Hmm, only 6 posts this entire year... sorry about that! I don't have any excuses; more like I'm not sure whether the few people who might visit this blog are interested in reading about yet another synchrotron trip to Melbourne. Not that I've had very many this year, but that's another story. Anyway if you are reading this, I'd appreciate it if you could let me know what you like reading about in terms of what's going on in my life - whether it's work, travel, tramping, church stuff, flying, what I've had for breakfast*, ...
*Never going to appear on this blog.
Since we are only a week away from the end of the year I thought rather than trying to write a whole bunch of posts and backdate them, I'll summarise some of the major highlights.
Work
Steady as she goes. The only constant is change. Et cetera. Not terribly exciting. There is increasing pressure for me to do synchrotron stuff for industry. I organised a half-day workshop for back in August and had about 14 people turn up. That led to 2 or 3 possibilities, which has led to $0 in contracts. Ah well, it's a hard sell. Isn't that why we have a marketing group?
Travel
I already wrote about the holiday that Raewyn and I had in
Melbourne/Bendigo back in April. Boy does that feel a long time ago. I had two trips to the Australian Synchrotron for experiments, in June and August. Both were looking at different stages of the animal skin to leather process. I was back there again in November for the annual user meeting, which was a bit ho-hum, not sure why.
I also had my first experience with neutron diffraction, at ANSTO in Sydney. I was there for about a week and was able to visit the Calvary Chapel in Castle Hill. It was small but friendly - kind of like our church, so I felt quite at home.
In August I had a second visit to the Advanced Light Source in Berkeley to look at iron-enriched milk (the first was August last year, which I seem to have forgotten to write about). Maybe I should show you some pictures of that.
My colleague Alistair loading some samples into the vacuum chamber on the beamline
Fiddly liquid sample cells chilling on a cold block
Church
Still going well, with the 11-14s on Sunday mornings, Friday night youth group, and worship. We might look at changing things up regarding the Friday nights for next year.
Sports
Badminton: We came second (I think) in the North Island Division 4 this year. I played #4 ladies singles and actually won about half of my games. Just changed a few little things - trying to get back to base and clear it to their backhand. Works almost every time. We had two trips away, to New Plymouth and Auckland. Remind me next year that if I end up organising the accommodation, to insist that people pay in advance.
No crazy bike challenges or marathons this year!
Family
Stu and Nicola welcomed Sarah on 22/2 (best said like Richie Benaud) as a little sister for Aaron. It's amazing to watch them grow - it happens so fast!
Home
I finished re-wallpapering, with a little help from my friend. (Ooh I get by...)
From this...
...to this!
Kitchen
Flying
Getting back into flying has probably been the biggest change for me this year. After an 11-year break, I had forgotten how much I enjoy it.
Obviously I was pretty rusty in the first few sessions - couldn't remember any of the mnemonics for the checks (engine runups, DVAs, downwind, etc.) but when my hands touched the control column and the throttle it felt like the most natural thing in the world. My biennial flight review was signed off after three sessions, although I did a couple more flights of solo revision before taking a passenger. After that it was getting familiar with the new glass cockpit setup in the aero club's C172s - and again, a couple more solo flights before taking passengers.
I've since taken a few people from work up, and from church as well (in conjunction with our retreat up at Waikanae in November).
The club hosted the Cook Strait regional competition in early November, so I signed up to compete in the non-instrument circuit. I had previously had a go in a comp that Welair had had, back in 1999, and came second, so figured I had a pretty good shot (and that it would probably be one of the less popular categories). Despite having five practise sessions, I got thrown a few curveballs on the day - (1) the aircraft I had used wasn't available, so I had to switch; (2) most of my practise had been into a southerly , but on the day it was a northerly so all my 'cheat' visual reference points were gone; (3) most of the time I had practised taking off and landing on the grass runway, but the instructor who was judging wanted to use the seal. I felt like I did a lot worse on the day than in my practises, but anyway I came second. Maybe next year.
In conjunction with practising for the comp, I ventured out on a few cross-country trips. I took Raewyn and Dad on the first one, to Blenheim; a workmate, Pauline, to Palmerston North and back (to practise approach and landing at a controlled aerodrome); solo to Dannevirke and back (as preparation for going to the Hawkes Bay); culminating in a trip to Hastings. The plan had been for Raewyn and I to fly up on a Friday night, stay at her parents' house, go for a scenic on the Saturday morning, and fly back to Paraparam in the afternoon. Unfortunately despite the weather being wonderful on the western side of the North Island, it was complete rubbish on the eastern side. So Raewyn drove up on the Friday night, I flew up on the Saturday morning and the rest of the plan proceeded as before. It was a great experience - a chance to put some of the advanced navigation skills I am currently in the process of learning into action - but pretty tough in terms of mental overload (not to mention the bank balance). Total flying time for the day was 3.8 hrs; by the time I came back across the ranges just south of Palmerston North, I was shattered. Hopefully with more experience, it will get better.
I'm currently about half-way through the training syllabus for an aerobatics rating (have had lessons on spins and loops, next one is on Monday for aileron rolls). I've also started on the road to a CPL, having passed the Law exam and booked in for Navigation on 10 Jan, and working through some navigation exercises on the ground (with the first CPL cross-country training flight booked in for 13 Jan). The CPL cross-country training syllabus requires a minimum of 30 hrs cross country, of which 10 hrs is with an instructor on flights >200 nm (nautical miles) in length, 10 hrs is as pilot-in-command on flights >200 nm and at least one >300 nm, and the remaining 10 hrs can be shorter. I have 12 months to complete the requirements for the first two (and a flight test), from the date of the first training flight. So I'm currently thinking where I could go that would make a round trip of 200 nm... for reference, Paraparam to Hastings is just over 100 nm in a straight line one way. So maybe Kaikoura? Taupo? Takaka, flying over the Abel Tasman National Park? So many choices!
A picture one of my passengers took during a local scenic flight, over the Tararuas looking northwards.
View out the front window between Masterton and Waipukurau, on the way to Hastings.
What's on the horizon
In no particular order:
- tramping with Raewyn: Tararua Peaks over New Year's, Routeburn-Greenstone in February (since I'll be in Queenstown for the AMN-8 conference), church youth trip at Wellington Anniversary Weekend where we're aiming to do the Southern Crossing
- a crazy period of travel in February and March: two conferences (Melbourne, Queenstown), holiday (see above), beamtime (Melbourne), more beamtime (Melbourne then Sydney)
- cross country flight training (see above) and more theory exams
