Posted 11:59 PM by Mark
Woohoo, I have Michael Giacchino's autograph now! I got my copy of the Secret Weapons Over Normandy soundtrack today. The autograph ended up coming on the cover of an extra liner notes that was in the package. Very cool. The music is great, as usual. I really want to get the game now...

Posted 4:43 PM by Eric
I just finished flying from Eau Claire to Minneapolis, I had a perfect approach but right before I flared a big gust of wind blew me over and I landed on the grass, oh well, doesn't look the greatest though. I should have listened to the weather report so I could correct for wind on my approach...

Posted 3:25 PM by Eric
lol, on the the local news they were talking about the 100th anniversry of flight, but they didn't show the right footage, they showed video tape of a different thing but not the wright flyer. I think it wasnt, It only had 1 wing, but maybe one of their test gliders only had 1 wing.

ha, another thing was some dude tryed to recreate the wrights flight at Chippewa Valley Regional Airportt. It was funny, he did it in a cessna so it looked messed, he just took off flew at 6 feet above the ground and then landed again, pretty lame. But good that he honored it none the less. It was all over local news, good way to become popular :D

Posted 12:30 AM by Mark
Yeah, it's pretty amazing to think about 100 years of flight. I wrote this in an email to a friend of mine:

When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.
— Leonardo da Vinci

Ahh, the centennial. Hard to believe, no? In the past 100 years, flight has gone from a dream to a dream come true to a science to a blue chip. A century after its realization, the dream has been lost from the public eye. The wonder of flight has become a transparent function that allows us to go from point A to point B faster. But the spirit of aviation lives on in the souls of people who don't board planes but strap them on; people who think of an airline as a fleet of wondrous machines, not a corporation; people who look at a machine born of man soaring through the sky and see not an airplane but a miracle. Those people are us. In 100 years time, another generation will look back on the second century of aviation and remember our names alongside those of the first - names like Wright, Lindbergh, and Armstrong. They will evaluate one half of the history of flight based on our actions. We must never forget the dream and what it means to us. And we must see to it that coming generations know what the dream can mean to them, for they are our future, and to whom we are obligated to inspire.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure that cowl flaps are flaps right over the engine that open up and allow air to run though, cooling the engine down if it's overheated. I'm not sure exactly when they're supposed to be used - if you look at the checklists on the kneeboard for the MS planes, I bet it would tell you when - probably like for certain types of climbs or something. I'm really not sure, Cessna 152s are pretty uncomplicated and don't have stuff like cowl flaps, so I get kinda confused when it comes to airplane engines and mechanics and stuff like that.

Btw, check this out:

http://www.flightsim.com/cgi/kds?$=main/howto/modu/part1.htm

That would be so awesome to have...I might ask for a yoke and pedals for Christmas, but they're pretty expensive, like $250 total. But if I had them, I could practice all of my flying stuff in FS.

Anyway, I've gotta get to bed.

Posted 9:45 PM by Eric
I was flying from JFK intl (New York) to Logan (Boston) but then I had to stop to do math :(

Anyways I was playing around with all the switches in my Cessna skylane (I dunno model # but its the one thats gear cant retract). There is a little thing that is in the center bottom part of the panel and it says "Cowl Flaps". Do you know what those are? If you do when are they supposed to be used?

Posted 4:07 PM by Eric
That is weird, one day I was thinking about that but I assumed you got to choose the ads...

I got an itch for FS today so I'm installing 2002 right now. I had to do a little (800Mbs worth :D) to fit it on my drive. I probably got like 50mbs left now :D Pretty amazing 100 years ago was when the wrights were in kitty hawk...

Posted 3:12 PM by Mark
Woah, I think it's kinda weird how Tripod has put ads for SOCOM2 and SOCOM and Walmart across the top of our blog...

Posted 3:26 PM by Eric
10 Force Feedbacks would cost the school a little under $1000 dollars, you got a nice teacher :D

Posted 10:06 PM by Mark
At school our computer teacher somehow convinced the school to buy us 10 force feedback joysticks for playing Aces High. Our computer teacher is pretty lazy and almost never teaches anything, but his classes are the best because most of the time all we do is play Age of Empires II or Aces High on LAN battles with him. It's really funny. Anyway, I've only tried the joysticks once, and it was pretty cool - it would shake when you were close to stalling and stuff, but I'm not really sure if it'd be worth it if you already have a non-ff joystick. If like your old one broke or you needed to buy a whole new one, then I would probably go for a ff joystick, but not if you already have a stick when you can buy 2 PS2 games for that much money. FF sticks are best for military flight sims anyway, so you wouldn't be missing out on a whole lot, I don't think. But then again, I don't know since I've only tried that ff stick at school once...maybe if I used it more I would like it more, but I don't know for sure...

Posted 5:10 PM by Eric
Can't wait until christmas, FS2004 will be awesome :D

Have you ever tried one of the joysticks with force feedback? I'm wondering if it would be pretty cool for FS. I'm not sure if it's worth 90 dolllars, because I could buy 2 games with that and alot of good games are coming out Q1 2004.

Posted 8:15 PM by Mark
That's awesome about running FS9 on your dad's computer! It should look great on it.

Posted 5:51 PM by Eric
My dad said that I can install FS2004 on his computer. Thats pretty cool cause I don't think mine has the space for it.

I think his is 2.4ghz, 128mb RAM (he's gonna put the old RAM from our computer that died into it), and its got a 32mb video card. I think that will work ok, the video card still isnt great, but I can run graphics lower if I need to.

I didn't make the DC-3 beta for OFP :( Oh well it should be out soon... check it out here scroll down a bit and there are shots of it.

I think we are going to superior for christmas, I can't see why we wouldn't.

Posted 4:23 PM by Mark
I saw the Logitech headset today at Target yesterday for $30, and I saw Socom 1 with the headset for $30! I almost got it, but I decided to hold off on it. I still don't know how I could get my PS2 online...

Anyway, the specs for FS9 according to the box are:
Windows 2000/XP - 128MB RAM
Windows 98/ME - 64 MB RAM
450 mhz
1.8 GB hard drive space
8 MB/3D video card
Direct X 9.0 or later

With a lot of the graphics options turned down, it runs real well on my mom's laptop, which is like 1ghz with a 64 MB video card, I think, I'm not sure. You have to turn the graphics down to almost the minimum to run it on our desktop, which is 600 mhz with a 64 MB video card and 128 MB RAM, but it will still run, if you don't turn on many clouds. But mainly what makes FS9 really cool is the new weather, so you'd really miss out on a lot of what makes FS9 better than 2002. I would guess that you'd probably be able to run it, but just barely, and it would take up a lot of hard drive space. But if you get a new computer sometime soon, it'd be great to have, so it still might be worth asking for Christmas. Btw, are you guys coming up to Superior for Christmas again?