May 29 - Memorial Day at SJ Beach getaway

Drove to SJ Beachweekend via Kitty Hawk (See Wright Brothers Memorial entry)

Stopped at Manteo for German restaurant (See Der Pit Stoppen entry)

Weekend at Emerald Isle with


Fujimotos


Dorsetts


Kastners


Capone

Russells
miscellaneous drunks from SJ on houses on each side of us...

speaking of drunks, wow...there were alot of them out. including yours truly. Saturday night spent walking back and forth between houses, sampling the drink special of the house.

lots of homecooking, jigsaw puzzles, drinks, sun....






hopefully some photos will appear here. (done!)

May 26 - Der Pit Stoppen

Bier

ok, so after walking around the hallowed grounds of Kitty Hawk, no aviator would pass up the chance to have a bavarian dinner/beer at a lost german bierhall, tucked away on a small island in NC.

this place has awesome food and makes it's own authentic beer on the premises. (edit--i'm now back in Va, drinking the last of the case i bought there)

so today's recommendation is easy....The Weeping Radish

May 26 - Wright Brothers Memorial - NC

Pit stop on the way to beach weekend at Emerald Isle North Carolina. We're heading down to stay a couple of days with F-15E friends now stationed at SJAFB. But the way things ended up, the five couples in our house were all stationed together at Lakenheath. If it turns out to be anything like the big bashes like SJ beach weekends I knew from before, it promises to be a good time!

edit--it turned out to be a veeeeery good time indeed!

in any case, no aviator can pass up a chance to stop at the most important aviation site of all time! Perfect weather too!

Apr 14 - Hostage Crisis Over!

the squadron commander of the squadron i will eventually end up at (94th FS) is a good friend of mine. i told him in Jan/Feb to think of any excuse for me to work around the squadron while i wait on clearances, it would be beneficial to his squadron getting to know me and even more so for me just to be home. so i guess he finally figured out something for me to do. i got a phone call on wednesday saying that my LM boss was quite eager to sign off on it b/c they are "very worried about keeping me happy". by friday afternoon i was on a plane back home!

the LM guy that will train me for the F22 specific job (once the clearances are finalized) is about to go on his Reserve Navy duty in europe. he won't be back in the country until early june. so it seems that i will be "stuck" here at home until june! ha! fran was disappointed in the change, b/c she was looking forward to going to live on the florida beach after her classes finished, but i guess she'll settle for me being at home in the meantime! :)

so i have been "promoted" to being the squadron scheduler while i wait on things. funny...that was the same job i did when i was a Capt. at least i'm getting paid better! :)

Apr 12 - Walk in the forest turns hot!

Fire!

One of the last afternoons in Marietta spent on a short walk at another civil war battlefield. Very nice walk and near the end, some park official were doing a controlled burn.

It certainly added to the feel of the walk through a place where thousands lost their lives...i could almost hear the rebel yell and whizzing of minie-balls across the valley.

Apr 12 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 94

some news on the hostage crisis. while i won’t get a new suit and an interview with the president before boarding a jet home, i will at least be going home. and i haven’t received a “full pardon” just yet. but a friend at LAFB came thru and has figured out a way for me to work in the squadron until my clearances come thru.

so i’m busy disassembling my hotel/prison room, boxing up stuff, packing the bags. it will be good to be home finally!

Apr 09 - Today's recommendation: Read this article, print ...

Today's recommendation: Read this article, print it out before it is buried by the Global Warming conspirators, then see if you can get a refund on all those carbon credits The Goracle is pushing.

while you're reading articles about hoaxes, read this one too from last summer about how far the MSM has fallen.

Return from Parole

New rental

I usually ask for a Toyota Camry at the rental car pickup at the Atlanta Airport. But they were out on my return. This was the only thing they could get for me short of an SUV. I figured that this would be fun and maybe more economical.

It has a big engine, I can say that much. It handles pretty good. Long hood, low riding, and the rear seat is a joke, the dashboard rattles terribly, the speakers are blown, and it used almost a 1/8 tank of gas just to get from the airport to the hotel. I could see the needle moving as I drove. I wasn't driving like a NASCAR-wannabee either.

More evidence that I'm growing old...knocking a sports (sporty?) car for its gas mileage! When I get my Camaro back up and running, what will I think of it?

At Yorktown on Parole

Sure you've read about their radar evading technology, their synergy of combat systems, but have you heard that they are good with butter and honey?

Here is the latest F-22 mod to roll out of LM...F-22 shaped biscuits. made'em myself. now where is that recipe for grits?

Apr 01 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 83

Insurgent allergens are still heavily engaged in their attacks. They’ve gained a new ally, pictured below. I found this one sneaking around on base, just across the street from the BX. I don’t know how it got through the front gate. It must have been well disguised. Intel hasn’t come up with the name of the new intruder.



