TGIF

I don't mean to focus on the weather again, but man is it cold here.  The minute I stepped out the door this morning my nose hair thermometer instantly indicated it was a LOT below zero and combined with the wind (15 knots) it was really uncomfortable.   The first stage is a cold face and then about 45 seconds later you have a cold, numb and stinging face.  It was kind of funny walking back from class this morning there was a car parked out in front or the building.  It's bumper was loaded with icicles and the licence plate numbers were hidden from frost except for the tagline "Friendly Manitoba" part.  If I were Premier of this province the licence plates would say "Frigid Manitoba".

I'm really glad it's Friday!  It was a very hectic week with a lot of information being thrown at us.  One guy likened it to "Drinking from a fire hose".  We had our first test this morning on Aircraft Operating Instructions.  It was nice getting the first one out of the way and shedding the first test jitters! 

 It amazes me the minute details about the airplane we are expected to know, right down literally to the particle level.  The Grobe is made up of carbon fibre fabric all fiber glass together.  This gives the shell steel like strength qualities at half the weight.  To make one Grob requires 400 sq. yards, enough carbon fibre to wrap the entire building that I am attending class in and 1.5 million dollars.   Of course that was not testable material, but something I found interesting.    

The calibre of instruction here really is second to none.  We have one instructor who gracefully dances for us with his arms out as if he were an airplane, to explain and clarify teaching points.  He's known as Dr Feaver because his last name is Feaver and his Dad really is a doctor.  This guy is like an airplane doctor though.  He looks like a cross between Fred Flinstone and JohnF Kennedy and talks similarly to Margie in Fargo.  He's a local and a real character.  He talks about pistons like they are people, describes oil filters like livers, and throttle mixture controls as if they are human lungs.  He's full of funny stories and expressions like if you don't do this or that correctly in an airplane you could find yourself "running out of "airspeed, altitude and ideas all at the same time".  He is obsessed with flying and builds both real and model airplanes in his garage then sells the plans which creates himself.  He was a mechanic for 16 years and is brilliant at teaching all the aircraft systems.

In education there are all sorts of flowery sayings.  One of them is "Education is not the filling of a bucket, but rather the lighting of a fire".  I'm no poet, but I'm guessing that fire is like lighting a passion for learning in students.  Here, the fire is constantly being held under our butts.  I never thought I could push my own information intake levels this high, or see other people push themselves to learn this much in a short period of time.  There is a constant fear of falling behind and that fear allows people to miraculously force more into the brain even if it's 12 o'clock at night.  The school here really is like a pilot factory.  People wake up, study, eat, go to class, eat, study some more, go to sleep, then repeat it the next day.  The level of focus is incredible. 

I am going to stop here for today.  I'm hoping to get some pictures up soon.  Tonight we will be initiated by the class who came through before us.  We were told not to worry and that we "wouldn't be made to eat sh#t or anything".  It's a tradition in the Airforce to do it though and I'm not 100% sure what it will involve.  As I was walking past the student lounge today though I could smell beer and saw our initiators setting up an old aircraft ejection seat with tacky leopard apolstery on it and a stuffed tiger head above it.  Your guess is a good as mine, but the smell of beer, I suspect, was an hors d'oeuvre of what's to come.  Thanks for reading.