The sound of democracy

A Minnesota State Patrol helicopter has been hovering more or less over my house for the past 90 minutes. Every now and then it moves off for a bit, only to return.

Apparently, 500 feet above my normally quiet home offers a good vantage point from which to observe the demonstrators assembling for their march on the Republican National Convention, which is being held a few miles away in downtown St. Paul.

I was looking forward to a quiet day at home after 7-straight days of work but so far it's just been noisy and annoying.

Ah well. I'll put a positive spin on it by saying having a state patrol Bell Long Ranger hovering over one's home is a reminder that we live in a democracy, that there is an election going on and I live in a country where there is still freedom enough to assemble and speak as one sees fit.

Hopefully the week will pass peacefully, the demonstrators will have their say, the Republicans will have theirs and St. Paul will soon return to normal.

The downside to all this democracy in action is that I'm losing out on a week's worth of work. My primary airport, St. Paul Downtown, is a stone's throw from the Xcel Energy Center and is, for all practical purposes, shut down while the convention is going on.

The other satellite airports that ring the Twin Cities area are slightly more accessible, but temporary flight restrictions abound making training flights a no-go unless one files a flight plan, gets a sqwak code, flies to an unaffected airport, closes the flight plan, does whatever training needs to be done then repeats the entire process in reverse. Hardly an efficient use of time.

The upside is I still have some work that I can get done. I've started flying a twin Cessna part-time for a cargo operation and since we're a scheduled operator and operate under IFR it should be business as usual. I have three freight trips scheduled this week so I'll still get in a good deal of flying.

It's really a good situation. The part-time freight work helps stabilize my income stream a bit and I can keep instructing on days when I'm not flying bags around the upper Midwest.

Hey, the chopper has moved off and it's quiet again.

Nope, it's back. It's going to be a long Labor Day.