Five minutes

Travelling most of the day for a 5 minute checkup with my surgeon.
Funny, you can think of it in a bad way, but in reality it's not.

See, first off, I only have to go so far cuz my surgeon is far away. He's far away because the closer ones are all booked up.

But the big one is... I'm very happy it was five minutes.
You don't want a long meeting for this one.
A long meeting means something's wrong.
A fast one means all is good.
Mine is the latter. :)

He also told me to loose the crutch. Said it was "redundant" at this point. So I'm limping around all on my own now. I still need the crutch for stairs without handrails though. That'll get better as my knee starts flexing more. The gym will be a big help with that.

Jim

Manly men!

I'm a lumberjack, and I'm ok...

So this week I got back to the gym. Happiness ensued.
Some day, I'll be able to go back to the hot tub as well. My knee's still a bit swollen for that adventure just yet.

My main thing at the gym for now is the exercise bike. I did a lot of work on the bike before my surgery. It's one of the main tools you use with ACL reconstruction.

I was warned before going that I would not likely be able to make a full revolution. Your knee just doesn't flex that much. So you "pedal" forward as far as you can go, then go backwards as far as that will go. It's very similar to stretching, something I'm very very comfortable with. I did heaps of stretching in my martial arts days and I really liked it. So this was familiar and comfortable territory.

So then the summit of the mountain before me would be to actually be able to "ride" the bike. The path to get there would be slow. Yesterday I was feeling pretty good... I'd progressed to the point where I could put the pedals vertical in reverse and level in forward. This was heaps of progress. I could barely move them when I started. But the bike is super effective. The progress I made each day was pretty stunning. Just ten to fifteen minutes payed off bigtime.

I was feeling pretty stellar when I hit true vertical today. I could feel the teetering on the top of the arc. It was great. Then, I pushed forward and went past level. I knew once those two angles met, kinda like a pie chart if you will, then I'd go all the way around. What a day that would be :)

Then back to reverse to see what past vertical would be like. I knew it would be just a little past, but that would be a very happy place.

Well, I tell ya, I about lost it when my foot just kept going... all the way around. Slow as hell, but holy *($*#@@#*$ YEAH!!!!!!!!!

I went a few times in reverse, then slowly slowly pushed through forwards. No pain. I wasn't overdoing it... I was there.

Ah, the little things :)
Jim

Back at the gym baybe!

Ok, I'm totally stoked today :)

I finally made it back to the gym! It's been three weeks.
There's just something awesome about actually being able to do something about your situation other than wait.

Till now, I've been in "recovery mode". I think of it as recovering from the trauma of surgery. I know many people dive right into things, but I just didn't feel like that was the wisest choice. My physio seemed to agree. So when she said I was good to go back to the gym, I was very happy. She gave me some very clear things to do and expectations. That helped a lot.

I knew to go straight to the exercise bike and not to expect to even be able to do a full rotation... which I most certainly wasn't able to do. But instead, to pedal back and forth as far as was comfortable. This seemed a lot like stretching to me, which I'm very familiar with from my martial arts days, so I treated it as such. And happily, it responded as such too. Very familiar territory :)

Stretching was one of my favourite aspects of martial arts... slow, consistent pressure. With patience it leads to measurable results. I know this world. I'm very comfortable here.

Oh, I'm so happy with my knee. I had to take a pic.
It's still swollen, but it's starting to look like a knee again!


This is my jury-rigged compression setup...


I got back to doing some upper body work as well.
It's just so nice to be back.
There's something about going TO the gym. You can do some of this at home, but there it's 100% focused. Everything there is set up for it and it's the only reason to be there. No distractions. Just work. Just get better. If I could ice my leg there, I'd stay longer.

Hrm... I should get a cooler! Bring some ice packs!
Oh, I like that one.
I like that a lot!

Jim

Compression you idiot!

So I finally figured out what they were talking about with the "compression" bit of RICE (rest ice compression elevation).

See, I've had this compression stocking thing... and it truly helps. It's especially nice when walking around cuz it slows the blood-pooling in my leg. It makes things way more comfortable. I figured I had the Compression bit covered.

Not by a long shot!
Freakin idiot!

It's ICE under compression!
You don't just ice your knee... you strap those suckers down! I've started taking some velcro straps that we tie up gliders with and using them to sych down my ice packs. I've also started getting them in the freezer. Now that I'm a bit more mobile, this is possible.

Holy freaking hell what a difference!
I feel SO MUCH BETTER!!!!

Jim

Maybe

This ones some boring TMI stuff, so run away while you still can.

Ok, too late... here we go...
I don't like popping corks too early, so I'm putting this in the maybe category for the moment.

See, I don't like to sleep on my back. I don't know why, but I never have. At the moment, aside from all the other BS, I wake up with sore heels. If I don't however, I seem to have added little pains in my knee. I don't seem to sleep very well either, although getting to sleep is much much easier.

I tried sleeping on my stomach. As per my physio's advice, I even stuck a towel under my shin. No go. Still too much weight on my knee for comfort. Then I tried sleeping on my side. As I've read, I stuffed blankets between my knees. I kept my operated knee high so as to avoid putting any weight on it.

No go. I don't know if it was that position or just general healing pains, but man I did not like it. The inside of my knee was feeling again like it did after the accident... I had bone bruising there, I'm quite familiar with the spot.

Well, last night I found a way to lay mostly on my side with my operated leg on the low side, but, without my upper leg resting on it. :)

I did wake up at 4 for a while, but then slept till around 10 or 10:30. No residual pains. That could work.

Here's hoping.

Ice is nice

Icing my leg.
I'm a bit more mobile these days which is nice. I still have one twinge of pain that's keeping me from feeling good about loosing the crutches. I'll be taking my good sweet time thank you.

There's muscle pain and then there's "other stuff" pain. This is other stuff. Muscle pain you work with. This stuff you stop doing whatever's causing it. It's very tiny, but I aim to keep it that way.

Today's distraction is computer emulators (as was yesterday's).
Found some stuff that allows me to use my WiiRemotes with my computer. So of course I grab the old AppleII emulator and "Wings Of Fury", my favourite AppleII game. With a little (ha!, couple hours) of tweaking, it's all up and running. Fortunately for me, I got lots of time, so tweaking around for a few hours getting a computer emulator running is absolutely no big deal.

Today, I've moved on to the Atari2600 and Nintendo64 emulators for the Wii. Neither of the two were running very well last time I looked. But that was a year or so ago. I just got the Atari running and they've got it running well :)
I'm going to be going head to head with my flatmate on Combat once my knee is done cooling off.

I'm hoping the N64 might be fixed up as well, though I'm less optimistic. That one seems to be a tough cookie to crack. I haven't even seen a good PC emulator for it yet. Here's hoping though. It'd be cool as hell to play PilotWings64 :)

Jim

Sutures out :)

The stitches came out yesterday :)

They warned me that there would prob be a little bleeding and swelling since even just removing stitches jars the knee a bit.

Between that and physio and not keeping it extra-elevated... it swelled up a bit. Fortunately today it's back down. It wasn't that bad, but I don't like overdoing things.

