Oops.

    So the toy, while a wonderful thing, is not really working out. Maybe if I moved to a Great Plains state, or even a Pretty Good Plains state, I would be in clover (which may or may not be a pun), but where I live there just aren't any wide open spaces. This isn't to claim that this is anything like Manhattan; the furthest thing. We're just lousy with trees is all.
    My old middle school would be the best place to play, as half of its lot is an open field the size of a city block. Unfortunately, it is very popular with joggers. This wouldn't be a problem if drones were easy to control. However, this one at least is not, particularly. Sooner or later, I'm going to bring it down too fast and too inattentively and clock somebody on the head.
    That isn't what happened yesterday, but it was worrying enough. Drone got away from me and was headed for the school so I cut power and it landed atop a metal covering for a walkway from the school to the parking lot. I bounced it off but then crashed it behind a fence. By sheer miracle it landed rotors up so I was able to fly it out. Otherwise, I would have been climbing a fence, never a good idea in front of witnesses and never a good idea in hiking boots.
    So I call that a lucky escape. The problem is that you can only get fun interesting pictures if you go really high. The ancillary problem is that the range of the controller is only 90 meters so when you go high is also when you no longer have control. Also the wind up there is often a lot stronger than the wind where you're standing. Result: I need a really really big field with nobody else around, or anyway nobody else around who is likely to sue me.
    I'm stumped. This morning, in a continuing effort to put off real life to the maximum extent possible, I went to Camden to Goodale State Park on the grounds that they used to have an unpopular 9-hole golf course and that should have been a great place to drone. Alas, I hadn't been keeping up. They seem to have closed the course many years ago. The area around the park's mill pond would be great for somebody with skills, but that is not yet me. I will definitely go back should I ever develop any.