Currently Reading The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate By Gary Chapman see related

Engaged!!

Last July, while contentedly going through a really awesome Bible study for singles (and very content to live single for the Lord), I met Vanessa Winkles, the lovely lady who as of about an hour and a half ago became my fiancée.  I was recently asked if one year ago I though I'd be engaged now.  The answer is: No way -- not in a million years!!  I was the one of whom they always said would never have a girlfriend, much less be married.  I love what the Lord does with discouragement.  So, that's all for now.

"The strangeness of this life cannot be measured."

--Michael Blake

Currently Reading Humility: The Fear of the Lord Is the Instruction of Wisdom, and Before Honor Is Humility, Proverbs 15:33 By Andrew Murray see related

Okay, more trip stuff.  Let's see.  A few of my favorite things at the USAF Museum are the raindrops on roses, whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles with warm woolen mittens, brown paper packages tied up with string, these are.....evidence that it's past my bedtime.

I don't know why but I loved looking at Ronald Reagan's overcoat and Jimmy Stewart's leather flight jacket.  It's amazing that we once lived in a country where we had celebrities making truckloads of money who took time out to defend our nation.  (Nowadays we have celebrities making truckloads of money who'd rather defend those who attack us.)

My favorite plane from WWII is the P-38 Lightning.  This aircraft had 2 propellors and a "forked tail".  It looks almost identical to the plane Howard Hughes was flying and brutally crashed in in The Aviator.  The lighting also featured four .50 calibre machine guns as well as a 20 mm cannon all in the nose, making it much more accurate than most of its counterparts which sported machine guns in the wings.  But the tail is what most P-38 enthusiasts love about the plane.  Unfortunately, due to some moving around of aircraft within the museum, my beloved P-38 has been backed up against a dark wall in a not-very-well-lit area and you don't really have a good view of the forked tail.

I finally broke down and bought an inexpensive flight stick for my computer.  It's nothing fancy but it certainly makes Microsoft's 2004 Century of Flight a lot easier.  So I enjoyed flying first around Galveston Island, then Chattanooga Tennesse, and finally Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.  My next flight lesson will probably be Brownwood, TX.

My apologies to anyone wishing I'd get off this airplane high (is that a pun?), but I don't think it will happen anytime soon.

PS Vanessa-updates are on their way.

Vacation's pretty much over.  Been interesting.  Seen lots of stuff.  On my way back to Brownwood.  Some other time I need to talk more in depth about my trip, my girl, and other stuff.

Can't believe Steve Irwin has passed.

Currently Gaming Mario Kart: Double Dash By Nintendo Of America see related

Just returned with my dad from a nearly 10-day road trip.  Went something like this:

Houston - Memphis (Graceland) - Louisville - Dayton (USAF Museum) - Chattanooga - Pensacola (U.S. Naval Aviation Museum) - Houston.

Some highlights and fun facts of the USAF Museum:

Houses the B-29 Superfortress, "The Bockscar" which dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki.  Contains nearly all of the Wright Brothers original flyers except the original 1903 model.  Contains aircraft which not more than a decade ago were considered classified including the F-22 Raptor, the B-2 Stealth Bomber, and the Predator (unmanned aerial vehicle).  Houses the infamous SR-71 Blackbird as well as the plane which ironically served as both its predecessor and successor, the U-2.  (Of further interest is the fact that both of these spy planes have rock groups named after them.)  Features a special depiction of the highest skydive in history: a jump from over 102,000 feet - 20 miles above the earth's surface.  And he lived to tell about it!  The Presidential Hanger contains the Air Force One used by JFK, the same which carried his body from Dallas to D.C. in November 1963, as well as the other presidential planes used by previous administrations.  There's a gallery which tells of celebrities who were members of the USAF including Ronald Reagan, Clark Gable, and retired Brigadier General Jimmy Stewart.

But the thing that intrigued me the most was when I saw that a plane I used to guard while I was still on active duty (and this plane was assigned to my base's reserve squadron), is now in a prominent place just outside the museum building.  It's the famous C-141 ("Hanoi Taxi") Starlifter, the last plane to bring our POWs back from Vietnam.

On a similar note, my dad worked on electronics systems on aircraft while he was in the Air Force (1964-68).  And inside the museum was an EC-121, the forerunner to the AWACS.  And though there were over a thousand of these specific planes built, my dad looked closely at the markings, serial numbers, etc., and after a bit of Internet research concluded that it was one of the exact same planes he used to work on.

It's good to finally be back.  Vanessa will be here in a few hours and I haven't even gone to bed yet!!  That reminds me, I haven't revealed to the Xanga world who Vanessa is.  Guess I have some catching up to do.  But it will have to wait for another time.

Currently Listening How The West Was Won: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack By Alfred Newman see related

This just in:

Pluto no longer considered a planet!  Well, I sure appreciate the fact that these astronomers and whatnot decided to wait after more than 25 years of indoctrination of pro-Pluto propaganda to tell me that!  And just who serves on this "To be a planet or not to be a planet committee"?  Have these people even been to Pluto?

I'm currently in a Holiday Inn Express in Louisville, Kentucky.  This morning my dad and I will be driving into Dayton, Ohio to see the USAF Museum as well as a few old friends.  Yesterday, we saw Graceland, and it was interesting, but I don't think I'll be making it an annual pilgrimage. 

While there we split a grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich.  I mean, you're in Graceland, and even a lot of non-Elvis enthusiasts know that this was EP's favorite snack.  So if you make it all the way to Graceland, ya gotta try one.  I like peanut butter and I like bananas, and a few times in my life, I've even enjoyed them together.  But this...it didn't really taste bad, it was just strange. 

To sum up, let me just say that it was the best tasting obligation I've ever eaten.