In the evening, Vic called to say she'd got a sled run in, so the day wasn't a total loss for us both.

After I'd dropped Vince off at Freedom Field, I was tinkering around with my new PC, and found that Blizzard have given me 7 days free game time to play World of Warcraft, so I fired that up to see that the frame rate is still woefully slow with my 8400GS graphics card. I also found that the netbook will play it tolerably well with all the settings turned right down - if you call 13fps tolerable. I started playing my death kniggit, and managed to get her to level 58. I've tweaked the graphics options to run decently - everything is down except distance, which is all the way up. I'm going to look at a 4650 card in the very near future, methinks.

After we got home, Vince came over for left over turkey from the weekend :o)

In the afternoon, while Vic cooked a turkey, Vince came over and freaked out Tilly by wearing a hat - she wouldn't stop barking at him until he took his hat off and she figured out who he was. We then headed over to the airfield and pulled the Flightstar out for a trip around the patch. It was quite funny when we got to the engine run up area and neither of us could remember the registration. No matter, we'll just make something up - it was really quiet there, and it's not like anybody can read the registration anyway. I started out with a longer takeoff run than I'm used to, then a slower climb (hey, there was a lot more weight, and not a lot more power pulling it). The circuit went a lot faster than I'm used to, too, and I had a harder landing than I'd like (but not as hard as when I did the test flight with Don). I've realised that I sit a lot higher in the Rans, so the picture's a lot different. We then left the pattern and did some stalls, turns and so on. It flies really nicely, and isn't quite as twitchy as the Rans. I had another less than stellar landing when we got back to Lincoln, but the radio works and the engine didn't break, so we're calling that a successful day. We stopped at Mike's hangar, behind us, and looked at his welding of his bent plane, then headed home and ate turkey.

After dinner, I dropped Vince home, then came home to find a bug in the Hulu desktop software - the new episode of the V remake is available on the web site, but not through desktop. Luckily I'm not the first to see this, so I logged a "me too" and fiddled around with my new desktop for a while.

I gave up trying to see the Leonids this year - there's just too much light pollution, and it's all cloudy.

I burnt another Vista DVD and got Vince's laptop installed and running, then spent the evening waiting for somebody to come and buy the AppleTV that I no longer need. Another Craigslist flake :o(

I was watching Big Bang Theory, and realised that tonight's the best night for seeing the Leonids - they were viewing them on the show :o) Of course, it was too cloudy to see anything but the brightest stars.

After all that, we went back to the house so I could install an operating system on Vince's laptop - it has 2 hard discs and the primary had crashed. Windows 7 wouldn't install, as the old Core processor is a 32 bit piece, and I only have the 64 bit install. Vista wouldn't install because it couldn't read the DVD, and XP wouldn't install - we think because it uses a SATA controller, and that's older than Windows XP. I'll look into that tomorrow. I ran him home and figured that I've done enough miles to run the catalytic converter in so it can be smogged.

Vince came over, and we went to the airfield to look at the Flightstar. On the way, we saw a parachute and a powerpack in a field by the side of the road, so we went to Athens Road to check that everything was OK - the pilot was just leaving to go and pick it up. Vince and I discussed how we should have just grabbed it for grins :o)

At Lincoln, we managed to not get the little tach working, as extending the wire makes it under read, and we didn't get the ignition problem figured out either - we think it might need a new coil. He did, however, point out where I'd gone wrong with the van exhaust. We were standing around when we saw a failed parachute, with what we thought was a parachutist hit the ground on the other side of the airfield. Ken called it in, and Jack drove over to see what he could do. When the police arrived, I was explaining how best to get over there when he suggested that I just get in, so I did. First time I've been in the back of a police car :o) We found out that the guy had cut away his parachute, and what we'd seen was the collapsed chute with probably the backpack - he'd landed just fine on his reserve. Still, it's a bit more excitement than I needed, thanks.

I got home and got the Van exhaust fitted properly. I think it's still leaking a bit, but we'll see if a few cycles helps, or if I need to get some exhaust putty.

I went and met Scott for lunch - this is the first time I've actually had lunch since I got back from San Francisco :o) I was worried that I wouldn't recognise him, but he hasn't changed that much.

The new, California approved, catalytic converter arrived for the van, so after work I crawled around swearing until I had it sort of fitted. I'm not convinced, however, so I might see about getting it hacked and welded to the flanges for the old one. Which, interestingly enough, you can shine a torch through - I thought they were more complex than that.

Vince worked on the Flightstar while I just worked. I started trying to figure out how to get the thing registered, and found that you can't download the forms - you need a proper copy. Bah, tomorrow.

In the evening, I tore a bunch of computer stuff apart, and now I have the media centre PC running with Windows 7 on the 750Gb hard disc.

In the evening, before Vince came over I changed the oil on the Subaru. We then ate spaghetti while we plotted what we're going to do on the Flightstar.

I got up on the roof and washed the solar panels for the first time in what seems like ages, and pulled a pile of leaves out of the gutters. It's fun spraying Tilly with water from the roof when she forgets that I'm up there, but she has no sense of humour about it.

In the afternoon, Vince and I went over to Cameron Park to see the Flightstar, and I took a quick test flight in it. It's pretty nice - it doesn't climb as well as the Rans, but it's heavier and not a lot more powerful. Anyways, I'm seriously considering it. Cameron Park's funny, as it's an aviation community, so the roads are wide enough to be taxiways, and the houses have hangars rather than garages - I'd live in one if I wasn't so poor :o)

We went out to dinner, and then I ordered a new refurbished PC for good measure... Dell had a 15% off sale as it's daylight savings change day. Hopefully that'll be here at the end of the week, and I can look at upgrading it to Windows 7. I might swap the big (750Gb) hard disc into my media centre, to save me buying a new one.