The weather over here started off pretty crazy this week. Our Monday and Tuesday are just erie! Dark clouds, windy, rain, hail...., it was crazy. That same storm found it's way to New Olreans a few days later also. But now the weather is back to beautiful. Perfect temps, no clouds, light breeze..., I can get used to this....
This week was filled with sims.... I feel like I'm really starting to get a hang of this airplane. It's a joy to fly. He's so powerful! And yes, the C-5 is a he, not a she. His name is FRED. F.R.E.D. stands for Freaking Ridiculous Economical Disaster..., which he is, but awesome at the same time.
This week I have just two sim days, two computer days and one walk around the plane day! <--- I can't wait for this day. I've only been next to the actual airplane once so far.
I went out to eat this week with an old ROTC buddy of mine. He was based in Germany for his first two years in and did some pretty cool "secret squirrel" stuff for the war and unknown wars. He couldn't tell me too much, but it was still cool. Now he's in San Antonio and he's bored..., haha. Anyway, while we were eating lunch this lady came up to our table. She extended her hand over my food and I kinda looked at her weird. Then I saw that she wanted to shake my hand. I extended my hand and shook hers. She had a coin in her hand that she passed me.
Now, in the military coins are collectable. Every squadron has a coin. You can trade it with others whenever you do something cool or whatever. A lot of high ranking people have their own personalized coin. And those are really cool to get. You also have to always have a coin on you, and I always do.
So, this lady passed us a coin that she purchased herself. That was pretty darn cool way of saying thank you. I mean, those coins are anywhere from $5-10 no doubt! Anyway, I see some people put their hand on their heart when I pass in my uniform, some shake my hand, some say thank you but I've never had someone give me a coin...., that was pretty cool for sure.
Mia had her bridal luncheon yesterday and having her bridal shower today. So Mia's wedding festivities are in full swing right now. Just five weeks left till her big day. I'm excited and I know she is too. I just got these pictures off of Facebook, so I couldn't tell y'all too much about it.
You can tell Dallas REALLY wants to take this picture.., haha.
Next weekend I'm hoping to drive back to New Orleans and pick up my bride! Our plan is for her to come back here and vista me for about 10 days. That'll be really nice. In saying that, next week's blog will probably be one day late (Monday) because I'll be getting back late on Sunday night.
My ID was never found back at Laughlin AFB.. :( I was forced to wait in the pass and ID line here on base and get a new one. It took a little over three hours for me to do. It sucked! But I guess that was my punishment to being so irresponsible that weekend. I'm actually happy that I didn't get into any trouble.
I've been living off of pizza and frozen dinners over here now. I miss Kristen's cooking!
I received a package from Kristen this week. It's always fun to receive something in the mail with your name on it (except bills, those suck). It kinda reminded me of getting packages from her back during my deployment. Haha. That sucked!
I had four sims this past week. They were all at 0600 in the morning also..., that sucked. But the sim is so realistic. It is a two story tall structure. It's held off the ground by giant hydraulic arms the actuate to simulate turns, climbs and dives. It's very realistic! When you push the throttles up for takeoff the whole sim just lurches back! It makes you feel the power that the engines are putting out. Oh, and it has speakers inside to make the sounds of the engines and gear also. It's very cool. I have now flown 10 sims. I only have a total of 25 of these before my sim check ride and then off to the real airplane!
I went to a restaurant here in San Antonio this week which was featured on the Food Networks Diner's Drives and Dive's. It was a very hippie place, but very interesting also. It was a burger joint, ice cream parlor, bar, coin laundry, car wash and a children's playground all in one! Haha. It was too cool! It was packed with people. I went on a Friday afternoon so there was a lot of parents letting their children play on the playground while eating a burger and having a glass of wine or a pint of beer. It's a great place. I'd recommend it to anyone in San Antonio. It's called The Cove.
My friend over here has season tickets to the local hockey team. She didn't want to go on Friday night so she gave us the tickets. They were awesome seats!!! We sat so close! We saw two and a half fights! Our team, the Rampage, lost unfortunately, but I had a great time.
