Surf, poker, cheese steak and a wedding.

Elwood: "We have a full tank of gas, a half pack of cigarettes, it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses."

Jake: "Hit it!"

L and I are rolling on another road trip on Monday. I know you're thinking..."Didn't he just get back from Florida?" Yea but that was a quick in-n-out for my annual airplane orgy and took place over my standard three day weekend. This trip is a full blown vacation we're talking about. L and I have the entire week off. The purpose of the trip is to see her cousin get married in Philly but we're using that as an excuse to head over to the outer banks of NC for some much needed sand and surf. OK so Kitty Hawk is there but it's just a coincidence. Scouts Honor! After that we're headed up north to fabulous Atlantic City for a couple days of gratuitous gambling where I hope to play in at least six poker tournaments. With tons of winnings in our pockets, we're going to Philadelphia to sample cheese steaks at Pat's. I loves me some cheese steak sandwiches and the original just has to be good. I wanted to take the Jolly Rancher but L wasn't too keen on spending forty hours of road time in a loud VW so we're renting a car. It's gonna be awesome!


Be blogging again in a week or so.

It was sunny and it was fun. V

The guy flying this WWII Stearman trainer is John Mohr. He is far and away the best pilot I've ever witnessed. Most airshow planes are specially designed for the type of flying that they do. They are modified with bigger horsepower engines and inverted fuel and oil systems that allow them to fly upside down. This plane isn't. If it stays inverted for too long the engine will quit. John is the master of this thing and no one can make it do what he can. His show might not be all that impressive to the casual observer, but to pilots, he's as good as they come.

It was sunny and it was fun. IV

Some of you might remember the P51s Crazyhorse and Crazyhorse2 form the pics I posted last year. They did some formation aerobatics this year and these dudes fly CLOSE! They're insane! Dude, watch out!

Note the blip on top of the plane. Yea, that's a chick standing up there.
Hang on girlfriend!
This is a Cirrus that the idiot put in the only ditch for miles. He wasn't landing or taking off, just driving to his parking spot. It's always been my assertion that the pilots that fly these planes are the biggest idiots in the sky. This knucklehead just reaffirms my theory.

It was sunny and it was fun. III

Want a boat, camper, and the plane? This Grumman will fit all those slots quite nicely. If I had $400K sitting in the bank I'd sure as hell own one. (Note dude in orange shirt. That would be Geek SR checking out the interior.)
This year I was finally able to get pics of the airshow thanks to a higher quality camera that would actually capture motion. This is a big friggin flag man!
DC-3 doing a low pass with the right engine off. This plaine is based a few miles from where I live.
The Aeroshell Aerobatic team. These guys are good.
I can't remember this guys name but he's always impressive flying this Decathalon.

It was sunny and it was fun. II

Since I'm planning on building my own plane one day, I always like to take shots of those paint schemes that are really wild of that look nice. These planes here are all RVs. They are the most popular kit plane on the market and they are always plentiful at the fly ins.
This one reminded me of the Jolly Rancher.
I thought this RV-8 was tasteful. I really like the cranberry red on planes. And the skull on the tail is sweet too.
Is this RV-6 purple enough for ya?
Umm....wow!

It was sunny and it was fun.

Cool old Waco Biplane.
I forget what kind of plane this is, but it was an ancient survivor. This is a line of old Cessna 195s. They're sweet old planes and I wouldn't mind owning one.
So you always wanted to know what I look like? Here's a self portrait in the spinner of one of those 195s. (Damn I'm getting fat!)
This is an RV-8 home built with a wild paint job. I originally wanted to build one of these for myself but it's a little out of my price range.

The Senior Geek

I just spent the better part of this week with my father down in Lakeland, FL at Sun-N-Fun. I had a great time in my element. I spent several days walking around salivating at thousands of planes and seeing some of the best airshow performers on earth and I'm going to get to posting some cool pics here when I can.

My dad is a great guy. As I grew up, I idolized the man that used to pick me up every summer and take me to his house for a few weeks. Unlike my step father, dad is laid back. He rarely gets upset about anything. He gave us (my brother and I) plenty of attention when we visited and played games with us. He read us stories and taught me how to swim in his above ground pool in Vegas. An Aircraft mechanic by trade, he used to take us out to the end of the runway in his VW bus and we would sit with the doors propped open and watch airplanes land for hours. He would explain to me what all the control surfaces would do and point out things that your casual observer wouldn't recognize. In many ways, he was like a big kid. He had a room full of remote controlled airplanes. He liked hard candy. He would call people "knuckleheads" in traffic instead of the obscenities that my step father would spit out. As a child, there was a little part of me that hated my mom for divorcing the nice man that bought me Hot Wheels and never once hit me. (Unlike my, sometimes violent, step dad would.) Dad was the greatest man I knew growing up.

Since I've moved to Georgia, I've got to know my father better and I can see why my mother left him. For all his great traits, he has just as many flaws. He's lazy. Or more accurately, he's not motivated. Dad has been retired since 2001 and has accomplished...nothing other then reading airplane books. He is a creature of habit and never goes out of his way for anything. He has several (5 or 6) model airplanes in various stages of construction. He has threatened to take a cross country trip to see all the airplane museums he has always wanted to see and hasn't even made a plan of attack. Dad's laid back personality is also a flaw. He will eat a meal he didn't order at a restaurant so he doesn't upset the waiter and then tip them anyway. I have never heard him say "I love you" or "I hate you" to anyone. His personality is almost one dimensional. Airplanes is about all he talks about. He rarely reaches out to his family. He never calls except on the occasional birthday he remembers. His brother may or may not be still alive. He hasn't talked to him in over fifteen years.

My dad is creeping up in years. He's currently 71 and still going strong. We spent two days running around an airshow which is like spending two days at an amusement park and he never needed a break to sit down or complained about aches and pains. My only concern for him, as he gets older, is that his driving is getting questionable. He drives well but I noticed myself hitting an imaginary brake pedal far too many times on our trip. I jokingly gave him a hard time about it.

I love my dad and it's scary how much he and I are alike despite me being raised by a different man. It's almost spooky to be honest. I look at him and I see myself. He is an amplification of my own yin and yang. About the only thing that I can see different in our personalities it the healthy dose of emotion that I got from mom. Dad helps me realize that, even at thirty four years old, I'm a work in progress and I need to keep pushing myself to become a better person. And all I've had to do to gain all this insight is hang out with him.

In '08

I was having a conversation in the break room today and I heard the news speculators on the TV saying that so-and-so won't win the '08 election because they haven't raised enough money yet. How fucking sad is that? Why don't they just start for 2012 while their at it?

The sky is falling.

There's an asteroid headed towards earth. You are one of a very few who know it's coming and you only have time to to visit one retail establishment before it hits.

Question of the week.

Where do you go?

Long live the Jolly Rancher!