There I was, eagerly awaiting Foreflight to finish downloading to my tablet.
20%... 50%... 80%... 100% !!!
Like a kid on (politically correct holy day of your choice), I started thumbing through the application looking at all the new features and that's when I saw the life changing feature that I had only ever seen before in Cloud Ahoy before they started charging money.
That's right, flight tracking!!! I had the same thought every other pilot had when they discovered this feature... "How soon can I fly a giant sky-wang over North Texas?"
First thing's first. Grab a buddy. Not that there is anything wrong with it but flying a 200 mile phallus in the bravo airspace alone is a little um.. Well it's sort of sad.
This is where my friend Alex comes in. I posted in one of the most respectable online forums seeking a right seat partner to help me test my GPS (Geosynchronous Penis Sketch) flight and Alex was all over it. Now in a massive stroke of luck Alex as it turns out, is a CFI. This in hindsight is key as it adds a lot more legitimacy to a flight such as this. Not only do 2 people agree this is a good flight but one is a professional.
In hindsight, if you and a buddy are going to make a flight like this, it is a really good idea to discuss all the details first. We just took off and headed west without any discussion or diagrams on sectionals.
So we are flying along straight out when this conversation takes place:
Alex: So um do you think we should start our turn yet?
Me: Ha! That's a good joke son.
Alex: Yeah, I was totally kidding. I mean if you did want to start your turn there, it would just be to save some fuel. I personally totally think we have a long way to go before we should make what I consider to be an anatomically correct turn.
Me: Oh yeah, I suspect we will be half way past the California border before we start the turn. I mean unless you have to be somewhere. If you do, we could go ahead and turn as long as we both agree that it is way premature to finish just now.
Alex: Oh of course, this is totally not to scale. We couldn't afford that much avgas and the engine would be at TBO before we got to that point.
Me: Ok, then what I hear you saying is you want to go ahead and make u-turn.
Alex: Not that I want to, its just less wear and tare on the plane.
We begin a turn south and start to head back the direction we came all the while joking that we were spending a couple hundred bucks to fly a giant sky crank and this is totally why the terrorists hate us.
Now another important thing to consider is agreeing upon what you each imagine this should be before the flight as 2 pilots may have completely different ideas in mind. We had departed KDTO and headed due west for just enough miles to get the point across but in no way a realistic distance. Then we made a circle around AFW and I headed back to DTO to land.
That's when Alex springs on me: "so are flying around DTO to make the other nut?"
Wait what??? I asked.
"This is a profile photo" I exclaimed.
Alex responded "No, this is totally a top down shot"
Alex: "I've got the flight controls"
Me: "NO! My airplane"
Alex: "This is insanity! its too short, the tip is the wrong shape, and now you are Lance Armstronging this work of art and it is all disfigured and weird."
Me: "Look, I know what I am doing, this is perfect except for the obvious inaccurate dimensions which as we agreed earlier is totally due to the cost of fuel and other factors unrelated to our actual perception of things in real life"
Alex: Oh yeah, I totally agree to that part.
Me: Let's just land and call it a day and next time we can rent a jet and do this the proper way.
That is pretty much how we left it. Alex has since gone off to fly commercial, working his way up to the big iron for the sole purpose of recreating a proper Skydong once he gets his hands on a plane properly equipped to achieve a realistic representation of a work of art not cut short totally due to conserving fuel, being short on time and no other factors at all.
In the meantime, This is the actual flight path (embarrassing as it is) we took that day.
Thanks Buddy! Hurry up and get us a proper aircraft. This is humiliating.
