Stream of Consciousness

(2)

How much Whiskey is too much whiskey for me? More than one pint.

No notes tonight. This leaves me free to enlarge on last week. I am sooo happy that I have no appointments with God this week! Talking to God is... boring at best. We have so little in common.

The real tail number of the Citabria was 8331V. I got the 'V' right, but mixed the number up with that of a Super Cub, 43o4Z. I did a lot of flying in Citabrias, Super Cubs, and expecially Cherokee 140s. I worked at Columbine Airport as a flight instructor (tap) for a while in about 1970 or thereabouts. As I was recovering from my hangover it hit me that I had screwed up the tail number of the Citabria and I began remembering some of the tail numbers of the airplanes I had flown at Columbine: 4242J, 4247J (our instrument trainer), 9666W (we called that airplane, nine-tripple-six Riskey for some reason although it was as safe as any other Cherokee 140), and last of all, 8440Y, our Twin Commanche. 40Y was our 'multi-engine trainer.' I did a 'barrel roll' in 40Y one fine afternoon, but that is another story.

04Z crashed, killing both on board. I had trained the pilot. It was a sad day. Not long after receiving his Private licence he ran into some power lines along the line of ridges just west of Denver one afternoon. Apparently he ran into the steel cable which runs along the tops of power lines and acts as a lightening protector. He must have seen the power lines themselves, but missed the thin steel cable above them. He was a nice guy, a geologist, who had had extensive experience (in Alaska?) exploring for oil (I think) in Super Cubs. I have forgot his name. I felt extremely guilty about his death and the death of his passenger. In fact, this incident, along with my failing voice, caused me to give up flight instructing.