Friday I spotted another suspicious group hanging around the parking lot at LM. Seems this particular sect quietly invades the undergrowth near its host, slowly creeping further and further up the local canopy all year long. It then engages in the tactic known as a Spring Offensive, waiting for the weather to warm up and then erupting in full bloom. Intel reports have identified this newest enemy in the War on Pollen as Wisteria.




Yesterday I drove back to Stone Mountain. (Fran and I went there when she was here on Spring Break...which reminds me I need to write about the places we visited while she was here) There was a car show going on in one of the exhibit areas featuring muscle cars. It was being put on by Year One, a company that has grown considerably from the last time I looked at one their catalogs. Seems like you can almost build a complete 1967-69 Camaro these days, almost from nothing. That’s quite a change from the last time I scoured a junk yard, looking for some small body or engine part. So it looks like it will be easier to re-build the Camaro when I start that project. Whenever THAT will be.

Some inspiring photos from the car show:









Today’s recommendation: The Art of Shaving. The company (especially the sales people in the brick and mortar stores) have an air of arrogance, but their shaving stuff is pretty good. But holy cow...expensive! I got a splashy DVD that teaches me how to shave using their products I purchased yesterday. I think I’d prefer saving some money and skipping the whole DVD experience.




Nothing else to add

Mar 29 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 80

From the paper today:

"Monday's pollen count was the highest in March since the allergy clinic began recording such data in 1995, with 5,499 pollen particles in a cubic meter of air. Tuesday's was 5,208. A high pollen count is 61-120 particles per cubic meter."

So normal “high” is 120 particles...and today’s count is is more than yesterday’s official record of 5208?

I think you could say the pollen attack is at a temporary surge level. I don’t know if the evil insurgent trees can sustain this increased level of activity or not. Maybe it is time to withdraw?

For proof of the surge I’ll paste in a couple of photos of my rental car. Realize that when I took it from the rental car agency it was a shiny black. But the daily attacks it has endured is starting to show. The car looks like it has been spray painted mustard yellow. The pollen dust is on the floor mats, on the asphalt, on the roads. Their are car tracks in the hotel parking lot that look remind me of tracks in the snow. It is the same on the road ways, the ruts where the tires contact the pavement look normal, but the rest of the road is yellowish. If Look closely at the windshield of the car...I have to clean the windshield even after just leaving the car in a parking lot for lunch.

At least the high levels seem to affect everyone and I’m not the only one who is uncomfortable. My sinuses seem to have adapted ok, but my eyes are constantly burning. At the end of the day, my eyes burn like they do after being at the beach all day long.








Mar 25 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 76

Had to get out of the jail cell today too. On a lark I went to the Atlanta Cyclorama. No, it is not related to bicycles. It turned out to be one of the most interesting civil war sights I’ve been to yet.

It is one of a few remaining large scale paintings. It’s so large that it has its own building to display it in. I don’t remember if it is life sized or bigger than life sized, but it is a 360 degree representation of the final siege of Atlanta. The detail of of the painting is phenomenal. Imagine if you were back at the height of the battle and took a 360 degree digital image, it is that good. Smoke, mud, blood, charging horses....and the way it was presented really brought it all to life like nothing I’ve seen before.

The painting is hung against the walls of a circular building. The recently (mid-90s?) remodeled building has the audience climbing up to sit in a giant round shaped viewing area in the middle. (Imagine a round Imax theater) The painting is up against the wall, at least 40-50 feet in front of you. In-between the edge of the circular seating area and the flat painting is a 3D appropriately scaled diorama that magically melts into the painting. There are trenches, small dirt mounds, horses, soldiers, fences, trees, a railroad, a bridge...all things that extend from the painting. The narration begins and shines a light on a particular area of the painting and describes the details of a particular scene...a dying soldier’s story, which battalions line is failing, what general is on the horse overlooking the battle. As the narration goes on, the entire seating area pivots around so that you can see the entire painting and continue learning about the depicted scenes without ever getting up. The narration is complete with gun fire, cannon roar, screams of the injured. It is a truly amazing display.

Just outside is the train engine “The Texan”. It is the other half of the train duo in the “Great Locomotive Chase”. I saw “The General” at the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History just down the road in Kennesaw. A really good little museum and great story.

I might be bored to death at work, but I’m learning alot about the Civil War!


The Texan

Mar 24 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 75

Spring is in the air and so is all the pollen. My head hurts and my nose is running. So I decided to attack the problem head on. I went to visit the Botanical Garden near Piedmont Park. The were having an "Orchid" exhibition in their hothouses. I took some photos of the enemy, and here they are.

