awesome

Mason's Tweet solo

In the Tweet world, this week was a good rebound from the crappy weather spout we had. I got to fly Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and today was a “travel day” so we didn’t have to come in at all. Although birds were a real problem in the area, I still managed to get my requirements done and solo on Thursday. There’s a rule about when birds are too severe, then no solos, and if it’s moderate, then solos can only do three patterns before making a full stop landing. When we got into the plane, they were first reporting severe so I thought my whole day just went down the tubes. But luckily they changed it right then to moderate, so I still got to do my three little patterns (a whopping 15 minute flight). Still, I’m relieved to have it done with. This last week, I had some concepts about the pattern work really click for me so I feel a lot more confident.

After we get back from our winter break, I’ll be pushing on to instrument work and doing some aerobatic maneuvers (loops, aileron rolls, etc). I’m not sure but I think there’s only about 9 more flights for me now before my contact (basic visual maneuvers) checkride. It’s a little different than civilian training syllabi in that a lot of the phases overlap. For example, I’m in the contact phase right now but I’m also doing introductory instrument flights. In college, it was very separated between what you were training in (visual one year, instrument one year, multiengine one year, etc). It’s a lot more to study and be prepared for so no slacking off too much during break!

The pics and video are from my solo takeoff in the T-37 Tweet. In the Air Force, the IP hops out of the plane and sits in on the little tower that controls all the pattern work. So he could hear and see everything I was doing. It’s a little more nerving than the civilian world where the instructor shakes your hand and goes inside to an office room to chew his nails until you land. But all was good, I think the controller even rated one of my landings as an “excellent touchdown” which doesn’t get given out too much (at least not to me)..

Mason forgot to mention the most important part…me! Since we got out of school on Wednesday I was lucky enough to get to go see Mason’s solo. I didn’t actually get to see him fly, but I was in the flight room with some of the guys in his flight and I got to hear him over the radio. Then I got to go with the guys out to the dunk tank. It’s tradition to throw the guys into this big (nasty) tank of water after they solo. So for me, it was pretty fun hanging out with the guys and I don’t think they minded that I brought a huge bag of chocolate chip cookies with.

Mason and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings for a celebratory dinner, and then went to the casino, since it was military night. Unfortunately they changed the hours from 5-9, so we were there too late, but discovered that we each had some money on our cards. Our rule, only play with the money they allot us…so we went in with $15 free, and came out with $28.25…overall I’d say pretty good! Mason and I are definitely enjoying the time off from work, and are now looking forward to Christmas on Tuesday, and a visit from my family next week. Mason just left for a group motorcycle ride with some of his classmates, and I’m going to just hang out and maybe run a few errands. PS, it is 76 degrees here today! :-)

Some photos: http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015131&l=6e5ff&id=77800450

It was beginning to look a lot like Christmas

This week was one of those weeks where you just wanted to hang out indoors. For me that was fine, since I'm teaching during the day, but for Mason that meant no flying. Fortunately, the weather has turned around and this weekend brought sunny skies and 50 (almost 60 degree weather). I finally hung my outdoor thermometer, so now I can just look out the backdoor and see the tempertures rise.

Mason and I are finally getting into the holiday spirit, and I told Mason he would get the husband of the year award. He changed his mood around and we hung our holiday lights this weekend. We tried to hang them earlier in the week in the rain, and it didn't turn out too great. We had a difficult time hanging the lights, and even duct tape didn't work. We finally decided to purchase the little clips you need to hang the lights to the roof. They now look great, thanks to Mason's height! We went to town last night and had an awesome dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings. We didn't have fond memories of it from a visit in Champaign, but REALLY enjoyed it last night. We finished off the evening by purchasing our first Christmas Tree.

Today, we decorated the tree and did some early spring cleaning. We went through a lot of the tiny things that accumulate around the house, and tore apart some closets with things that were still boxed from the move. It's crazy to think we've been living here 5 and a half months already. I guess that means we're closer to the end, although things here are going well. I've come to realize that Wichita Falls is one of those places that you can't judge by it's cover. There's actually some cool little places, it just takes awhile to find them.

I only have 2 and a half days until I am on my 2 week school break, and Mason gets off Thursday afternoon. Hopefully he'll get his solo flight before then. My students had their holiday program on the 11th and they were GREAT! I attached a video. They learned social dances, and were awesome.

Cheers to another week!

http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015053&l=90893&id=77800450

A crappy winter wonderland

This week sucked.

I, along with most of H flight, flew ZERO times this week. Every day was cloudy and either icing conditions or complete fog. In Illinois, fog over the airport in the morning was normal but it would burn off as the day went by. But here, the fog just shows up and doesn't move all day.

My last flight was last Friday and I was starting to feel like maybe I knew what I was doing up there, "flying a decent jet". But now after not flying for so long, that confidence has dropped back down. I spent a lot of time in the sims all week just practicing for my next flight. I have two scheduled flights before my first solo. They're supposed to be all pattern work (just touch and go's) so that will be good for me. Because we've all had such a long break without flying, they might give us an extra flight but maybe not. Our last day of flying before winter break is Thursday so that gives me four days to fly 3 good sorties if I'm going to solo before break (which is the goal).

With all the sitting around and not flying, you would think I would get a lot of studying done. But really, with 12 students all sitting around in our flight room all day, it's extremely difficult to focus on what you're reading. With the exception of one guy who's already solo'd, all of us are at about the same point in training.

Tonight is an ugly sweater/turtleneck & eggnog party at one of the guy's houses. More chairflying this weekend and better luck next week.

In other news, Christmas/Hannukah lights have still not been hung. Nails/screws didn't work. Duct tape didn't stick. I don't think the plastic clips at the store will hold. Staple gun is next.
Chuck Norris approved our class patch so that's in production right now.
People in Texas complain non-stop when the weather is below 60 degrees. It's a little annoying.
We tried to go for a big group motorcycle ride last weekend since the Italians got their bikes but we got rained out. Bummer.
We went to Ellen's school's winter production and it went exactly as you would picture a 3rd-? grader show to be. The 3rd-5th graders ended up being much better than the high school students.

For grins and giggles

Check this out: http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1239982372

Where does the Time Go

This week went by so fast. I can't believe that it is already December, although it's hard to think about holidays and such when it's still 70 degrees out. (Not that I am complaining. It's great!) This weekend was also too fast. Mason and I seem to keep passing during the week with our different schedules so Friday night we went out to dinner at On the Border (yum!) and had a chance to catch up on all the things that happened during of busy week. We both were feeling sick this weekend, so Saturday we mostly slept. Mason seems better, but I still don't feel to great. We ran a few errands, and worked around the house and got to go out to dinner again, this time at the Texas roadhouse. They have really good BBQ. When we got home Mason took me for a night motorcycle ride. It was pretty fun, since the weather was perfect and the fresh air felt good, but it was a little scary since he took me on the highways for the first time. It's pretty scary when a truck goes whizzing by...

Today, Mason's class painted a dunk tank by their training building. The tradition is that, when you have your solo flight you get dunked into the tank. Mason's class will be working on their solos over the next few weeks, so they got to paint the tank with their class theme...they chose Chuck Norris quotes. It was warm, but VERY windy today, so it felt pretty cold. I tagged along for fun (and borough cookies.) we didn't too much work done, but Mason spent the night studying, and I took it easy to prepare for tomorrow.

http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2014831&l=6ef28&id=77800450

Holidays = no work = yay!

This week was just as hard as any, but it got done early for both of us so there was much rejoicing. Ellen got off at noon Tuesday and I got out at noon Wednesday. I flew once this week but did a couple simulator flights. Things just keep getting added on to every flight. I'm still working on getting a hang of all the radio calls and remembering to do all the little checks here and there. The Air Force is full of these acronyms for every bloody detail. So you can be going through a practice emergency procedure situation, and only use about 2 pages in the checklist, but between those two pages, you end up having to remember like 10 acronyms (some of which are acronyms FOR other acronyms!). It gets a tad excessive.

