Category: Activities

As I turn into the Grammar Police

In the article AOPA Online – House bill could terminate flight service station modernization, AOPA President Phil Boyer is quoted as saying

“It’s incredulous that in an atmosphere of concerns for FAA funding, more business-like air traffic operations — and wise use of taxpayers dollars — that Congress even considered, much less accepted, this amendment”

I wrote to AOPA this morning and said

I find it simply INCREDIBLE that a person whose position requires clear and accurate communication would misuse the word “incredulous” so badly. I am simply INCREDULOUS at this misuse of the language.

AOPA’s response was great:

Paul: Thanks for pointing out your incredulity with our incredible web site article.

I promise: We’ll do gooder next time, irregardless of the grammer problems we’re having it with.

😉

JM

Jeff Myers
EVP Communications
AOPA

Some more thoughts about Vinokourov and Hincape

I’ve been thinking more about who will lead the Discovery team next year. Obviously for the Discovery team, the consideration isn’t about what’s best for American cycling, it’s about what’s the best use of their advertising dollar and which will get them the most press. But US Postal and now Discovery have been doubly blessed by having an American team lead by an American rider who is winning, and winning big in the biggest race in the sport. A lot of American sponsors have come and gone because they weren’t able to field a winning team or because their wins weren’t being done by an American.

If it came down to having an American rider leading but not winning, or having an non-American rider leading and winning, I don’t think either of those is going to be good for American cycling or Discovery. So I think they’ve got to go with Hincape and hope that in the next two weeks he proves himself capable of leading and winning.

A tale of two super domestiques

This time of year, I’m majorly enthralled by the Tour de France. I’m going to presume to explain a few things about professional cycle racing even though I’ve only been following it avidly for 7 years now (and a little less avidly back when one of the riders in the peleton was a guy I’d shared tips on preventing penile frostbite with). Some of this might be laughably wrong to people who are really into the sport, but it should be close enough for the rest of you.
Continue reading “A tale of two super domestiques”

Drool

Garmin 396 GPS with XM Weather (Americas) – Sporty’s Pilot Shop

When the Garmin 296 came out, I said that all it really needed was XM Satellite weather and approach plates, and it would be the perfect electronic flight bag (EFB). Since EFBs start at about $4,000, they are so far out of my reach as to be laughable. But now they’ve done it – they’ve combined the Garmin 296 with built-in XM Satellite weather (and you can listen to XM Satellite stations with an audio jack on the unit), and it’s just about perfect.

I seriously wish I flew enough to justify this beast. But since all I really do is a few 2 hour flights every month, I should probably just keep drooling and keep the credit cards locked away.

Anecdotes from the Tour

Watching the Tour de France coverage the other day, a couple of riders were accidentally shown by the cameras on a “natural break” (normally they show something else when the riders stop to take care of the biological necessities), and Phil Ligget was talking about how the riders won’t attack when a rival is taking a “natural break”. Paul Sherwin said that when he was riding, there was one rider who frequently attacked at those situations, so one day when he was off his bike for a break, the other riders stole his bike and pushed it a few kilometers up the road before abandoning it in a ditch. The rider had to wait for his team car to give him a spare bike, and maybe learnt a bit of a lesson about pay-back.

Then Phil told a story about when he was racing, and there was a guy who used to sprint on ahead until he was out of sight of the peleton, and then he’d hide and wait, and rejoin the peleton, and then enjoy being sucked along as the peleton tried to chase down this break that they couldn’t seem to catch sight of. He said this would continue for a few minutes until somebody recognized him in the back of the peleton. I guess this was before the days of race radios.

Just a couple of amusing anecdotes to while away the days before the race begins in earnest, with the first mountain stage on Saturday.

It’s nice to see Lance in yellow again, though.

I have a theory about this year’s race. The two time trials in the early flat stages of the race make it seem like it was designed to make Lance and his team have to get yellow earlier than they like and force them to defend it. And then the fact that both Saturday and Sunday’s mountain stages have long downhills to the finish means that no matter what Lance does in the mountains, the other “big men” will have a chance to catch him back up for the finish. I think Tuesday stage with two 1st category climbs and a mountain top finish will be the one that really shows whether this is Lance Armstrong’s tour again.