into the abyss....

night flying...holy shit....coolest thing in the world. pilots deal with what is called currency, you have to fly so many hours and so many types of flying within 90 days to remain current. One part of that is that you have to do some night flying. so i went up tonight at around 8ish. first off, its incredibly weird knowing that you are about to go flying at night, it makes you just a bit antsy. you have to do your preflight stuff using a flashlight which really only adds to any apprehension you may have about what you are about to do. but you really do everything the same you would if it were noon. but you line up on the runway and there are all these lights everywhere and you cant see the end and it feels like you are in the middle of a PS2 game. you plunge down the runway...20....30....40....44....50 lets go flying. you pull up off the runway and its solid black decorated with a few spots of glistening gold. you cant see water, you cant see vacant land that isnt lit, you cant see horizon, and you sure as hell cant tell exactly how high you are just by looking down.
landing is equally cool. when you drive past an airport at night and it is lit, you say to yourself, wow thats alot of lights, and youre right, it is. but something you dont realize is that most of those lights are not visible from the air. you can only see them from certain angles. essentially you dont see the runway until youre on final approach, and even then you cant see the actual runway, just the lights surrounding it that hint that maybe, just maybe there is a runway right here. this is pure video game flying. two streaks of color and you have to plant yourself in the middle of it. rock. you dont really even see the runway until you are about 10-15 feet above it at which point you very much realize that you should probably pull up to avoid making some fireworks of your own. tonight was badass.

three more flights this week, one solo just goof off flight, two cross country flights (50 miles from home and back). im thinking maybe hyannis one day and then "flying out to the hamptons" the other. yes, those hamptons. i'll tell diddy you said hi.