The new Great Grandbaby

I wish I had a picture to show you of my new great granddaughter. She is a darling little baby with long black hair. I think her hair is long enough to braid and she is less than a month old ! But she is a little Indian baby and Indian babies have nice round heads, a beautiful complexion and long black hair. That is the way it was with my babies.

I had said in a post before the new grand baby's birth that I would probably be polishing my gyro when the baby decided to be born but no, I came down with bronchitis and I was sick as an old dawg at the time. I have wasted nearly a whole month trying to get over the truck that ran over me , well , figuratively speaking, it felt like a truck had run over me anyway. I am back to 100% good health now and hoping to see my new great grand baby soon. She and her mama and daddy live about 500 miles away and they promise to bring the little one to me for me to hold and cuddle for awhile.

Meanwhile, my other granddaughter, Lynette and her husband Amer, are foster parents to two little boys, brothers, whom they hope to adopt. So, for years no grand babies and suddenly three of them...well, technically, one and maybe two others. In September I will get to see my two future grandsons when they come down to visit. It's been a long time since I held a baby or a little child and I'm looking forward to it. There is just something priceless about cuddling a baby or a small child. It's one of the joys of life.
Till next time.
Marion Springer

Happy 81st. birthday to me!

Today I turn 81 years of age. I never dreamed I would live so long . I have enjoyed almost every minute of the journey. There were a few rough patches along the way but I'd do it all over again and the same way, I'm sure. I'd marry the same man, have the same kids, you know, live it again if I could.

Last year I flew an 80th. birthday celebration flight in my gyro and in a few days, when the weather cooperates, I will fly an 81st. plus a few days, BD celebration flight. The photo is of me suited up and just back from a flight in my Bensen gyro on the dry lake of El Mirage, Ca. The photo was taken a few months ago at the annual gyro fly-in in September , 2009.

Gyro flying must be good for people! Commander Ken Wallis of the UK is well into his 90's and he is still flying gyros. Johny Miller, an old time gyro pilot of the 1930's who flew Pitcairn and Kellet autogiros continued to fly his Bonanza airplane until he passed away at the age of 102. It must be something in the air up there.

On the day he died, Johnny told his grandson, " It looks like my flying days are over". Like most gyro pilots, flying was ever on his mind. It is with mine for sure. Just ask my children. Sometime back when I asked my daughter Linda if I could bring my new Rotordyne blades into her living room to take them out of the crates, she answered,

" why not? I've lived with gyros my whole life". She is an understanding daughter! She gave me a fuel transfer pump for my gyro for Christmas awhile back . Other gifts from her have included motorcycle hand grips and a set of screw drivers. A recent gift from Linda and Donna was a gift certificate from my favorite store, Home Depot . As I said, a most understanding daughter who knows her mom pretty well.

I find it very peaceful and relaxing to do housekeeping chores on my gyro. I plan to polish that machine till it outshines the sun and I will enjoy every minute of working on it. And just think, my granddaughter Crystal will be making a Great Grand Mother out of me any day now! I will probably be off polishing my gyro instead of doing grandmotherly things like making baby clothes for the soon to be greatgrandbaby. Is that any way for a woman of my age to act? YOU BET IT IS !!

Till next time.

Marion Springer

CFI-Gyro, Ret.

Styles- fashions- trends- fads- whatever!

My friend tells me that I have lived too long when I complain about the lack of courtesy and good manners and some of trends of young people of today. I think he really means that times are different today than when I was young and that is very true.

Back in my day if a kid misbehaved in school the teacher or school Principal could and did paddle the kid and when the kids dad found out about it he added his discipline to the kid. Nowadays, parents stand a good chance of doing jail time for child abuse if they discipline the child. And kids know it... " yeah dad, you spank me and I'll call the cops, so there "!

Some of the fads of the young people just mystify me...how in the world can anyone eat with a ball bearing fastened to the tongue? How can anyone blow his nose if he has a ring through it?

