So I’m flying along, fat, dumb and happy in my Lancair IV-P. I had blasted off out of Fargo, N.D. There is good news and bad news about the frozen north, my new home. Okay, the bad news first—it’s really cold here. Did you know that the Centigrade/Celsius system is the same as the Fahrenheit measuring system in Fargo? Well, it is—at minus 40 degrees. Yep, you don’t need a “C” or an “F” at minus 40 degrees—there’s only one minus 40 for both systems. You know it when you feel it, trust me.
Leaving Fargo, I flew over to Grand Forks, N.D. (motto: “We’re like Fargo, only colder!”) and did a touch-and-go. Then I pulled into a closed pattern so I could relive my T-38 days in the U.S. Air Force, and then exited the pattern, heading to Grafton, N.D. I spent the flight fooling around with my glass cockpit (“the heads-down display”), the autopilot and the radio and thinking about how Grafton had beaten us in the North Dakota boys’ high school hockey tournament in 1979 (although I am so over that).