Afterwards, I drove around the corner to explore Piedmont Park. All in all a nice green place in the middle of the city. A LOT of people roaming around a big giant grassy area; reminded me of the Commons in Cambridge. A small lake, lots of people throwing frisbees, and the clincher...a pub right at the edge of the park! They had some pretty good Euro-beers, and thank the gods, they brewed their own beer as well. So I ordered a "Belgian Ale" and went to sit in the sun. Not quite the main square in Brugge, but it was pretty darn close.

I miss Europe!

Today's recommendation: Park Tavern

Mar 23 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 74

I am under attack. My nose hurts, my head hurts, my eyes are watering. This innocent looking cherry tree near the hotel front desk looks suspicious.

I think it is spying on me, reporting to its flowery friends that I am an outsider and vulnerable to a coordinated allergy attack. They know I am isolated and I have no intel on what indigenous plants are in the area, so they meet at night and plan the next day's attack on my senses. They hope that a constant bombardment of pollen will wear down my defenses and force me out of their stronghold.

So far there is great damage to my vehicle, a black rental car. I should have known that this car would stand out from the local vehicles and highlight me. The local insurgent plants attack the car every night, and my black car is now pockmarked with fine pollen dust. What used to be black is now a powdery yellow.

I feel sorry for all the innocent locals caught up by the untargetted pollen. The nightly local news broadcasts the daily pollen count and the daily toll on the populace. But I have made it clear to the insurgent plant leaders, despite the collateral damage I will not leave until my tasks are done.

Mar 22 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 73

This is the Dragon's Shower. It's across the street from where I work. Every once in awhile the dragon that lives nearby wakes up and takes a shower. He makes alot of noise and splashes water everywhere.

It's actually a huge watercooled windtunnel. This is a pretty bad picture from the phone, but it was an amazing sight this morning in person, the water was going everywhere and the sun was shining through the mist in a really pretty way.

So when they fire this thing up, it makes a huge amount of noise and water is cascading off of the thing like a minature Niagra Falls. You have to shout to be heard when you're close to it, and the waterfall has a big mist cloud around it, even more-so when the temp is low and humidity high. So loud roaring noise, water spraying everywhere...Dragon's Shower...get it? Duh.

Even when I get my clearances to work on the F-22, I probably won't be able to see this thing in action from the inside. That's because these days, even more clandestine things are being tested behind the high security doors and razor wire than 5th gen fighters. No one outside the "black" projects have a schedule, you just know the evil spies are at work when you walk out to your car and hear the dragon taking a shower. What program is the government working on here, something that will be used to torture their citizens, something that the Neo-cons have been cooking up to use on the "dissenters" to squash rebellion? Something Orwell predicted? What evil is it?

NASCAR! Yep, all you "sky is falling" liberals put away your "Impeach now" signs, b/c NASCAR is the supersecret organization at work here. They rent time in the tunnel to test their designs and are extremely tightlipped about it all. That stinkin' F-22 badge won't get you past Bubba and company when they're busy testing their car!

Mar 20 - What tree is this?

I stopped and took this picture this morning on the way to work. These trees are in bloom everywhere. From a distance they look like big cotton balls.

Quick google search reveals they are called Bradford Pears. Ornamental only, and they supposedly don't smell very good. That's a relief...I thought it was me!

Mar 16 - Escape (temporary) from Marietta!

Documenting my escape from secretly CIA run torture chamber @ marietta. Rosie odonell, where are you when i need u? How about a quick pick-me-up rant on my behalf? Want to know real torture? Try typing an entire paragraph on a cell phone, while the guy next to you yells into his wireless micophone. Evil CIA bastards!

Mar 15 - Marietta Hostage Crisis - Day 66

whew,

glad i got that whole photo thing worked out. i will editing out those experiments, maybe. but then again, whose reads this anyways?

turns out that the AF security clearances finally showed up...for the other guy. something about not having brazilian relatives. who’d have thought. so he starts in Florida next week. and i get to go home this weekend so i can swap out the winter clothes for spring clothes. yay....

it’s spring alright. all the trees are in bloom. don’t know what they are, but they look nice. fran said she went for a nice walk yesterday at yorktown natl park. wish i was there.

ugh...the talking heads on TV are re-hashing Rosie Odonells latest PMS surge. ranting about secret CIA prisons where she KNOWS torture is going on and that poor poor terrorist was so abused that he admitted to alot of things. poor poor terrorist. at least he doesn’t have to listen to her crap on tv. now THAT is torture.

todays recommendation:

Adluh Stone Ground White Grits, Ops checked at Corner Kitchen in Asheville. never thought i’d be a fan of grits, but their recipe was awesome!

Mar 15 - more from the phone