Excitement in the Valley

I've been really busy lately, and haven't even made a dent in my to-do list. Tonight after dinner I took the lawnmower to the red house and cut the grass. As I was throwing my back out loading the mower back into the van, I noticed this HUGE, H-U-G-E, slow-moving aircraft flying really low over Stuarts Draft. I watched as it floated northward, and disappeared from view. A few minutes later, it reappeared, coming south. It turned around and headed back north again.

Jumbo jets, the "heavy" planes, are not usually seen in the valley. This joker was big. As I drove home, I kept watch out the windows. This guy was obviously practicing approaches at Shenandoah Airport (SHD). The airport was on my way home, so I pulled into the airport parking lot, and was totally awestruck as this giant plane barrels down out of the sky, gets to within 100 feet of the ground, jams the throttle forward and roars back up into the sky. As he circles around again, taking almost 15 minutes to go around and line up, I get out of the car and walk over to the fence to get a better view. It's almost dark. The security guard recognizes me (I fly out of SHD a lot on business trips, so most everyone there knows me), and invites me into the fenced pad area.

He and the other employees are being kept busy answering the phones... everyone in the valley is calling to ask what's up with the huge plane coming right over their houses! Except for those living near the airport, however, the plane isn't right over their house... he's maintaining at least 5000 feet of elevation over terrain, but since the plane is so huge, it seems like he's much lower. You have to see one of these things in person and hear it to appreciate the thunder.

The security guard explains that this is a FedEx MD-11 Tri-Star, related to the Boeing DC-10, tri-engine jumbo jet. The pilots are testing out new software on their avionics, and since SHD has the same instrumentation as all commercial airports, they decided to shoot their approaches at the little-used airport, where they don't have to get in the line-up and landing queue, holding patterns, etc. SHD is so low-traffic, they just go around and come in again.

He explained that they weren't doing touch-and-go landings because a plane this big and heavy would tear up the runway. The few little planes using the airport tonight have to watch out, because the "heavy" designation means that the jumbo jet leaves some mean turbulence in its wake.

There must have been 300 rubberneckers (including me) stopping by the airport to see what was making all the noise. One lady said her sliding glass doors on her patio were vibrating so bad she thought they were going to shatter. Of course, the noise wasn't at all bad for someplace like Dulles or O'Hare, but for the valley, this was some of the most excitement we've had in a long time.

The pictures are all obtained from the internet... I didn't have my camera with me, and by the time I got to the airport, it was dark anyway. Keep in mind, if this plane were outfitted for passengers, it would have three seats, an aisle, five seats, another aisle, and three more seats... in one single row across! This is one huge momma. In the photo below, notice the size of the guy standing on top of the platform on top the van, under the wing! Huge momma.

Below is a photo of an old MD-11 sitting behind a Boeing 727. The 727 itself is much bigger than anything that's ever landed at SHD, and notice how much bigger the MD-11 is compared to the 727.

Williamsburg

We are in Williamsburg, Virginia. I am an invited speaker at the Virginia Society of CPA's annual Industry Conference on Friday, so Dubby and I came over a couple of days early and are enjoying a mini-vacation. Yes, that's the "Royal Governor's Mansion" in the background.



Yes, this is Tommy Jefferson writing the Declaration.


The kids loved this maze, but it isn't always open. The bushes are at least 7 feet high.


This great blue heron was perching on a limb over the lake beside the governor's gardens. This is a telephoto view.


We purchased the pass that let's us into all the shows and exhibits. Being a new volunteer at the German farm at the Museum of Frontier Culture, Dubby picked up a lot of tips and tricks.


Yes, they were quite good. More than just Yankee Doodle. They had a wide repertoire.


Fingers in the ears. The guy at the far right isn't taking any chances with powder burns, either. They've obviously done this before.


And for those under 75 years of age, the treasure picture in the post below is a 20 megabyte disk pack. This was the "removable hard drive" of a computer circa 1974. The pack sat in a drive machine the size of a modern laundry washing machine. It's capacity was 20 megabytes... which was an almost unbelievable amount of storage for those days. We ran our entire paper mill -- puchasing, payables, billing, receivables, inventory, maintenance, payroll, accounting, everything -- on two of these disks. 20 megs. Today, you can't even get a thumbdrive or SD card that small. I'm proud of my antique.

Treasure!