It's kinda hard to see..., but right in the center of the pic.., the green dudes... FUNNY!
At the game there were these two dudes that dressed up in green spandex bodysuits. I mean, the bodysuits covered their entire body. They would go and harass the oposeing team members when they went to the penalty box. They were so damn funny! I couldn't stop laughing. You could tell that the other team didn't want to look at them but they could barely keep a straight face.
Yesterday was St. Patrick's Day. My classmates and I went out and had lunch together and drank some green beer. From there we went to the Riverwalk and walked around. From there we went to an arena football game. That was OK..., but not as good as the VooDoo!!! After that we went back to the Riverwalk for dinner and drinks. It was a long day!
Today I met a buddy from my deployment who was passing through San Antonio. It's so cool to meet up with people that you deployed with. I mean, we shared in a cool experience. It's just cool to see people in regular clothes and with smiles on their faces back in Merica'! Yeah!
I probably have two more weeks with no Kristen..... It's sad... We might be spending a week or so together coming up. It's been tough for us the past year and a half. Soon enough we'll be in our house in Dover! I can't wait! Kristen has been sending me pictures of Dallas to cheer me up.
It's already halfway through Mustache March and I don't have any pics of me on here yet. Next week I'll need to get some on here....it's gross.
Everyone's doing this nowadays. I read that it can be done because of the alignment of the planets or something..., but that just sounds weird to me. I tried it out in Wal-Mart and it works!
I had just one sim last week and one test. It was my first test in the program. I'll have a total of three tests, one ground eval and two checkrides before I'm a qualified C-5 co-pilot. So..., the first one was 148 questions. I got a 98%. It was stressful and took a few hours. I'm glad its over with because I was stressing about it all week. This next week I have four sims! And I am now into the "cool" sims where they are in full motion. So far our sims have had the motion turned off, but from now on they'll be rocking and rolling. The C-5 is a BEAST!
OK..., here's a video of a C-5B Galaxy taking off (it's 2 minutes long). This is what I'm training to do. Just do this all over the world delivering beans and bullets! I can't wait.
I had a pretty good weekend.
Driving to the edge of nowhere (Del Rio, TX)
On Friday I drove to Del Rio to hang out with a buddy of mine in pilot training over there. It was sort of a crappy drive up there, besides being a three hour drive with no civilization, I found out that someone stole my debit card number! Bastard. They only spent $43.00, but it's just aggravating. Once I found that out I had to call and report it to the company, Experian credit score company, who charged my checking account, and then I had to call and cancel my debit card. They canceled my card and told me that my new card would be getting to me in 7-10 business days. 7-10 days! Holy crap! What an inconvenience. I hate people for doing this sort of stuff.
Being back at Laughlin was fun for me. It brought back a lot of memories that Kristen and I made over there. The party was a whole lot of fun. Someone called Shiner beer and got them to donate six kegs. Then someone else made a refrigerator full of jelly shots. It was a complete sausage fest but it was a lot of fun catching up with my buddy. I also saw a dude that I was deployed with, so we got to catch up to.
Here's an old pic of our house in Del Rio when we lived there
And here it is as of this weekend....sad.....
The next morning, Saturday was a rough one. It felt like the movie "The Hangover". I woke up on the floor in my friends room, cold, still in my clothes from the night before. I had my cell phone right next to me so I turned that on so I had a light to see what I was doing. I packed my backpack and got ready to leave. My head was POUNDING! Wow, I drank way too much. And that's when I realized another problem..., I couldn't find my military ID. This is bad. When I left the night before since it was all on base and we were just going to walk I took just my cell phone and mil ID. How could I have lost that? There was no reason for me to take that out the entire night so it's a mystery to me. My three hour drive back to San Antonio I felt like a different man. I had no debit card or mil ID...., two staples of my everyday life, haha. It was a rough 24 hours.