The upside is now I'm that much closer to getting back in the pool :)

Ok...
Geek warning... all others may wish to leave the room now.
So, my happy fun project today?
Getting my computer to connect to my wii remote.
Why you might ask? ;)
Weeeeelll... Couple reasons.
I lack a joystick... and I'm not shelling out a bunch of money for one either. I've got an old AppleII emulator with a stack of games. I've got a stack of flight simulators as well. Soooo... with enough time, something I've got in spades, and zero money... well, I found some instructions and programs that let you hook up your wii remote and use it as a joystick. Still a few bugs to get past, but I'm playing some old favourites like Chopper Command, Arctic Fox, and Wings Of Fury :)

Jim

Two weeks post

Everything in the world of surgery, as far as I can tell, is measured in how much time has passed.
Tomorrow morning, I'll officially be two weeks post :)

Things, thus far, have seemed to progress at about the rate I've expected, judging things on what I've read and what I've been told.

My estimation for ditching the crutches was around now. I've heard lots of "before two weeks" stories and even some "days post" stories, but that either seemed a bit like they were rushing things or had a different procedure. Some techniques include manually draining the swelling caused by surgery. This allows for far quicker mobility. I don't think they do that with arthroscopic surgery. Slower mobility, but far lower risk of infection. That's not why they make that choice, but that is one of the end results.

For me, the marker was feeling well enough to start using less to little pressure on my crutches. My physio reckons I could go faster about it, but I just haven't felt that good about it. I'm in no rush. I've been through this before.

I remember the first time I was asked to take a "weight bearing" step after I had broken my femur. I know I gave the doc a distinct "are you sure?" look. I think I may have even asked that.

There is a definitely different mentality when you're feeling "fragile".
It's quite the contrast to the "push hard!" society we live in. There's a time for that. This just isn't it.

The first week is all RICE.
Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation
Week two is the awkward inbetween phase. You need to move more, but only so much. And you can only take so much. Swelling pooling in your ankle sucks ass.

Now I'm beginning to be able to stand for longer periods of time. I can take more weight on my leg. I can walk fully upright with little weight through the crutches. It's getting there.

I'm also holding to the muscle building mentality. Rather than doing muscle building exercises every day, I do them every other day. Routine is a lovely thing. I actually wouldn't mind a bit of that. But I also know that to build muscle, there is a technique to it. You workout "to failure" and then rest a day. Your body builds back up on the rest day. If you interrupt it with an other workout session, you reset the clock. Oh, "to failure" just means that you lift (push/whatever) till you physically can't. You want to make it 1/2 way through a motion and not be able to complete it. This actually tears muscle, which is what you're trying to do. When that heals, it heals stronger.

Tomorrow is my workout day.
We'll see how it goes.
Jim

White or Wheat?

Boy, if it were only that simple.
But no, the chemists out there are continually figuring out ways to sell us crap "food".

Some bits are simple.
White is crap.
Eating white bread is roughly the equivalent of eating a spoonful of sugar.
Your body processes it the same way. You might as well be eating a candy bar.

But when we get down to "Wheat" bread, things get "tricky".
(They're not, but you gotta know what to look for)

Wheat has 3 main parts.
Before I bore you with the jargon, it's easiest to think of it like an egg.
You've got the shell, the white and the yolk.
(Bran, Endosperm, Germ)

White bread, including "white wheat", uses only the Endosprem... like the eggwhite.
It's basically starch (up to 75%).
Without the other two, it's crap.
Your body turns it into sugar and it makes you fat.

"Whole Wheat" bread uses all three.
The key word is "Whole"
This is practically speaking and legally speaking.

"Whole" means they use the whole wheat kernel... all three parts.

This is also where you need to read the ingredients label as well, cuz the government allows them to call anything around half composed of whole wheat as whole wheat... except on the ingredients label. There they gotta spell it out.

Once you know these tricks, it's surprisingly simple to tell the crap food from the real food.

BTW, that "Multigrain" crap, is generally just that... crap.
It doesn't matter how many styles of grain they use if they're milling off two of the three base components.

Here's to better eating :)
BTW, white rice and pasta are the same as white bread.
Rolled Oats on the other hand are great for you.

Hamstrung

Everyone's heard of your hamstrings. I didn't really know which muscles they were, apart from leg muscles, till the other day.

Do this.
Lay on your stomach. Now, lift your leg up bending at the knee. That's your hamstring. Easy right?
I currently can not do that.
That's a weird feeling.
I can try (I have to try)... the muscles go tight. I can feel the ends where they've been cut. The ends hurt, but not too much. There's just no power. My leg is 100lbs.

With my right leg... easy peasy.
With my left?... I can't lift it at all.

My surgery used hamstring ligament to replace my ACL.
So all my power is gone. I'm sure a lot of the muscle will go soon too. Building it back up will be a large portion of my rehab.

New day

New day, a little more mobility.

The swelling's backing off. I can stand for quite some time now. Might even get confident enough to take a shower standing up! Really, how many people get to say that? And mean it?

I can even walk with some weight on my bad leg. The only thing holding that back was the swelling. Now I get to feel the real limits... the muscles. This is great. This is a weakness I can fix. It'll take time and effort, but this one's do-able. I'm not just sitting and waiting.

Now comes the need to consciously go easy.
To reign it in and "don't be a hero". It's a slow road. No need to rush. The tiny improvements have such a dramatic effect on my psyche. Now is the time to be patient. This is the time I've waited for.

Next up, so the story goes, are the dramatic improvements.
This is of course followed by the plateau. You get a month of big big changes, then things level off. This is often viewed as "hitting a wall", but I think it's more that the low hanging fruit of repair work is done and you go back your body's normal pace of improvement. I think it's kinda like getting off those flat escalator things at an airport.

Jim

Like Clockwork

I currently have a natural alarm clock.
I set mine anyway, but I find that I don't need to.

See, every six hours I'm meant to take my pain meds. And they last almost exactly six hours. So I pretty much know when it's getting close to time for an other pill. It's nothing dramatic, but I start to feel a little twinge of "inside pain". This would be opposed to "outside pain" which is from swelling. That disappears as soon as I elevate my leg. "Inside pain" comes from just inside my kneecap, which is where they've drilled.

So, this morning I woke up at a strange hour. My knee was feeling a little sore, so I iced it. Then it dawned on me... hrm... did I forget to set my alarm? I took a look at my clock and Yup... 6:20am. 20 min overdue.

Jim

Out of the dark.

Is there anything scarier than new pain?
Just got back from the physo though, and all is good :)

But man, what a week.
The hardest part I think is the unknown.
Not so much the not knowing what's next, I sorta do, but the not knowing what's "normal" or more importantly if you're doing something wrong.

So, post surgery, they wrap the shit out of your knee with ace bandage stuff... even some insulating type stuff under it. It's to keep DVT away and to help keep compression on your knee to help with swelling.

Well, that wrap prevents you from icing it!

Anyway, long story short, by Friday, even sitting up was uncomfortable. Standing was brutal. Moving around was next to impossible.

Of course, in addition to the swelling, the heavy drugs are wearing off by now. All this adds up to... it feels like you're going backwards!

I have no clue what "normal" is. I just know it all feels worse than the day before... this doesn't seem good! So I calm down and remind myself that I'm seeing my physio soon. She has a blown ACL herself and I'm sure she's treated many people with one, so I'll just wait and freak out later.

My first sign of happiness was this morning I could feel that the icing was starting to take. It's handy that it's winter here, cuz I don't have to go to the kitchen to cool my packs... I just put them on the window sill above my bed. That's a life saver!

