Chris,
From your description of your ground work, it shouldn't take all that much
effort to study toward a score in the 90's so that you (and your father)
can come away proud of your score. Instead, it sounds like you are taking
efforts to ensure that you score the lowest score possible without failing,
just so your dad can't be proud of you.

The risk there, of course, is that unless you actually know 100% of the
right answers, you might make a mistake and end up failing after all. Now
THAT is a TOTAL waste of time and money!

As far as landing on the centerline every time - on a 150' wide runway, it
probably is not very critical. But if you were landing on a narrow runway,
it might be more important. And if you let yourself get sloppy on the 150'
wide runway because it didn't matter, you might get into a world of trouble
when you found yourself on a 40' wide runway with other objects along the
sides... If instead you consistently landed on the center line, after a few
hundred landings it might not be so hard anymore, and you'd do it without
much effort every time - so that if you got to a narrow and short runway,
you could focus on the other, more critical novelties...

The same thing even goes for toilet bowl cleaning. While I'm no expert, I
would agree that the first time you cleaned the toilets inside and out with
a dishrag and some spray soap, it might not make much difference. But after
a few weeks, the toilets would no longer look the way they do now - between
destroying the porcelain with soap that is too harsh, and spreading the
germs and bacteria from the inside to the outside. And the cost of
replacing all of the toilets or of losing customers because the toilets are
gross would be much higher than spending a few extra minutes every day
cleaning the toilets correctly...


The cost of getting good grades and studying properly for your flight
training will payoff later - even if you don't realize it. Be mature enough
to recognize that the easy way out is usually not the best...



chris priest wrote in
:

It just seems silly to me to have to spend all of that time studying
just to get a perfect score, when you can spend 80% less time studying
and still pass, giving you the same result. My summer job currently is
basically being a janitor at a RV park. My job is to pick up trash,
clean the bathrooms, sweep the floors; stuff like that. The biggest
thing I dislike about this job is how they instructed me to clean the
bathrooms. I have to spray the toilet bowl with chemical #5, then
chemical #7, then after a few minutes, I have to scrub the inside of
the bowl with brush #1 soaked in bleach. The the outside of the toilet
with brush #2 in bleach. After that I have to wipe it down with a wet
rag, then with a dry rag. Then I have to do it all over again to the
rest of the toilets. After this whole process the toilets have the
exact same appearance they did before I started. It just seems like I
spent all that effort for nothing. I could have achieved the same
effect with a 30 second spray-n-wipe then be done with.

I sort of feel the same when I study for these knowledge tests. I don't
see any reason to go all out when a 70 is all thats required. Thats not
to say only 70% of all there is to know is only worth having.

I don't see the written exam tests as the SAT. To me the only point of
taking the test is to pass. The grade is irrelevant. Heck, when I took
my PAR, I remember skipping questions because I just didn't want to do
them. They were mostly those calculating problems that use the E6B
which I knew how to do, I just didn't see the point in laboring over
the problem, when i could have as easily skipped it. I must have did
this a lot, as you all know I came close to not passing. Now, mind you,
if I was in the air, I would have done the calculation without second
thought. It's all about putting the effort where it belongs.

Looking back, I probably had too much confidence. I'm part 141, and
during ground school I never got below a 85 on all of my tests, so I
have no doubt in my mind that I was going to pass that test. When I
take my instrument knowledge test sometime in the next week, I'll most
likely use a slightly diffrent approach, but I'm still not going in
there with a 100% as my goal. My goal will be to pass.

Is it really important to concentrate on a perfect on-center smooth
landing every time, or to just focus on landing each flight safely?