And the hair! for some young people of today fashion dictates that their hair stand straight up in peaks that look sharp as nails. Others go in for wild colors, with rainbow streaks of color throughout .

But the pants the guys wear with the crotch at about knee level just is unbelievable . I was walking through a parking lot recently and there was a young man with his family just ahead of me. At first I thought he was limping but no, he was having trouble walking because his pants were barely hanging on and the crotch was at knee level or maybe just a tad lower. Thank goodness he was wearing a long T-shirt so I was saved from getting mooned !

His manner of walking was wierd ...to take a step, he would first throw a knee out to the side , then step forward with that foot, then throw the opposite knee out to the side and follow up with a step from that foot. I realized that throwing the knee to the side was to allow a little more room in the pants so he could take a step. If he had had to move suddenly he would have been like a deer in the headlights or more likely, would have fallen flat on his face.

And the girls with the push-up bras ! I'm an old gal and not much surprises me anymore but one day I turned a corner at a fall festival and just stopped in my tracks when I saw two young girls with push-up bras and what was being pushed up was nearly out ! I see practically the same thing on women on television and even on the female news anchors . Besides the low cleaveage , the news anchors are all very cutesy when giving the news. Walter Cronkite, I miss you!

Tatoos seem to be in fashion . I saw a woman with tatoos on every inch of skin that wasn't covered with clothing and that was a lot of skin. I thought to myself, when she is old and her skin is all shriveled and wrinkled, her skin color will be all blue. Then I thought of things we used to say to someone when we were annoyed with them , back in the good old days. Drop dead was one, Cool it, was another, then there was , don't have a cow, and also, ' turn blue'. The tatooed lady will do just that when she gets old, she will literally ' turn blue'.

Till next time.
Marion Springer

We said good bye to Lucky

She came to us as a stray pup about seven years ago. My son Dave,had recently lost his 13 year old Princess to cancer. He wasn't ready for another dog. I had two dogs so I didn't need another dog.

It was decided that Dave would take the pup to the animal shelter but on the way there he decided he couldn't do it. The little dog was obviously part pit bull. Dave was certain that she would be put down if she was handed over to the animal shelter so he brought her back home. He named the little dog Lucky and she became a part of our family.

She hated snakes with a passion. There are rattle snakes where we live and when she saw a snake she sounded the alarm. That was about the only time Lucky barked for she was a very quiet little dog. The only time she attacked a snake was when the snake happened to be very close to me. she picked it up and swung it around, dropped it and picked it up again. I made her leave it alone for it was a harmless snake, not a rattler.

Lucky was a gentle loving little dog. She was a little bit picky about eating and she played me like a fiddle. She would sometimes balk at eating her regular dinner and of course I would dress it up with little tid-bits that she loved and before long her bowl was empty and she had gotten the treats she wanted. I didn't mind pampering her that way for she gave so much love in return.

Lucky's immune system went awry and last week she got very sick. The Doctor couldn't do anything to help her and with heavy hearts, we said good bye to our little friend. She was placed to rest beside Princess. My two Doberman pups are just lost and there is an emptiness in our home without her. She brought us much love and joy in her short time with us and she is missed greatly.
The words from an old song, Old Shep, come to mind..."if dogs have a Heaven there's one thing I know, Old Shep ( Lucky ) has a wonderful home".

Till next time.
Marion Springer

My Other Passion

I wanted to fly from the time I was about 5 years old but I also have another passion that dates from a very young age. From early on I wanted to create dolls.

And so, I made dolls. My husband , Docko would tease me, I think he was teasing, he would say , " You have come full circle. You are playing with dolls". My answer was always, " I am not playing. I am creating".

Through the years I made cloth dolls for my daughters. But what I really wanted to do was to create realistic dolls, not dolls to play with but to be displayed as one would collect and display art and items to be cherished.

I leaned toward making Indian dolls, because of my heritage and because I liked the Indian way of life.

I tried making dolls from various mediums and finally discovered polymer clay. Polymer clay is a plastic based clay. It is used to sculpt all or parts of dolls which are then cured in a regular kitchen oven or toaster oven. Curing sets the clay in a hard permenant position.

