Hi Jack,
when I returned to gliding in 2001 after exactly 30 years, I
looked through
my log book for some memories.

My 6th & 8th solo's were in a T21 under a huge thermal in the middle east,
and I struggled
to stay below cloud base at 7000 feet. Reading my log brought it all back.
Even the flights
that didn't go too well as my inexperienced hands wanted, came back.

I always put a comment in, unless it really was that boring or short.

Since then I have created a sophisticated Excel log sheet that does a lot of
graphing and
analysis for me automatically. It even found an error I made 30 years ago on
my flight numbers!

I only wish I had taken more pictures of all the different gliders I've
flown, (not that many types @ 10
and locations @ 8) in my 502 flights.

Your correct, it is worth the effort to make some comment on your flights.
Just a few flights require a
bit more detail (like 5 pages of A4 for my 5 hour)

cheers,
Malcolm..



"J a c k" wrote in message
t...

I dug out my oldest logbook tonight--figured on transferring the
records to electronic storage--and discovered my first glider ride
from so many years ago. It happened on 22 MAR 70 in Big Spring TX, in
a 2-33 belonging to the Signal Mountain Soaring Club (N2435W, now the
registration number of a Cessna 172). Dan Riemondi (sp?) was in the
back seat as we winched into the clear blue west Texas sky.

I remember thinking at the time, "Who needs an aircraft that can only stay
up for ten minutes?" Little did I know. I logged 0.2 as an amazed
"co-pilot"--on top of the 1700 hrs I already had in USAF jets--just to get
the flight on paper for the future.

Well, the future is here, and this is one of the few flights in this,
or any of my other logbooks, of which I have any specific memory, out of
20,000 hours of flying--and one of the very few I can specifically
remember that don't also include a notation of significant weather,
mechanical malfunction, or other event like carrying a former POTUS,
certain combat missions, etc. The date, pilot's name, and other specifics
would without any doubt have been lost to me if they weren't right here on
the page. My logbooks are the only notes I've made of my years in the sky
and, as skeletonized a record as they are, I'm very glad now that I have
them.

You fledglings might want to keep in mind that what seems mundane
today may very well brighten your days and nights in the distant
future. Fill those pages now and they will fill some of your empty
spaces later. As for me, I'm going to try and do a more thorough job
of log-writing from now on.



Jack