Airmen Medical Exam

I had my medical today. This amounts to a ten minute physical and then paying a doctor $165 for a piece of paper saying yeah, this guy probably won't have a heart attack while flying. A third class certificate, which is what I got, is good for non-commercial flying and lasts five years. This medical certificate coupled with my student pilot certificate is all the legal documentation I need to fly solo as a student. The only thing left is the go-ahead from my CFI.

Interesting thing of note, I am red-green colorblind, which means my certificate is restricted to daytime flying with a radio. I haven't thought too much about how this would hamper my plans with flying. I imagine it'll be easy enough to plan trips during daylight hours, and I can't imagine why I'd want to go up without a radio. I have the option to contest the restriction though, by going up with an examiner and demonstrating I can see the color signals from a control tower. Colorblindness varies widely from one colorblind person to another, and so do the actual colors used for things like traffic signals and navigation lights. One of these nights, I'll hang out at an airport to see if I can tell the difference between the colors being used because I've never tried it.