Another Nickel on the Grass

I disagreed with most things John McCain stood for as a politician, but although I consider myself socially progressive I was also a career military officer and that informs a lot of my thinking. If I held public office half my socially progressive brothers and sisters, probably more, would hate my guts. So I try […]

Air-Minded: Grand Theft Airplane

Last night an airport employee commandeered a Horizon Air Q400 twin-turboprop airliner at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. He got it started, taxied to a runway, took off, and flew around Puget Sound before crashing on an island (he died in the crash, of course). He was followed by a pair of F-15s that had been scrambled […]

Sunday Bag o’ Updates

Halfway through my post-surgery physical therapy sessions at Tucson Orthopedic, and already starting an off-the-books PT regimen at Anytime Fitness. I dropped by this morning to spend half an hour on the stationary bicycle and some of the leg machines, the ones that help with bending and straightening my new knee. Getting over the top of […]

Air-Minded: IL-2 Restoration Photoblog

Work continues on Pima Air & Space Museum’s IL-2 Shturmovik. The fuselage is largely finished, the engine is in, the wings have been fabricated from original blueprints and are awaiting installation, and the propeller, damaged when the Shturmovik’s pilot crash-landed on a frozen lake near the Russian village of Zamejie on January 28, 1944, is being hammered […]

Air-Minded: Son of Non-Starter (Updated 7/25/18)

See my earlier speculations on the possibility of new F-15s for the USAF: The Non-Starter Option? Non-Starter Option Revisited The first post addressed three “legacy” fighter aircraft still in production for overseas customers (F/A-18, F-16, and F-15), and wondered if the US military might be talked into extending the lives of its own fleets by buying new ones. […]

Wednesday Bag o’ Staples

Progress report: my knee still aches (with occasional sharp nerve twinges) and I still walk like Festus, but the home exercise routine is going well, the outpatient physical therapy at the orthopedic institute even better, and the swelling has almost disappeared. Tomorrow I see the surgeon who replaced my knee and who will, I hope, […]

Thursday Bag o’ Schnozz

I steeled myself for a stern lecture and a return to white pads and tape, but the dermatologist’s nurse practitioner (the nice one!) took one look at my skin graft Tuesday and said “Let your nose shine out upon the world for all to see.” So here it is, in its bumpy, slightly discolored, W.C. […]

Air-Minded: PASM Photoblog XIII

I included an image of Pima Air & Space Museum’s Curtiss F6C-4 Hawk in a recent Air-Minded entry. At the time it was still in restoration, and the photo wasn’t mine. The Hawk is now on display, just inside the main entrance, and I’m able to share some of my own photos: The Curtiss F6C Hawk was […]