How on earth did it get to be mid-August? The wall-to-wall flight and duty schedule my husband’s been on might have something to do with it. At least he’s not hurting for flight hours this month. We would, no doubt, both be a little more sanguine about the whole thing if fewer of those hours ate up our weekends, but such is life when there are aircraft carriers at sea who demand their COD hits with the clamorous fervor of a infant seeking a pacifier. “Want it now! Want it RIGHT NOW!”
My current level of flight time leaves much to be desired, although attempts were made to rectify my sad ground-bound state last week. Alas, Mother Nature foiled my first bid for a Mission Observer proficiency hop with a grumbling sky and a worrisome number of lightning strikes in the vicinity. The weather at the airport was such that we probably could have taken off safely, but returning at the end of our flight would have been iffy. Our Mission Pilot decided that he didn’t fancy explaining to our superiors precisely why we thought it was a good idea to take off only to divert for weather and get ourselves stranded at another airport, so we stayed firmly planted on the ground.
No problem, we just rescheduled for a couple days hence… only to be stymied by another group signing the plane out from under us. Here’s hoping for better luck this week. I would dearly love to take advantage of the funding CAP always seems to have available for flying as the end of the fiscal year draws closer, especially consider how long it has been since I stretched my MO muscles. Those skills are perishable; I hope I haven’t completely forgotten my G1000 tricks.
I have not made much progress in transitioning from the right seat to the left (translation: I have not yet begun working towards my private pilot certificate). A while back, though, my husband and I visited a few local flight schools to get a feel for the various operations and instructors. At one of the schools, we were chatting with an older gentleman about the process, how many hours would be needed, the rates for aircraft rental and instruction, and so on and so forth. When he reached the part of the spiel about solo flight, though, he looked at me kind of funny.
“You know, you have to be at least sixteen years old to solo.”
I was a little taken aback — after all, I was there with my husband, wedding rings clearly visible. Boy, I thought, this guy must think my husband is one hell of a cradle robber! I assured the gentleman that I was, in fact, a full decade safely past that particular minimum.
I’ve often been told I look young for my age, but to have someone wonder if maybe — just maybe — I might be fifteen? Everyone says I’ll appreciate it later, but I’m not quite convinced that I have reached the point at which it is flattering to have one’s age underestimated by ten or more years.
To the Nth 
Such a fine line between a compliment and an insult in terms of age. But that being said, I’m still sad that I rarely get carded anymore.
To me, it’s in the same “grate on one’s nerves” neighborhood as having one’s name mispronounced or misspelled. That’s a good point about the carding; I bet I’ll miss it when fewer and fewer people ask me to go digging through my wallet. 😉
I used to be the same way, until about a year ago. I specifically remember one incident where I was going to see an R rated movie and I was 25. I was asked to show ID because apparently I didn’t look 17. I was also ALWAYS carded everywhere, told that I looked way too young to be married, and in general just always mistaken as at least 6-10 years younger than I actually was. I HATED it. Then I turned 28. I’m 29 now and in just a little over a year, I have apparently done some drastic aging. I can see that I now have crow’s feet around my eyes, and some other general aging signs, but I honestly didn’t know that it was THAT drastic! Needless to say, I haven’t been carded in well over a year and recently someone told me that they thought I was at least 33 years old. I can now say that I finally understand why people always told me “You’ll appreciate this when your older.” The last time I ordered a drink and wasn’t carded, I was very tempted to demand that the waitress ask for my ID. I definitely wish I could go back to the days when I looked 10 years younger, and appreciate that a little more this time around :-). I think my biggest issue is that I really don’t think that I look THAT old, but somehow in the course of a year I went from looking 10 years younger to 5 years older. 😦
There must be a happy medium somewhere!