What is it? It's the size of a large snare drum. It's a little larger than a cake container. It cost approximately $5,000 when it was new. It goes in a machine the size of a washer or dryer, and that machine cost nearly $20,000 when it was new. The blue cover, when it is screwed on like it is now, is airtight to keep out dust and dirt, because even a microscopic amount of dust could ruin it. Of course, this one is bad, and I got it for $15. But hey, even at that price, I consider it treasure, because these things were in vogue in 1975! What is it?

Another Good Day at Dayton

Another good day at Dayton. The crowds this year are way down, and the weather is perfect, making for a very laid-back, pleasurable experience. I've completed the acquisition of my entire shopping list, spending about 15% less than I budgeted. Best of all, I got all but one of the things that Debbie wanted, and I got one more thing that she added to her list once I called her and told her the fantastic prices I found here. I only purchased three items that weren't on my list (which is actually very HARD to do at a place like this!). But to be fair, one of those three really should have been on my list to start with, if I'd been able to remember it before I got here. So overall, this has been an excellent trip.

Here is a photo of the main arena, which normally holds about 5,000 people for a basketball or hockey game. this is just ONE (1) of six huge buildings containing the vendors. Four of the buildings are exhibition halls much bigger than this arena. In addition, there are about 30 acres of parking lot covered with ham-radio flea-market vendors, hundreds, maybe thousands, of them. Look up "Hara Arena" on Wikipedia. (Click on the pictures below for a larger version.)



Here is a picture showing some of the antenna samples being shown. You really have to click on this one to appreciate all the antennas in this one aisle of this one single room.


Here's my friend Brian with the roaming astronaut. There's all kinds of things to see at Dayton.


Here is the Hammock-mobile, my cousin's RV, from Minnesota. I had a very nice hour chatting with him. He has three grandchildren, even though he is younger than me!


We call this car "the porcupine". Click on the pic and take a close look at the larger version and you'll see why. Dubby should be glad our cars don't look like this. And yes, the owner is still married to his first wife. Of course, she's also a ham...

Successful Day at Dayton

We had a good day at Dayton today. I found a few things on my shopping list, for prices even better than I expected. I was able to find four of the five things that Debbie asked me to keep an eye out for. My friend Brian had a good time today too. I enjoyed seeing my friends, and I even stopped by my cousin's RV. Our group from the Shenandoah Valley got together for dinner tonight, and we had a great time. But best of all, I came across a real treasure in the flea market today! Fantastic treasure! An unbelievable find. Something that I paid $15 for, even though the guy was selling them for $10, because I felt very badly about taking advantage of someone who apparently didn't realize what he was selling. What is it? You'll have to wait a day or two to see the picture. One man's trash is another man's treasure. This thing, to me, is real treasure. I couldn't pass it up. Even though I paid $15 for it, I won't sell it now for $500, or even more. Sure, it cost thousands of dollars new, and the machine it requires in order to be of use to someone costs tens of thousands more, and of course I don't have that machine nor the money. (Those machines may not even exist anymore.) But hey, it's a real antique, and is something to show my students how things were in my generation. (I honestly used a couple of these at a job I once had!) Even though it can't operate, its antique nature makes it treasure for me! I'm gleeful, exuberant, and overjoyed that I found it. I can't wait to show my Dad!

Trip to Dayton

Here is a picture of the Dayton Group this year. This was taken right after breakfast. We've arrived in Dayton safe and sound. Hamvention starts tomorrow morning.

Mother's Day

Mom wanted chocolates. So she got her favorite chocolates. It was very helpful of her to map out the specifications so precisely; ...greatly appreciated. She also bought some chicken, so guess what we had for dinner.

It's Turning Green

Spring is here, but thank goodness the weather is still quite cool. It's been sweater-weather here recently. The trees and flowers have finished blooming, and it's looking a lot like summer, but with really cool temperatures. Niiiice. Here's the front yard.



The backyard, as seen from the deck.


The garage as seen from the deck. The elderberry tree is really getting big.

Black Bear in Shenandoah Park

It struck me that some of you might not have seen the picture of the black bear that Bryan and I stumbled across a few years ago while we were hiking on the Turk Mountain trail in the Shenandoah National Park. This was taken about 3 miles from the trailhead out in the Trayfoot Wilderness Area. We rounded a bend in the trail, and there he was. You'll have to click on the image below and get the big version to see him, -- right in the middle of the photo.

