.  It was incredible, though.  Then at the end of the year, EAA’s Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress “Aluminum Overcast” came through the area offering rides.  That was another experience deserving of its own post.  Most striking was just how much the technology developed and changed in the relatively short time between the development of the two bombers.  I’m looking forward to what 2012 might bring on this front.

One more cool thing to add to my aviation high points for the year — flying under the Golden Gate Bridge.  Yes, we really did it.  I have the photos and video to prove it.  I didn’t think it would be possible, but during a helicopter tour of San Francisco the pilot offered and we hardily took her up on it.  It was incredible.  Definitely a high point.

We’ve done a bit of other travelling as well.  I attended a conference in San Jose and stayed for the weekend to do some sight-seeing in northern California (I’d never been before).  Shinta flew out too and we even met up with some old friends.  We crammed a lot in, but it was a good trip.  Because we were “close”, we had to go see the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium.  This is another one of our “things” now.  We try to see big aquariums.  The other “things” are Segway tours, helicopter tours, and fancy food.  So, on this particular trip we also went to see the giant trees, famous San Francisco landmarks, and Pebble Beach.  Neat, but short trip.

We drove out to Atlanta for Independence Day weekend (returning before the actual day).  That was a whirlwind.  We went to the famous Georgia Aquarium (which was completely awesome), the World of Coke, and got a tour of CNN Center.  We also worked in a Segway tour which led to a dinner at Ted Turner’s Bison steakhouse (very tasty).  Who knew he owned the most bison in the country.  Neat city and we’ll have to visit some more to explore.

We made a trip out to New York City this year too.  We went up to see the sights and hang out with friends.  I absolutely had to have lost some weight with all the walking we did.  I had some good shoes and my feet hurt daily.  We walked all over Manhattan (at least it felt like it, and I have the GPS tracks to prove it).  We also saw a couple of Broadway shows (Spider-Man and Chinglish), ate some awesome food, and saw the sights.  Amazing city.  It’s incredible just how much there is there.

So 2011 was a great year.  I wonder what 2012 will bring.

As a pilot, my way of remembering 9/11 was to try to get out and fly today.  Back in 2001 I was a newly minted pilot and the attack had the national airspace immediately grounded.  I was calling daily to see about scheduling a flight, but we were grounded for 2 weeks.  Small aside —  I now know that flight training was what was grounded so long, but I rented from a flight school and they probably assumed I was just a student.  Anyway, I really wanted to celebrate freedom today and fly.  In some small bit of coincidence, I crossed the 100 hour of PIC time flying today as well.  That’s certainly still low-time, but I’m into 3 digits.  So, where did I go — Gaston’s.  Since the trip last year to see the CubCrafter’s demo, I’ve been wanting to go back for their Sunday brunch.  Well, today was that day.  Funny thing — I wound up parking at Gaston’s next to a plane I fly fairly regularly.  Popular place, apparently.  It was a good brunch buffet.

I’d stated in my last post that I got signed off on a Flight Review.  Well, today was my first solo flight in forever.  It’s been about 9 years.  I had been thinking about doing a little cross-country practice going out to an unfamiliar field a little south of Memphis, but the weather was overcast with a fairly low ceiling so I just stayed in the pattern practicing landings.  This was a good thing.  I didn’t have a single landing that I was proud of, but I got in a bunch of practice and they got better.  I did a mix of full-stop and touch-and-go landings to mix it up a little.  A nice plus was that there was actually other traffic in the pattern (and staying in the pattern).  It’s a little more fun when doing pattern work with others.  In the end, I can add 1.1 of solo PIC time to the logbook.

I’m proud to say that I’m an active and current pilot once again. I’ve been working with a flight instructor for the last few weekends and he signed off on my flight review yesterday. Along the way I logged some time in a couple of Cessna 172s and the new Cessna 162 Skycatcher. I must say, I’m impressed with the Skycatcher. It has got loads of power, a nice comfortable cabin, and nice avionics. It’s certainly different than anything I’ve flown before, but I’m going to try and get more time in it. I would have Saturday if the weather had cooperated. We’ll just have to see how it goes.

So we actually stood in line for the iPad 2 launch. Shinta had a doctor’s appointment she couldn’t drive after (some drugs require several hours to wear off). Afterward, I took us to the Apple store instead of home. We managed to be about number 350 in line. The line literally wrapped around the building. Naturally, there wasn’t enough stock for me to get my top pick model, but I’m fine with what I got. I’m not going to do a full review here as there are plenty of reviews out there already. From my week+ of usage, I tend to agree with most of what I’ve read — this is a great tablet for those that don’t have one already. The thinness and lightness really are that good. The extra horsepower is welcome as well. I’m taking it slow in transitioning away from a notebook for couch surfing, but so far so good. I can’t wait to use this in the cockpit too.

ZFS saved me again. No, I don’t throw my drives against the wall or anything. Everything lives on UPSs too. Anyway, over the holidays I just happened to run a “zpool status” command on my media server to see how things were doing and it reported the media pool in a degraded state. That was a surprise. One of my drives was dead and had apparently been down for 2 weeks. 2 weeks and I didn’t even notice! I use this box daily. So I ran over to Best Buy, grabbed an equivalent replacement, swapped it out, and let the pool resilver. 6.5 hours later, all was well. I really need to get that RMA going for the dead drive. ZFS just rocks.

True to form, I updated all our iOS devices to 4.3 (well 4.2 for the AppleTV 2) the day of release now almost 2 weeks ago. The changes are are almost imperceptible so far. Safari does feel a bit faster, but that’s about it. I’m looking forward to app updates that use the newly exposed AirPlay video feature. It’s already cool with the YouTube app, but having it with something like ABC Player would be nice. I haven’t tried using home sharing yet. I did try using IPv6 with Atomic Web Browser and it works now. I don’t know if that’s a 4.3 change or from an app update, though.

Today was an exciting day — I got my FAA Third Class Airmen (re)Certification. I’m one step closer to getting back in the air again. I might just be able to make my goal of being current again for the 10th anniversary of earning my Private Pilot License.

My TN HCP came due for renewal this year.  I got notice several months early, but did what most people probably do and put it off for “later.”  Obviously, I didn’t read the notice closely enough to see the warning that renewals can take up to 90 days.  So, less than a week before expiration I find myself reading on some online forums that the TN Department of Safety really means business about taking up to 90 days for issuing renewals with lots of people citing their own stories.  Ouch.  To top it off, mailing in a renewal won’t get you the form copy allowing you to continue carrying until your renewal is approved (or denied).  Double ouch.  So, I found myself standing in a 2 hour DMV line on the Friday before expiration.  Note to self — the security guard recommends not coming on Mondays or Fridays.  Lesson learned.  At least I had the form copy.  Much to my surprise, my new permit arrived in the mail 2 weeks later.  So, thank-you TN Department of Safety for doing a reasonable turn-around in processing my application.

iOS 4.2(.1) has been out for a little while now and so far it’s been good.  We updated all our iOS devices to it and I say, AirPlay is really cool.  Mostly, for our purposes, it’s just bug fixes, but I think we’ll really be using AirPlay.  Also, it’s nice to have some of the organizational features of iOS 4 on the iPad finally (and the Thai keyboard).  I suppose the iPad has IPv6 support now, although I haven’t tested it.

Update:  I tested it and IPv6 works on the iPad, at least via Safari.