It's better to be down here wishing you were up there, than to be up there wishing you were down here. An airplane will probably fly a little bit over gross, but it won't fly without fuel.
Speed is life, altitude is life insurance.
If you're ever faced with a forced landing at night, turn on the landing lights to see the landing area. If you don't like what you see, turn 'em off. Too many pilots are found in the wreckage with their hands around a microphone or holding onto a keyboard. Don't drop the aircraft in order to fly the microphone. An airplane flies because of a principle discovered by Bernoulli, not Marconi.