January 19

Tuesday, January 19 — Another ragged night. To bed about 8:15 after dinner and up at 12:30. More arranging in bedroom office and watching YouTube aviation videos. No interest in working on models. It’s too DAMN cold even with the thermostat set at 70! DANG it. To bed again with a large “nudge” to sleep from Carlo Rossi at 4, slept until 8:30. Up and into the day. ..In at 11: 30 after delivering review copies of JTW book to Illinois Times, State Journal Register, free copies to Illinois Military Museum, Sangamon Valley Collection. To post office and mailed books to Ed Gost and Bob Dorr. Sunny and cold. Didn’t accomplish much relative to AKM. Wrote a new poem. Phot’d a new Bonanza A36 and Bombardier Global and the LOUDEST Medevac helicopter I’ve ever HEARD. Went home early to see what positive good I can do with models at home if I can tolerate the COLD. I was about to leave when I decided to stay and process the pics I had taken of the planes I had phot’d earlier. Glad I DID. Welcomed two visitors with a King Air E90 hospital organ transplant plane, one of whom chatted for about 20 minutes about his dad who flew 17s late in the war and became a POWof the Germans on the Eastern Front. Said some Soviet fighter pilots few combat without parachutes over the 1944/45 winter. To leave their planes they low and slow over snow and jumped. He saw many pilots with broken legs and arms from all that. Soon after he left, another two organ transport pilots with a King Air 200 from New Jersey they had just hangared came in. Both were interested in my guitar. After chatting 10 minutes, on e returned to the airplane to make sure it was good to go and soon. The other asked to see the guitar Out it came. we chatted and I played two songs I’ve written. He was very impressed and bought two of my poetry books. He took a selfie of the two of us, returned to the airplane after 30 very good minutes. When he told me it was snowing pretty hard, it was news to me. Grabbed my camera after FINISHING posting a few pics at FB, out to the fence and phot’d the Global and the E90 in floodlit dark with the snow coming down like a blizzard! Home in a hurry departed about 8:45 and had a pretty challenging drive home on packed snow and mercifully little traffic. The visitors really turned my day around for me. Day rating: A 🙂