It started simply enough a few years ago. Some musician friends got together one night every week or so to write some songs, or at least sketch out some song ideas. Pooling resources and using each others’ feedback as sounding boards, the song snippets began to gel and some of these ideas eventually became complete […]
Author: Robert Townsend
Eventual Imminent Demise
If you had to sum up your philosophy of life, what would you say? I recently had a few correspondences with an old friend from school days who is going through some health issues. I spoke pretty matter-of-factly, and upon re-reading it, it struck me that this is probably closest to my current life philosophy […]
Risk Management & Impulsivity
I suppose training as a pilot has benefited me much more than just learning how to get off of and back onto the ground safely in an airplane. Thank goodness that aviation safety is a major part of earning one’s wings these days. In pilot training we learn about accident chains and how to avoid […]
Reservations?
If you’re not certain you want to stay in a hotel room you booked at the Native American casino, does that mean you have a reservation reservation reservation?
Favorite Bass Players
Although I scarcely ever go out anymore into the bar music scene, I ventured out this past weekend to check out a band that I had been wanting to see and to scope out a room for its future show potential. I ran into a friend there who invited me to sit at a table […]
ADM
A major part of piloting an aircraft is Aeronautical Decision Making, or ADM. It’s what the FAA examiners have been focusing on in the past several years when granting pilot certificates. It has been a good move on the FAAs part, because the general aviation accident rate has steadily decreased in recent years. I had […]
My 30th Re-Birthday
Today marks the 30th anniversary of my decision to stop drinking. I call it my rebirthday. This was accomplished not by my willpower, it was accomplished only through a bizarre series of so-called coincidences that can only be attributed to Grace. If life is a school, some lessons are hard-learned. For me this was one […]
UFO Sighting From The Plane
People who know that I’m a pilot and am interested in the topic of UFOlogy have often asked me if I’ve ever seen anything while aloft. The answer has always been, “no, but I’m looking.” That all changed Wednesday morning. I had to go to Tennessee on Wednesday for a service call for work. […]
Confirmation Bias
“Confirmation bias, also called confirmatory bias or myside bias, is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one’s preexisting beliefs or hypotheses, while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities.” (thank you, Wikipedia) It is well-trodden territory for anyone who is seriously involved in UFO studies, and […]
Ulcerative Colitis & Smoking
My jaw just about hit the floor when my GI doctor told me that several of his ex-smoker patients restarted the habit and went into remission for UC. And it’s not necessarily the nicotine; he advised that there is/are some other toxin(s) in tobacco smoke that UC doesn’t like. I was incredulous because I had […]