Wow Richard, the stories you tell.. What a blessing it must have been to experience all these things and thank you as always for sharing. I love listening to peoples stories and always implore others to listen to peoples stories as it enriches our lives as well since we wont all be able to experience everything life has to offer.
There are a few others here on the forum who also has magical stories they have shared with us and to them also I send my deepest appreciation.
Never apologize for telling stories, there will always be people wanting to hear them. My grandfather was one of those story tellers that I could listen to forever. Miss that so much...
Oh, I have had conversations with people that would not paint a Gulfstream 550 livery onto the HTAI Gulfstream V because "it's not the right aircraft". I'm very much of your mind. I need a Gulfstream 1, now where's that SAAB 340 paint kit!
So funny that you mention this. One of my very first repaints and uploads for FS9 was that of Pelican Air and Asas de Mocambique's Gulfstream 1's. I also could not find a suitable model, so Mike Stone's Saab340 was the one used and released. I am sure some people were not impressed and I even think I received some emails pointing out the "issues". Oddly though I clearly wrote in the Readme that this all was the case so did not even bother to reply to those mails at the time other than with the words "please refer to readme"...

When it comes to my scenery that I design though it is a completely different matter and I take very little (if any) "artistic license". Other than the clutter or static vehicles/planes, all buildings and other structures are exactly as it is at the real airport/airfields. This is also one of the main reasons I have not really done large airports, since in South Africa you are not allowed to go and photograph airports (except if you are either willing to jump through a million hoops or pay for the "privilege's" (if you know what I mean)). So until I find enough photos, I simply don't even go down the route of designing them. Must be the accountant in me coming through with my OCD

Downloading sceneries is an entirely different mindset again and there I am grateful for anything that remotely resembles the actual and true nature of the airports.
It's the hottest day of the year and I'm taking a break after defrosting and cleaning a freezer (luckily we have more than one, otherwise dinner would be huge). There's a nice logic about doing that job on this day.

Greetings
Kabous