One thing I have neglected to do in the last year is fly flight simulators on my computer. It's a hobby that has been in my blood since I booted up my first PC around 1984. I can honestly say I have owned every single version of Microsoft Flight Simulator since *before* it came out! I have probably logged thousands of hours in the virtual sky. I especially enjoy small prop aircraft, and the Boeing series of airliners. These days the standard is Microsoft Flight Simulator X, which is an incredible jump in technology from the previous version, Flight Simulator 2004 "A Century of Flight." Recently I purchased a terabyte external hard drive, which cleared up enough room on the local drive the reinstall the grand master of all flight sims.

You should see my set of flight sim software! Of course, I have FSX (the Acceleration add-on is ordered and on the way) with SP1 and SP2 installed. From there I have the registered version of FSUIPC, which allows for excellent communication between the base game and third-party programs & hardware. The only third-party aircraft add-on I use is the Level-D Boeing 767-300 for FSX, which can be described as nothing less than totally realistic in its systems and graphics portrayals. I also use an add-on for the add-on (how about that?) called FS2Crew, which literally adds a crew to the 767. The crew functions enhance the simulation to the maximum degree, even allowing for the co-pilot to take off and land the plane for you in all weather conditions if you so desire. A second add-on for the add-on I use is a DVD flight training video made by AoA Productions, explaining every function of the B763 is minute detail. The flight planning software I use is FSBuild 2.3, which is awesome because it allows for the use of flight routes as well as SIDs/STARs, and can export it into a file which FSX can import. To top it all off, I use an external program for air traffic control functioning, called Radar Contact. As a real air traffic controller, I can tell you this is the closest you will get to real ATC services in a game at the present time. It is much better than the default ATC.

In the past I have been into flight simulation to a much more major degree than I am now. A few years ago I attended two flight simulation conferences sponsored by AVSIM. I also used to run a complete set of functional hardware designed to simulate an actual cockpit. These days I find it adequate to run a simple joystick with rudder and throttle capabilities.

Now that I am back in the sky, I feel at home again!