Back to "work"

School started back this week and I thought I would post my thoughts after the first week of classes. First off let me say I do enjoy my job and thank God every day that He has given me the opportunity to hopefully have a positive impact on young men and women working on their college degrees. But, I will be honest with you, teaching doesn't have nearly the amount of enjoyment and satisfaction that flying had for me. My prayer is that I will continue to give it my best effort and not short change any of my students due to my lack of complete excitement about teaching. I count it a blessing that my job pays pretty well, gives me plenty of time to still live life, and doesn't stress me out so bad that I can't have fun. It's hard to complain just because you like your job but aren't in love with it!!! Anyway, I have a good group of students in all of my classes. The classes are getting larger, I have about 80 in my MBA class this semester. Part of them are on campus (45) and part of them are distance only (36). The problem with large classes at the masters level is that it tends to stifle discussion when the group is too large. I'm hoping that they will end up comfortable enough to throw out ideas and get interested in the topics we discuss.

We had a great surprise here in Sparta today when one of our wandering family members returned home for a few days. It was great to see Nathan at the Pizza Hut today for our regularly scheduled lunch. Felt like old times with all of the regulars in attendance. After lunch we went by Mark's office and bothered him for a little while. He and others in his office had made some home-made ice cream so we had to sample some of that. It was excellent.

Our church is facing some exciting times. We have a new pastor and things are starting to happen! We are working on getting all of our property paid off and moving ministries into those buildings and starting to really think and pray about our long range plans and goals. I'm excited about the future.

Light Sport Airplane repairmans course

Friday I went down to one of my least favorite parts of the US, Atlanta. Man I hate that place. Anyway thankfully I only went to the North edge of the city to attend a 2-day training session on earning my FAA Repairman Certificate for Light Sport Airplane-Inspection. The class had 16 attendees as well as an FAA designated observer who participated and reviewed the instructor and the material presented. The class was to prepare us so that we can conduct and sign off the annual inspection in our experimental light sport aircraft (ELSA). The inspection can take from 8 hours to more than 20 hours depending upon the complexity of the airplane and how many cowlings and fairings you have to remove. My Titan Tornado isn't too complex so an annual shouldn't take too long compared to some airplanes. I do maintenance during the year to keep it up so most years there really isn’t too many issues that are found during my annual inspection. This past year I put new tires, new brake fluid, and recently installed a new battery so I am expecting to have a fairly light annual this coming year. The good thing about having this certificate (and I did pass and receive it) is that I can now do my own inspections instead of paying 1000 bucks to somebody else to do the annual, so I got that going for me, which is nice.

School starts back tomorrow. I think I'm ready, but I never know for sure how prepared I am until I actually get back in there in front of every body. It seems that no matter how many times I read the syllabus or review the handouts .... on the actual day I see an error or two (usually a typo some where).

Bourne Extravaganza

Well the gang finally got to see the Bourne Ultimatum. Wednesday night we went to Rhino's house and watched the first 2 films (back to back). I'm glad we did so that the story was fresh in my mind for Thursday night. Thursday afternoon we drove to Nashville to pick up Nathan and Kara and then ate dinner at Macaroni Grill before the movie. The movie was good but not excellent. I liked it, but still think the first two films were better. This one really showed how self absorbed Bourne really was. It also had a very anti-government slant with all of the bad guys as pro America (which in the film makers view meant - corrupt, murderers, liars, selfish, etc) and the good guys (concerned with revealing the truth) as only trying to show how bad and corrupt America and our system really is. Bourne, though painted as used by the system and just a pawn, was in the end exposed as a willing participant in this "evil" system. The bottom line was that the movie was pretty good but the trip was a blast just because of the company.

Hanger Visit

Not a whole lot of exciting news to report this past week. I've been using my breathing machine at night and have not noticed any better sleep yet. I'm guessing most of my waking as I said earlier is related to shoulder pain rather than sleep apnea. I'll keep trying it for a while to see if I notice improvement. In my opinion sleeping on ones back is not very comfortable.

Thursday I drove down towards Walter Hill area to see a hanger that Harold knew about and said might help me get ideas for my own project. Jim, the owner, built the 50' X 60' hanger all by himself. The only part of the project he had help with was setting the main roof trusses. He used insulation in both roof and walls but had his main door open to the West. I think I will place mine so that the main hanger door opens to the East so that in the hot afternoon I can open the door and not have direct sun in the building making it even hotter. Here in Middle TN heat is more of an issue than cold, so I am more concerned with keeping it cool during the long hot summers. Jim suggested I keep it 50 feet wide instead of going wider since the larger width results in a much larger and more expensive truss system. He also built a small apartment in one end so I got some ideas for how to do that as well. It would appear that it might be much more economical to build a wooden frame system if I decide to include an apartment. He also suggested not going higher than I actually needed both because of added expense in initial construction as well as heating. I'm still thinking I will go with 16 feet eve height to help with summer cooling and not worry so much about winter heating issues.

Yesterday the gang did the weekly Pizza Hut extravaganza with about 12 people attending. I would guess the numbers will reduce significantly after school starts back since about 5 were children of school age. It's a great time of fellowship and even when it is just Ryan, David, Tim, and I, it's a "can't miss" event. After lunch my brother Bob brought over some stuff for me from Woodbury so a few of the guys came over to help unload the truck. Bob and Dustin then stayed around a little while helping me arrange and move things around. I'm tying to get my stuff more organized so that I can keep what I really want and get rid of a bunch.

VA Hospital visit

I got up early this morning to drive over to Murfreesboro to the VA Medical Center for an appointment. About 3 months ago I had a sleep clinic where I slept in a lab at the VA to see if I had apnea or any other sleep disorder. So today I went to pick up my CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine. The doctor told me that I didn't have signs of apnea but that I was waking every 20 to 30 minutes to reposition. I sleep on my stomach and can't sleep on my back (just can't fall asleep) but am going to try again with this machine. I honestly think I awake due to the pain in my right shoulder and shoulder socket and when I lie on my stomach it hurts more than on my back. So, I am going to try and force myself to sleep on my back for a few nights to see if I can get used to it and get some sleep. Maybe the machine will help me be able to fall asleep on my back. Some nights I stay in bed 10 hours and honestly feel even more wiped out when I get up than when I went to sleep (like I didn't get any sleep at all). Anyway, say a prayer that I can get some good sleep which should help all areas of my health from maintaining a healthy weight, increased alertness, less stress on the heart, etc....

I also called a well digger to see about having a well dug on my property to get ready to build my shop/new house. I am really leaning towards building a new place in the next couple of years. I will probably build the large garage/hanger first and then build the geodesic dome in a year or two. I am getting kind of excited about the possibilities.