The military is also very vague about VFR (Visual/good weather conditions) vs IFR (instrument / cloudy weather) which is strange for me to get used to coming from civilian flying. Every training flight includes parts under IFR and parts under VFR and you don't even realize it because of the way they apply the rules. A lot of manuals refer to "standard cloud separation minimums", yet I've never found what that means in the military regs.

Only about 8 flights left until we're supposed to solo, a little intimidating...

Ellen and I spent most of the weekend hanging out and relaxing. We went easy on the Thanksgiving dinner since we already had turkey etc twice in the last month. Around base is pretty empty since a lot of people went to Dallas or are visiting home. For the first time, weather dropped too so things don't seem as chipper and bright. It went from about 87 one day to 38 the next.

Yesterday, we decided to take a trip up to the Wichita Mountains near Lawton, OK. We were originally going to take the motorcycle, but since it got colder and we weren't sure how much hiking we would be doing, we opted for the car. I had heard people joke that the Wichita Mtns are more of just a few hills and no big deal. But the website and online reviews said it was a really nice place. It turned out to be amazing. The mountains were pretty good-sized in our opinion (bigger than just a few hills at least). But the really great part about it was the wildlife. Maybe it was because of the cooler, darker weather, or maybe it was because it's not the summer season when there's so many people going through the park. But either way, there were a ton of animals. We had been disappointed when we went to Caprock Canyons because it was a refuge and bragged about the wildlife on the website. But when we got there, the only real wildlife was tucked away in pens out of public sight. Wichita Mountains sounded the same on the website, but when we got there, it was a really huge spread of plains and mountains with animals everywhere. There were random fence lines here and there but we weren't sure what their purpose was.

We drove around most of the park, but spent a couple hours climbing up one of the mountains. We started on the trail, but then a lot of other groups were following along and making too much noise. So we took a turn and went over the rocks to see some good nature. We got our first Texas snow while we were there. It was only a little bit of dried up hale but we'll still count it. As we were driving around, we saw a herd of buffalo twice. The first time, they were just grazing next to the road in an open field. The second time was when we were leaving and they were crossing the road in a wooded area. A bunch of cars were all stopped and we were in the middle. It was pretty crazy since they were right next to our window. A couple of them broke out in a fight and that's when we decided to start moving on before we got a dent in our new Highlander. We saw a lot of deer and elk roaming through the woods. We stopped at one area which was literally a prairie dog community. There were a few dozen of them all in this small little area full of holes. We ran into a group of ugly looking wild turkeys. And at the top of the list, we saw the animal that I had really been looking forward to finding ever since we went to Caprock. We were driving down a long road that had lightly wooded area on either side. About a half mile ahead, we saw a short animal crossing the road that looked sort of like a coyote or wolf trotting along. But when we got closer and stopped to see it, it turned out to be a bobcat! We were really surprised at how non-ferocious looking it was, but it was unmistakable with the pointy ears and cat-like body. Of course, none of our photos of the bobcat came out because it was that perfect time of dusk when there's not enough light for anything to be in focus. Lastly, we saw some famous Texas Longhorns as we were leaving. Big animals they were.

On our way home, we also stopped by Ft Sill just to see what it was like on an Army base. Turned out to be pretty lame. It was dark out but the entire base had HORRIBLE lighting. We were on this main road and there were barely any street lights. We felt like we were just driving through an empty city. So maybe we'll go back sometime when there's natural light out.

Here's some good shots from the Wichita Mountains and adventures with Rembrant.
http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2014649&l=2752e&id=77800450

Here's our first attempt at putting a video on the blog, so cross your fingers- (it's 4 mb so it may take a couple minutes to load)

The Grinch has moved into town

'Twas the morning of Thanksgiving, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. The turkey was stuffed in the oven with care, in hopes that a hungry husband would smell delight in the air...

Okay, my rhymes are lame, but it is 6:30 am, and while the dear hubby was in bed around 11pm, I found myself with a restless, insomniatic (is that a word) night. It's a strange feeling being away from family for the holidays. This is actually the first Thanksgiving that Mason and I will be having together, as a married couple, and in our entire relationship. Thanksgiving was the one holiday where neither one of us wanted to stray from our families to be with the others. Christmas was a fair split between Christmas Eve, and the day of, but Thanksgiving was the one holiday where we both felt it necessary to be with our families. So I guess today, we have our family dinner, just the two of us...but not to worry that we won't be thinking of our families as we have green jello, cinnamon bread, stuffing, turkey, and play monopoly and Mexican train all day long. The Thanksgiving parade is on at 9am, and while Mason was less than thrilled about waking up for that, I think I will have plenty of energy to stay awake.

Meanwhile, on my original point, that the grinch has moved into town, in fact this very house, one could guess very easily that that would be Ebeneezer mason scrooge. Of this, he is very proud. While having the benefit of an early day off school on Tuesday I decided to go out shopping for some post Halloween bargains, and some early Christmas bargains. (yes, I skipped mowing the lawn.) I ended up getting 1 thing on a Halloween sale, that I was begging Mason to let me get for a month, but I got it 80% off...much better (but not free) I also got some Christmas lights for our non-(yet)-existent Christmas tree. I was only joking when I said to Mason that we could point a tree on the wall and hang the lights there...he may have taken me seriously. While it may be TETO (to early to obsess) I have reminded Mason that Christmas, with no tree, stockings, etc...would kinda be like any other day...so we'll see how that goes. And, apparently there are NO Jewish people in Texas whatsoever, because when I walk into a store and say, Hanukkah, menorah, dreidel...I get looks like I am from a foreign country...something not quite right.

Anyways, on a more positive note, Mason's aunt Caty and her husband Derik had their first baby girl Janneke this week, and she is so cute, we saw lots of pictures! So, it's fun to see both sides of the family growing all the time. Eventually we'll add to the Weinberg-Kehs population (but that will be in a LONG time.) Hope everyone has a happy and healthy Thanksgiving.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood

It is a beautiful 75-80 degree day here on November 20th. Today we had a half day of school (YEAH!) and are officially on Thanksgiving break. It's really hard to be in the holiday mood with such warm weather, but having the nice weather is great! My kids spent this week doing Thanksgiving crafts and such, a major difference from the elementary level to high school. I don't recall every making fan-tail turkeys, and Indian beads, and turkey place cards with high schoolers...you have to know a lot more crafts when you teach the younger ones. The transitions have been working OK with my students , but the 4th graders miss being with the 5th graders, and 3rd grade children are just crazy! But we'll get them in line shortly.

When we get back from break we'll be plowing into lots of work before Christmas break which starts on the 19th of December (1 month, not that I am counting.) When I was in school it seemed like we had SOOOO long until June, but on the other side as a teacher, it's crazy how much you have to teach in only 10 months. Testing is a whole different ballpark. My kids did some reading test s this week and scored very low, so we'll be doing lots of reading and writing practice. There is a lot of pressure when it comes to testing since I teach reading and writing (testing subjects) to 3 grade levels. We are actually using two online programs which seem very beneficial, at least one of them.

Mason is on early goes this week, which means his duty day is from 5am-5pm. Yesterday they were fogged out, and couldn't fly, but today should have been okay. I stopped by after school to bring the boys a cake, but they were taking a test so I left it with one of their IPs. They looked pretty funny all taking their test. It was like 12 peas in a pod.

It looks like we'll be having Thanksgiving, just the two of us, but if the weather's nice we'll probably take a drive to the Wichita Mountains, or check out some paths by the waterfalls. It will just be nice to have the break. Mason gets done tomorrow at noon. He's been heading to bed around 8pm lately, so I'm sure the normal sleeping hours will be good for him.

I'm looking forward to the rest of my relaxing day, I think I'll be hitting the gym and maybe giving the lawn it's last mow of the season...no rain in the near future.

