Whadda you NUTS!

As I was leaving for work today, I saw a female cardinal bird attacking herself in the window of a van that was parked in my driveway. She perched on the mirror - and was quite comical as she tried to keep her footing - and would then fly and peck her reflection in the window. She did this for a while. All I could think was "are you crazy?!" Maybe we could take a lesson from her.

I tried to honk my horn to get her to stop, but she seemed impervious to my efforts. She just kept pecking away at the reflection. Apparently its part of her genetics. From what I have been able to find, cardinals are aggressive and territorial, especially during mating season.

She apparently thought that the bird she saw was another cardinal - one that she perceived as a threat. The behavior usually stops one of two ways - you put something on the glass to cover the reflection or the bird bangs its head in or hurts itself to the point where it stops.

Have you ever acted like that?

I have. As they say in recovery insanity is "doing the same thing and expecting different results." I have done that. I have stayed in relationships that were - to put it gently - "chew your arm off" terrible. You know, like a coyote that will chew its own leg off to get out of a trap. And I stayed in them even though I wanted to get out of them.

I have stayed in jobs that sucked the life out of me even when I wanted to get out simply because I had no where else to go.

I have stayed in churches where I knew the life was gone out of them and yet I kept hoping for it to get better. But it didn't. So why did I stay? Was I nuts? Was I like the cardinal that kept pecking away at the same target because it was angry or thought it was threatened?

So what to do in a situation like that? The best minds I have encountered say the first step to healthy thinking is surrender - realize that your life is unmanageable. So that's the first step. The second one? Come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could deliver us from our insanity.

Then what? Surrender. Make a conscious decision to turn our lives over to God as we understood Him. We call these three steps the codependent's waltz - 1-2-3, 1-2-3. And we keep doing them.

There are other steps, but these three keep coming up. So let's keep dancing. There is a step four - actually there are 12. But the first one has to be to stop pecking the mirror and realize that we don't have to attack the phantom reflection.

Mother's Day

There are two children this mother's day who will remember it more for the pain than the celebration. There is a mother nearby who mourns the loss of her son. There is a community in shock, still struggling to understand "why?" We all are. Why did Michael Kennedy decide that the best way to express himself was to take several weapons to a police station and start shooting? Why did Vicky Armel get killed leaving two small children and a husband behind?

From what we have learned, Vicky Armel was a dedicated policewoman, who loved her family, loved God and was enthusiastic about everything she did. She was also a decorated officer, the only woman in the history of the Fairfax Police Department to earn the "distinguished shooter" award which requires five perfect scores in a row.

Michael Kennedy appears to have been a troubled young man who left suicidal notebooks, and lived in a house full of guns. He had a website where his browser ID was "ghost." He talked of being an alien who had to save the planet from evil aliens disguised as human beings. Some have described him as "a normal kid" while others said lately he was depressed, and talked about aliens and saving the world. He had been arrested for carjacking in Montgomery County and had received mental health treatment. He escaped from a mental health facility in Maryland. He also lived in Centreville with his parents and little sister.

Meanwhile, Fairfax Police Officer Michael E. Garbarino remains hospitalized after being shot several times during the meleé. It was his cries for help over the radio that sent Vicky Armel and other officers out of the Sully Police Station to confront Michael Kennedy.

The question that I have asked most is "how did this kid get all these guns? Was it at a gun show? Did his parents give them to him? Did some of them belong to his parents?" We don't know yet.

Are such weapons necessary in a civilized society? An AK-47 was made for one purpose - to kill people. It's not a hunting rifle; it's not for sport. It's to kill people. It was developed for motorized infantry - infantry as in soldiers in the Russian Army! If you Google this weapon you find more than four million hits on the Internet. And it was banned as part of the Federal Assault Weapons ban, which - ironically - expired in September of 2004.

So why did an 18-year-old have one of these things? What does it say about us that we think that the free traffic of such instruments of death is a profitable business protected by the Constitution. Do we really thing the Framers had an AK-47 in mind when they wrote the Second Amendment?

But that is a debate that has raged hotter and longer than this forum can handle. So we grieve with those who have lost loved ones - the Armels and the Kennedys. Pray for them - and for your mothers and sons.

Bad Mamma Jamma!

