dollar ride

So friday was my first ride in the T-6. Its called a dollar ride because you give a dollar to your IP to commemorate the ride. It was absolutely awesome. This plane is fully aerobatic and it is pretty high powered. It climbs like a champ and overall is a pretty neat aircraft to fly. The sortie is pretty laid back and there really isnt much instruction, so the learning curve is going to be pretty steep starting tomorrow. We should be flying almost everyday from here on out and it is going to be pretty tough. Here are some pictures from my dollar ride (they are all on the ground because we cant take cameras in the planes).

This is me getting ready to "step" to the aircraft.

This is me strapping in to the cockpit. Apparently we are so inneficient at first, the IP does the walkaround while we struggel to attach ourselves to the ejection seat.

This is my hero shot. I pretty much dwarf this airplane.

Visor down, ready to close the canopy for engine start.

BIG big news!!

So, of course, Rick forgot to mention the most exciting news of all. I found a job!!! And the best part is that I can ride my bike there if so inclined. I probably won't but it is nice to know that I could (Rick will read this and make me ride my bike at least once...betcha two dollars). It's at the Child Development Center here on the base. The pay is really decent and is made even better by the fact I won't be spending it on gas money to get into town. We're spending the next few days rotating in and out of the various classrooms to get a feel of where we'd like to be most of the time. My first two observations today involved me getting spit up/ thrown up on so we'll see what happens tomorrow. Rick and I are both pumped about this job, though, because I've been home alone so long I've started talking to the dogs like they can 1) understand me (in Bill's case, hear me) and 2) will respond. I think it's definitely time to get out of the house.

Also, the other exciting news he forgot was that our friends just had their little baby girl. They are in our class and we are all so happy to see baby Avery. She's like the class mascot, Baby 0914 (Rick's class #). It's going to be an extremely busy year for them but I have a feeling they'll have lots of help if they need it.

Other than filling out my half ton of paperwork for my job, I've been hanging out with the other spouses in his class. It's a total change from Altus and really nice to be able to hangout iwth people who know what you are going through. If you need to just have a gripe fest about how the Air Force is ruining your life or how much you want a puppy or how all the husbands have forgotten how to take out the trash since pilot training started, someone is there. We've also going to spin class. Unfortunately it's at 7am. Fortunately, last time they played early 90s music which was awesome and a great way to start my Monday. We'll see how long it lasts.

one more week...

So we have come to the last week of academics. Its not even a whole week, but we still have a test. We actually spend one day on the flight line with them teaching us how to do the everyday tasks that we are going to have to do. Its pretty exciting to know that we will actually be flying starting this Friday. Its going to be pretty rough, they expect us to know absolutely everything about flying the plane and they make it very obvious when you don't know it. We go in on Monday and we get to switch pubs with the class that is leaving so that we don't have to make a million updates to the dash-1 and our checklists. Even though it is going to be tough, it will be a lot of fun getting to fly again.

This last week I did some simulators, mainly emergency procedures and we took a couple of more tests. I am getting the hang of actually "flying" the plane in the simulator, but it will be nice to actually be able to feel what you are doing when we get in the plane.

Rachael's parents drove down this weekend. We had a pretty good time, but Debbie was sick and the weather wasn't that great when they got here. We went to get some pretty good food at some of the off the beaten track restaurants. We watched some good football games and then we watched the Arkansas-Alabama game, and that made me want to be an alumni of some other school. That was absolutely the worst game i have ever seen on television. It looked like mediocre junior high team was playing a collegiate team. I hope that they get their act together before they come down to MSU because we already bought our tickets and I would hate to be as embarrassed as i was yesterday.

Well, that's all we have for now.

wedding pictures

So, after three long months of waiting, the photographer finally decided that she would put our pictures up on the webpage. They are at: http://onlocationphotog.com/Harris%20+%20Winfield%20Wedding/index.html. I am not going to lie, I look pretty good. I never really had trouble with that though...

just another day in paradise

Another week down, only 48 left to go. This week we had our aerodynamics class/test and then we started on flying fundamentals and local procedures. we also had our first real simulators even though we really werent even flying. The aero test went alright. I didnt make a 100 but at least i made a 97. They should really start putting our tests on friday and then not teach us stuff because it just makes it that much harder to sit through instead of testing on thursday and then having to do stuff on friday. The aero stuff was actually pretty difficult, but i know what i need and now i can pretty much brain dump the rest of that crap. we started our basic level simulators where they teach us how to do the checklists in a timely manner. we also practiced responding to basic emergencies and using our cockpit resources effectively. I did pretty well on the sims (they really arent that hard). I managed to get my checklist time down from 25 minutes to almost under ten. We also got our flight assignments this week. I am going to be in T-Bolt flight with half of my class. The other half of the class is going to be in Lightning flight. We are all in the 37th FTS. Rachael and I are having a pretty good time with the people in our class. We spend a lot of time with the other married couples. Rachael is going to start golf lessens this week because she really needs them. we are also in major house decorating mode because rachael doesnt like the idea of having our style be "early college". Well, i guess that that is it for now.

why rachael owes rick a disc

Just an early morning update for those of you that actually check this......

Rachael and I went out with a couple of friends to play some disc golf this weekend. Rachael is not the best player, but she seems to have some fun while we are out there. We had a good time, but little did we know that I would get to attempt some "fishing" while we were out there. Maybe one day she will learn to throw over the narrow part of the water and we can avoid situations like this:

This is one of those moments where you know you really love someone. At the point in the picture above, the water is actually ony about a foot deep. The mud, however, is up to my thighs. For the record, we never found the disc. Now to be fair, I actually ended up in the water a couple of holes later, but it is all about LOCATION. Overall we had a pretty good time. I just wish that the only course around here wasn't thirty minutes away.

Here are a couple more action shots.

Rick with another tree hit

Rachael and her disc prowess


Ryan's wife Julia

more pics of the things we have been up to

This is Rachael beeing a trooper and riding her bike all around Bainbridge Island, WA. She rode 15 miles in one day!

This is Rachael and her best friends from ASMS the day after the wedding.

This is the official wedding party. The best man Seth, Rick, Rachael, and the MOH Abbey

This is a pic of me getting ready to start my first triathalon. I actually did pretty well. I finished 37th out of 270.

another on bites the dust

so we are now officially done with systems. we took our fourth test of upt and i managed to once again make a 100 on it. i am the only person in my class to get a 100 on all four tests. i guess that it is just good luck, but i have been studying really hard. i just hope that i can keep my streak alive. i doubt that i will because our next section is aerodynamics. this is one of those completely foreign subjects to me. i have never liked anything physics or physics related. we are also starting our simulators this week. we actually have to wear the full get up (helmet, mask, and harness) just to sit in the cockpit and do checklists. we also are going to get split up into flights this next week. it doesn't mean much until we hit the flight line but it will be interesting to see how we get split up.

on other notes, Rachael and i are having a great time. we usually have people over for dinner a couple nights a week and we hang out with all kinds of people on the weekends. it is definitely a big adjustment getting back into all the studying (for both of us) but we are doing pretty well so far. well i guess that is it for now!