Another week down

After about 5 flights in the T-37 now, I'm starting to feel a little bit like a pilot again. I've gotten more comfortable with all the checklist flows starting up the plane and shutting it down. The radio calls are getting there, although it's hard because the Air Force calls are so scripted. It makes it easy to learn/remember, but at the same time, there's no room for the civilian "uhhh, roger, we'd like the left side and uh, cleared to land, uh Archer three five". In the Air Force, you don't even get cleared to land- it's just assumed if you don't hear the contrary. I've still got a long way to go before I start flying this thing the way I'm supposed to. However, only about 10 flights left on the syllabus until we're supposed to solo. Hmmm

This upcoming week, we've got an academics test, our first EPQ, and standup EPs will begin. EPQ stands for Emergency Procedure Quiz but in reality they're based off tons of different info from our regulations, procedures, etc. I think we get one a week or so. Standup EPs are one of the big things that UPT is famous for. Every morning after our formal brief, the instructor will call up a student at random. You stand at attention while the instructor tells you the situation (you're just lifting off the ground on take off, passing 75 knots, and you see a blinking red light in the corner of your eye). From there, you have to go through some scripted lines, then completely analyze the situation, and go through the entire process of what you would do from there in painful detail. The whole thing can last up to an hour sometimes because of all the checklists and variety of things there are to jack up. It's hard to study for because of the span of things that could go wrong and you have to really understand the systems to get through it.

My flights have been going pretty good so far. After studying all last weekend, some concepts clicked in my head. Now we're going to be introducing a lot more maneuvers and the basics of taking off, getting to and from the training area, and landing are expected to be out of the way. I hadn't really stopped to think about it until this week was done, but they really don't spend a lot of time here teaching the basics like I just mentioned. They pretty much expect you to read the study material, spend one or two flights practicing it, and move on. Never once so far have I heard an instructor talk a student through the aim-point concept and what you're supposed to be looking at during the flare to level off and what you're supposed to be doing with your power and pitch as you go through the flare. But on the other hand, every student in our class either has previous civilian flying time, or has gone through their respective military's introductory flying program (IFS for Americans).

All this week has been start times around 7-8 am and release times around 6-7 pm. Starting this week, we'll switch schedules with our sister flight (the other half of our class) and we'll haves show times around 5 am. It's good because the weather should be clear and we'll get done with the stressful parts of our day early. But it's hard because you don't get the morning to prepare and mentally go through your flight. Lately, I've been getting the nervous sick feeling in my stomach leading up to each flight. I know what it is, so I continue the flight and forget about it once I step in the jet. But maybe with the early go's, my stomach won't have time to realize what I'm doing. On that same note, I think this week I start doing G-exercises during each flight. It's basically rolling into a 90 degree bank and pulling back for 2, 3, and 4 Gs to see how your body is feeling before practicing the rest of the maneuvers.

Personal aviation landmarks reached this week:
5 Gs
~260 knots
(they happened at about the same time... My instructor told me I can try entering our practice area by going inverted. Turns out what he meant was to just roll over and let the plane naturally fall into the altitude block. But what I did was roll over to inverted, pull back the stick, and take the area by storm. About halfway through the pull, the instructor took the controls, rolled over and pulled us back to straight and level flight. Miscommunication can getcha like that, luckily he was understanding about it)

Ellen and I attended a "changeover party" on Friday where the class that was previously in our flight room (H flight), was celebrating leaving the Tweets and going to the T-38s. They all took turns calling out their IPs and telling funny stories about them. Lots of drinking was involved... looooooots of drinking... There's gonna be a lot of working around tradition in this journey to fighter pilot land.

And today, Ellen and I went to this Hangar Bazaar that the spouse clubs sponsor on base. We didn't really know what would be there but it turned out to be another Texas knick-knack-palooza. There were about three booths (scented candles, boring jewelry, and stuff relating to the Texas star to decorate your house) that just repeated over and over and over and over.

Tomorrow's Sunday and everyone knows what that means - back to the books! ...dang

The weeks are flyin' by

Mason and I had very productive weekend of grading and studying, and enjoying the BEAUTIFUL weather here. We've been having sunny 70-80 degree days, with light breezes. It's really hard to get into the holiday spirit with the weather being so warm, it's hard to go in the stores and see Christmas everything out already.

We had Mason's flight over at the house on Saturday night, and I think there were only 9 or 10 of us total, which was less than expected, but we had a good time. I ended up making brisket, two small turkey breasts, peanut noodles, veggies, salads, mashed potatoes, and lots of dessert! Overall a big success, the guys all appreciated the home cooking which was the idea.

Sunday we mostly spent doing work and enjoying the weather. Mason got me a motorcycle helmet, so we went for a bike ride :-) It was pretty scary, but pretty fun too! Out here is is so nice because you can see for miles around, and you are riding on empty country roads with just the cows passing judgment.

I'm hoping that the weather lasts nice a little longer, I am hoping to plant my tulips next weekend, since I keep putting it off. Mason had today off for Veteran's day, while I went back to school. But next week I only have to work Monday and a half day Tuesday! YEA!!!! All continues to be good, we could use some visitors though, we get a little lonely and miss our families.

As usual though, we've included some pictures so you don't forget what we look like. :-)

http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2014489&l=5e711&id=77800450

The firehose is on, and the water is coming out my ears!

I have flown the tweet! Monday was our first day in the flight room where we spend our whole days, surrounded with our IPs. We received some briefings and then spent about an hour in the simulators with our instructors. There's 12 students in my flight (Hotel Hogs) and about 6 IPs assigned to our flight. So each IP has about 2 students who are assigned to them. That IP is the one whose desk you sit at and are supposed to take the majority of your questions to you. You'll fly with them a lot too, but it's very common to fly with a different IP just due to scheduling. I learned from the sim flight but I don't think we really got a lot done. While my flight partner (the other student assigned to my IP) went, I watched. But even then, I still was fumbling around when I got into the cockpit. The simulators here are really nice. The T-37 sims aren't full motion, but the cockpit is pretty much complete (you climb into it) and then it's always hooked up to the computer and running. So at any time, you can go in there with a classmate and just do a practice flight with no hassle or restrictions. My instructor kept bouncing around with all these different techniques about how to do the starting up checklist flows. And we ended up going back and forth so much on different techniques that in the entire two or three hours that the three of us were there, none of the "flight" was ever spent in the air.

Most of the week, our report time was around 7 am and we would start off with academics (which is nice in the morning, because academics are really low-stress; unlike with the IPs). Then around 10, we would head to our flight room where a student would do a briefing on the weather and restrictions for the day. Then the flight commander or a lead IP would give some critiques and quiz the flight on general knowledge. General knowledge are questions that come from anywhere in our regulations/books/manuals that relate to airspeeds, procedures, limitations, etc. So basically, on day 1 in the flight room, you're already expected to have read ALL your books and memorized everything. One at a time, each student stands up at attention and the IP asks a question. If you get it right, you sit down and they go to the next person. If you get it wrong, you stay standing until it gets all the way around the room and back to you again. Our flight did pretty well all week on all the questions (I didn't get any wrong, woo-hoo). How do we do this you may wonder? Gouge. And that's all I'll say about that.

After general knowledge, we would take a quiz on boldface emergency procedures and operating limitations. There's a form that lists all these items and boldface on the back. So you know exactly what the quiz is going to look like, you just have to fill in all the blanks (verbatim - including dashes, capitalization, etc). For all of Phase I, we were in blues. When you get to the flight room (Phase II), you're still in blues. You don't get out of them and into flight suits until the whole flight passes the boldface quiz three days in a row. So you really want everyone to pass! We passed Monday. Failed miserably Tuesday. Passed Wednesday. Passed Thursday (sorta - they let one mistake slide for some reason). And we should have passed Friday, but the official word isn't out yet. The flight room has an answering machine on which they record the next day's schedule every night. So everyone calls before going to bed to find out when they're flying the next day. And our IPs said they would post the results over the weekend. So everyone keeps calling to find out if we get to wear flight suits, but no message yet. Part of the reason blues are a pain in the ass (besides just being uncomfortable) is that we have to change into our flight suits for our flights. And then when we're done with flying, we have to change back. It gets pretty tiring and gross from the sweat. Not to mention everyone laughs at you when you walk down the hallway to the bathroom wearing your blues and carrying your flight suit.

