I have this really awful habit of forgetting that this journal even exists for months at a time. Oh well.

News: I am in Lemoore, California, and I've only got four or six months to go in the rag! Then I'll get packed off to new and exciting places like...Lemoore. Eh heh. Well, that's one of three options, anyway. My first choice is Japan, of course, but I just found out that they might be going on deployment as soon as I got there. Not convenient, not at all. And then there's Oceana, Virginia (just by Norfolk, not far from Washington DC) which would be pretty cool, first ebcause my family lives around there, and second because it's a cool place with lots of stuff to do and see. And I miss New England a little.

I blew up an airport today. That was kind of cool. (No, I did not randomly bomb Los Angeles International...it was an old, abandoned airfield that the government designated as target practise. Still...)

And now I'm rockin' out to Russian techno/rock. I kind of like it. It's a band called Faktor2, and they're almost as good as Aqvarium (although nothing will ever be quite as wonderful as "Shumelka.")

Oh, and in case anyone was still wondering: I am a confirmed nerd. I bought Vegas Movie Studio this weekend. Now I can take my nerdy movies and graphics up a notch to a whole new level of extreme special effects! Yeah, that's a real achievement.

Not much else to talk about. I got stranded in Fallon, Nevada when one of my engines crapped itself at 20,000 feet. I'm learning how to do Close Air Support missions, which is all about helping the guys on the ground in Iraq or Afghanistan or what have you. Still eating like crap and letting the dishes pile up until the sink reaches maximum capacity.  Still working on my relationship with my mom (sometimes we seem to be progressing and sometimes we...aren't.) I now have enough (full) bookshelves to cover every wall in an entire room. My kid brother rocks like the champion. My dad's coming back from Baghdad in a month. And.....and....I have a fresh block of chedder cheese in my fridge.

Yeah, life is going okay.

I made it! Cross country solo drive, two weeks of pure Hell at SERE school, and a couple days of Swim-Phys/C-FET (AGAIN, damn it), and I am still in one piece!!! More or less. Only a few bruises remain, none of my eardrums got blown out, no injuries that will scar, and only a little residual mental anguish from the SERE stuff. (I swear, I still wake up in the night and think the guard is going to come and hit me for making noise or something). So. Alive. Go me.

In other news. I still have no home. My new apartment won't be ready until October 5. Ironically, I am starting FRS (Super-hornet training school) October 6. Yikes. That'll be a tight scheduling squeeze.

OK, I'm tired now. The Helo Dunker (you sit in a giant can, get dropped several feet into water, rolled over, then you have to unstrap and get out somehow while a bunch of other nervous dudes try to do the same all around you and no one can really see what they're doing and you're all disoriented and water shoots straight up your nose) really took it out of me. Sinus headache like whoa.

Oh, and congrats, Meg, on getting your bookstore job. Pass on anything interesting you may pick up around work.

I BE MAKING WITH THE WINGS!

Sixteen months from the word go, I finally get my Naval Flight Officer wings! I am now a winged naval aviator, part of the glorious tradition of fine men and (some) women who patrol the skies in a kick ass F/A-18F Super Hornet and then go home and drink. Heavily. Creatively!

OK, so no, I don't actually drink much. Maybe a little, socially. Which is actually kind of an advantage for me, because it means 1)I actually wake up and remember what happened 99 percent of the time and 2)I get all the good blackmail pictures but no one's got any dirt on me. Well, evidence, anyway.

But this is all a sidestory to the important bit: I got my wings! I flew my last two air combat maneuver flights yesterday, and when my wingman (John "Lube" Baron, USMC) and I landed, a bunch of our buddies were waiting with buckets of ice water and bottles of champagne. Yeah, my flight suit still smells like booze. Good thing I've got another. And the Commander I flew with came over and ripped off my old non-winged patch and slapped my new patch with the shiny wonderful golden wings on my chest. And then he punched them. And so did everyone else. John and I punched each other. What? You gotta make them stick! I'm actually glad that all the guys were willing to punch mine (although a couple were really, really careful about where the blow landed....) because it means they don't see me as a girl, they see me as an aviator. Just like them. I'm graduating ina class of 21 (that's huge, actually, for a NFO wingee class) and I am the only female. The class of 12 behind me has 1 female. The class of 8 behind them (yeah, we were the biggest class in the last like twenty years) has no females.

But all that aside.

I'm going to eat ice cream and do the happy dance now. Again.

Will put a longer entry up later. In the meantime, here:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ptC9N9YJ24Y

Funny!

Decided to make a few changes. Because I can.

Been reading Lord of the Rings again - which I do at least every other month or so. But I rewatch the movies about once a year, and the last couple days have been my annual Tolkien-fest. I LOVE the extended editions. Of course, watching and reading these stories and more or less totally giving my imagination over to them for awhile has inevitably led me to start pondering those questions and philosophies that Tolkien always inspires in me. My favorite this time around has been the question of duty. What is it exactly, and just how heavily does and should it weigh? Are there more than one kind of duty, and if so which matter most? Does self-imposed duty matter more than that which is placed on you by others? What is the link between duty and promise? After all, I have seen people make all kinds of promises, but balk at duty itself, and (interestingly enough) vice versa. Is that even possible, or is it the blackest of hypocrisy?

