Cirronimbus

I cancelled flying (and work) on Monday because I was still recovering from the cold I acquired over the weekend. Actually I'm still recovering from it now, but I'm down to the sniffly-nose part that can be tackled with Kleenex and decongestants.

The weather this morning was iffy for flying, due to heavy clouds coming in, but it wasn't raining, so my instructor decided we could fly as long as we just did pattern work (that's flying circles around the airport, for the uninitiated). We did some more practice on unusual takeoffs and landings, which are pretty fun. I scraped the tail skid on one of my soft-field takeoffs, but other than that they went well. The landings weren't quite as pretty but I got a lot better as the day went on. Some better flare technique helped out here, as well as learning to use some rudder to correct for crosswind alignment.

I have homework for the weekend -- some final studying for my FAA written test, as well as plotting out a detailed course for my cross-country trip, which (weather permitting) will be this sunday.

Oh, and a cirronimbus cloud is a big, puffy raincloud, which is exactly what the sky was full of this morning.