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. | 
