Last Flight of 2010

Today I was off of work to enjoy part of the New Years holiday so I spent a good portion of the day in the hangar.  My normal hangar flying buddies were not there today to distract me so I actually had a productive day working in the hangar.  Not that I think catching up on the airport stories is a waste of time... it just is a different type of aviation therapy to actually WORK in the hangar!

I unloaded some of the Christmas gifts out of the truck and spent a few minutes unpacking them.  One gift was a light weight drill from my parents.  My old drill had bit the dust a couple months back and I had resorted to the manual screw driver.  (Gasp!  Manual?!)  The big heavy drills for working around the house just aren't that good for working on the airplane.  With the battery charged I tried it out.  Works... and is not too heavy or too much power.

The next gift to be unpacked was a small six inch buffer from my father-in-law.  The Cyclo buffer/polisher is my polishing work horse but it can be heavy when trying to hit those vertical surfaces.  The new buffer can be palmed and is not heavy.  The rudder buffed out nicely with my normal procedure and using the new palm sized buffer!  A great gift and it will be useful for those higher vertical surfaces.

The weather was warm but windy with low clouds when I arrived mid-day.  As the day wore on I would peek out the hangar doors to do a weather check.  The clouds lifted and eventually cleared out.  So I wrapped up the polishing.  The windsock finally stopped its vigorous flapping so the classic Cessna was wheeled out for a flight.  It felt good to get up even if it was a short flight at sunset.  2010 wasn't a full year of flying but the Cessna helped get my feet off the ground for some much needed arial therapy.
Hope your 2010 was adventurous and may you have more Blue Skies in 2011.