I have no doubt that any amount of alcohol within 24h of doing a hop in the soup is playing with fire. But absolute abstention? I dunno.
As for flying in IMC, modern avionics makes that stuff much easier. Getting an instrument rating has become more of an effort in mastering procedural complexity than any relevant flying skill. I did my rating almost 40 years ago. It took a different mind-set with basic steam-punk instruments.
Nephew got his rating about three years ago and has about 700 hours, with about 150 on the gauges, but all done with the modern stuff that does the situational awareness thinking for you. We were shooting an RNAV in the soup last winter in my old bird with mostly old stuff in the panel. He never got stabilized and I had to take the bird and took a missed approach.
His comment was that it should be illegal to fly in IMC with that "old shit". Whatever. Never bothered me any. And I have a few beers per week, but never within 48h of screeching "clear prop".
I'll tell what should be illegal: my wife's pork tacos without beer.
Unless the ATIS specifically stated that you should expect a visual approach, the controller violated FARs and is part of a criminal conspiracy. Also, phrases and specific words that controllers are allowed and required to use are well documented. The transcript revealed the use of non-standard terms; which is very dangerous when a controller does not precisely communicate with a pilot using English as a non-primary language.
I am a licensed (private) pilot with an instrument rating. I fly a GA airplane aprox 150 hr/yr, mostly for business. Within the previous two years, FAA controllers have given me incorrect instructions in three seperate instances, twice while I was deep in the soup. The controllers failed to correct their errors even after my readback, then yelled at me when I wasn't going where they wanted me to go. Each time, I had a camera on the panel and the camera's audio connected to the ICS and radios.
The latest incident, the controller told me to call them after landing. I refused to talk to them without legal counsel, so they forwarded the incident to an Air Safety Investigator. My lawyer listened to the controller's many falsehoods, then listened to the investigator ask me questions. Then my lawyer talked to the investigator as follows:
lawyer - have you pulled the tapes?
FAA - yes, but I have not listened to them.
lawyer - do you think that the controller could have given him an incorrect vector?
FAA - not possible.
lawyer - please listen to this. [plays video on computer]
FAA - [after playing video] we cannot further discuss this. We will need [controller] to bring a union rep.
me - Why don't we send the video to the FBI. Isn't it a felony to lie to a federal investigator?
FAA - [quickly exits room]
Most enroute controllers are working six days a week. I do not care, so am I. Many, perhaps most, experienced controllers are making north of $200k. I am not.
Final note. When dealing with any level of authority, record everything. Put cameras in your home, in your vehicles, and on your body. The authorities, whether it be the local police or the feds, are not there to help. You will lose money and time and freedom if you cannot document their incompetence and malfeasance; and even then you may still go to jail.
Not quite anecdotal, but a very narrow range of subjects.
Sample of 19, all male, between 19 and 26, medium age 21. Approximately half were smokers. All had scored a class I or II PFT prior to deployment, had passed a physical, and were in good to excellent health.
Environment and Conditions = Aircraft carrier on gonzo station in the Indian Ocean. Period = 4.5 months. Working temperature range 24 to 35C, 50 to 100%RH. IMA mostly sedentary, sitting at avionics bench in air conditioned space. OMA mostly active, on flight deck or on hanger deck
Work level = 12 to 24 hr/day for OMA(this includes chow breaks). 10 to 20 hr/day for IMA. Both worked 7 days/week.
Food Intake - OMA people ate 3x to 5x per day where range of consumption not less than 3400 cal/day. High end of consumption range indeterminate, probably over 5700 cal/day. IMA people ate 3x/day, unless standing a mid-watch, where range of consumption was 3100 to 4200 cal/day.
About 30% of OMA subject did weights 3x to 5x per week. Essentially all IMA lifted 2x to 6x per week.
Results - all OMA people lost between 5% and 20% body mass by end of cruise. I lost approx 9%, but may not be representative because I spent approx 30% of time working in IMA.
IMA people weight gains ranged from 0% to 10%.