On Tuesday, we had our dollar rides (your first sortie/flight is called the dollar ride because you don't really have to do anything, and you pay the IP a dollar afterwards that you decorate with quotes and such). We did sort of a tour of all the local visual references in the area and came in to a full stop landing (no touch and go's). It was awesome, but verrrrry different than the little Pipers I'm used to. Just wearing the helmet and breathing oxygen for the whole flight is enough the throw your game from the civilian world. Wednesday and Thursday, I flew again. No flights Friday due to scheduling and weather.

So how does it compare to civilian flying? How hard is UPT? Is it really like sucking on a firehose and trying to drink it all during the beginning? YES, it's f'in hard. The hands-on flying isn't much different than civilian flying, but the procedures and techniques are very different. Although the terms IFR and VFR still exist in the military, they're so blurred during your flight that they really lose all meaning. Basically every sortie involves portions under both VFR and IFR (regardless of the weather). And you think you need a clearance to land? No. Do you need to read back a clearance to taxi a runway? Only certain runways. And if you miss one word in the script of radio calls, you get written up for it. All the procedures and the way the pattern works are really hard to grasp. Each of my three flights, I've taken huge steps in seeing the big picture. But still, it's like trying to fly with a completely fogged windscreen. Each flight, I wipe off a little section of the window. And you think you're getting there, but then the IP tells you that you suck because it should all be clear already. When talking to other guys in the flight who have commercial ratings, etc. we all agree that it's a ridiculous feeling to know that you used to be such a great pilot, and now you can't even hold within 200 feet of your altitude.

So I've been doing a lot a lot a lot a lot of studying. It's hard, but when life sucks, I remind myself that it's supposed to be hard. The guys in my flight are great and we all get a long really well. There's been a few cases of airsickness already, but it's not a big deal (yet). Even I felt a little queezy on my second flight, which is the first time I've ever felt sick in an airplane. But I kept calm and just sorta "survived" the rest of the flight. When the question starts forming in your head about whether you're going to lose it in the cockpit, the learning process is pretty much over for that flight.

Personal aviation milestones this week:
Highest altitude flown while at the controls - 14,000'
Fastest airspeed flown while at the controls - 220 knots
Most Gs pulled - Positive 3.5
First hour in a jet aircraft (and two jet engines)
First flight using oxygen
First time flying inverted (that's right - upside down, WOOOO)

Three flights down. About 11 left until we're expected to solo. Got a lot of learning to do before then. Thank whoever that we get a three day weekend for veteran's day. Maybe I'll actually figure out how the hell to fly a military pattern with radio calls by Tuesday.

For any UPT-bound kids reading this, here's my advice so far:
When you get your pubs, read the manuals. Don't worry about the academic books because those are easy. But read the manuals, memorize the radio calls, and chew some other student's brain to learn what the heck a military overhead pattern and container are all about. I thought I knew from IFS, but they left out a lot of parts to it. As one of my IPs told me in the air - if you don't know it at zero knots on the ground, you sure as hell aren't going to know it at 200 knots 1000 feet above the ground.

Friday evening was the graduation for class 0801. So one year from now, it'll be our class (0901). As the baby class, we were required to attend and serve oddjob tasks. It was a good piece of inspiration after the first week of flying. Having everyone in their mess dress with all the past generations of pilots and IPs pinning on wings to new grads was good stuff. It was surprising how many pilots graduating had parents who were military pilots.

And today, we hosted a flight dinner at our house. Ellen sent out the invitations last weekend (before she realized we wouldn't have any time during the week to plan and get ready for it). But she spent the whole day cooking and we did a bunch of cleaning and it came out a big success. Not everyone in the flight made it so we have tons of leftovers now, but I'm not complaining.

Ellen's motorcycle helmet came in the mail today too along with my Illinois license plate so that's awesome. Maybe we'll take a spin around the neighborhood tomorrow. As soon as one of the Italians gets his Ducati (fancy Italian bike) which he ordered, we're all going to take a group ride up to the Wichita Mountains in Oklahoma.

On a final note, UPT is awesome. Despite the bitching and how hard it is, it KICKS ASS to go out to the jet with your parachute, strap in and put the visor down on your helmet, take off and climb way up there, go upside down, pull some Gs, and take it home (or try to do all that anyways). Ellen was telling a story about how she was telling someone I was "busy at work" and it didn't even click with me at first that she meant I was at pilot training. Flying jets for the Air Force is no job.

(I didn't take this photo, but it is of a T-37 and it gets the point across)

So long, farewell, I'll see you in 55 weeks

Well, I saw Mason for about 3 minutes this evening when he walked in the door at 7:35 from training, and said "I'll eat later, I'm going to group PT at the gym," he changed and POOF was gone again...guess the 12 hour days have really begun.

Things at school have been somewhat stressful, because there has been a decrease in enrollment and so they let a teacher go. Which in turn meant that all my 5th graders had to move to the other 4/5th grade class, and I now have 3rd and 4th graders! It's like starting all over again with all the new 3rd graders in my classroom. I still teach 3rd-5th Language Arts and Reading, so that's nice, but this kids are VERY rowdy! Is it Thanksgiving break yet???

Phase I of UPT COMPLETE

(sorta/almost)

This whole last week was spent bouncing back and forth between the classroom and the computer lab. There's a very structured arrangement of classes (in person and computer-based) that has to be done in a specific order. So this week, we learned every system in the T-37. It wasn't quite the "sucking from a firehose" metaphor that people talk about (I think that comes more this next week). Our academics instructor was really good about breaking things down into pilot terms. And surprisingly, the computer-based training (CBT) was actually pretty well-made (it had lots of animations). We'll have to take the final systems exam tomorrow morning which will be more of the official end to Phase I. It will be the first big exam we've taken since the Aero Phys exams (which I think were pass/fail anyways) so it's important to do well.

Although Phase I is done, we'll still do academics through the first few weeks of Phase II (T-37 flying). That's another thing that differs between ENJJPT and other UPT bases. Most UPT bases spend the first 6 weeks or so solely in academics, but ENJJPT overlaps part of academics with the beginning of the flight line stuff.

Most of academics included a start time around 0800 and an end time around 1400 (sometimes with a one hour break for lunch, sometimes just push straight through). Now that we're in Phase II, we'll be spending 12 hours a day in our flight room. Our class, 0901, is split into D flight and H flight (I'm in Hotel). After our systems test tomorrow, we'll meet our squadron commander (squadron is the next level over flights; all T-37 training here is under the 89th Flying Training Squadron). We'll also get fitted for our parachutes and then do our first link mission (they call the simulators "links", not sure why). Each IP (instructor pilot) has two students assigned to them, although you'll eventually fly with lots of other IPs based on availability and scheduling. So when I go to the sim tomorrow, I'll probably watch my IP and my flight partner fly the mission, then I'll hop in and switch places.

Tuesday, we're scheduled for our dollar ride in the T-37. Dollar ride is the tradition for the first training sortie. The expectations for the student are very low and the student is supposed to give a decorated one dollar bill to the IP afterwards. I'm looking extremely forward to pulling Gs, going faster than 200 kts, crossing 18,000' on the altimeter, and looking up to see the ground. I'm also very nervous though since I can barely remember how the heck to strap into the plane with the helmet, oxygen system, parachute, shoulder harnesses, etc. I also need to practice my anti-G strain maneuver (you tense up your whole body and take very short breaths every 3 seconds).

The whole atmosphere will be a lot different now that we're in our flight rooms because we'll be in there for a long time with our IPs and Flight Commander. There's a lot of stress and until we can pass 3 boldface tests in a row, we have to stay in blues. (Which means that we have to change into our flight suit before flights, and then change again afterwards - BOGUS!!!). We also have to take our PFT (standard Air Force physical fitness test) sometime this week or so. (blegh)

So that's that, big week up next.

