New camera! Lens questions...

After years of dreaming and lusting, I finally have a quality camera, a
Sony A700. Bought the body only, but my brother has loaned me several
lenses until I can get my own. My overall interests are scenery and
closeup (flowers, insects, etc). But I'm also quite interested in taking
great photos of airplanes, static and in the air. I don't have a lot of
money to blow on fancy lenses. And boy in looking around, cameras are
like a Bridgeport mill. Machine itself may not be cheap, but tooling up
to make it useful is where the money really is...

But this group inspires me, and so I thought I'd inquire here.
So looking for recommendations on some good basic lenses. Zooms are a
given, but also quite open to fixed focal.
And, any sites to recommend with tips on getting good aviation shots?

Looking forward to finally taking shots worthy of sharing here.

Thank you,


Jon