Source = Senior Chief Corpsman (paygrade E-8) that was collecting performance data on aviation maintenance personnel for unknown reasons.
Based on this small sample, I could conclude that both caloric intake and activity level are among the principle things that effect a weight loss or gain.
This is an edge case. Marines in particular, and the military members in general, will form a special bond that can seldom be duplicated elsewhere. And that has been my experience.
I was among a group of six that met at the schoolhouse after boot camp. We did not get sent to the same units, but we were all PCS'd to the same base. Two of us (not myself) made a career of the corps, and the others went to school after separation to get various STEM degrees; all four of us attended two schools within 60 km.
After graduation, our physical distance slowly increased with each new job, but we never stopped talking to each other and typically met in person one to five times per year. The singular spouse that accepted our special friendships and our strong sense of mutual loyalty to each other, is the marriage that endured over the last 35 years.
My wife is very special to me. She is the center of my immediate world. But these, now five, friends would have been there to pick me up if my wife had ever kicked me to the curb.
Epilogue. The five of us are now, at least, semi-retired. The other four are now single. Three of them are building another house on my property in which to live out the remainder of their time. They have accepted my wife is the sixth member and as a 'principle'. Our only recurring issue is which of the six will have to die alone.
I am not a great father. I am an uncle that 'helped' my wife raise a niece and nephew. Many consider my guardianship to have been, at best, poorly implemented.
I simply went along with whatever they had wanted to do. My wife was stuck with all the non-fun stuff. We climbed mountains, we hiked across deserts, we flew airplanes, we canoed rivers, we ate whatever we wanted and when we wanted (at least when the wife was not around), let them routinely skip school when the wife was not in town, taught them to use all of the power and hand tools in my shop, taught them to use all of the equipment on my electronics benches, took them to IPSC matches, took them to rock concerts (at least I did not allow any weed smoking). Took them to whatever R-rated movies they wanted. Read Heinlein, Asimov, Sprague de Camp, Le Guin, and other such stuff when they were young as bed-time fare. I shit you not, their favorite was 'A Brief History of Time' - not a chance that kids at 5 and 7 years of age understood that Hawking shit, but they liked it.
The boy got a fancy PhD and does stupid shit for stupid people that pay him obscene salaries. The girl got music and math degrees and teaches music and math in a New Mexico public school.
My wife says that they turned out ok in spite of my non-efforts, not because of them. She may be correct, I dunno.
0. I am mostly a hardware guy. Process automation, ATE, manufacturing, and product and process compliance. Banging out code ranges from 10% to 50% of each job.
1. My experience and skill set is not that common. Most EEs and MEs have eschewed this field because it has, outside of FAANG-type companies, paid less.
2. If you go the formal accreditation route, getting up to speed in EMC/Product Compliance/Corporate Conformity, depending on the industry sector, is approx 4 to 7 years.
3. Most of my original client contacts came from attending various IEEE Society symposiums. New business contacts are through former/current clients.
The American and Canadian military are significant examples where many organizations are 'run' by people under 30. Yes, most field-grade and general officers, and senior NCOs are over 35. But, for example, the day-to-day decisions of logistics and tactics and technological is done by people between 19 and 27, by junior enlisted and company-grade officers.
I have never had as much responsibility an operational control over my job, in both fiscal and mission terms, as I had between the ages of 19 and 23 while in the military.
As for flying in IMC, modern avionics makes that stuff much easier. Getting an instrument rating has become more of an effort in mastering procedural complexity than any relevant flying skill. I did my rating almost 40 years ago. It took a different mind-set with basic steam-punk instruments.
Nephew got his rating about three years ago and has about 700 hours, with about 150 on the gauges, but all done with the modern stuff that does the situational awareness thinking for you. We were shooting an RNAV in the soup last winter in my old bird with mostly old stuff in the panel. He never got stabilized and I had to take the bird and took a missed approach.
His comment was that it should be illegal to fly in IMC with that "old shit". Whatever. Never bothered me any. And I have a few beers per week, but never within 48h of screeching "clear prop".
I'll tell what should be illegal: my wife's pork tacos without beer.