Chazd's (Charles Dowdell's) News Burps

Busy. I shouldn't be blogging. This week will be a blur as last week was. This weekend, I flew up to NY to pick up my truck and stuff for my new house. There were terrible weather delays in Detroit and I missed my connection. That is not really that big of a deal, but since the weather was bad all day in Detroit, lots of other folks were stranded overnight as well. I found a hotel (miraculously) about 30 minutes away (turned out to be 1.5 hours because of night construction). Anyway, I drove back down to Atlanta with my truck. It feels weird driving my truck in Duluth. It was a tight schedule for a weekend, the weather delay didn't help. I am moving. I have to fix the plumbing in my new house though before I can really move in. The new roof is going on today. The new HVAC system is already in. I caught a view of a nice Sundog amongst the urban sprawl of Atlanta. I was thinking of the 100s of thousands of people who could have seen it, how many did? When you travel a lot by ai

The house that got away from me is now mine. It took a awhile to close, but I am now moving in. I have quite a bit of work to do. I am hiring out a bit as well. My new home. It sounds weird to say it.

I am closing on my house Wednesday the 25th. Finally! There sure were a lot of hoops to jump through. There is quite a bit of work to do, a roof, air-conditioning and so on. I have to be moved out of my apartment on Aug 2nd. The following picture is of the my meetup dinner Saturday evening. I have been in Atlanta two years and I am still getting used to the idea that a big city like Atlanta has lots of opportunities to meet with people that were impossible in rural NY... like a Portuguese language instruction club. We took a long plane ride today up to Blairsville, GA, up in the mountains, in and around the clouds.

"There comes a special moment in everyone's life; a moment for which that person was born. That special opportunity, when he seizes it, will fulfill his mission-a mission for which he is uniquely qualified. In that moment, he finds greatness. It is his finest hour." -- Winston Churchill, British prime minister

My Portuguese (Por TOO Gayze) classes are going well. I joined a meetup group of folks who want to practice Portuguese. Very nice. It was inspiring. As someone said, "Learning a language is so empowering!" The soup is my favorite Korean Number 5 I have been flying, I was in and around a lot of fluffy clouds today. I forgot to take pictures. It is breathtaking being around those huge pillowy things. I am in likelihood going to start my instrument and complex/hi performance training in August. I expect to close on my house in Duluth this week. It has been a long time coming. I believe I passed the last hurdle. Foreclosures can be difficult... even for buyers. We sold my Mothers condo in Upstate, NY. The realtor and seller's attorney didn't do a very good job and there is some additional action to make things right. They send emails, can't seem to read em.

Images for this week. 1.) The lake shore with friends (without faces). 2.) Lake Lanier from the air. 3.) Georgia is general aviation Heaven; I have used crew cars before, but look at what it says on the door. This car is available to get over to a friend's place a few miles away in "Talking Rock" on gravel roads most certainly used by bootleggers years ago. It is almost too easy. (this is a Calvinist talking). Life is good, grand and humbling all at the same time.

It was an aviation weekend. I spent a bunch of money (Ahh.. I mean time.. Hpmt..) in the air. Here is one of the flights shown mapped out on the chart. Cory and I went down to a 2400 foot grass strip skirting around and under the class bravo airspace of the world's busiest airport. It was a bit of an oxymoron. Navigating some of the worlds most complex airspace to land and have lunch at a primitive airport with a nice country restaurant/aviation museum. Loads of fun. I had blinders on most the time for simulated instrument time. It was bumpy and hazy. It was also 108 degrees F out. Needless to say, climb performance and comfort were issues. It "aint" much cooler 5000 ft in the air. The hazy picture shows what "home" looks like. It is (LZU) Gwinnett County Airport from the South on about a 1.5 mile left base for runway 25, although you can't quite see the airport off to the left.) It is refreshing to get a "good" look at things when the blinders com