Occassionally I will make a doll all of clay from head to foot but generally I only sculpt the head, hands, feet and legs of polymer clay then attach the various parts to a wire armature . Next a fabric body covering is put on over the wire armature and filled with polyester fiber fill.

Synthetic fiber is used for hair. The part I enjoy most is making the clothing and accessories. The material used for clothing is deer skin ( buckskin) and is all hand stitched . Moccasin's and other accessories are decorated with hand beading.

The picture above is an 18 inch cradleboard with baby. Used leather coats are generally used as covering for the cradleboard. Used fur from old fur coats is often used to line the cradleboards.

The baby in the picture is about 15 inches long . The baby's head is polymer clay on a fabric body. Other cradleboards I make are from 8 inches in length to full size 36 inches. My next cradleboard baby is going to be a life size infant in a 36 inch cradleboard. I plan to fully bead the sides of the cradleboard. Beading is slow tediuos work and it could take me many moons to finish the beading but it will be a treasure when finally finished. I plan to keep the life size baby and cradleboard for myself, or try to keep it anyway. My family has a way of talking me out of most of the dolls I make.

Most of the Indian dolls ( I say ' dolls' for lack of a better word ) I make represent adults engaged in the daily tasks of life as it was back then. The dolls range from 18 inches to about 22 inches in height.

If you care to see some of the work which has resulted from my other passion, click on my website www.authameriindiandolls.com .

Till next time.
Marion Springer

In The Super Market

I've had some bad and some weird and some very rude experiences while shopping in the super market . I was standing in line at the check out counter and there was a woman ahead of me . Her items were on the counter being rung up by the cashier. A man hurried up and crowed in between the woman customer and me. He set a six pack of beer on the counter . Naive me, I thought he was with the woman customer and had gone back to pick up an item they had forgotten.

Not so , she paid for her purchases and left the store and the man was still there at the counter . I stood there with my mouth open in surprise as the guy who had rushed up and crowded in line paid for his beer and left the store. I mentioned the incident to the checker and she replied, " Oh, yeah, he does that all the time". What a shame that the checker didn't protect the rights of other customers by making the man wait his turn in line as he properly should .

Checkers and bag girls talking and not getting on with the business of checking out the merchandise really gets to me. I am not smart enough to let it go even if it takes an extra 15 minutes or more to get waited on while they carry on their conversation. I usually have to say something to the effect of , " please stop your visiting with each other and finish ringing up and bagging my groceries. That almost always gets me cracked eggs in the carton or an item or two that I've paid for left on the counter . That's the baggers retaliation for my speaking up .

The very worst thing that happened was the time I was the only person in the whole isle and I got touched by a jerk. I stood contemplating the items on the shelf and I heard fast foot steps approaching but I didn't look around. As he passed behind me I felt a hand drag across my posterior. I quickly turned around to see who had touched me and the guilty man was about 10 feet past me taking very long steps.

When I reached the check out stand the man was at the counter with several customers between him and me. He turned and looked at me just smirked. Oh, how I wanted to knock that smirk off his face ! But what could I do ? If I had made a complaint there were no witnesses to back me up . It would have been he said, she said. So I said nothing but I sure had some dark thoughts.