Well, my physio confirmed all the stuff I was hoping. The ice is working. The swelling is actually very low, and yes, she's treated lots of ACL patients so she's quite familiar with "normal". The little exercises I've been doing have already paid off and she showed me some new stuff as well. I've been doing right by not walking around a lot. Walking is good, but only for a minute... then back to ice.

I am so flippin happy to know that I'm on the right track.
It's cool to know that I'm actually doing very well so far, but I'm mainly happy that I've not been doing anything bad.

Jim

Heat

"Is it warm in here? Or is it me?"
An innocent question. Simple really, till it matters.

I've been sleeping under a pile of blankets... a big pile. The house is normally cold. We've got a wood burning stove, but anyone that's had one knows that the heat comes and goes. You have to keep after it, or it stays pretty cool.

As I was trying to sleep last night, I felt hot.
Normally this wouldn't be a big deal.
But I've just got out of surgery.
A fever is a huge deal. If you get a fever, you go to the hospital immediately. Fevers are a sign of infection.

I wasn't convinced I had a fever though. I was warmer than normal, but not overly warm. I threw off some of the blankets and didn't feel like I needed my hat (yes, I live with a hat on). Like this, I felt normal.

That's the tricky bit though. If you're running a fever... how do you know? Of course it feels warmer... you're overheating.

Then I remembered that we've got someone staying in the livingroom and Abe appointed him the task of looking after the fire. I figured that he was probably doing an admirable job. So I asked him and yup... the house was just warm.

Whew.

1st layer off

Rather than shoving this in everyone's face on FaceBook... I'll put it here.


With the pressure bandages off, I can finally actually ice my knee.
Before, all the wrapping stuff acted as insulation.

Hell week

The first week is hell.
I knew this before I got on the plane to go to surgery.
The path to recovery requires a pound of flesh.

Your body does not like when they drill holes into your bones. Not at all. And it lets you know it.

After the surgery, you are way wacked out on drugs. They don't let you leave till the next day. Not that you could.

Day 2 isn't much better.
My leg was swollen and "weak". This translates to it feels like a balloon that's about to pop and "weak" means it feels like a ton of bricks. You don't feel "weak" muscles. You feel like your leg weighs 100lbs.

Day 3... will this swelling ever go down?????
That lingering voice in the back of your head keeps warning you about infection. When you get mentally past that one, you've got DVT to keep you worried. Both are very real, so it's not a "just put it out of your mind" thing.

The infection risk got way lower simply by leaving the hospital. Not kidding. Not being a smartass. The best thing you can do from that standpoint is leave the hospital. The antibiotics don't hurt either.

DVT's a kicker.
You need rest right? You need that swelling to go down right? But guess where you get DVT from? Immobility, especially post surgery. So you elevate your leg which helps in many ways. And... uhg... you walk around on your balloon of a leg. The first few steps are the worst. It settles down a bit after that. But that doesn't help the swelling... in fact it does the opposite. Fortunately, the benefits far outweigh the little bit it sets you back in the swelling department.

So when I tell you that I am out of my chair happy that the swelling has started to subside, I think you'll get the picture a bit.

I'm not there yet, but holy crap that's a welcome move in the right direction.

Once the swelling's out of the way, then I can start making real progress. I can already move around my place fairly well. It only starts to suck if I stand in one place too long (which isn't long).

When that goes away, then it's just sore, stiff and weak. Those are easy. I can do that. That's just patience and perseverance. A slow, steady push. Wearing it all down like a river wears at it's banks. I look forward to it.

Jim

Internet

Gotta love the internet.

Latest one... Hey google... my shin hurts after my ACL surgery....
"Yeah, that's normal"

If your calf hurts, look for these other signs...
(mine doesn't)

Freakin amazing.
Also learned that while elevating your leg is good (along with cold, etc), it's also rather important to move around as well. Sure, it sounds simple, but when you're dealing with something like this, you don't take anything for granted.

Such as, I know one of the biggest issues right now is reducing the swelling. Well, running around cuz you can't feel any pain cuz you're on meds, might not be the best idea. So, I'm on minimal meds and very easy but consistent moving around... and a LOT of laying around (watching movies and surfing).

Got my next appointments all arranged as well.
Next up is physio on Monday.
The week after I get my sutures out.
Then back up to Christchurch to follow up with my surgeon.

Jim

Pizza Delivery

When you can barely walk... is there anything quite as sweet as pizza delivery?
I mean seriously.
Pizza, Garlic Bread, Potato Wedges... and a Chocolate Brownie!
Delivered to your door.

And I was concerned about getting something to eat?
30 minutes though. :(
Soon enough.

Jim

Post Op

So far, so good.
Gotta say, that was weird.
One of the strangest bits is I've heard people talk about how much they enjoy the pre-surgery drugs. Well, I'm a freak I guess cuz I hated them. They shoot you up with something right before they put you under... made my world go all wonkey. It was like a TV with bad reception... the picture would flip up and down... for the geeks, the Vhold was out of sync. I did not like this at all.
That wasn't bad though.
Just weird.

When I woke up however.
UHG
No thank you!
Man oh man. Groggy, half there, half not. Just up, so not sure if you're supposed to try and stay up, but you don't want to. That sucked. Lasted a few hours too, though thankfully wearing off the whole time. I'll be quite happy to never do that again.

Knee's good as far as I can tell.
Doc's happy, nurses are happy. Doesn't seem to have too much swelling. Very little pain, but can't tell how much is the pain meds. I'm not taking both meds. They said to use both if it does get rougher.

Time for lots of movies I think.
Jim

5 min

Taxi should get here in 5 min or so.
Then it's off to the hospital.
Strange mix of nervous and exciting. Of course I didn't sleep much last night. All this waiting will do that to ya ;)

Ah well
See ya on the other side.
Jim

Turn it up to ELEVE.... easy there tiger.

It's funny.
One of the hardest things so far is not "finding the motivation". Quite the opposite. It's reigning it in. I've got so much pent up energy that the real struggle is "not cutting loose". It's good though. It's a long road ahead and not having to search for motivation will be a big plus. I'll be searching instead for patience and discipline. Slow and steady win this race.
One of my favourite sayings at the moment to remind myself has become "Don't be a hero".

I look forward to being able to get back to the gym.
Strength training flows well with my condition. Part of strength training is "pushing to failure". Unlike cardio, where you go for long periods and slowly grind yourself down, strength training comes is bursts. You push hard till you can't push. You literally go till your body fails you. Then you rest and push again... till you fail again.

It's a concentrated blast of punishment.
I find that it suits my current situation well.
After I've exhausted myself, I can relax. I've done all I can. I crawl over to the pool and the hot-tub. I love Aqualand (my gym).

It'll be a week or so till I can get back to it.
We'll see how it goes.
Till then, I think I get to live in the internet for a while.

Jim

Junkies are all the same

I'm used to hearing the reactions of pilots when someone quits hang gliding or paragliding.

It's always the same.
There's this denial and shock. In general, it's a mad mental scramble to find ways that "you can still fly!". Like "just give it time" and such. It's a bit comedic really.

See, for a lot of pilots, this isn't something we take up lightly. It's a lifelong passion and we are complete and utter addicts. And of course, we naturally assume that everyone else is too. For us giving up the sport is akin to giving up breathing. We can't fathom not flying and thus we can not fathom anyone else not flying. There's a bit of comedy in this narrow minded thinking. But everyone does it.