Other headlines-
The housing landscapers annihilated our bushes in the front of our house. We didn't think they were the best looking plants around, but they were definitely better than the big stump and empty woodchip area they left us with. Hopefully they do something else to fix it up.

Ellen had her first motorcycle experience this week. We took a slow cruise around the block with her on the back of the seat. She was nervous, but she had the big biker grin by the end. A few of the Italians are getting bikes too so that will be fun when we can all go out for group rides. I think I saw two of them on my ride this evening but they didn't recognize me behind the helmet.

This week's casino earnings - $6.00 (and we've still kept to our rule of not spending any real money, only the free play they give us for military and men's night Sundays)

Rembrant still spazzes out whenever we try to hold him, and he poops a lot more than I ever thought hamsters did.

Handgrips raise, triggers squeeze, it's time for bed!

Mean ole Me

Mean ole me, I think I was probably the only teacher to give homework on Halloween. Not really any surprise when only a handful of children had actually turned in their homework...can't really blame them, after yesterday I didn't really want to do any work at home either. This week has been a busy one at school. Every three weeks my students have big culture presentations and this week is one of them, so it's a madhouse getting visuals done etc...although I did a better job so that they are organized and not in so much panic. I was fighting off a cold this week too, which made me a little more short tempered than usual.

Halloween was a fun day for the kids- too much candy. I used my "creativeness" and was a stop light, using three pieces of construction paper, not too original, but cheap. Mason and I carved our pumpkin on Monday so that I was fun. He was the designer and I carved. We didn't have too many visitors, but enough to make a dent in our candy bowl. It's nice that the weather was warm and the sun was up until 7:30pm. The weather has been much better here, cooler in the mornings and evening, but still in the low seventies during the day.

Tonight Mason and I hit up the casino and walked away with our "free" $6.00. Wahoo! Wee can get some frosties or something this weekend. I took pictures of my classroom on Wednesday morning. I'll take some soon with the kids in there, but for now here's a little look(and Halloween too). http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2014235&l=4a4bd&id=77800450

Saturday night date

Mason and I were reminiscing of past dates tonight as we went grocery shopping at 10pm at the Walmart...things do change from dating to married life. Today was a pretty relaxing day. I slept most of it trying to fight off a sore throat and minor head cold that I woke up with. Mason did some studying and washed both cars, and his motorcycle. Tomorrow we'll really hit the gym and the books. Grocery Shopping was pretty funny though, made us think of our younger years buying poptarts, and Eggo Waffles for school...Mason's schedule will probably not be so relaxed the next few weeks (well, year really) so we bought him some snacks to help him make it through the day.

Last night we went to the assignment night and "dinner" before hand for our class. We got to meet the instructor pilots that will be teaching Mason and the people in charge of his squadron. The Italian guys are so fun to hang around, and I told Mason I want them all to be our friends so that when we go there one day, we'll have places to stay. All in all good assignments were given out, 2 FAIPS, and 1 bomber, but the rest were F15/F16 and A-10s...so good variety in the new fiscal year. It was crazy to think that a year from yesterday Mason will find out his future plane...

Week 2 of Pilot Training

Week 2 is already pretty much done! "yaaaay"

We finished with Aerospace Physiology today and I guess the systems staff isn't ready yet for us so tomorrow is pretty much a day off. The only exception is that our class (the current "baby class") has to serve as designated drivers for tomorrow night's assignment night (baby class working for the senior class). There's also a dinner beforehand for us to get to meet our IPs and other staff.

So this week was pretty frickin great week all in all. Monday I passed the Aerospace Physiology exam with 100%. On Tuesday, we did parasailing, which was fun as hell. Last week and this Monday, we did a lot of training with how the parachute works and how to land properly after ejecting. So as the final training evolution, we went out to one of the big fields on base and they strapped us into a parachute, tied a rope from us to a pickup truck, and off we went! We were all pretty amazed at how quickly we went from standing still to a couple hundred feet in the air. You would see the rope coil start to get drawn out, then you knew it was about to lose all of the slack, you started to run, and by the 5th step you were already airborne. And I don't know exactly how high it was, but I'm thinking somewhere between 100 and 200 ft up there. Each person go to go twice. The first time, they would take you up and then slow down the truck so you had a somewhat-controlled descent. And the second time, they let you get to your max height, and then disconnected the rope. Being the large fellow that I am, I came down pretty fast. And on my second go, the wind wasn't working with me so I hit the ground with some extra 'umph'. But I did my fall that they taught us and it worked pretty well. I had a lot of dirt on my back, but all my bones were in tact and I wasn't even sore the next morning. Someone was shooting a video, so I'll try to get that later and post it.

On Wednesday, we moved on to the survival portion of class (still taught by the aero phys people). Although the staff seemed like they were trying hard (a lot of A1Cs and Senior Airmen that I think were teaching for their first time), they didn't really teach anything useful. I think because everyone knows that we have to go to Combat Survival School after pilot training, they don't bother getting too deep into anything. So the survival stuff pretty much came down to identifying the stuff that's included in our survival kit (which for the T-37, is pretty unhelpful). On the plus side though, they took us outside and let us practice using the different types of flares. It's too bad they don't sell these things in stores, because they were cool. One was an orange smoke flare (met for daytime out in the open), one was a BRIGHT burning red flare (meant for night), and the third was a little handheld device that shot off flare capsules about 1,000' in the air (meant to penetrate thick tree canopies).

Also yesterday, we did some training with the ejection seat itself. We practiced going through the ground and air egress procedures in these chairs that were identical to the seats in the plane. For the air egress, once you pulled the ejection handles, the seat actually sprang up a couple feet and the chair cushion snapped up so you were forced out of it. I give them an A for realism.

This morning, we took our exam on survival and I got one question wrong (96%). The whole class except 2 people got it wrong because we never went over it in class and it was about an acronym that was extremely unintuitive. But then a few students were talking to one of the instructors and it sounded like since we all go over the answers people got wrong in class, the aero phys staff marks down everyone as 100%. Which is nice because that means I got two 100%'s on my first two tests. But it's also bad because that means that I don't get any credit (moreso than my classmates) for studying hard. There was a score that you failed if you got below, but no one came close to that. This is one of the first of many many examples in pilot training to come where we have to face the challenge of getting "ahead of the power curve" vs. helping each other out and succeeding as a class. That can be taking the wrong way a lot, since we all want to help each other to do well at pilot training. But the unfortunate truth is that our assignments at the end of UPT will be based on how well we do compared to our classmates. Of course, everyone's biggest competitor is him or herself. But enough of that-

After the survival exam, we had to take our FACT (Fighter Aircrew Conditioning Test). I've been worrying about this one for a long time since I knew what it entailed and I've never been good with upper-body strength. So I've been training for this test for a long time. And ironically, as I've trained for the FACT, I've been doing less running, which has caused me to gain weight, which in turn means that I had to lift more for the FACT. Each exercise is based on a percentage of your body weight. I had been chugging water for the last few days trying to get my body ready for this morning. And when we started, I just wanted to get up and do it since I had all the adrenaline in me. So of course, I ended up being the LAST person called up to go. By then, they had all these other sweaty people so the doors were open to outside and it was freezing for me. But anyways, I went through it, and I passed! A lot of students say it's a really easy test and no big deal. But for me, it was hard. I knew it would be, and I trained a lot for it. Here's how it breaks down. There's 5 strength exercises and then 3 timed exercises. All 8 go in order with exactly one minute rest time in between. For the 5 strength exercises, you have to do at least 10 repetitions and 15 is the maximum. Each repetition has to be to a 6 count pace (they had a really annoying pace counter going the whole time). So to lift the weight takes two counts, then putting it down takes four more. This slow count is what really makes the test more difficult. So for my body weight, this is what I did -
15 Arm Curls - 75 pounds (35%)
14 Sitting bench press - 168.75 pounds (80%)
13 Lat pull - 150 pounds (70%)
15 Leg press - 340 pounds (160%)
15 Leg curl - 106.25 pounds (50%)

So I was only three repetitions from the maximum on all that. Then I had to do as many pushups as I could in a minute (20 minimum, 50 maximum). I pumped out 50. Then I had to do as many situps as I could in a minute (30 minimum, 50 maximum). I pumped out 50. Then I had to do as many leg press repetitions at my body weight (210 lbs) in a minute (20 min, 50 max). I pumped out 50.

