The Grindstone Is Wonderful

Thanks for being so patient. I have some lovely readers who are willing to wait a few extra days to find a post from me. I really try to blog every other day, sometimes more. I had forgotten, however, how tough it can be to find time on the road to actually sit down and upload some pictures! That may sound silly...how can I possibly be busy all day, every day, to the point I can't sit down and write a few words. Since we are going non-stop from early in the morning until well after midnight each day, the last thing I want to do when I drag myself into the hotel room is fire up my computer. Thanks for being understanding. And for hanging in there!

My alarm clock went off at 2:30 AM on Tuesday morning, and it was actually intentional. The airplane was still at WIlly Gateway Airport from maintenance over the weekend. We needed to take it to Sky Harbor to be ready for a 6:00 AM departure with Big Boss and his team of two others. We arrived early and in style with our beautiful new paint scheme. I still can't quit gawking at this thing. We are certainly the envy of the ramp everywhere we go! And it feels like we are starting with a clean sheet because no one recognizes us when we pull in! It's fun to see their surprise when we open the door (with a big smile on my face, mind you), and they see it's just us.

We flew to Dallas Addison for the first flight. I couldn't nap so eventually went to lunch at Macaroni Grill. Sometimes a girl just needs some pasta. And olive oil. And rosemary sea salt bread to dip. I ordered a Caesar salad and half a chicken sandwich on the lunch menu. It was so yummy! Though I was tired when I returned, I knew sleep was still going to evade me. So I charged up and tried out the new cordless vacuum I bought to carry on board. New carpet fuzzes up and needs to be watched carefully. We have several fans in the cabin that could easily be clogged, so I bring the vacuum with us now as preventive maintenance. It sucks like a charm, and I'm glad we have it.

Big Boss arrived around 3:00 PM for an hour-long flight to Brownsville in south Texas. I watched a bunch of crazy bare-footed people prepare to go skydiving and land on the beach of San Padre Island. Crazies. Who would jump out of a perfectly good airplane?!

Soon we were on our our way again, this time to Atlanta. We first stopped on the south side of town at the Fulton County Airport. Our last flight of the day was to the north side of Atlanta to Peachtree Airport. We landed after 11:30 PM and hitched a ride to the hotel from Epps Aviation. It was a long day...up about twenty-one hours. I was starting to cause alarm on the radios from all my slurring! The bed sure felt nice that night!

Wednesday morning we prepared the airplane for an 11:00 AM flight. I grabbed a quick lunch at my favorite restaurant, The Cheesecake Factory! Big Boss showed up around four hours late for our next flight. We were shortly on our way to Knoxville, Tennessee. What a beautiful state. And they were having a heat wave, so I got to enjoy some lovely weather, too. After waiting in Knoxville most of the afternoon and chatting with some fun pilots from Kentucky, we left for Bedford outside of Boston. We flew over Washington DC and New York City on our way. I usually stop there, so it was fun to see the sites from 37,000 feet! We were soon landing in Bedford and caught a ride to the hotel near the Hanscom Field Airport.

This morning meant making up for lots of sleep debt. I didn't get out of bed until 8:00 AM, which felt great! After getting ready, we went to Jet Aviation to get the airplane prepared for our next flight. We didn't know where or when, but it's always important to be ready for Big Boss. When he called to give us a ten-minute warning, he said he wanted to go to the north side of Detroit. So off we went to Detroit Cole Young field! We had 120-knot headwinds the entire trip but didn't get any icing in the descent.

Detroit was cold, and this part of town was nothing to write home about. We grabbed a crew car to make a quick run to Olive Garden. Big Boss "guesstimates" his time to be back at the airport so we don't dare leave for long. Luckily, we got some food and still made it back in time to be ready for our next flight of the day...to Chicago.

Which is where I'm sitting now as I write this. Still not done for the night. We've decided to challenge a blizzard in Kansas City later tonight. Wish me luck!