Girls Rule

GIVE ME A CRACK AT THAT T-6!!!!!!!!! (This is what happens when you let the ladies into the life support room.) When Lt. Col. Hamilton asked if anyone wanted to hop into his G-suit, harness and helmet, my hand shot up! SOMEONE please just throw me in the back of the Texan!!! I wont make a peep!

The boys have all the fun...but atleast the ladies of 09-15 could get a chuckle out of me looking like a tool!

The Dip

There are many, "traditions,'' that go along with an USAF pilots first solo flight. Here is a pictorial description of what went down after Chris's solo flight. As you can see, "Lt. Herk " was the first to greet Christopher when he got off the breadbox back at the squadron. Hi Jason! Doesn't this look like a friendly exchange?

Below...you can see things getting a little violent. Tradition says, if a pilot gets away from the mob after his solo, everyone in the class has to buy him/her a 30 rack of beer. As you might imagine...pilots can never escape their fate. Chris put up an OK fight though.
"The Tank." Doesnt it look pretty on the outside?? 09-15 is Chris's class number.

A view of the water... yucky, but doesnt look to bad in this shot.

THIS IS THE WATER THEY DUNK IN! Even the rubber duckies are floating dead!!

If you look closely enough, you can see dead flies and rust chunks in the H2O! Even if these guys survive the solo flight...I am not quite sure how they live through a dunking in this water!

Post-tackle..Chris's classmates grabbing an arm and an arm and some legs.

Heave HO!!!!

...and a splash.

Alright people...I posted this one so you could see that even his head went under that nasty water.

I am so happy that I was able to be a part of Chris's big day. I was able to go out to the ramp with Chris to watch his pre-flight checks, watch him strap up and taxi away. I even was able to watch him fly over my head a few times! Thank you to Dave and Ian for being my escorts! :-)

This page is also under construction

SOLO DAY -This page is a work in progress....

Bama Trip: November 2008

Last Saturday, Chris and I took our first trip to Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham is a two hour drive from Columbus....but well worth the drive. I think that if Birmingham hand a mute button and a fast forward button it might seem a little like Portland. The mute button to mute the southern voices, a fast forward button to speed up the customer service...OK maybe it needs a, "be nice," button as well. Below is a picture of one of the malls in town. This is a two story beast and you can see they are all ready for Christmas!


After our shopping fun, we went to the Birmingham Science Museum to see Blue Planet in IMAX. We had some time to kill before the next show so we played in the museum for a while. My favorite was the wind tunnel that simulated hurricane force winds.

This is Chris's friend the Morey Eel. You cant tell from the picture...but the eel's head was bigger than Chris's head. This guy has been a resident of the Birmingham Science Museum for many many years. He eats once every other day. They watch him if he doesn't eat often enough. Sometimes some of the other fish in the tank go missing if he doesn't eat his museum MRE's. :-)

MSU v. Loyola: HOCKEY Mississippi Style

Last Friday, Chris and I were invited by another couple in the class to drive to Tupelo, MS for Mississippi State University's FIRST EVER home hockey game. This was the most fun I have EVER had at a hockey game. UMAINE hockey rocks my world...but MSU hockey makes me laugh. The team has to drive hours to practice because there is no ice nearby. You might imagine, this is not quite the caliber of UMAINE hockey we are used to.


At one point during the game, the teams got a little rowdy. A fight broke out and as you can see from the scoreboard below, each team was pretty cozy in the penalty box! It took the refs a VERY long time to figure out the rules of the game in this situation.


Here is the crew having a blast! Jeff (Chris's classmate) on the right, Chris, Caitlin (Jeff's wife) and Courtney a pilot from another class. See that guy in the grey sweatshirt right behind Chris? He is an Ol'Miss fan (MSU's all-time rival) He and his pal were pretty drunk and stood up and sang an Ol'Miss cheer in front of all of the MSU fans. I can not BELIEVE they didn't get jumped! And yes, they served beer at this hockey game. We can't figure out if the venue allowed it or the hockey division allowed it.

This is a great shot of Caitlin and Jeff. We all stuck around for the open skate after the game.

Happy Halloween, 2008

Happy Halloween! Check out Jaxon! He was our first and favorite "trick-or-treater." Here he is picking out some yummies for mom! What a cute frog!

Here are some of our other favorite, "Trick-or-treaters!" Unfortunately, they did not visit our neighborhood....NH was too far a walk! Chris and I still hope that they come and visit though...we would even give them lots of candy if they did! Lucy! I miss you! You look like you are six feet tall in that picture!

Anyone love SNL? Here are Chad and Bill (Chris's classmates) dressed up as the, "D*ck in a Box Guys. The whole class went to a costume party at the Club on base. Nikki got us our own private room with a bar. When Chris and I showed up there were about 10 guys there and we were the only ones dressed up! Fortunately for us, later in the evening, a cowboy, a fat lady, a bed bug, a cop, a construction worker, and a GIANT box of Tampons showed up.



My handsome Spartan with his painted on abdominal muscles.

Close up of the helmet. Chris made it! This was such a fun project for Chris and I... More fun was had AFTER I figured out how to use the dang sewing machine!