Lightchaser’s Neighborhood

Woke up this morning to bright blue skies so I just had to make the most of it. I've been meaning to try and take some nice Autumnal shots so I walked up to Green Park to see what there was by way of subject matter.
Just a few of my favourites the rest are on Flickr

Autumn leaves in Green Park

Curious squirrel

The squirrel's are quite tame as they are used to being fed by the tourists. This little chap was looking to see if I had anything for him. I didn't but he and his Green Park buddies don't really look malnourished, far from it.

A tourist annoying one of the Green Park pelicans

Green Park has had pelican's since the reign of Charles II. I wonder whether visitors to the park back then were as annoying. I did get some non-tourist shots of the pelican after I pushed this man in (joke).

Quiet days. Mildly depressed as I always seem to be every November what with a long cold winter ahead of us. 

The canal at night

Folks,

It was a good flying day today: low winds, some puffy clouds but otherwise a lovely VMC (visual meteorological conditions) day for VFR flying.

Which meant that the airspace over Jandakot was busy. Coupled with the fact that there was an aviation tribute to the late Aussie aviatrix Nancy Bird-Walton at the Perth foreshore and there were plenty of vintage planes which flew in for that at 11am this morning, it did have an impact at Jandakot. Well, my lesson was at 1pm and by the time I was doing my second circuit, tower told us to do a full stop landing and hold short of Runway 30 while they sequenced a squadron of the oldies for landing. It was quite a sight to see 4-5 bright yellow Tiger Moths plus a few other classics coming in to land at almost standstill airspeed on final. Pity I couldn't grab some footage on my mobile as I was busy holding my position in the takeoff queue behind two other light aircraft.

The Good

Anyway, my pre-flights are getting faster and my taxiing has vastly improved. And being told to do left hand circuits on Runway 30 is actually great because it is a wider runway and the approach is less intimidating compared with Runway 24L. I joked with Min that I therefore had more room to weave since there was more room. She laughed, I did, too but deep down I have been cross with myself all week for not getting rid of this "yip".

So, a shorter flight log today folks.

Take-off roll outs were good. I managed to keep KMB on the centreline before pulling up at 65 knots.

In fact, I'm pleased with my progress up till about short final on the circuit. This is when KMB is about 150ft AGL (above ground level), engine power is down to about 1100-1200rpm and I'm probably 50m just shy of the runway piano keys. This is when the yips start.

The Bad

My final line-up is good but I am somehow just a tad too high or airspeed just that fraction too fast as I power down to idle rpm (about 750rpm on KMB) when I cross the runway threshold. So I go into quick correction mode: pitch down to lose the altitude.

The Ugly

But this means the airspeed picks up a notch. Then my eyes are fixated on the tarmac. Shit!!! Then I pull back on the yoke to flare, but now the attitude of the wings is starting to bank slightly right at 30ft AGL. So I work the left aileron to correct my attitude. All this while KMB is about to touchdown... my head's all in a mess as we have a somewhat heavy landing. Now I'm working the pedals furiously to keep KMB centred on the runway, retract the flaps, two trims forward of the wheel before whacking the throttle up to full power to take-off again on the second circuit.

The Plan

I know what has to be done. Min said I needed to fixate on the horizon more as I get towards short final instead of looking down. She's right. It's target fixation. This is what I learned riding motorcycles; you never fixate on traffic coming in the opposite direction or you'll invariably veer across. The same thing's happening here with me and landing the damn plane. I'm focusing too hard on the threshold and forgetting to prepare for what lies a couple of steps ahead. And this causes my workload to rush at me quickly (literally) and I'm not giving myself enough time to respond immediately on landing. This also explains why I'm having these annoying post-landing weaves on the landing roll-out and pre-takeoff. I reckon if I can improve my short final preps to gain an extra 3 seconds, the weaves will be a thing of the past.

I recall my struggles with Straight and Level Flying back in June, and the same feeling of frustration is too familiar. I know what I've got to do. Time and practice are what's needed; I can't fix this any other way. Flight Sim can get me some of the way there but it can't simulate the updraft turbulence that always happens on final approach. This is what causes the aircraft's attitude to get off the runway's centre, requiring more rudder/aileron/throttle coordination. And this is where time starts to condense and the cockpit workload builds. This is exactly the phase of my circuit session where I have to focus on.

I shared with Min that I was getting angry with myself for not getting rid of my yips, but she's cool with it. A quick Google around and I found that a lot of student pilots did anywhere between 8-25 hours of circuit training before being asked to solo. I checked my log and found that I've only done 3.6 hours of circuit training including today. Maybe I'm being unrealistic to expect miracles. Perhaps there's also a lesson here about safety in wanting to rush things along. Still, I'm just not built to accept something less than good when I know I can do this.

So, I've got a few more circuit sessions to go yet. I'm thinking maybe I should take a few days off work to go flying 3-4 days consecutively to really lock in my lessons. We shall see. 

Till the next instalment, clear prop!

Ninja 

Har Mar Superstar - Game Night Har Mar Superstar Tour Dates 11/08/09 Aquarium* Fargo, ND 11/09/09 Waiting Room* Omaha, NE 11/11/09 Brick Kansas City, MO 11/29/09 Oxford O2 Academy 3, UK 11/30/09 Relentless Garage London 12/01/09 Thekla Bristol, UK 12/02/09 Wedgewood Portsmouth, UK 12/03/09 Cabaret Voltaire Edinburgh 12/04/09 Bodega Nottingham, UK 12/05/09 Brickyard Carlisle, UK 12/06/09 King Tut’s Wah Wah Glasgow 12/07/09 Ruby Lounge Manchester, UK 12/08/09 Plug Sheffield, UK 12/09/09 Academy 2 Dublin, Ireland 12/10/09 Stiff Kitten Belfast, Ireland 12/12/09 Concorde 2 Brighton, UK 12/13/09 Barfly Cardiff, UK * with Bang Bang Eche Read More Har Mar Superstar http://weheartmus... Har Mar Mall - I mean Superstar - is back, after five years of absent since 2004's The Handler......

