3 Oct., 2008 -- Friday, Airport stuff

Last day for excavation at the airport, found lots of textures. They relocated all that limestone, used it for drainage fill.

Needed a tripod for the video camera, and morphed an old one into a monopod. I had cabbaged a leg and the post with the attachment bolt several years ago to make a monopod, and this is what was left over. So, one tripod became two monopods. Fascinating, huh?

That epoxy is a mess, gets all over your fingers as you knead it, and then... RING RING... At least my nose didn't start to itch. I bought the tripod for five bucks years ago at a pawn shop, and it was very short and flimsy, so I added an extra leg section to this iteration

Makes the videos a little steadier at the telephoto end of the zoom range. Yes, there will be a test.

2 Oct., 2008 - Thursday, I think

I'm losing track of the days!

This red dahlia is blooming in the compost pile. Stubborn, eh?

Hey, there's the moon. This is a composite of two photos.

1 Oct., 2008 -- Book Store

Went to Springfield to take my broken HP desktop computer to Circuit City before the warranty runs out. Had time to kill before going to a flight seminar, so I bought a pair of winter boots at Shoe Carnival, and browsed through Borders. Imagine that, I didn't even buy a book! (I already had the best one, "Sarah".)

Take offs and landings. The numbers need to match. Not always pretty, but safe, that was the main message.

The cows across the road don't seem to be disturbed by the equipment disturbing the terrain around the east end of the airport. Looks like the last part of the excavation, the flattest ground they've tackled so far.

30 Sept., 2008 -- Rocky Day

Excavation crew found a shelf of solid rock, and had to bust it up. They
are still chewing and pushing and hauling and digging and raising dust,
that's a lot of dirt! All red clay.

29 Sept., 2008 -- A look back to 1953

My Dad was a telephone lineman in Colorado back in the good old days. They hired Stuart Mace and his Huskies from Aspen to take the Mountain Bell linemen up to Cottonwood Pass near Tincup, between Aspen and Gunnison on the Continental Divide. That's Thad looking out from behind the guy on the sled. In the next picture, he's on the sled, has on the funny hat with the ear flaps.

The snow was so deep, they could stand on the sleds and fix the lines. Looks like they found a cabin buried under the snow in which to hole up for shelter. I don't know if they spent the night. I regret that I didn't pay more attention to the stories, or whether I ever heard the stories at all when I was a kid. I would have been 11 then.

These mountain passes were closed to vehicle traffic in the winter, and some of them still close, such as Independence Pass between Aspen and Leadville, connecting the western watershed from the eastern slope and the Denver, Colorado Springs, Pueblo areas.

All the water on the western slope (Aspen, Gunnison, Glenwood Springs where we lived) runs into the Colorado River and down the Grand Canyon to Boulder Dam, then separates California and Arizona until it reaches Mexico and the Gulf of California. All the water on the eastern slope
runs into the Gulf of Mexico via the Rio Grande, or the Arkansas River that starts at Leadville, or the Platte, or numerous others running out of the Rockies.

So much for the history lesson, eh? There will be a test.

28 Sept., 2008 -- Throwed Rolls

We certainly trashed that table full of food at Lambert's "throwed rolls" in Ozark! LAD & his mommy were heading from Branson to Iowa, Jared & Jamie & their mommy and G'ma Airplane met them there for a "let's do lunch" thing.

Hugs all around, bye bye for September!

Later, at the airport, a stowaway came out of hiding from the cowling and hunkered under the nose wheel of Bill's Tomahawk. It was a feisty battle, but Smudge Cat 1, stowaway 0.

And I'd know that 150 anywhere! I trained and got my private license in that Cessna back in 1990, as did many others, the latest just this summer. Good ole airplane!