So it's been kinda interesting telling people I'm never skiing again.
That statement alone illicits the exact same reaction.

I'm definitely outside the looking glass. It's a strange perspective that I've not had before. I understood it, but it's quite an other thing to see it up close and personal.

Everyone tells me about their friend that's torn their ACL and continued to ski. They use braces and strength training and la-de-da.

Oh the disappointment in their faces when they see that their stories aren't swaying me.

For a while I tried to explain how I wasn't really into skiing in the first place. To them of course, this just sounds like denial. Nevermind that I only skied a handful of times 15-20 years ago. I'm seriously not that into it. But they don't understand how someone can not love it as much as they do.... ah, just like flying ;)

Even if I did love it though, it's not worth it.
The thing people miss is it's not about my physical ability to ski. I should eventually be well enough to go skiing, but I just can not go through this again.

But try explaining that to a junkie ;)

Silver lining

So, don't get me wrong... this sucks. No bones about it, I'd trade it in a heartbeat.
But...
It does provide an interesting perspective.

See, there's an old saying everyone knows... "You don't know what you've got till it's gone".
It was put very well in Fight Club
Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of Raymond K. Hessel's life. His breakfast will taste better than any meal you and I have ever tasted.

And, my favourite... Lucky Number Slevin...

The unlucky are nothing more than a frame of reference for the lucky. You are unlucky, so I may know that I am not. Unfortunately the lucky never realizes they are lucky until it's too late. Take yourself for instance; yesterday you were better off than you are off today but it took today for you to realize it. But today has arrived and it's too late. You see? People are never happy with what they have. They want what they had, or what someone else has.

So I am in a unique position.
I know what I have and more so, what I am about to lose. Albeit temporarily and thankfully so.

I can very well right now. My knee is in very good shape, as it needs to be for my operation. I remember the day after my accident when I couldn't even put weight on my leg. I was confined to crutches and felt like quite the invalid. It's a strange place when you have to struggle to put on a sock. I know what that world looks like. I've been there twice. And in just over a week, I'll be there again.

The strange part is I'm looking forward to it.
It's going to suck.
A lot.
But, it's the road back.
I have a thought ringing in my head... "I have the most amazing life... I'm very keen to get back to it". When I'm struggling, this is what keeps me going. And I've not yet even begun to struggle. So I push hard at the gym. And it's very easy to push hard. I want my life back... it's easy to find the will power. Almost too easy sometimes. I have to be careful not to push too hard.

But then there's this interesting spot I'm in.
It's not easy knowing you will struggle to so much as shower. Stairs will be mountains. Temporary fortunately. And here I am now. I'm in good shape. I'm quite mobile... I can even drive a manual car, something I won't be able to do soon. And I'm working on being even stronger.

Going to the gym is easy.
I wonder how long it will take to get back to this level. I know how long it takes to get past it and that's the joy of the small hell I'm about to go through... I get to go past where I am even now.

Odd stuff in this head of mine ;)
Jim

Zen Master

I am the zen master.
I don't really have a choice in the matter, but since I am a big believer in cognitive therapy, I have to be.

Ok, hang with me... this one takes a little to get through...

For the uninitiated, it kinda goes like this...
You have some control over that little voice in your head and the way you allow yourself to think about things has a definite impact on your well being.

People call it perspective, or "the glass is half..." There are many ways of expressing it. But the end product is the same. If you walk around "reminding yourself" that "everything sucks!", then it will. If however, you do the opposite, it has the opposite effect.

So.
My flight home from Christchurch today was diverted. We wound up getting bussed up from an other town because the Queenstown airport was snowed in. This is not unheard of, but having snow all the way to the valley floor is uncommon.

Now, I'm not going to tell you that having all kinds of fresh powder on the mountains doesn't hurt a bit. Knowing that I screwed myself up on the one bad day in an otherwise epic season is a bit stingy as well. However, dwelling on this is a very bad idea.

Once I start down that road, I get to make a scorecard of "how it could have been". This is not a mentally healthy process. This is the way of the half empty glass. Though it is a very tempting road, it clouds your vision of what you do have.

So I'm sitting in the bus, looking out the window when someone mentions the epic snow we're getting today. For a moment, pain. Then, I think... "no". "Look out the window you idiot." Before me is the amazing snow capped beauty of the Southern Alps. It is truly stunning. People travel half way around the world to see this. I'm in a bus full of them. And I live here!

I can choose to wallow in misery. Or I can appreciate what I do have and focus on how to enjoy it. It is a conscious decision and it does actually matter (that's the cognitive therapy bit if ya care).

My day instantly got brighter.
And not a surface brighter, I truly felt better.
Nothing had changed but the direction I allowed my thoughts to wander in. It's a deliberate mental action and it does work. It's not 100%, but it helps.

Ah, the stuff that goes through my head before I fall asleep ;)
Cheers
Jim

Ortho

Not a lot of time at the moment... so I'll fill in the details later.
Saw my Orthopedic surgeon today.
Good stuff. Amazed I got to be seen so soon.

Gotta run.
Jim

WOOT!

I'm scheduled in for an MRI today!!!!!
Surgery possibly tomorrow morning!
Someone's getting a big box of chocolates!!!!

I don't have a ton of time to write this up, so it might come in spurts, we'll see. I gotta make sure I've got all my ducks in a row first.

Anyway,
I call down to my Doctor's nurse to get a new referral slip for the Ortho in Christchurch... she let's me know that... WOOPS!... he's a back specialist! OH NOES!

Can I tell you how much my heart sunk!

She then says she's going to do some calling and will get back to me.
I hang up and start banging away on my list of ortho numbers in CRCH.
I'm getting Early/Mid July quotes, so not all horrible.... then...

I get one nurse that sees that I'm booked in for tomorrow with the back specialist. She informs me that, as I know, I'm not likely to get a better appointment... prob mid July at best... and I should keep my appointment. He does do knee work, he's just a back specialist.

Ok, better than nothing right?
At least I'll get the consultation out of the way and hopefully the MRI at least scheduled.

Then....
My local nurse calls back.
Holy crap!.... she's already got me scheduled in for an MRI. Says I should just jump in a cab at the airport and boogie over cuz it's at 3:30.
She's also got me slated up with the surgeon!!!!

HOLY CRAP I'M HAPPY!
Jim

One at a time

So that's step one.
I'm just so happy to be in the pipeline right now.
It's not all roses yet, but I am feeling better about things.

What I'm expecting is that I'll get up to Christchurch and have a visit with the doc. Probably get an MRI, or maybe just get booked for an MRI, but hopefully actually get one. Then, after that confirms what is extremely obvious, that my ACL is completely detached... then I'll get booked in for surgery. No clue what the timetable for that one will be. Hopefully not too long. And if it is long, hopefully there will be someone/anyone in NZ that'll be able to do it sooner.

See, the need the MRI I'm sure not only to confirm things, but also to have a good idea of how to proceed. I know from the doc here that this is surgery time. So confirmation is just a formality. So I'll get there and "get in line" (make an appointment) for surgery.

Till then, it's just "killing time".
On the upside, I get to see my friends up in Christchurch. :)

Ortho

Holy crap, I get to be seen on Wed!
WOOT!

Ok, so here's the long story.
The doc on Saturday wrote me up a referral for a guy in Dunedin (close-ish city) and said I'd get an appointment in the mail over the next couple days. If I didn't hear something in a few weeks, I should enquire.

