About Me

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1964: after high school life begins. Asked to consider not returning to OSU after the first year. 1966 drafted; grunt, door gunner, HU1 pilot. Out in Dec '70. 1972 married, joined fire dept and bought first house over a 6 month span. 1980 moved family (which now consisted of wife Teri, daughter Amy and son Ryan) to CO. 1990 moved all to bush Alaska to work for the dark side (the FAA). Started Blog to keep family and friends up on our whereabouts. Retired in March 2010. In Feb 2012 sold house in Alaska. By May had bought in Redmond and completed the move. Still nesting in Redmond and loving it!

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Birthday

Yes, today was mine. I pretty much don't like them but looks like everybody else needs to make a big deal of them. Don't get me wrong; I enjoyed getting phone calls from family and friends today.  It was good to catch up with everyone. I just don't get the need to celebrate.

I guess it all starts with the one year old demolishing a cupcake that they don't particularly care to eat and progresses from there. Then there is the need to have milestones that tell us where we should be in life. But after 16 and 21 they are all downhill markers. The main theme being how much faster and closer they occur. The things that I notice now as milestones or markers in my life are the things that I have done for the last time. Hopefully that includes falling in the stream as well as off the roof. Not likely.

Went to an aviation exhibit with Les Hatch yesterday.  Always good to see old airplanes.

There was mostly old Air Force jets but there were some interesting antiques too. This early water cooled engine had two valves per cylinder. They were both operated by the same push rod. The rocker opened the exhaust valve on the upstroke and opened the intake valve on the down stroke (at least that is what appeared to be happening).
These were 30+ megaton bombs that were carried by the B1 bomber (the bomb bays are right above the bombs).
Here's the manufactures data plate located at the center of gravity.

There was even a battle scarred X wing fighter.

Complete with R2D2 copilot.
The front entrance had a B52, always an attention getter.

Nothing special planned for tomorrow. Hope your day went well.

Staying warm.