Till next time
Marion Springer

Analysis of A Gyro Accident

Recently Teddy Udala, an experienced gyro pilot of many years had an accident in his gyro. Teddy was badly bruised in the accident but had no broken bones. His gyro was destroyed.
There is a lesson to be learned in every accident and for that reason, Teddy asked me to write an account of his accident. he hopes his story will prevent someone else from making the same mistake.
The weather: Wind was from the west and variable from 10 to 20 mph.
The layout of the area where the accident occurred is this...the runway is an east-west dirt runway. Teddy's hangar is adjacent the runway and is about 400 feet from the east end of the runway. There is a power line that crosses the runway near the east end of the runway and a fence at the end of the runway. Beyond the fence to the east is the El Mirage dry lake.
The accident :
The PRA Chapter One meeting had just ended. There were several visitors who wanted to see a gyro fly. Teddy invited everyone to go to his hangar to see him fly. The group from the meeting went on to Teddy's hangar. I didn't go with the others instead, I pulled up a chair and sat in the shade of the meeting trailer.
After his take off Teddy flew past the place where I was sitting then he made a turn back toward the other end of the runway. I walked out a little ways to watch his descent and landing. When I saw him next, he had already made the turn toward final and was on the lake side of the fence and very low. He looked to me to be about 30 feet above the surface. The gyro was in a nose high attitude and was descending very fast. I could see that he was very near the fence and the power line and facing in that direction. Then there was a great pall of dust and I saw the flash of one rotor blade. I couldn't see the gyro contact the ground but from the rapid descent and the single blade flash, I knew he had crashed.
I quickly drove down to the area and to my great surprise saw Teddy helping pick up the scattered pieces of his crashed gyro. The photo at the top of page is Teddy and his crashed gyro just minutes after the accident. His gyro was destroyed. The redundant mast had broken in two. A shiny area of several inches of the mast showed that the metal had been stretched, indicating that one part of the mast had actually been pulled apart where the separation had occurred. One rotor blade had separated from the machine on contact with the ground and was found some distance from the main body of the wreckage.
Someone had videoed the flight and the crash. The video showed that shortly after take off, the gyro climbed to about 20 feet above the ground then suddenly it descended to what looked to be 3 feet above the ground. That indicated that the gyro didn't have enough airspeed to maintain level flight. He was behind the power curve, in other words. Then the gyro began climbing again. After climbing out he flew downwind and then he turned onto final .
The wind was slightly from the left of the runway, maybe about 15 degrees off. The video shows the gyro lined up into the wind and in a nose high attitude. The gyro dropped fast then Teddy made a slight turn to his left and then immediately he began a turn back toward the runway in an effort to line up with the wind, but he hit the ground at that point.
Teddy said he had turned slightly toward the lake looking for a clear area where he could land as he knew the power line and fence were immediately in front of him. Seeing no place to land, he then tried to turn back into the wind but it was all over by then. He came down approximately 100 feet from the fence and the power line. That he survived the crash is nothing short of a miracle.
My analysis of the accident:
I don't believe he ever reached adequate airspeed at any point during the brief flight. That was evident by the loss of altitude shortly after take off when the gyro descended from about 20 feet down to 3 feet from the ground.
Teddy says he was about 100 feet above the ground when he made the turn onto final , but no matter whether it was 100 or 30 feet, it was too low to make a turn so close to the fence and the power line.
Teddy says he wanted to hover, thus the nose-up attitude. Without enough airspeed to begin with, raising the nose of the gyro killed off what airspeed he had. At that point the gyro was in free fall as evidenced by the very rapid descent. The small turn out of the wind only hastened the descent to the ground.
Even if the fence and the power line had not been in close proximity , a hover so low to the ground with gusty wind is very dangerous because there is insufficient altitude between the the gyro and the ground to regain airspeed if the wind should let up as Teddy said it did in this case.
Several things indicate poor aviation decision making in the flight. First, I believe that spectators waiting in front of his hangar to see him fly put pressure on Teddy to the point he neglected to be mindful of airspeed, altitude, obstructions, etc. He says empathically that he only fly's for himself and no one else. But it is a fact that pressure from spectators can cause a pilot to become careless about all the things that go into a safe flight.
Turning onto final at such a low altitude and with low airspeed and with obstructions immediately ahead was poor judgment.
Teddy is generally a safe and cautious pilot and until this day had never had a gyro accident . It is my belief that he was distracted by the spectators wanting to see the gyro fly and he was lured into complacency as to safe piloting. The result was an accident due to failure to maintain airspeed, or pilot error, in other words.
Teddy is to be commended for wanting his story told in an effort to help other pilots.
Marion Springer , CFI Gyro, Ret.