Yeah... no.
Don't think so.

Of course I was on the phone at 9am today. You better believe I'm not sitting around waiting a few weeks for an appointment in the mail... what is this? The 1930s?

Well I'm glad I called.
Cuz the first available appointment is in... OCTOBER!
Bzzzrt!
WRONG!

I gotta tell ya... My heart sunk a bit.
It didn't get better when they told me that all of the orthos in Dunedin would be booked up like that as well.

I called up a mate of mine that's a nurse and asked him what he'd do.
He said to phone around Christchurch... an other city that's just a bit further away.

That worked out a bit better.
I was hearing things more like "August" and even "Mid July" :)
But when I heard "How about Wednesday?"... I did have to pause for a second and ask "this Wednesday??".

Woops

Well that was pretty stupid.
After not skiing for something like 15 years, I jump back into the deep end on someone else's skis.. and without adjusting the bindings. Moron.

So how'd it happen?
Was out skiing with a mate. It was really really icy, but things were going well. I'd been out on the Greens for a while and things were going well. We headed up to the peak and started carving up the blues.

Down one of the harder blues (black?), I fell over. I don't exactly remember much of going down... classic "It's all a blur"... but I do recall the moment when I thought "shit.. this is where the bindings let go"... and then they didn't. That didn't feel good.

When I stopped sliding, I felt good that I'd been smart enough to wear a helmet. My knee was feeling painful, but not a sharp pain. I laid there for a bit and the pain subsided.

When I got up, it wasn't feeling bad, so I tried to turn down the hill and ski easy and slow, but fell right over. I unclipped and tried to walk down, but my knee had no strength and I feel right over.

My friend called ski patrol and they carted me down.

One interesting bit of the story...
All the emergency people that attended to me... women. Heck, even my friends that I was skiing with ;) Even the people that carted me down the hill. Well... there was one guy... he drove the snowmobile that drug us the last bit to the emergency shack.

Anyway
Nope, no pain.
That's apparently how these ones go.
When I got down to the medical center in town for x-rays, the doc there said I'd totally broken off my ACL... "It's gone" she said, kinda to herself and kinda to me. I thought she was joking for a second.

So next up I get scheduled for surgery.
It's Sunday here, so that's not happening till at least tomorrow. It's likely going to be a bit slower process as well cuz I'll prob have to have an MRI first, then schedule the surgery la la la.

But the sooner I get into the pipeline the better.
"Normal" recovery is something like six weeks. I'm a tad skeptical since I took the damn thing completely off. We'll see.

Oh, as some have been asking... yes, this is covered by the government insurance program.

Jim

Jetlag

It's 4am and I actually feel like I've slept in?
Hahaha, jetlag can be so much... fun?

Ah, so good to be back though :)
I'm staying at Abi's so there's no stuff to move since he was holding on to what little gear I had over here. Sorry, no great "moving" stories.

I thought all this "white dirt" would take a bit of getting used to, but man.. what growing up in the stuff does to you eh? What do they say... "like riding a bike". Oh how nice it is that it's up there in the mountains but not down here! Living in slush I think was my most hated aspect of winter. And true to form, so far it's in the 40s. Very tolerable.

Flying over the skifield yesterday made me a bit itchy to get out the skis :) Hahaha, much fun having a season pass for work. Oh darn, will have to use that.

The truck's batteries were a bit dead. A little inspection though revealed low water levels. So that's #1 on the list today. Gotta have wheels ;)

It was a bit sad, as it always is, leaving everyone back in the States. But man oh man, it is good to be back. Even with the cold. I'm back in my "happy place".

Jim

Guess I'll get a new post up here.
Crazy fun summer. Almost over :(
Less than a week to go.

Then it's off to Utah, Colorado, Maryland and finally Virginia. We'll see how it all goes.

Till then, still more fun to be had ;)
Jim

Some flights are just too cool. I flew a young girl the other day... 9ish? She was a little nervous... kids are either apprehensive or no-fear. No worries... I've flown lots of kids before... you gear down and do things a bit differently and it's all good. If we were doctors, you'd call it "bedside manner". We had a nice flight and she had a good time. She went off to say hi to daddy while I broke down the glider. Back in the van driving back to town, I got to chat with the dad. Let me tell ya... having dad thank you for doing such a good job with his little girl... that she had a wonderful time... (he entrusted you with his kid and you came up aces).. well, sometimes I get to feel like a superhero.

A fun coincidence

Today the weather cut work short. Big ole Westerly started blowing hard around noon and shut us down. Well, I've been meaning to figure out some technical stuff about my wii and songs I download for Rock Band on it.

So I start with "More Human than Human" by White Zombie. It's a good rockin song that I wanted to practice anyway. Later on, I'm surfing the news and there's this list of the top 15 dystopian movies. It's a good list and I now have a few more movies to watch ;) Naturally, the #1 movie is Blade Runner. Well, there's a Wikipedia link which leads me to the "Immortal Game" (famous Chess match)... oh, and "More Human than Human". The song's title and some lyrics are from Blade Runner.

I had fun showing my flatmate Hector the chess scene (he's a big chess fan) and just seeing all the stuff Zombie had referenced (More Human than Human is the slogan of the company that makes the androids in the movie).

Jim

You've got great veins!

It's an odd compliment, but I'll take it.

I get that every time I go to get stabbed. This one was for my yearly MRI that I get to keep my Pilot Medical current. I have a "stent" in my neck which is a little piece of tubing that keeps one of my arteries open. They like to keep an eye on it.

To see what they need to see, they inject me with some dye... so they can see the blood flowing (through the stent).

I like that I always get the "you've got great veins" bit cuz I carries the unspoken implication that it's not going to hurt :)

Which it doesn't

!

Nope, it wasn't the adjustment... the clutch is buggered.

Fortunately there was a mechanic shop on the way to my appointment this morning, so I just stopped in there. He gave it a quick fix adjustment (it's simple to do) but said it would need replacing.

Not to worry as Haagen had told me of a Subaru wrecker in town. For the unfamiliar, think of a wrecker as a dedicated junkyard with a mechanic. I'll try and remember to get pics when I pick the car up.

So when I got there, it was like driving into a Subaru graveyard... loads of every kind of Subaru in every kind of condition (except new!). Perfect. While the cars at the wreckers, I'll be hanging out in Dunedin (it's done on Monday... it's Friday now).

A mild panic

Holy crap do I love the internet.

I drove down to Dunedin today. Just as I got there, my clutch got all funny on me. *OH NOES!*

The way it was before, it would engage about half way through it's travel. This took me a bit to get used to, but I did. I'm used to clutches grabbing very quickly.

Everything was normal till I stopped a few K's out to check my map. After that there was a big change in where the clutch grabbed. Now it was nearly immediate. First gear got pretty hard to get to as well. Oh crap... did the clutch just die?

Off to the internet to see if I could find out some info.
Most of it didn't sound like a burnt clutch, although some stuff did say that having difficulty getting into gear was one sign.

A bit more digging and I found out that clutches have an auto-adjustment if you pull the clutch pedal towards the seat... which I've done. I may have done this as well when I stopped to check the map.

The guy that wrote it said that he didn't like the auto-adjusters cuz they set the clutch annoyingly close to the floor... sound familiar?

There's a way to check for sure (stall it in 2nd like you're learning to drive stick). That'll have to wait for tomorrow.