Parking in the college area known as "Dinkytown" in Minneapolis can be kind of hard, especially when the meters on 4^th Street runs until 10pm. I didn't mind walking a few blocks to the beautiful Varsity Theater as the weather was nothing less than perfect that Friday evening.

Opening up for Har Mar Superstar are three very different genre and acts. Starting with Koo Koo Kangeroo (official / myspace), whose music styling is that of hip hop - for toddlers. Their songs are dead simple, like "AOA" (sample lyrics: "aye oh aye oh aye") and "Cheh Cheh Chi" and "LMNOP", but they're catchy and easy to sing along. The highlight of their set was when they threw down a white tarp-like covering and the audience was dancing under it like a party fort.

Wow, Bang Bang Eche (myspace) are young. Someone told me that they're about 18 years old, but they certainly look much younger. Their music is very punk high-energy and reminds me a bit of Arctic Monkeys influenced. My easily favorite song from their set is "Fist Full of Dollars", perhaps a reference to Sergio Leone classic film? They ended their setlist with "Die Hippy Scum". Oh, also, it's worth noting that bassist T'Nealle sported a three keyboard cat moon t-shirt. Adorable.

The odd group on the bill was two-person group, Lookbook (myspace). The band is basically guitarist Grant Cutler, who plays guitars and handles the pre-recordings, with vocalist Maggie Morrison. Their music sounds like 80s pop, not exactly the "body-moving" type of music that you'd think Har Mar's audience would demand. Not really much to say, except I think Maggie looks really cute and I will be talking about them in further detail on my "book"-theme news on Sunday.

Har Mar Superstar ♥ Varsity Theater, Minneapolis (11/06/09)

Compared to the last time I saw Har Mar Superstar, which was basically a man and his undies and boombox - he now has a full band, all dressed in white with a red cross on the back. Also, the last time I saw him, he basically stripped down after the first few songs - this time, he started off very heavily dressed with an African cover, hat, etc.

After the first song, he took off his hat. After "DUI", he took off the overall to reveal a Prince "Purple Rain" shirt. He kept taking off articles of clothing as the night went on. From "EZ Pass", to "Girls Only", to "Creative Juices"... the audience was loving it all.

Har Mar and Melinda Park singing "Powerline"

By the time "Brothers & Sisters" was played, he inevitably took off his shirt. The pants disappeared with "Apple Sauce", followed by "Turn it Around". The finale song was "Tall Boy", which Zach, from Bang Bang, and some woman called Melinda Park (or was it Mindy Park?) joined on stage to help sing the song. Park would later turn up again to help sing one of the encore, "Powerline".

The very last song, Har Mar sang an a cappella version of Boyz II Men's "It's So Hard To Say Goodbye To Yesterday". He would pretend the song ended and everyone would clap... only he would continue to sing the refrain. After the third false ending and after he said "goodnight", he came back and sang some more.

Har Mar's latest album is Dark Touches, available from Dilettante Recordings. Read Andrew's review of the album, pick up a copy at amazon

 11/07/2009 04:22:06 ♥ vu () ♥ harmarsuperstar.com ♥ myspace.com/harmarsuperstar ♥ twitter.com 

Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish as John Keats and Fanny Brawne

OK so Bright Star was in a win-win situation:
 
John Keats: check
Jane Campion: check
Ben Whishaw: check

The trailers were promising. Campion was going to have to do something pretty stupid for me not to like this film, for me not to love this film.

For those who don't know the story, it is told through the eyes of Fanny Brawne, the neighbour and object of romantic poet John Keats' affection and some would say muse. The two were unable to marry because Keats didn't have any money as his poetry was yet to gain mass market appeal and then his life was cut short by TB.

Keats wrote beautiful poetry and this is a beautiful film. The setting, showcasing the simple beauty of English nature is like a third character next to Brawne and Keats.

The script is kept simple almost with the attitude that less says more leaving Abbie Cornish who plays Brawne and Whishaw who plays Keats to showcase a more subtle side to their acting abilities.

There is one particular scene which cements Cornish as such a talent, I find it hard to believe that she could have produced such overwhelming emotion for more than one take. It is when Brawne finds out from Keats' friend Charles Brown that he has died in Rome, where he had traveled to for the good of his health to avoid the British winter.

The performance touches on such grief and heartbreak that it brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. And it is up there with Juliet Stephenson in Truly Madly Deeply.

If I was to judge this film on tears alone, my tears that is, not the actors, it would get a very damp 10 out of 10 as blubbed the whole way through. And I wasn't the only one in the cinema.

Not that I particularly care but here are what some of the professionals thought:

Daily Telegraph "It’s by some measure the best film she’s ever made. It feels special without being at all precious. Eloquent, too, but not self-consciously lyrical or florid."

Time Out "A combination of unstuffy dialogue, wise casting, unselfconscious performances and sensuous but never pretty photography makes Campion’s version of the nineteenth century feel current but not anachronistic."

Sorry about last night. I actually did get up, believe it or not, and worked on that child's speech until 4 a.m. Which is crazy, of course. And wrong. I do realize this. But it was only a draft. She'll have to write the final draft herself. 

• 17:29 At curzon sitting on comfy sofa with a glass of red waiting for my bright star #

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