I have been flying for about 4 years now, after a break for about 10 years. I brought my cousin along today, and in 2 m/s wind
did some fancy manouvers. I rolled my plane over on the back in low height, touch and go’s, hammerheads, spins, snap rolls, barrell rolls, but
most of the time just basic low level flying. That’s how we roll in our Norwegian Lowpas Union after all. Low and fast mofos!!

After doing a decent three-point landing, I plugged out the battery and felt quite happy about my little show for my cousin.

Suddenly the club forman calls me over to our information board. I walk over, still quite happy, and he starts pointing to
the documents involving an RC model license. It turns out I need one. To get an RC model license you need to do some very, very
basic flying, which includes take off, landing, flying an eight and doing two loops. The rules are there to keep an eye on
those of us who are new to flying, which means keeping a minimum level of flying skills before taking to the air.

And so, the forman, which have seen me fly a gazillion times (and I never even crashed a plane) starts yapping that I need
a license. I was taken back by his approach and replied to his demands with a joke that I already had a license only given
to those of us who flew Aces High combat simulator combined with warbird RC fighters.

“That doesn’t count!!” he blasts out…
“So, flying inverted 3 meters above ground doesn’t count either?” I gasp.
“No, in fact, it can be harder flying level…” he replies.

It was at that time I told him I didn’t care about the bloody license and left him.

It’s actually good to get some fresh air with exercise.

Or it could be that wife promised me McDonalds if I went along…

Read all about it here

http://www.spitfirepilots.com/per_waaler.html

So, Duxford Spring Airshow, here I fucking come

http://duxford.iwm.org.uk/server/show/conEvent.3618

I got inside the grocery store and this big-ass promo deal involving cheese caught mine and everyone elses attention, so we all panicked and went instant left instead of
passing these annoying cheese fucks. You just know they’ll be all over you trying to sell you their cheese. They even put up two workers on that stand, a 50% increase from normal
procedures. They meant serious business.

That was the first thing that made my mind wander off.

I picked up a few of the items, and kept going, looking at the list. Halfways into my shopping programme my mind wandered into the worlds of things to put on bread, and a mysterious
feeling of wanting fish in tomato sauce on my bread popped up. No fucking idea where it came from, I don’t even like fish that much. But even so, I picked up those too and
strolled over to get a few beers. The party tonight was cancelled, but I thought buying Spitfire Ale would cheer me up nonetheless.

And after buying that beer, I felt my whole mission was pretty much over and went to the register. I mean, you got beer, coke, candy and tomato sauce fish. You don’t need anything else.

Coming home I discovered to my complete surprise that I had forgotten two items on the list. And that list wasn’t very big. 7 items. So I got 5 of those items down, and came home with another extra 4 that wasn’t even on the list instead. So the wife just have to deal without any oat meal and mango fruit for a bit longer.

I have my beer though, and I’m happy.

“Starwing” was just up my alley. Spaceships, flying and shooting. Everything I like packed in one game. This spaceship guy called “Fox” flew around in the Universe shooting anything coming his way along with his pals the eagle, a toad and a bunny. It couldn’t be any better. And the graphics was amazing of it’s time. The opening sequence of the game was breathtaking, watching Fox fly his Starwing craft thru a narrow tunnel and coming out low over a green looking planet with weird alien creatures flying around.

What was more fascinating though, was that I actually had a clue that I was getting the gift. I think it’s the first and last time I actually let my curiosity get the better of me. I doubt I unpacked it in secret before christmas eve, but I prolly peaked or felt my way thru to the answer. It’s a video game, and it might just be Starwing. What more fantastic though, is that the revelation of unpacking it was just as great even though I halfways knew what it was.

I played the game to death, rounding up my Starwing adventures by the following summer.

I remember my father used to say; In 15 years time, you will say “arr..we only had Nintendo in those days”. I thought he was out his mind. However, I have to admit the graphics on Starwing looks less
impressive today than it did to me when I was 14 years old.

15 years ago, all we had was a bloody Nintendo.

There, I’ve said it.

Merry christmas and a happy new year

Gateworld, arguably the most famous and popular Stargate related website, put the blame on screening schedule and network agendas. While I do agree with many of the authors voiced opinions, I want to put the focus on the show itself, and not the politics involved. As with a airplanes crashes, almost never are there one reason why the crash happened. There can be plenty, human error and technical error happening at the same time. And I believe SGU’s problems didn’t stop with Sy Fy’s “interesting” (what does Wrestling got to do with sci fi?)approaches, the problems came from all directions.

SGU was different than SG-1 and Atlantis, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. But, maybe they went a bit too far?

In SGU, the reasons SG-1 and SGA was succesfull was almost non-existant. The sense of action and adventure mixed with that special type of humour was all gone. When those key elements to the success of Stargate are gone, they have to come up with something else instead, and they didn’t succeed.

SGU was called “the most depressing show on TV”, and I see why. The characters were all full of flaws, like any human being is. It’s just that none of them gave the sense of being character a person might like. Rush, perhaps the best character, brilliantly portrayed by Robert Carlyle, just wasn’t very likable. He was, in short, McKay of SGA but without the humour. Rush was simply too realistic. Col. Young was supposed to be the O’Neill of 10 years ago, but all the characteristics that made you like O’Neill was never there with Young. He was a brave commander, but emo and at times quite annoying.

And this goes for most of the crew at SGU. Even Eli, the shows humour-box turned out to be a tragic character. The only one I see some form of fit in was Greer.

So, by replacing key factors in what made Stargate a major success, they replaced it with more realism, and a great deal of character drama. The episode Cloverdale is a good example. The team, stuck on a planet with dangerous plants, focuses on Matthew Scott’s “dreams” rather than what is actually taking part of the planet. Then you simply sit there and thinks; “but it’s the drama on the planet I want to see, not what Scott is doing while he’s in coma”. And it’s that stuff we want to see, the sci fi fans of Stargate. We don’t really want to see personal character drama on such a level. It’s the wrong product to the wrong kind of people.

While season two changed from season one, with more action and less drama, it was too late to get the viewers back. And I do put plenty of it on the actual SG fans who doomed SGU from the get-go, simply being upset that SGA was cancelled. Almost like trading in your mother for a step-mother, and no one likes it. So many SG fans didn’t think further than to the tip of their own nose, boycotting SGU. And now, they can collect their price money, no Stargate on TV. Perhaps no Stargate ever again. Because no matter how one looked at SGU, having Stargate on TV should be the main priority.

Also, if you want to change a TV show, the fact of keeping the same writers going into the new show is a doomed idea from the start. If you want change, get in new writes and shake things up. Not only did they show they had problems writing such a different drama, they also clearly showed they had problems coming up with new storylines. The sand alien in season 1 looked a lot like the black fog alien from the first episode of SGA.

But nevertheless, SGU showed more potential than any Stargate before them. Too bad the writers never grasped the opertunity, and too bad a conservative fan base never liked it.

Giving it five seasons, and a little changes, it might as well have been a serious contender to the epic Babylon 5 story. Now we will never know.