So overall, I got 222 out of a maximum 225. "Kick - ASS". Obviously, I was pretty proud of that. I don't think I'll have to take test again until Introduction to Fighter Fundamentals (IFF - a course that comes after graduation from UPT). But now I can at least go back to balancing running and weights in my exercise routine. A lot of guys in our class maxed the test. We had one guy, who was the only guy who weighed more than me, not pass by 3 reps on the bench press. He was pretty bummed out and I felt for him, since I know how hard it was when you have more weight to push out. He'll get a chance to retake it in between T-37s and T-38s (Phase II and III). There was also an Italian in our class who did really well on the FACT, but then when he went to the bathroom, he passed out. So the flight doc and everyone rushed over and freaked out about it, but I think he's all good now. Usually the key with getting out of the flight doc's office is having a concrete okay reason WHY you passed out or spewed in the plane or whatever. When they can't figure out why your body did the funky chicken at 1 G, then you're in big trouble.

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For ROTC and inbound students out there, here's some things you should know. The situps are with your hands crossed over your chest, and your feet are propped up over a bench. So practice your situps with your legs up at a 90* angle over something. It actually turned out to be easier than a normal situp I think, especially if you keep your butt in as close as possible. For the weights, the 6 count deal sucks, but it can be made easier for yourself if you make sure not to go past 90* with your arms/legs. For example, on the bench press, don't bring the handles back in line with your chest every time, just get it to the point where your elbow makes a 90* angle. It's difficult to hold in that position, but not as difficult as it is to go all the way back and do that big pump every time. A lot of people in my class seemed to be thrown off by the leg press at your body weight. It's very unusual to do leg presses that fast on a machine, so even though you may be strong enough, make sure you practice the fast rhythm. For the weigh-in before the test, we did it in flight suits with our boots off. They subtracted 3 pounds for clothes and then rounded to the nearest 5 pound mark (whether that be up or down). Then they used a chart to figure out how much weight you would be doing on the machine (since the machine can't do 1 pound increments, sometimes you would have to go a little higher or a little lower than what your percentage would normally be). I haven't found this same chart anywhere else, so if you're really concerned about it, contact the aerospace physiology people at your training base. Note that I did find other charts that did the percentage math for you, but this was different since it grouped different body weights together so people from 200 - 210 lbs were lifting the same amount of weight, for example.
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This week, our class did a lot of brain crunching to come up with a good class patch. The process of getting them approved and created is a long one so we had to start right away. A few ideas were thrown out, mine got some "hey cool"s but no votes. Unfortunately, we ended up going with a Chuck Norris theme. Stupid Texas strikes again... So even though I didn't really like that theme, I still volunteered to design the patch and it came out looking pretty good. We're going to work with the patch company to finalize it, but here's what it's looking like so far. (The color scheme needs some work I think).
We also have a class website now, but it's not very amazing. Hopefully we'll "purdy it up" as we go. There's a link to some pictures on there but not very many yet.
http://enjjpt0901.weebly.com

Monday we'll start off with the systems instructors so we'll be back in our blues ("boooo"). It's pretty much our last week or two of Phase I and then we'll be going to our flight rooms and starting to master the screaming T-37 Tweet ("yaaaay").

Goodnight!

First Week of Pilot Training

1 down, 54 to go!

The first week of pilot training was pretty awesome. I've spent a lot of years thinking about what pilot training would be like and getting hyped up about what it would take to get there and survive through it all. And really, the first few days weren't what I was expecting. We were in service dress blues for Day 1 and it was pretty much all briefings from different people in the chain of command and services on base. We also had our picture taken for our files. We have 25 people in our class (16 US, 9 Italians). Most of the Americans are from ROTC and there are a few from the AF Academy (but no OTS and no Guard, which is unique).

We were in short sleeve blues for Day 2 and it was pretty much just more briefings. We also got fitted for our helmets. The rest of the week we were in flight suits because we were with the Aerospace Physiology people. The instructor staff is really good (knowledgeable and also laid back). We learned about the limits of the human body, the eye, all about the parachute, the atmosphere, etc. They taught us the proper way to fall down ("parachute landing falls"). They had a large gravel area with some platforms at different heights so we would all jump off them and fall down properly over and over. It was all with deactivated parachute packs on so it was sort of fun. Then they took us up on a higher platform (about 7 or 8 feet I think) and they hooked us up to this tall harness to simulate hanging from the parachute canopy. We would swing back and forth and then without a whole lot of notice, they would release the ropes and we would hit the ground. We did it over and over so that we could land on different sides / forward and backward. The whole day we did that was fun but the next morning nobody could move their neck because we were so sore.

On Friday, we got to go into the altitude chamber which is a little steel room in the Aero Phys building. They seal it off and pressurize it to simulate being at different altitudes. We got to wear our own helmets so that was cool getting used to breathing with them on. They took us up to 35,000 feet so we could get used to pressure breathing (instead of inhaling with your muscles and then relaxing to exhale, you have to use your muscles to exhale and then the air rushes in when you relax your lungs). Then we went to 25,000 and took our masks off. We did it one side at a time so we could watch each other feel the effects of hypoxia (lack of oxygen). They had a worksheet for us to do while off the mask so as we went, we could see how hard it was to focus. My symptoms weren't too extreme. I got light-headed and a little dizzy right off the bat. But then it was about 5 or 6 minutes before I started to feel really anxious / jittery. At that point, I put my mask back on. The guy across from me said that I was moving really slow going through the worksheet and taking huge breaths to try to gulp air. But when I was going through it, it felt like I was blazing through the worksheet and I didn't realize I was breathing so deep.

All day Friday, they (the 80th Flying Training Wing) was having Combat Air Force Day. I guess they try to have it periodically to give students insight into the planes they'll be flying after UPT. But since they only have the airshow here every other year, CAF Day is rarely this good. Since we were doing the chamber in the morning, we missed all the briefings. But in the afternoon, we got to walk around the flight line and talk with the pilots while we checked out the jets. Sitting in the F-16 felt unreal but it fit like a glove. It's hard to imagine flying something that hardcore in a year or two from now. They had the two F-22s out so we could get a lot of cool photos but we couldn't get close enough to touch it.

This whole first week of pilot training was pretty laid back. From what I gather, the intensity picks up a lot more when we go to our flight rooms (after Phase 1 / Academics is over, around week 4). The whole first phase (academics) is spent with the Aero Phys people and then the academic instructors who are mostly retired pilots. After we get done with Aerospace Physiology this week, we'll be back into blues for the rest of Phase 1. Phase 2 is when we fly the T-37 Tweet. We'll start out Phase 2 in blues until we "earn" our flight suits (by passing three boldface/ops limits quizzes in a row as an entire class). The intensity picks up at the start of phase 2 because that's when we'll be in our flight rooms and be introduced to our Instructor Pilots (IPs) and Flight Commander (Flt/CC). We'll have to do very formal briefings every morning and get quizzed on all sorts of emergency procedures. With all that ahead of us, it's easy to forget that Phase 1 is still just as important to our success at ENJJPT as a whole. So I have to keep up with all the reading, which I'm notoriously bad with.

