I didn't get much sleep last night - pre-flight jitters? We head out to the airport. Good news - the tire is fixed. I preflight and we go up. The hood goes on at about 1000 feet, and John gives me a few vectors and says climb to 5500. At 5300 he gives me another vector and I miss the altitude, but catch it and get back down where I belong. Wise guy. We begin work. First, some holds over VORs, which don't go too badly. John wants me to look at the center of the AI, not the top. I try but we decide that perhaps we should cover the top, so I can't see it. I usually carry a roll of electrical tape in my flight bag, but we can't find it, so he neatly solves the problem by failing the AI altogether. We do a few more VOR holds, then some intersection holds. The AI comes back and we do some at NDBs. John has chosen a local AM talk radio station to hold at, so I'm treated to trying to calculate wind correction while some woman is droning on in my ear about her son's sexual dysfunctions. We head back with John giving me vectors, and the hood comes off as we're entering the pattern. I'm about to enter the downwind when John asks me why I'm so high. I look at the altimeter and say 1150 seems okay for entering downwind runway 29, and he replies that I'm supposed to be on base for runway 23. Oops!!! I cut power and slip the heck out of the thing, with the VASI going red/white just as I cross over the numbers. Good thing there's 5000 feet in front of me. I save the landing, and we break for lunch in historic Concord.

After lunch, we start doing VOR approaches on the sim. The first one he throws at me is the VOR 12 at Concord, NH. To the VOR, descend to the procedure turn outbound, descend to the VOR, new heading and descend to the airport. It sure kept me busy; I can hardly wait to try it in real life.

The VOR approaches go alright for the most part, but I seem to have a mental block for the difference between '...cleared to the VOR, expect the approach' and '...vectors to the approach'. I also have the alarming tendency to make right turns when I'm vectored to the left (I've never done this in a real airplane). Must be my lysdexia.

We take a short break and then continue with NDB approaches. Some confusion, but basically I have the idea. We try (and he leaves me with as homework) the Manchester NH NDB 6: a hold at the beginning, a letdown, another letdown after a VOR radial, then missed approach to a VOR hold, and finally that VOR hold has a course back to the original NDB - sort of a big circle. I can fly this all night if I have to. I will, but first some dinner

Honest, I hoped to spend dinner reading about ILSs (tonight's homework assignment), but the restaurant was one of those where if they have one large table and two small parties, they'll seat you together. I've got my study guide out, and it turns out that the fellow of the couple I'm seated with is a pilot and runs an aircraft leasing business. We all have a delightful chat, but not about ILSs. Back in the room, I try to fly the Manchester circuit without much success, until I turn the wind down. I'll try again tomorrow. I tentatively choose the destinations for my long cross-country - Montpelier, VT and Orange, Mass. I've always wanted to go to Montpelier, and Orange is in about the right spot and has no tower, something I need. I quit slightly past midnight.