Jim

It can be a bit of a struggle at times ;)

A new perspective

I'll have to dig out some pics... I shot a few on the way, I'm just feeling lazy at the moment.

So I took a bus down to Dunedin (town, 4 hours away) to visit some friends. The bus was pretty empty, and well, I don't have to drive, so I took a snooze in the back (long seat). I woke up in a town called Roxboro. We were stopping to gas up.

Here's where it gets neat.
Roxboro sounded very familiar, but I was sure I'd never been their before. Then it dawns on me... it was a waypoint on one of my cross country flights for my pilot license. Ok, big woop right? Well yeah, but then I noticed a huge contrast.

See, before, driving down to Dunedin (I've gone a bunch of times) was like heading out into the great unknown. Sorta like driving in the desert in a way, though much more beautiful. You sorta have this detached, out in the middle of nowhere feeling cuz you're in unfamiliar land. You know the road is going to end... eventually... somewhere.

Well that was gone.
In a big way.
I'd flown over where I was and where I was going. I had a really good picture in my head of the whole shooting match. I was no longer adrift on an ocean of strange, I was plodding around in my back yard.

Kinda neat.

Back in Black :)

Ah, back in Queenstown :)
I'm going to post up some of the stuff I've been using facebook for lately.
It dawns on me that I can't find it quickly later if it's there and there's just some stuff I want up that doesn't fit in facebook well.

Like my new home :)
Google Street View

Woo Hoo
This year was super easy.
A friend of mine, Jose, contacted me on facebook cuz he heard I'd be looking for a place and he needed flatmates for the summer. He's located in the perfect part of town in a very nice place. Bingo.

So this year, I just landed at the airport... Jose picked me up and we drove into town (how cool is that!... usually, I'm struggling to get to town), I drop my stuff off and catch up with Ian who's heading up the hill for a fly... OK. We have amazing flights, it's an uncommonly good day to fly, and then head over to the climbing wall to drop in on Nial and Shane on our way to the hot tubs at Aqualand.

What a nice way to come home :)
Jim

Oh yeah, I have a blog

Oh right, I have a blog.
As you can tell, I don't update it much in the summer. Not much really "newsworthy" happens around here. Life at the airport is pretty mellow. That's one of it's draws.

But now were getting into Fall, which means that it's getting close to time to go. It's odd, I used to hate the Fall. Fall meant Winter. And Winter in Buffalo isn't a happy thing... I'm not a fan of the cold. But now that Fall means Spring... well that's just a whole other ballgame :)

Still, it's that sad happy again.
I'm leaving my friends again... the party of Summer is over.
But I'm also returning to my friends as well.

It's an odd life I lead.
Jim

sushi

We don't get out much.
We all live at the airport and typically stay here most of the time.
However, every now and then... we go out for sushi.

It's one thing we all like and just can't get here.

Normally we go to Dover. It's 40 minutes away. Zach's been bugging us to go to this new place he found up in Northern Delaware. So we did.

It's just about as far to get to the new place... maybe 10 minutes longer. But the sushi's way better. The old place was good.. but the new place is unreal.

Now the odd thing about the place to the North is how you get there. Mind you, I rarely leave the airport and it's almost unheard of that I go North. This is important in that I used to come down from the North. The road up to sushi is the exact same route I would take every weekend... for three and one half hours... well, the last hour of that trip anyway.

This is the road where I spent a lot of time contemplating a very radical change in my life. It was also the path between the 9-5 "normal" world and the world of hang gliding. Alice's rabbit hole if you will.

People like to listen to the music of their youth because it "takes them back". There's a lot of emotional baggage wrapped up in that. Well I was having a lot of similar flashbacks. You not only get to remember things you've forgotten, you remember how things felt... how the world looked at the time. It's a bit freaky.

So, getting to relive those days in a way, the question naturally surfaces... if I knew then what I know now... would I make the same decision?

You don't often get to answer that one... not really. Maybe intellectually you can make a bit of a guess. Now I had a bit more insight.

As I often phrased the question... "Red pill or Blue?"
Yeah... still most definitely Red.

Driving home felt great... content. The further I got to my life and away from my past, the better I felt. Not that I didn't enjoy the past, but I had this very weird understanding that I'm walking the right path.

I love my life, my friends, the places I've been, the things I've seen.
I am a very happy person.

Resistence is futile

GoPro mount

Yup, that about sums it up...

Cowboy-Land!

Hahaha... I think that's my new name for the States!
Part of it I'm sure is flying into Phoenix, but I was thinking that even in LA. After living in proper English-Britto-Land for six months... damn if everyone doesn't sound like they're from Texas! I'm sure it'll wear off after a few days.

And man it's nice returning to a country that ISN'T run by BUSH!!!! I distinctly remember arriving before and getting instantly inundated with big American flags, cops wearing all black and assault rifles (I'm not kidding) and huge portraits of Bush... felt like China. Now, there's modest pics of Obama over in official places. Security still has an air of "What are you doing Mr. Criminal?" to it, but whatever. Far less totalitarian than it's been in years past.

Immigration was as it's always been... nice an pleasant. Hahaha, had a chuckle with some Canadians about that over Summer... seems that the US/Canada border nuts over at Niagara Falls are indeed kinda jerks... it's not just me. Growing up there seems to spoil your view of immigration.

Not sure if traveling's just getting easier or if it's the lack of layovers this time (I think both), but I can't believe how easy it was getting to Phoenix. One little hop to BWI and I'm home. Crazy.

Hahahaha... and yes, already missing New Zealand.
Jim

The hard bit

Awe crap. It's leaving time again. :(
I always hate this bit.

I have to say goodbye to so many wonderful people. I'm always torn with thoughts of things I didn't get to. I would have loved so much to teach Julianne hang gliding... to take Royden for a tandem... to finish Zdenick's PG training... to... well, you get the idea. "C'mon MA... just one more D-bag?!"

It's been such a bloody fun Summer. Living in the middle of Queenstown, playing Rock Band with my flatmates... flying with Sean and Nail all the time... working on occasion... practically living at the airport. Life just doesn't get better.

But Winter comes, and thus I go.
I've even been living on borrowed time as well... I delayed my departure and I'm so very happy I did. I needed a little extra time to finish my Private Pilot License (PPL) and it's actually worked out extremely well. Instead of returning with a Restricted PPL, I've got a full PPL, Cessna type rating, Technam type rating, and (my favorite) a Citabria type rating :)

Of course it's always a mixed bag of emotions.
As much as I truly hate leaving, I get to go home now and see all my friends back there.

I'll just miss this place.
Jim

One last hura

Well, it looks like the weather's lined up for one last nice stretch (while I'm here anyway). Should be nice and sunny for the next few days... and oh darn, I've nothing to do but fly :)

It'll likely fall to pieces right around the time I'm due to leave, which will help with the leaving bit ;)

Done

It's been a long haul... but now it's over.
Did my last cross country flight today (in regular planes). So now I get a full unrestricted Private Pilot License.

Ahhhhhhhh.

No more flying bloody Cessnas!
Well, that's a bit optimistic. I'm sure I'll have to drive one around for a flight test or something sometime.

Now I can get back to flying dragonflys :)

Mellow days

It's nice to be back to semi-mellow days again :)
Almost done with flying regular planes over at the airport... that schedule's toned way down already.

