I went to the CD release party (with the lovely Kate, of course) for my friend's band, Big Hotel. It was awesome. They rocked the house. The new album is really good, you should check it out. They say the style is "rock/americana/classic"...I just think it's good. You can hear some of it on their MySpace site at www.myspace.com/bighotel. 

Also, if you want Big Hotel gear (shirts, hats, mugs, buttons, etc.) go to my web site at www.Flying37.com.

Pictured is Tommy Corona (left) and Gary Thompson (right).

Postcard

I was messing around with Photoshop today and was able to come up with this postcard-sized ad for Flying37.com.  I think it's cool, but what do I know?

Big Bear

Flew to Big Bear, California today for the first time. The airport elevation is around 5500 and it is surrounded by mountains with peaks of around 8500. Fun, fun, fun. Except when we walked into the FSDO and found out that someone had crashed just 40 minutes before we got there. Seems the pilot was attempting a go-around and ended up landing between two houses. Pilot was in good shape considering what happened.

Rust Ridge Vineyard

A few months ago, Pilot Pal Ron and I flew up to visit his brother Jimmy at the Rust Ridge Vineyard in the Chiles Valley of eastern hillside region of Napa, California. Now we're making plans to go again, hopefully next week.

We land in Jimmy's neighbor's Vineyard. Yes, IN it. There's a small private air strip there. I'll get photos this time and post them.....

Who Cares?

I've noticed that people on vacation tend to let loose and do things they wouldn't do at home. "It's Havasu, Who Cares?" seems to be an attitude that is common. I was thinking about adding a whole lot of cities to a complete line of shirts like these....It's Miami, Who Cares? or It's Venice, or....? What do you think?

Conceit

Some people say pilots are a bit full of themselves. This new T-Shirt from Flying37.com addresses that issue with "Enough about airplanes, let's talk about me". 

Letter To My Cousin....(I'll let you read it too)

Hey Cuz Linda,
I just wanted to tell you about my new web site. I've dreamed for many years about making T-Shirts with slogans, sayings and remarks on them and never really took the time to make it happen. At the prodding of one of my kids ("Gee Dad, you've talked about this for as long as I can remember, but you never actually DO anything about it") I decided it was time to stop talking and start doing.

I designed a bunch of shirts (and hats and mugs and other stuff too) and then built a web site in order to sell them. I am most passionate about flying airplanes, so there's a lot of choices in that category so far. But I also have a bunch of "Topical/Current Events" type of designs too. Plus I'm working on adding as many Gamers (Xbox, World of Warcraft, etc) slogans as I can. As you might know, I'm a big sports fan so I have some of those too, with many more coming in the near future. Personally, I think the "Golf Ruined My Life" shirt might become a tongue-in-cheek favorite (or maybe serious statement for some spouses!).

My designs consist of words. That's my background, after all. I have a Journalism degree and I work with words every day as a magazine editor. A lot of the airplane stuff has a double meaning.

The web site is called www.Flying37.com and I also have a blog called www.Flying37blog.blogspot.com. Eventually I will figure out how to get the blog onto the Flying37 web site, but I have more to learn.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know that I was doing something that was important to me. If you have any ideas or suggestions for shirt designs please e-mail me at Flying37@gmail.com (I might get rid of the Verizon e-mail soon). If you have any comments on how I can make the web site better, don't hesitate to let me know...I have a thick skin.

Talk to you later.

Cuz Bob

The Left Seat

Ah, the left seat...the seat you want to be sitting in...unless you want to be a Certified Flight Instructor...then you go back to the right seat and let the student have the honored left seat.

Web Site Updates

I worked late into the evening to make a bunch of changes to www.Flying37.com. Instead of having the logos displayed on the main page I now have actual products (shirts, hats, mugs, etc.) with the logo on there. That should make it easier for new visitors to get a quick idea of what we do.

First Blog Ever

I'm so excited to get started with my new Blog that I just want to get the first blog done and "in the books". I'm going to plan on keeping everyone up to date on what's going on with Flying37 so come back frequently.
Bob Carpenter
http://www.flying37.com/