Then yesterday my classmates called me up for some dinner. We went and ate at some nice restaurant here in town, went next door to a cigar shop and bought a few. From there we went to a place called Twin Peaks for a few beers and to smoke our cigars. This place is pretty cool. Think Hooters, with better food. It was a good night.
Dallas checking out her new toy that we got from the safari
Kristen left to go back to New Orleans on Tuesday. She has had a busy last few days. She went to two different wedding functions on Saturday alone! We talk a few times a day everyday so we're doing well. She left me with about a week and a half of food here so I'm not starving yet. By the next blog I'll have to learn how to cook or something I guess...
Gotta love the Saints...., and a franchise tag on Drew Brees...? C'mon man!
It's been a while since I've written a blog. Kristen wrote one two weeks ago, thanks babe! To be fair, we didn't have internet the first two and half weeks we were here.
So at first we started enjoying San Antonio (the first two weeks). And since then our weekends have been full of other stuff to do.
Within the first 24 hours my mom came to visit us, which was fun. We played tourist in the city and had a good time that weekend.
The next weekend we had all to ourselves but the weather was terrible. So we just watched TV and rented a movie..... boring, but it's always good to spend time with Kristen.
My mom bought Dallas and the in-laws three dogs toys..., see, she's a dog lover...
Funny faces
Beer
The happy couple
Then two weekends ago Kristen and I went back to New Orleans for my sisters couples shower. She's getting married in two months! We're so happy for Mia and Matt. It wasn't to long ago we were on our own journey to our wedding. Those were really fun times in our lives and I know that Mia and Matt are enjoying themselves right now too.
Unfortunately, this weekend my Saturday and Sunday were taken up by the Air Force..., ughh.. Oh well. You win some and you lose some. I had a intel and tactics "school" day on Saturday. We went out with my classmates that night to a hockey game.
chem gear
On Sunday I had a "How to survive a chemical/biological/missle attack" class. Luckily on Sunday I was let out by noon. It was a beautiful day so we decided to go check out this animal wildlife place that we've heard of. It was a blast!
As you can see, we had a great time. The weather was awesome. We even went through it a second time.
It's hard to see in this picture..., but in the park we go run in there are deer EVERYWHERE!
Kristen and I have been running and walking a lot over here. It's so much fun to work out with your wife. Kristen likes going to the track and running there and I'm the kind of person who likes to run all around. Sometimes we go running on base and sometimes we go off base. We both agree that we like to run three miles, usually, but we have to switch between our two locations to keep us both happy.
So what has my school been like so far you ask? It's been like drinking through a fire hose, haha. Actually the first few weeks was a lot of death by powerpoint. I have flown five sims now. Those are fun. I have 25 total sims and then 5 or 7 flights (I think) in the real airplane. My instructors are all retired C-5 pilots and they just LOVE the C-5. They'll brag all day about how our plane is the greatest cargo plane of all time and I'm finding it hard to disagree with them....., the plane is a BEAST!
I'm getting addicted to Starbucks..., it's not a good thing.
We got Dallas some snow shoes in preparation for the snow next winter in Delaware. She HATES them! But they're so cute. She kicks out her back legs every step..., it's the funniest thing.
Kristen being here everyday when I get home has been so nice. She is the best wife I could have ever asked for. She has had a rough life the past year and a half with no "stable" place to call our "home". She didn't have to come here to san Antonio with me. I wanted her to to try and make things as normal as possible. But it's hard to do that here in a large hotel room. It's kinda sad. I wish I could do more for her, but it's the life that we choose. It won't always be like this. Once we get to Delaware we'll be there for a few years and then move again probably two more times till I retire and we get to finally settle down somewhere. I just wanted to let everyone know how awesome Kristen is. She puts up with a lot from me and the Air Force. She deserves the Best Wife Ever Award! Kristen will be heading back to New Orleans for at least a month to because she has a ton of obligations coming up in the next month (she's in three upcoming weddings). It will be tough being away from her but it we're pretty good at the Skype relationship thing, I mean, we just did it for seven months..., what's two more months tacked on to that?!
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