So, went up and D-bagged my glider... then we packed up Naill's speedglider for D-bag as well. We've not d-bagged one of those wee things, and hell, I don't think anyone in New Zealand's done it for that matter. So why not? We figured they'd be well suited to it. And it was. Went off without a hitch. Good fun.

One more cross country flight in regular planes tomorrow. Then that's all done.

Ferg at the beach

Life's finally slowed down enough for me to post again.
April's been an other month of cramin-slamin-it with my private pilot license stuff.

I passed my flight test (yeay) and moved onto "Cross Country Flying". Basically, you get a license, but can't go more than 25nm till you finish the cross country stuff... then you can do as you please. Well, that all sounds simple enough (and it is), it just takes a LOT of time. I've been living at the airport for the last week or so. I spend nearly as much time there as the staff.

But, todays a break :)
No instructors are available today, so I can't fly (my next flight is dual). Nice weather today, so I'm going HG/PG.

Last night, I took a stroll down into town, swung by Ferg-Burger, picked up a "CockAdoodleOink" (chicken/bacon/burger) and had a Ferg at the beach :)

Happy Times
Jim

Slow down there sonny

The world's finally slowed down a bit :)
It came in the odd form of my plane breaking. It just blew a "mag"... ignition system stuff of which it has two, so everything kept humming along. It just meant that I couldn't take my flight test this week. I was cramming hard to get it done. This just means that I have an extra week or so to get ready. Less stress.

Oh the pic is from our recent helli-mission up the Remarkable mountains. We (36 of us) flew up one in a helicopter (couple trips) for a flight. The takeoff is over twice as high as the highest "normal" takeoff spot in Queenstown.

Good fun.
Jim

"Fly down"

Massive flydown over Queenstown for Gera last evening. I think nearly every pilot in Queenstown (and we've got a LOT of pilots) flew. Hopefully someone will post some pics (there were plenty)... Takeoff was absolutely packed with gliders. And as someone launched, more filled in the gaps.
We even got special permission from the powers that be to fly hang gliders. So we did.

Gera

It's hard, but it comes and it goes. There are loads of good friends here to lean on. I also knew Gera well enough to know that he'd be very upset if we stopped. He didn't sulk and he wouldn't want us to. He'd want us to go fly.

Passed!

Woo Hoo!
I passed my Navigation test!

Thank god... I absolutely did not want to go through that again!
Jim

Back at it

Ok, so the tests are done... hrm... what to do with all this newfound free time?
Yeah. Of course.

Jim

My head hurts

Took the Navigation test this morning.
Hardest bloody test I've ever taken. I should know pretty soon (paid extra for fast grading) whether I failed it or not. At the end, I honestly wasn't sure if I was going finish.... and it's only 20 questions!

Here's hoping I never have to do that again.
Jim

Deep in the books

One test left (assuming I haven't failed any of the others) and it's the kicker... Navigation. We don't do any "navigation" in dragonflys, so it's the topic I am least familiar with. I've done some before for my Sport Pilot license, but that's it.

So I'm buried deep under a pile of books at the moment... with my trusty circular slide ruler in hand (not kidding). It's hell, but I'm getting there. As luck would have it, the weather's absolute crap which really helps because it means that I've got NOTHING ELSE TO DO!

A bunch of my friends from the States are visiting, which should be fun since the weather is meant to clear later this week and I'll be done with my tests.

Jim

It pays to follow up...

Oh the difference a phone call can make.

For my Pilot License, I have to get a criminal background check. Being in New Zealand, I needed one from both NZ and the FBI. Thanks to Robert's help, the FBI one went super easily.

The New Zealand one for some reason was taking a bit longer. Oh yeah... trying to have it processed on the 26th of December *might* have something to do with it ;)

So after a month (usual waiting period), I gave a call to the Ministry of Justice, and as expected, they were a bit behind due to the holiday (they were closed for a week, tends to back things up)... they were just getting to Dec 24th records. Fair enough.

Well, it being late Feb now... and still no word. I figured it might be a good time to call back. I got a very nice lady on the phone and explained what I was doing and that I'd submitted back during the holiday. Since it'd been a while, instead of getting the "these things take time" speech, she had a dig on the computer and... yup... they'd processed my application on Feb 10th and it was being mailed to my address in the States.... wait... what?!

Hahahaha, so she just posted an other one to me here.
Whew.

Jim

Slacker

We'll I've been a bit of a slacker lately eh?
Last post was... ages ago.
I've been hip deep in two things... one good excuse, the other not so good. Good excuse: studying for my private pilot license. No so good excuse: Guitar Hero 2.

Well, the studying's hopefully almost over. I have my last test Tuesday... there's six total. Last of course assuming I haven't failed any! They take a week and a half to grade. Failing's easier than you might imagine as there are only 20-30 questions. So every wrong answer hurts a lot.

Aside from that... Guitar Hero 2's here!
Thanks to Zach and Sunny who mailed it out to me!

As expected, it kicks much ass. Me and some of the other flatmates are completely addicted, so much time is lost to it. It's been crap weather lately as well, so that helps.

The weather's turned nice though and looks to be nice for the rest of the week. Should be plenty oh fun. Actually had a busy day at work yesterday! A rarity this year (which is ok cuz I have to study so damn much). I should also get to D-bag my paraglider again now as well. Youtube it if you're curious and have a strong stomach... it's pretty radical stuff. It's hard to describe.

Jim

The Fabulous

Well, I promised pics of the fabulous accommodations here.
So here ya go :)

Yup, it's always full of dishes.
We do dishes constantly, but there's 13-15 of us. So it's never done.


A surprising lack of beer bottles.


Home sweet closet.

Happiness

In case you're curious, this is what happiness looks like.
It's my Class 2 medical. Without it, I can't fly.

Brick walls are there for a reason: they let us prove how badly we want things. -
Dr Randy Pausch
That little card took three years, thousands of dollars, eight months of medical testing and more patience than I dreamed I'd ever have. And it's worth every last bit of it. And no, I'm not crying.

Caught in the act

In our never ending quest for weather information, me and Sean found some ski webcams up on Coronet mountain... and... woops, they're still on :)

Well, hell. Let's throw a windsock in front of it.
So I looked up how to make a simple windsock on the net, made a few and hiked up the ski field. On my way up, Shane (an other PG pilot), gave me some idea of where one of the other cameras would be. As luck would have it... he was right.

Funny thing... when I got home to check if I had gotten the camera right... yup.

Weather came right

It's been crap weather for the last week or so... but it came right Saturday. So it's been fun packed days of flying ever since. :)


In the midst of all the fun, I got to solo over at the Wakatipu Aero Club (where I'm working on my Private Pilot License).


Me and the "Technam" (the plane I'm flying)

Ya kinda have to...

As if you didn't know... I'm insane.

I'm also terrified of heights. Seriously. I have trouble climbing ladders. So the mere thought of bungi jumping scares the bejeezus out of me. But, I'm in NZ.. and you kinda have to. Well, you don't, but for me... I'd always wanted to be able to, but couldn't bring myself to do it.

BTW, that's not a bungi. That's a canyon swing. See the bungi guys got bored, so they started playing with rope climbing gear. It's the same, except instead of bouncing, you swing at the bottom. It's bungi on steroids.

That's 4 ton rope with an other 4 ton backup rope.
Can't say I'll be doing it again anytime soon... but wow.
Jim

Wii Sports!

On my way over here, I lost my Wii Sports game.
This was a very sad thing indeed.
Wii Sports is one of the most fun games for the Wii.