May 8 - Still Busy

Yes, I'm still busy. Let's see. What I did today... hmmm. I started off by making a dump run, after emptying all the garbage cans in the house. I got to the office and spent a couple of hours finishing the report for the APR at University of Maryland and got that sent off. I got my annual faculty activity report about 90% done. I completed and submitted my travel forms to get approval for my June Colorado conference trip and my August Anaheim conference trip. I made reservations for my Williamsburg conference trip. I made the plane arrangements for Colorado. I completed the changes to an article that'll be printed in the Journal of Accountancy and got that sent back to the editor. I wrote the first draft of the first half of a new research report I'm writing with a colleague for Issues in Accounting Education. I answered a dozen emails from people about an article that appeared in the May issue of Strategic Finance (hey, has anyone here even HEARD of any of these publications, let alone read anything in them?) I added a couple of late renewer's to the ham radio club roster and mailing list and emailed them the issue of the newsletter that they missed because they were too dense to figure out how to write a check to renew on time, even though I put reminders in the newsletter for FIVE straight months in a row warning them that they'll be removed if they don't renew by the end of April. I'll bet these guys were blondes before they lost all their hair. I spent almost an hour on the phone talking to the new FMIR in Antwerp instructing him on how to log onto the Telenet website and check the students' usage quota on their internet service, configure the wireless routers, and other tech stuff that I wasn't supposed to be doing anymore since I'm officially no longer assigned to the Antwerp program anymore. When I got home, I released the beautiful bluebird that somehow had tripped my critter trap (birds usually aren't heavy enough to trip the trigger, I wonder how a light bird like a bluebird did it? Stupid bird.) Then I rebaited the trap (yep, stupid bird ate all the stinkin' bait). I set out some mice traps inside my back garage (preventive measure), baited with bacon that the cat had snitched from Mom's plate yesterday while she was out and had left on the floor underneath my living room computer stand (the cat left the bacon there, not Mom). I fixed myself a Marie Calender's pot pie since Mom has Ruritans tonight. I cleaned out the drain in front of my garage out back because we are under a tornado watch right now and there's a big front moving in on the radar map, and I don't want the garage to flood again because the drain is full of grass clippings. I found some important papers for the red house for Mom, who had let them slip behind her nightstand where she couldn't find them or reach them even if she had known where they'd gone. Finally, I checked into the ham radio emergency service net tonight... we always organize and test out our equipment any time there's a tornado watch or severe storm warning... I'm good to go. I just got through commenting on a couple of blogs I check daily. And yes, all this was done today. Like I said, I'm busy. That's why I don't blog more often. I stay busy from the time I get up to the time I go to bed. And people wonder why I'm so irritated when I have to sit through boring useless ridiculous meetings (like, well, I won't mention any by name, but Mom knows the ones I'm talking about) which do nothing but waste my time. My to-do list for tomorrow is even longer, and I have to knock off early to go to the red house to sign some papers for Mom. I don't know why. I don't believe we'll ever sell this darn house. We'll be sitting on this house when we're 105, and in the meantime, we'll use all our retirement and savings keeping it up. 105, mind you. 105. Maybe even 110. Mark my words. Yessirree.

May 3

Busy, busy. Thursday: Gave final exam to students. Went online, found manual for broken lawn tractor, determined parts needed to fix. Went to Ham Radio Club meeting, introduced guest speaker. Friday: graded final exam. Found parts place. Purchased tractor parts. Spent rest of day working on lawn tractor. Went to dinner theater with Debbie, had to leave dinner to go back to house and get camera Debbie forgot, got talked into taking pictures during the play. Put pictures on CD for Martha. Saturday: Graduation, all morning until early afternoon. Went to co-op and got last parts for tractor, finished fixing tractor, made a dump run with garbage, finished mowing lower 40, mowed front, back, and side yards, took shower. Still need to pack for trip to Hagerstown tomorrow, still need to write report on Univ of Maryland program review visit. Still need to fill out and submit final grade sheets. Still need to submit travel authorization for August trip. Still need to ....

Nice Photo...

Here is a photo I took of my parents last week while I was in Florida for my uncle's funeral. My parents are in the their mid-80's and are still living independently in their own home. My dad still drives, and is a pretty darn good driver, too. I sent you kids a hi-res copy of this photo.