This week will also be the FACT (Fighter Aircrew Conditioning Test) which is a series of weights we have to lift/push based on percentages of our body weight. I've been training for it since the last semester at Urbana, but I'm still not completely ready. I have very poor upper body strength so I've had the hardest time doing the sitting bench press (I have to push about 165 pounds 10-15 times at a very slow count). So FACT on Thursday, keep your fingers crossed. Oh yeah- the whole point of the FACT is because flying fighters involves pulling a lot of Gs. Your ability to withstand such high Gs (up to 9 times the force of gravity) is mostly based on being able to strain the muscles in your body to keep the blood forced into your head. If you relax, breathe wrong, or aren't strong enough, you'll black out. So although I don't like this test, it's not one of those tests you take and then forget all about.

I'll try to post again next weekend since my weeknights are full of naps, working out, and reading. If anybody from ROTC or wherever is reading this and has specific questions about UPT, feel free to email me or post a comment.

A great weekend

Mason and I both survived our "first weeks of school" and were able to enjoy a great weekend at the air show on base. Mason will post another time about how his class is going, but I can talk a little about my class. The behavior was better this week, and we had two class birthdays which was fun. My class is making a newspaper right now as language arts assignment and we have just about finished decorating the room. This week I have parent teacher conferences and more preparations to make about the holiday show.

Thankfully school is out at noon on Fridays and I had done my lesson planning for two weeks in advance, so I was able to leave before 1 on Friday to meet up with Mason at the ENJJPT building. The pilots had a sneak preview of the planes that were showing at the airshow and we got to walk around the planes and talk to the pilots and go inside the planes. It was pretty sweet! We even got to go to a twilight airshow in the evening which featured the F-22 and some acrobatics.

The weather here is still pretty warm, 90s on Saturday, and in the 80s today, although we've had some HEAVY winds so that's made it feel cooler. Hopefully it will begin some more cool down this week. Saturday was perfect for the airshow and we spent most of our time by the flight line since we had toured the planes the day before. We saw the F-22, F-15, F-16, F-18, A-10, the CV-22 Osprey, C-5, C-130, C-17 the UAV, AWACS, and some other cool planes. There were some old war birds and lots of acrobatics and parachuters. It was a very cool day, and fun experience for me since I had only been to the air and water show in Chicago before.

We're got two sets of pictures that are a mixture from the two days. ENJOY!
http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2013936&l=25bb9&id=77800450
and
http://neiu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2013941&l=f6bea&id=77800450

The first day of class

Tonight felt very much like the first day of school for both Mason and I. We packed our bags, laid out our clothes, and packed our lunches for our big days tomorrow. Mason begins pilot training tomorrow and I will begin my first full week of teaching. Last week I had the kids to myself for 2 days, but I am hoping that with Monday will come better attitudes and a calmness...I might just be kidding myself. Mason has to wear his service dress uniform for the first few weeks of training (or at least his blues) so I don't envy that. I love my teaching job where jeans are completely acceptable!

I told Mason that we will probably living like roommates the next 55 weeks, as he trains and I teach, hopefully things will slow down for me as they really begin to pick up for Mason. We had a BBQ at a friends house this past week to meet all the people in Mason's training class. There are 14 Americans and 14 Italians. The Italians are very cool. We discussed how it's hard to find good cooking ingredients, especially cheese in Wichita Falls...they've been trying to make Bachemel sauce, while I still would like to make homemade ravioli. Somehow I think Mac and Cheese will be more frequent on our menu after long days.

Anyways, we're both looking forward to next weekend when we are having the big airshow on base. Since our base is a huge engineering and mechanical base, they are opening an F22 maintenance facility here, which opens on Friday...there should be a F22 here too. We're excited! I'll post pictures of my classroom soon.

Great Week Wrap-up

It seems as though each day this week I kept thinking, make a blog post and I never got around to it, so, sorry for two very cool posts on the same day. This week has been very exciting for both of us. Mason and some other guys in his pilot training class have been spending time with a Capt. who is helping them organize their pubs and work in the simulators. This has been proving very beneficial for Mason. He begins pilot training on the 15th, so he's been studying and working out quite a bit. Earlier this week he went back into the office where he had been working and the Col. he was working with gave him an awesome coin (it's an AF thing to give out coins from the dept. you work in when you do something cool...) Other than that he's been riding around the neighborhood on his new wheels.

Since Mason got his motorcycle, he gave me permission to buy a BBQ!!!! Yea! We're hosting our first BBQ on Sunday night for some of the other single guys and our married friends. We both worked to put it together, there were some extra parts, so hopefully it doesn't fall apart. While waiting for my BBQ I decided to try out my baking talents and make a cheesecake for the first time. Four Stars were awarded by the stomache de la Mason. It was so simple, and it's very rich. Chocolate-chip cheesecake-YUM!

I felt it was key to mention in this posting, that for the first time ever I beat Mason in racquetball! It was our best game ever, with the final score of 15-13. My victory. He was pretty surprised, but it was a very exciting moment for me...maybe I'll enter the tournament in November...

Rembrandt has decided that he doesn't like one of the seeds in his food mixture, so he'll eat all the corn, and sunflower seeds and larger seeds, and then he flips his food bowl over. Tonight we saw him sleeping under the food bowl. We were able to rig his ball with a toothpick and superglue since he had worn down a plastic piece in the cage from spinning so much. We've had him in the bath tub less, and out more in the ball, but he's pretty fast if we don't keep him on a close guard. I have been substituting on most of the days that I have off from AAFES, and one of the teachers that I subbed for is leaving the school for a higher paying job (where she can work from home) and so I was asked to submit a resume for the position. After a week of waiting, and proving different qualifications and certifications that I have, and doing a demonstration lesson for some teachers, the principal, and some students, I was hired. I am officially the new 4th/5th grade teacher at Bright Ideas Charter School in Wichita Falls. It's pretty exciting, but I'm a little nervous too. I'll be subbing for the teacher Monday while she is out, and then observing her two days next week when I don't work on base, and then I'll begin working full time on the 16th. My current job was really understanding, and the school was respectful of letting me work a few more shifts at AAFES so I could officially give my two weeks. So this will be a new adventure.

To celebrate, Mason and I had dinner at Olive Garden (yum!) and then went to the casino right over the border in Oklahoma. On Thursdays they have military night, where they give you $10 to gamble with. We had to register for a club (all free) and then you use a card to play on the machines. We were each given $20 worth of money to play with on the cards because we had our military IDs and had signed up. We agreed that we'd only use the money that they gave us, and out of the free $40, we ended up making $37.90. Not bad! Next week we'll probably try again. All in all a good end to a good week.

Hiiiighwaaay tooo the danger zone!

The picture is complete - I have a sport bike!

After scouring craigslist, ebay, and a million online/paper classifieds, I found the deal I was looking for. I found it on www.cycletrader.com from a woman in Dallas who was seven months pregnant and was in a hurry to sell her bike that she rarely rode. It's a 2004 Kawasaki ZX600-E (also known as a ZZR600, don't know why it's got two names). After doing some research, I figured out that the color is "metallic ruby red".

I debated a long time over getting a 500 or a 600 cc bike, but after hearing a lot of people say that you usually get bored with a 500 after a couple months, I decided to put all my chips in for a 600. A friend from my ENJJPT class who owns a sport bike, gave me a ride on Tuesday in his pickup truck down to Dallas to strap it in and bring it home. I was pretty nervous about the whole thing, but he seemed to know what he was doing. He didn't have a ramp so we had to pick the bike up and wheel it on (which is REALLY difficult when you've got a 400 pound bike). I think he underestimated how much it would be, but with the help of a third person, we managed.

Since then, I've been riding it around the base housing neighborhood and getting comfortable stopping, turning, etc. Today, I made my first venture out of the gates for a refuel and then I ventured onto "the open roads". Around here, there's not really any in-between steps from residential roads to highways. So after choosing a random direction and taking it wherever, I ended up on I-44 towards Oklahoma. I passed the border, turned around, and made it home all safe and sound, with some bug juice on my new helmet. It was an awesome feeling, but definitely intimidating. At highway speeds, the wind gusts can bully you a bit.

