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2006/7/24 Monday's lesson: Mashed potatoes and stalls.Alright... I'm in another writing mood tonight. Heh heh. It seems the creative juices just keep flowing. I guess that's a good thing... Anyway, what I wanted to bring up was something that happened last night. Now, you may wonder how in the world I can compare making mashed potatoes to flying, but I going to try. Actually, not only does it relate to flying, but also making mistakes in general. Here it goes. I got the radical idea to help Mum make those delicious out-of-the-box mashed potatoes with chives last night, seeing as she was running all over the kitchen. As I read the instructions on the box (without my reading glasses...) I poured in what I thought were the correct ingredients. Turns out that one box made two big serving things. As Mom noticed my mistake, I quickly had my spoon revoked and was rushing to the fridge for more milk and butter. I felt terrible, even though they came out alright. So terrible that I kept my mouth practically shut for the rest of the night. Why? Because I screwed up something that I thought was easy, and I thought it was fail-safe. I was disappointed in myself and I didn't want to set foot near a stove or mashed potatoes ever again. If I could mess up out-of-the-box mashed potatoes, I wasn't worth half a cent to be called a cook. Now here's the flying part. Let's transfer the situation of making mashed potatoes over to a flying lesson in the cockpit. The weather is perfect and there's not a cloud to be seen. You make the preflight extra tedious... you want to impress the instructor today. You jump in the cockpit, fasten the seatbelt, everything's a go. The takeoff is the best you've done in weeks and you feel like there's not a thing in the world that could screw up the flight. The instructor notices your enthusiasm and decides not to let you get off easy just because the weather is nice. He asks you to do a power-off stall, just to kick off some rust. As you ease the power back to idle and trim for slow flight, you pull the stick back and the nose climbs above the horizon, nice and steady. The buffet comes along naturally, the stall horn sounds and the nose drops suddenly. You get spooked because you have a face full of ground directly in front of you, and you pull the stick back up abruptly to return to level flight. But you forget to add full power and you're on the brink of a second stall. The instructor swats your wrist and quickly grabs the controls, lowers the nose and applies full power. You're shocked... you thought you could do it, but you mucked it up, and you feel like crap for the rest of the flight. The instructor says everything is fine and hands the controls back to you, but all you want to do is get back on the ground. You made a mistake. You screwed up something that you thought was so easy you could do it blindfolded (or without your reading glasses). As soon as I had mixed the ingredients for the potatoes and Mom let me know of it, I dropped the spoon and didn't want to go near the stove. The same goes for stalls (or even flying in general). You shy away from it, fearing that you're going to make the same mistake again and your flight instructor won't want to see hide nor hair of you around the FBO again. You feel that you've earned the title "Ex-student pilot", and you want to give up flying altogether. But that's where the lesson comes in. When I realized that I had made a stupid mistake with the mashed potatoes and that they came out fine (though there was enough to feed the Navy), I had completely overreacted by sulking over it. So what did I do about it? I stepped up to the plate tonight and proved my worth as a cook in the kitchen. I made tossed salad and noodles Alfredo while Mom made steak on the grill. That's a big step up from screwing up mashed potatoes and putting a wall between the stove and me the night before. I had learned from my mistake and therefore decided to give it another go (and dinner was delicious, if I might say so myself...). Allow me to go back to the student pilot scenario. You're at home in your room nosing around MySpace or flipping through Spin Magazine. You don't want to see another thing related to flying. You just want to drop it. It felt like everything was going grand, but the stuff hit the fan and you just don't want to do it anymore. That's when it hits you - if I could do it before, why can't I do it again? The thought of giving up something that has grown on you like a welcomed parasite is a nasty feeling, like losing one of your limbs. How could you live without it? Hah! You say those words... "I messed up, but I'm going to give it another shot.". And at that moment, you're a born-again student pilot. The next flying lesson arrives and the first thing you do after takeoff is explain to the instructor how you felt and what you're going to do about it. Power comes back, trim up, buffet, stall, and recovery. A textbook procedure, and the instructor's expression shows it. You've pleased him and you've never felt better in your life. You learned from your mistake, and you feel as if nothing can stand in your way. What a sensation! So there you have it. My little comparison of mashed potatoes and flying. Heh heh. In other news, the Waco is history (the guy wants between 60 and 80 thousand for it), but we might just have another trick up our sleeve. I didn't really want an open-cockpit airplane anyway... useless over the winter. Anyway, I think I might go on EverQuest for a bit... or maybe I'll just read. Who knows? Until tomorrow.. 引用通告此日志的引用通告 URL 是： http://elationaviation.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!FD1CF9BB907EDDE0!223.trak 引用此项的网络日志
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