Lesson one:

YOU cannot "Beat" whatever is thrown your way, that's why you try to AVOID it! Most guys who have gotten themselves into a bad situation, and lived to tell, will say.... "Never again!"

But it takes bad experiences like that to build good judgement, good judgement keeps you out of bad situations. In Aviation, you should NEVER go looking for trouble, it will find you, don't worry about that, that's why you always need to have thought about a Plan B, before you even get in the plane.

You may be too young to remember an old TV add campaign, but the punch line was, "It's not nice to fool with Mother Nature".

You cannot beat mother nature. She is a cruel bioch, she don't care if you are low on fuel, that's when she'll cover the ground with fog for 100 miles. Now whatcha gonna do in your nifty 150?

When I was a kid, my mom (a private pilot) used to say, "There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots, but there are no old, bold, pilots."

My dad, who was a CFI when I was 8 (now a retired NWA Capt.) used to say to some of his studs, when they wanted to go up when the weather was turning bad, "You go right ahead and take off into that crap, I'll be sitting right here, and I'll be here tomorrow too, I doubt if you will be though."

Read up on the accident reports, it's usually some guy who got in over his head, going into weather he had no business being in. Remember Jon-Jon Kennedy? And that was a lovely night, weather wise, a little haze, but he got in over his head.

Still want to go play up there? You think it's some kind of a game? You think if you are "Good Enough" you can beat Mother Nature? Ha! Many have tried.

Just remember, when you are dead, you are dead for a very long time.