Since everything's PAL over here, not NTSC, I can't buy games over here. So, I ordered one from the US and had it mailed here. It came today :)

So today is Wii Sports Day!
It helps that we've got tons of wind, so we can't fly.
Game on!

Medical

As many of you have already heard... I got my Flight Medical approved today :)
To fly as a Private Pilot, you have to have a Flight Medical... so this now means I'll be able to fly without my instructor as I practice for my Private License test.

Happy Times :)

Favella

The Fabulous.
It's the white one on the left. The tin roof one below is also part of the Favella. I'm upstairs in the white house though.

I'll get some interior shots later so you can see what a dump it is ;)

New Years Sushi!

For new years, my flatmate Yushimi made Sushi!!!


MMMMMMMMMM DAMN it was good!


Down at the rugby field, there were a bunch of people camping.
Every year, there's free camping in the rugby. Helps cut down on drink driving.

NOOOOO!

I nearly booked a ticket to Fiji!
It was sometime around Christmas. Not on, but close.


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!


Looks nice from the valley though.

HG School

Seems to be a bunch of people this year that are keen to learn hang gliding.
Kelly's got her own glider which makes things super easy (rounding up the gear is generally the tricky bit).







My mate Sean dug up this other beauty for those lacking a glider (himself included). I know... she's a real flash machine :) She's an old beast of a glider, but we're lucky to have her and it'll be perfect for training. I started on a very similar glider myself.

The Fabulous

I've moved into town.
I now live at the base of the gondola in "The Fabulous"

Ha... I thought it was Portuguese... La Favela.
It means "Shanty Town". We just call it the ghetto. Someone tried to spice it up (and couldn't pronounce the Portuguese) and it became "The Fabulous"

It's a dive. Think frat house and you've got the idea. The shower water handle is a pair of vice grips clamped onto the bit that spins. It's good fun. Lots of people. No stress... and no sleep. Well, on the weekends at least. No one takes anything too seriously, especially since people aren't always around all that long. Some stay weeks, some stay months.

Who knows. It's fun for now.

Craziness

So things have been a bit crazy lately.
The weather came right, so work's been full-on. I've started flying at the Wakatipu Aero Club (regular planes). Loads of after work fun with the guys at the flight park. And oh yeah, I've moved. Chaos is my middle name.

I just got the internet sorted. I'll work on getting some pics of the happenings up. Gotta let things settle down first.

Jim

Rain

Well, payment for the perfect day I guess.

The other day was absolutely smashing. Flew a few tandems in the morning. Got to fly my PG in some sweet mid-day wonderful air (wicked good day) and then some more tandems in the evening while everyone else had to sit through a "seminar" (poor buggers). To top it off, went over and flew the gondola with our driver... landed and Richard wanted to D-bag, but couldn't find a tandem pilot to drop him. Ok. Sure. :) Bopped down to the local pub afterwards where everyone was recovering from the seminar. Headed home a bit later and zonked out. Oh, mid 70s and sunny. Doesn't get better.

So, today's fine. It's been raining all day. It'll still be raining a bit in the morning, but should clear later. That's a lovely thing about Queenstown... it rains, then it's over.

Long Days

The days are almost too long here. I know, crazy?
Yeah, it's 9:30pm and it's still light out. It will be till around 10. It'll be light around 6:30am. Hahaha, I've started sleeping with one of those eye cover thingys.

I'm not complaining. I like it this way. It's just weird.

Unsettled

The weather for the last two days has been less than perfect.
We even had thunderstorms the other day... very rare here. I've seen them once before.

Anyway, things cleared a bit, so I headed outside and figured I'd get to those bridge pictures I'd promised...


Here's the bridge from below.


From the side obviously.


Ok, now the fun stuff.
This is what it looks like on top... notice my hand... on the rail.
It's a big railing, you're not going anywhere, but yeah... I have to hold the railing o take a picture.


This is what things looked like when a car went by.
I mean really... I fly for a living.
I should have no problem with this. But yeah, it took a bit for me to cross that bridge. I stopped anytime a car went by. I didn't deathgrip the rail or anything, but I stopped... I could have kept going, but it just felt better to stop.

The irony is not lost on me.

Hike

Decided to have a hike out back the other day. Up past my neighbor's house. There's a trail that starts just up there.


Here's the view.
I know, just horrible.


Here's a bit further.
I don't know how I put up with it.


You can see the shotover bridge pretty well from here.
I'll get some more pics of that later... it's right outside my flat. Seriously.
It's called the "shotover" bridge cuz it crosses the "shotover" river.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shotover_River
Ok, but what's in a name?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shotover

You might know it from... dum de dum... yeah, Lord of the Rings... like everything else around here ;)

Tea?

The Kiwi's take their tea pretty seriously... One of our pilots, Swanny, likes to have a cup of tea before he takes his tandems for a flight. So on takeoff, there is a permanent propane fired tea kettle with tea, sugar and water. That's dedication.

Aaaah... Queenstown

Yeah, it's like that.

Aqualand!

Couple bad weather days here lately. Ah well, that's Spring for ya.
No worries. We all headed down to Alpine Aqualand by the airport. New Zealand's idea of a public pool... well... kicks ass!

Lets see... there's a lap pool of course. Big deal. Then there's the waterslides, the funpool... complete with water cannons! No kidding. And not like just water jets... these are full on aim at your friends swiveling turret water cannons!... the "lazy river" where you get swept along by the current round and round a winding path... and my personal favorite, the gigantic hot tub :) (like 20 people gigantic)

Well worth the $8 admission price ($4.30US)

Glorious Internet :)

Ahhhhhhhhhh
Oh that's much better.
Got the internet sorted out today. Happy times. Now we have net at home. See, I'm living just outside Queenstown at the moment and my car is in the shop. It takes me an hour to walk to town... it's less if I hitchhike, but that's not exactly reliable. Besides, I don't like being separated from my gear (paraglider) since you never know when the opportunity to fly will arise.

Anyway, it's all better now. And just in time... the weather's meant to go back to crap for a bunch of days. I can only watch so many movies before my head explodes. I find the internet sooooo much more entertaining.

Now if I could only get my car back! Hahahahaha. Priorities. I'll take the net first thank you.

So today was lovely.
It's been pretty crap lately, but that turned around today. Sunny, warm, good flying and flying all day. Yum. Then went down to the local pub where all the pilots hang out after the day's flying is done and hahahaha... there's some guys basejumping off tandem paragliders over town and landing on the beach. Would you believe that's not an uncommon occurrence here? I love this town. :)

Net

Sorting out the net at the moment.
Hopefully have that up soon. Living without internet is... uh... well it sucks. At least we've got plenty of access in town. My car's out for inspection at the moment, so that leaves me to maybe a daily hit... but it should all clear up soon. Oh well.. guess I just go fly ;)

Cheers
Jim

Auckland

Just got into Auckland.
Couple hours till my flight to Queenstown, so I figured I'd surf a bit.
Easiest Pacific flight yet... slept almost the whole flight :)
Did get one movie in "Tropic Thunder". HA HA HA funny stuff.

A mate of mine, Tom, hooked me (and him) up with a sweet flat so that's sorted. Arno's been looking after my car for the winter. Gera's picking me up at the airport. And I got my work visa done before I left the States, so hell... let's just play! Too easy.

Tick tock... hour and 1/2
Jim