So a friend of mine let me listen to a couple of Marcus Miller CDs and my response was again "We're not worthy!" This brother can thump with the best of them. Makes me realize I have a long way to go. But hey, he's a pro and one of those names that people say with a certain sense of awe. So thump on!

But his fretless playing (for all you mwah hatahs out there) is on par with anyone I have heard too. And he's coming to the DC area. Wolftrap June 9th to be exact. I would love to check him out but that's also the first day of the World Cup in Germany, and the man wants me to be writing about das fussballers!

But Marcus at Wolftrap would certainly be worth the price of admission. Especially since he has Stanley Clarke on the same bill. Make it funky, y'all.

Oh Manfred Where Art Thou?

I got the chance to do something today - my 44th birthday - that I have wanted to do for literally 40 years - I got to ride in an open cockpit biplane.

And not just any biplane.

A radial-engine 1942 WACO ZPF-7! Okay so I didn't know what kind of plane it was before today, but it was GREAT! It was a perfect day to fly and a perfect present(from my lovely wife) for an somewhat middle-aged guy who has always been fascinated by flight.

This particular bird is owned by John Corradi, who I found out used to fly a P-3 Orion when he was a Naval Aviator.He also flew with United Airlines for 30 years, flying the B-727 and the 777 before retiring in September 2002. Thas right y'all he was working for United on 9-11. But a more pleasant host and wonderful captain I have not met. (Of course this was the first time, but some jet jocks can be a little arrogant; not John. He was great).

We had a perfect day to fly and I got to wear the Snoopy helmet.It was really something. We were cruising at about 650-700 feet on a perfectly clear day. The temperature on the ground was about 65 degrees, but I was wearing a heavy shirt and leather jacket to fly. And yes I got the silk scarf to go with it. I mean if you're going to do something like this, why not? Besides, the Red Baron and I share the same birthday!

But it was absolutely the smoothest roller coaster I have ever been on. We didn't go acrobatic - although you can if you pay a little more and go through the mandatory parachute fitting and briefing. Frankly, the way you are situated in the aircraft, it isn't going to do you much good, particularly in a tumble or a spin. You're probably not going to have time to get out of the aircraft, but the FAA requires the chute and the briefing anyway.

But this was a fantastic ride for flight nuts. The first thing we did was go over a home a few miles from the airport where John's mother is staying and fly low and wave. I was a blast and all I could say was YEEEEHAAHHH!

Then we went over John's farm just to check on the cows. They seemed not to notice as we swooped down near the tree line over his landing strip - in the back yard of course.

John took me over to the Flying Circus Airfield - which opens its season this weekend by the way. They are in the process of putting the roof on a pavillion (so folks can get out of the sun a little). It also has a grass landing strip and of course we had to buzz it from both directions. (Did I mention the YEEEEHAAH factor?)
Then we went over Luck Stone quarry near Culpepper. Apparently the office manager there is something to behold - and John wanted to buzz by and say hello. Down from 650 feet to about 200 and a little gun of the engine. Jet jocks. But again, it was YEEEHAAAH!

All too fast it was time to set down. John put this bird down as smooth as a feather landing on cotton. I kept waiting to hear the wheels chirp, but nothing. I just heard the engine gear down a little and we started to roll slowly toward the hangar.

If you want to feel what it feels like to be an eagle - as close to freedom from the workaday BS as you can get, call this guy. We get one spin on this ball. No repeats, no bet on black instead of red this time. Riding with this guy is one thing you could tell the great grandkids about. They have their own webpage. The title of this post links you to it. YEEE HAAAAHH!!!

Gearhead stuff:

The plan is a WACO ZPF-7.
(pronounced WAH-ko; WAY-ko is a town in Texas)
Manufacture: 1942.
Engine: Jacobs R-755 radial engine made in Guthrie Oklahoma.
Prop: a Hamilton Standard 2B20.
Aircraft Gross weight: is 2,880 lbs.
Fuel Capacity: 50 gallons (burns about 16 gallons per hour).
Oil: four gallons of oil (which leaks - of course, all radials do. John said that if your radial engine is not leaking oil, you need to set down because YOU'RE OUT).
Yee Hah factor: Absolutely phenomenal.