A new kite

I'm building an 8 ft tall kite. I'll be lifting a camera with this kite. More soon.

Baby Girl

Minna already posted the story.

It's different, natural, weird, fun, tiring. We'll see if she continues to be so easy and calm. But I'm happy to report that after one day home she seems to be pretty easy to take care of.

For every newborn I meet, see, or help bring into the world. It always blows my mind how small they are. Even at 8lbs 4oz she's bigger than a lot of babies, but still so small.

Some people have said that she is "precious". Which is code for congratulations on your ugly baby. No worries. A camera can never capture the feeling of seeing a newborn, the size, the smell, the tiny cry, the little feet, the rooting. Not all newborns are cute, but I think my baby is.

I have three girls. I'm so outnumbered, soooo out numbered.

My time in the simulator

I went to Orlando on business. While there I had the chance to fly in a flight simulator. It was the real deal simulating an Airbus 320.

It may have been a simulation but it was so amazingly real. It blew my mind as soon as we started taxiing. I just couldn't believe how real it felt.

I started by taxiing out to the runway. Hitting a few runway lights on the way. If you could have watched me it would have been like watching someone learning to drive a clutch for the first time.

Take off was easy. The bigger the airplane, the easier they are to fly. Landing, is a different story.

After avoiding other airplanes programmed to come right at me, the first thing we did is fly under the Verrazano Narrows bridge. I flew it so low, too low. I accidentally skipped on the water a bit. This would have caused millions of dollars in damages to the aircraft.

I made it under the bridge and then went for my first landing. I did ok on the approach but never really pulled up just before touching down. Actually that's somewhat of an understatement I died on my first landing. The simulator lurches and makes a loud sound and the screen turns red and everything turns quiet.

After resetting, I did a couple V1 take-offs which means that one engine fails at the most critical point during take-off, this means you don't have runway enough to reject the take-off, and you have to continue to take-off. Getting up to speed, the engine fails the airplane starts to veer sharply off the runway and you have to correct for that, using the foot pedals, then take-off. The first time I pretty much cleared out any lights and signage on the side of the runway, but with the help of the instructor I was still able to take-off. The next two times were much better.

I successfully landed twice (very hard landings).

After I was done my equilibrium was all out of whack. I had a headache, was a little dizzy for the rest of the night. It was totally worth it.