My 100th Post!

[migrated from myspace blog]

Okay, this is probably more than just my 100th blog post, because I have deleted a couple posts here and there that I didn't feel were worth keeping around. But, I just happened to notice today that my "blog control center" tells me I have 99 posts and 2826 views. So what will my 100th blog be about? Well, just like all the other ones...nothing.

I had a conversation over lunch yesterday with another flight instructor. Inevitably the conversation turned to flying. He tried to put into words what all of us at this stage in the flying game certainly feel. He remembered back to when he was working on his private license, and there's a very specific minimum amount of knowledge that one has to be able to intelligently discuss at that level. As a person moves up through Instrument, Commercial, Instructor, there's obviously an increasing amount of information one has to study, yet the more knowledge and farther along a pilot gets, the more he realizes there is that he doesn't know. It's like a dragon who grows back two heads for every one the knight cuts off. I'm not complaining about this, but it was actually a bit of a comfort to hear a fellow instructor articulate what I felt, especially months back when I was just getting started:

"There is so much information that I don't use on a regular basis because I don't need it, so when a student comes and asks me something I don't know, I feel like an idiot, but I just tell them I don't know, have them look it up, and tell me the answer when they find it."

So, the book listed below as "currently reading" isn't quite accurate. I just ordered a signed copy after reading about it in Geek Monthly magazine. It's a post-apocalyptic comedy novel chock full of pop culture where conversations take place that read like this:

"Do you think that Obi-Wan Kenobi changed his name to Ben Kenobi just out of convenience?" Bobby asked.

"Convenience?" Erik replied.

"Yeah, like can you picture him on the phone trying to order a new droid from QVC or something? He'd be all 'Send that to Obi-Wan Kenobi. No, I'm sorry, not Joey Kenobi, Obi. Obi-Wan Kenobi. No! Not Juan Kenobi! Do I sound Colombian to you? Look, just send it to Ben, okay? Ben Kenobi.'"

Who wouldn't want to read such a book? The same writer spent a year writing a blog as a fiction character, an experiment to find out how absurd he could get before people would begin to stop believing such a person was real.

Well, I'm thinking this is pushing the limits of how much a person is willing to read, so I'll wrap it up. At least I got all the way through without mentioning LOST. (Doh!)