Hopefully, I'll get comfortable enough with it and the different traffic/weather/etc that I'll be able to ride it to/from pilot training every day and save some gas money. But even if I just end up getting to take it out for a ride on the weekends, it's still TOTALLY AWESOME!

And yes, Ellen gave permission for me to buy it....

Vroom Vroom

Mason is celebrating being done with his boring behind the desk job. Thursday was his last day, can you say sleeping in for the next two weeks. Pilot training starts on October 15th, so all the guys have this time off now. This week he met with a Capt. who showed him around the squadron and showed some of the guys how to use the simulators and things. On Monday they are meeting up again to go through some other things. Sometime this week Mason has to go though intense physicals and get lots of shots to prep him...I think they even give him small doses of anthrax and something else to make sure he doesn't have it, or catch it.

Yesterday I subbed for middle school and high school math classes in the morning and met up with Mason at lunch time to go to a squadron picnic. There was lots of yummy BBQ (that we can't get at home, no BBQ, still) I worked at the shoppette in the afternoon, and Mason was a doll and cleaned the house. (the jury is still out on who is going to mop the floors) Currently I'm having more inner conflicts about jobs. There is an opening at a school I have been subbing for, and I was asked o submit my resume, but the principal was concerned with my lack of experience. Two teachers were really trying to convince her to hire me though because they liked my style, and the kids liked me when I subbed in that classroom. However, I think she is looking at other options but hasn't said no to me yet, I might find out early next week. KEEP YOUR FINGERS CROSSED! Meanwhile I applied for another job as a Human Resource Asst. with the company that I currently work for, and I will interview for that Monday or Tuesday. So, lots going on with the where should I be working thing...

I recently discovered that Mason's been having a love affair...with Craigslist. Every night, afternoon, and now mornings I see him staring at the computer and searching for motorcycles. After the deal that he wanted fell through he was very sad...but nonetheless he kept looking and has finally made the deal. Merry Christmas to Mason. He should go Monday or Tuesday to Dallas to pick up his "new" motorcycle. His face looked VERY happy today at the bank when he was withdrawing all the cash to pay for it.

Insomnia has been plaguing our house for months now, but this past week Mason joined the club, it was either one or the other who was up til the birds were chirping. Last night, the planets were aligned and I think we were both asleep by eleven, and then we woke up at the normal time of 9am. We watched tv in bed and Mason made pancakes. We made out bi-monthly grocery trip to Walmart and Mason is recovering from the bill right now.

Only three weeks to the airshow...but who's counting.

Texas is its own world

Instead of debating whether or not Puerto Rico should be considered the next state, perhaps the argument should be if Texas should separate and be the 8th continent. Sometimes I think people here are from another planet, and if you ever have driven with the crazies on Chicago highways that's nothing compared to the self-centered drivers in the town of Wichita Falls. Despite the faults of this larger than life state, it's not all bad.

Mason and I had dinner at the only Thai restaurant in town with some of the other causal Lts today, which was fun and a change of pace. The guys we've met are really friendly and we all have a good laugh. Mason will be finishing work this week which makes him very happy! Me too! On a more upsetting point (depending who's perspective you're looking from) the motorcycle deal Mason was looking at fell through, but his helmet and jacket should arrive tomorrow.

If any of you are living in Evanston or have access to the Evanston Review at your local library, there was a wedding announcement from our wedding in the Sept 20th issue. We haven't seen it yet, hopefully it was good. :)

Keepin' Busy in the Real World

I am now signed up with 3 different school districts, who have been calling and trying to keep me busy. Unfortunately, most of the days they were looking for I had already committed to someone else or was working at AAFES. I did however sub at a charter school in a fourth/fifth grade classroom on Wednesday. The school was very interesting, because it was basically a warehouse on the side of the highway converted into a school. I was in the only room on the second floor, which was nice because it made it very private, and I didn't have to deal with all the other people in the school. The staff is only made up of about 11 people so it's a very small school. It's K-12th grade and there are less than 200 students. The atmosphere is nice, lots of air flowing in the school, because they keep the warehouse doors open, but I'd hate to think what the trapped winter will be like.

Yesterday at work Mason got to wear his flight suit and be a Guinea Pig for some photograph thing that fell through, but he got to do semi-virtual parachuting with some other Lts. We went to a BBQ off base at one of the Lts houses and we met a lot of the other people in Mason's pilot training class. Mason and I spent most of the time just catching up with each other since we both had worked all day. Today I worked again, Saturday's are very long at the shoppette, since we don't get too many customers; which in turn makes it a day of looking like you are busy.

Mason went out in the morning today to a police auction in Wichita Falls to see what sort of things they had. He didn't have much luck finding anything, only two auctions of some random cell phone parts, a bag, some radios etc...but the price jumped too quickly for him. Mason got a kick out the auctioneer and his fast Texas-accent callings.

Mason and I are going to enjoy SLEEPING IN tomorrow!!! No plans, nothing to do. We'll probably head over to the gym for some more racquetball later in the day. While my game has improved (meaning, Mason's seen me run more, and slam into walls less) I still haven't won a game yet... perhaps my luck will change with more practice.

Rembrandt is sad because we still haven't replaced the piece for his cage. The warehouse charges more for shipping then for the piece, but we saw that the warehouse is on Touhy in Chicago, so I might just go get the piece when I am in town next month...unless anyone else wants to help us out...

Mason is also one step closer to his fantasy...today he bought a motorcycle helmet and jacket. He's still bargaining a price on a bike he saw in Dallas. Mixed feelings are held on this subject, just hope nothing breaks before, during or after pilot training.

It's going to be a Charlie Brown Christmas

After Mason and I finished putting together our wedding album we created our "money left over for Christmas budget." As we've been saying everything's a little slower and BIGGER in Texas...including traffic tickets. As I was on my way to a meeting with the Burkburnett school district and was stopped for going 8 miles over the speed limit...28mph in 20mph zone. The kicker, it was a school zone, which means extra fines. All in all this 8mph over the limit will cost a whopping $250 for the ticket and traffic school...a major BUMMER!

Meanwhile, I am officially registered to substitute in the Burkburnett School District, and I have a job tomorrow subbing for 4th and 5th grade at a charter school in Wichita Falls. I'm a little nervous, but helpful in-between work at the shoppette this will be some extra moolah to rebuild the Christmas and savings funds.

We attended a "town hall" meeting today on base that was for the base housing. It provided some helpful information and Mason and I voiced our opinions, but overall it went well. Rembrandt is wearing away at his wheel so we will probably have to replace some parts soon otherwise in the middle of the night he'll roll off the cage.

Uuuuugh

Well, it's official, insomnia is a b*tch. It's 4:45am, and I'm seeing this time of day because I haven't been to sleep yet. Hmm...sorta ruins the "relaxing" weekend when you're up all night and asleep most of the day. Anyways, Mason and I had a late start to the day, but mostly hung out and went out for a Saturday night date and had some Texas BBQ. Pretty good food.

This week was a busy one, at the same time it went by very fast, but also drrrrragged on. On Thursday I hosted a a Tastefully Simple party for one of the consultants, a friend Patty. It was really easy to prepare the foods and it was nice to have some of the other spouses come over. Unfortunately, the power on base and in our housing area has been going in and out a great deal lately so of course, at 11:45, a half hour before people were supposed to arrive the power goes out...we dealt fine since it was sunny, but no AC makes things warm after awhile. But, the power was off base wide so when Mason came home for lunch he stayed the rest of the day since power didn't go on again until 4pm or so.

It was a busy week of working long days for me, and Mason worked on lots of data entry for his job and has to begin planning three large "exercises" before he leaves his position in early October. Since we are both procrastinators we left putting our wedding album together to the last minute, so we had a few late nights choosing photos, and eliminating photos and getting things ready to send back to the photographer...but we managed. It's so hard when all the pictures were so good. But it was fun to relive the wedding, which was already 41/2 months ago! Wow, time flies!

Tomorrow we are looking forward to relaxing, and maybe heading to check out Lake Wichita.