ello.

So over the past few months I’ve been playing around with this that and the other and decided that I can’t pay for my webhosting anymore. :’-( Which means those that I’ve hosted will now have to find their own hosting or get a free blog. Like mine is now. So I’ve got a new site.

I say it’s new, but if you look at the posts, they’re back from ‘07/early ‘08. So it’s my old site, as a new one.

Only thing that pisses me off? I can’t import the old posts, or get my old theme back.

So I’ve been browsing the Internet, and reportedly four died in a mid-air collision this morning at 1100GMT. Terrible yes, to the local aviation community. But  these two aircraft are Grobs from RAF St Athan.

Flight lieutenant Alastair Hawes said the planes were on “air experience” flights.

Such flights usually feature an RAF instructor alongside someone, usually a young person or cadet, who is interested in a military career.

The aircraft involved are believed to be twin-seater Grobs used in basic flying training.

I don’t know how this effects the local VGS like Hullavington, but I’d imagine we can see 6AEF at Colerne grounded for the remainder of February and possibly we might see (or hear) some shockwaves at 625. It’s quite worrying how they were both downed and all occupants died. I hate to think the implications for the ATC…

So it’s 6th February 2009, and my god is it cold…

I just got back from seeing a few friends of mine and delivering one very late present (Sorry!!) and it is bloody cold out there…

Over the past few days we’ve had a LOT of snow, more snow in the past week than in the past 6 years. All of it added together has made quite a lot of the white stuff settle, and as night moves in today leading onto Saturday morning, it’s been melting. This means the roads are covered in that horrible slushy brown stuff that just makes my boots soggy. But once that water is on the road, and it’s nightfall, it freezes. Or at least, it has done tonight.

Some of the main roads around North Bristol really dangerous right now. They haven’t been gritted since yesterday, and for me walking home it was slippery just walking across a T junction. Black ice is really a bitch. So anyone driving over the next day or two for gods sake BE CAREFUL. Filton aerodrome and Bristol International were both closed today until 4pm due to the ice/snow threat, and I think Filton is still closed until Monday. No idea how bad Lulsgate had it but we must’ve had it a lot worse.

Whats more is we have MORE heavy snow forecast for Monday evening….:-D

Well bugger me, it’s been a week of up’s and down’s…

First snow we had was Sunday night, 5 days ago. Started just trickling then it HEAVED down, the whole day pretty much, and was still coming down at the end of mine (around 4pm). Good day that.

Tuesday and Wednesday was a bit shit for…several reasons…

Thursday though! My god, the snow was back on Thursday morning around 1am. With a damned vengance too. Roads closed, only motorways and A-Roads around South Gloucestershire being gritted, so that meant most bus services were out and we couldn’t drive anyway. Huge snowball fight, I got a bit wet, and all that jazz. Great fun, pictures at the bottom.

Friday (today), the snow was back AGAIN! It had all melted yesterday leaving some slushy crap behind but it snowed heavily this morning and the roads were shut AGAIN! I mean, hahaha, it’s great!

Hullavington has 6-8 inches of snow level on the airfield, so like hell am I gliding this weekend…:-(

Yeah it’s a bit random.

Took a few pictures on Saturday. Here’s the two raw files of the best ones.

More to come from Hullavington next Sunday, if I remember to take my camera.

Tasty beverage. Yom yom.

So a bit of background information for you. A few weeks back I bought a printer from eBay, some guy had about 150 of the things and he was getting rid of them really cheap. £10 including postage and packaging, a lovely laser printer with a hell of a lot of toner. So I got it after about 2 days, plug it in and haha, “PAPER JAM”. Then it complains about some missing toner bottle or something, so I just gave up and left it.

So I emailed him and he was going to send me a new toner bottle from a printer of the same model, one that was gonna get scrapped. That was about 5 days ago and to be honest, I forgot about it and I had a huge package wrapped in bin bags and masking tape waiting for me in the kitchen. Instead of sending the spare part, he sent me the entire printer.

Om nom nom, two printers for the price of one!

Rogah!

So I went solo on Saturday December 27th 2008. Was AWESOME.

Then I didn’t fly for 4 weeks.

Following discussions with my CO and relatives about me going back up as staff, today  I went back to 625VGS in Wiltshire with my new Corporal stripes and flightsuit, ready to roll. Two new staff cadets were up there, a nice couple from Cardiff, the motely crew was still about who I had trained with. So all was good. Got 5 flights, I feel a million dollars…

…and now I’m going to go have a bath…

Photograph copyright Duncan Porter

Bloody hell it’s windy.

I just got back from walking home, and the wind is unbelievably strong. Doesn’t help when you got a huge coat flapping about, does it? Acts as a giant parachute and you can hardly move. Grrrr.

With all this cold weather we’ve had I wouldn’t be surprised if we get thunder of the next few days. It’s forecast to be rainy with highs of 9 Celsius and lows of 1-2 Celsius, which is a contradiction of the highs of -1 Celsius and lows of -7 we had on Friday. Plus, we got a rainy front moving in from the Atlantic. Nasty tail of a weather system over there has flicked onto the British Isles, so we should see some nice exciting weather.

With any luck.

So it’s January 9th 2009, and a few things have come up.

Firstly, my wings. I’ve lost them for the time being, until I can reach a compromise that will get me back up there. It’s not looking good, I’m trying to get cleared by my CO on Monday for AGT, but gah, it’s not going well. You’d think I could just turn up in my flightsuit, wave, and go “Yeah can I fly now?” – wrong. Instead I need to sign forms, get RAF medicals, get up there for a start, and do all kinds of weird crap to even get the go ahead. GRRR.

Second, an alternative to the god-awful iTunes. It’s called Songbird, link and picture at the bottom, and it rocks. Anybody who says “OMG ITUNES FAKE!!!!!!!11!!OEN!” can go crawl back under the rock called their iPhone and quietly die.

And lastly, some clever teenagers around the area where I live have decided it would be a good idea to put themselves on video. This WOULD be a good idea, if they weren’t in their school uniform and making out. And wouldn’t it be even less of a good idea if they happened to be, say, slightly undressed? And of the same gender? Bloody stupid I tell ya.

Songbird - http://www.getsongbird.com/