Hmm

And in two days, I'm off to Langley AFB.

Merry Holidays.

Note: Yeah, ok, so Derek wasn't this bad back in high school. But remember that I was extremely shy and nervous and not at all outgoing, and so to me, this is how he came across.

( Read more... )

If ever I doubted that people are weird, or rather, that people will write songs about anything, this has laid to rest all doubts.

In other news, I've been flying every day these last two weeks. EVERY. DAY. The Navy is trying to kill me. Further proof: I had my annual physical AND Physical Readiness Test on the same day this week (ok, so I got ONE day off...sorta). They poked me with needles then made me do pushups. My arms are about to fall off. Maybe it's something in one of those shots. They gave me AFOS - Arms Falling Off Syndrome. I bet there are support groups for that.

But hey, I passed both tests. Guess there's nothing physically wrong with me. Well, nothing that they know of. w00t!

And now, back to more silliness.

...... I'll be posting more Goddess later. When I remember.

Some more.

( Read more... )

It keeps flickering on and off.

Anyway.

So I've decided that ignoring one blog isn't enough. Now I have two!

Well, Jen and Derek and a few other people that I wish I could keep in touch with better are on this site, and I can't link between the two. Hence, I figure I'll just make a doppelganger of this blog on there. When I actually do post, I can just copy paste it to two places. See? I R literate in the ways of internets.

Sorta. Maybe if I really were, I'd be able to stop it from booting me off every ten minutes like it's been doing ALL DAY.

Sigh.

This is weird. I was thumbing through some old story ideas in an old notebook, and somehow....this formed in my head. I wrote an outline for a whole story in about an hour (and I never finish an outline. It's a curse or something), and then wrote a whole chapter. It's now 2330 and I need sleep something fierce because I have to go to work in 6 hours, but I feel the need to post at least part of it.

Megan, forgive me the liberties I took.

( Goddess )

There's more, which I think I'll put up later.

Alive, to a point. Very tired, and a little lonely because everybody seems to be off on cross country flights all weekend. Got duty from 0500 to 1400 tomorrow. Way to spend a Saturday.

On the other hand, going to see HARRY POTTER 5 Tonight. Well, plan to go. Have several carefully calculated plans for getting around crowds of screaming devotees. Are good plans. Favorite is the one with strategically placed goats. Least favorite, although entirely plausible if situation becomes desperate, will offer to sleep with kid behind ticket counter. (Note: no need to actually keep that promise when sufficient amount of tear gas and blow to the correct pressure point will do). If all else fails, will just go early and stake claim in theater. Defense strategy involves ants. And honey. Lots of honey.

Need nap like all hell, though. Very early morning, long flight, and not enough food in my diet.

On second thought, maybe I shouldn't have named him Hector....

( It's all so horribly fitting )

You know, after Bob (my Beta #1) lived two whole years in spite of ridiculous circumstances, I think I'm kind of disappointed in Hector, getting all crazy and suiciding for no good reason. I mean, I've actually been feeding them every damn day; I've changed their water every couple of weeks. There are absolutely no cats around. And I haven't dropped a brick on either of them at all.

Silly Hector. My next one shall be named...Hulk. Or maybe Anachronistic. Ooh! Rikki Tikki Tavi!

The prompt:
Use: Timothy
Iowa
blimp crash
parka

20 minutes.

( Go )

Why can't I write anymore? So aggravating.

Prompt: Lila, grey, Seattle, spork

( Go. )

Been feeling a bit cut off from the world lately. Hence, I finally succumbed to the pressure and made a myspace account. Don't know how long that will last, but I'm kind of hoping it will be a good way to keep up with people around the world. Everyone I know well is somewhere else, with one exception, and he's still too new to my life to help much against the general loneliness born of nostalgia. And listening to depressing music isn't helping, but it fits my mood so well.

I need something new to do, aside from flight planning and school, to keep my brain occupied.

Look!

An onion is more romantic than a rose.

Ooooooooh, this is the story 'bout a guy named Ned.
He had three angels living in his head.
OK, they weren't really angels, they were hedgehogs in disguise,
but it doesn't really matter 'cause their opinions don't apply
to the story.
So anyway, Ned woke up one day
and decided to try doing things a different way.
See he was stuck in a rut that he couldn't shake free
and he was really only living vicariously
through the TV.
So, today instead of getting "up" out of bed
he rolled over and went down instead
underneath the mattress where he found some lost keys.
but the wire springs were tough on his tender knees,
so he decided to low crawl to his front door
and instead of driving he rolled to the store.
But he didn't need to buy anything, of course
so instead of shopping he just rode the little horse
outside the doors.
And then he went home and called into work to say -
before realizing that was too mundane
to just call, so he hung up and went to the porch
to catch a pigeon.
It took a couple hours but soon he had worked it
so that he had his very own air mailing service.
He stuck a note in the pigeon's little bag
and all it said was "Am no longer office punching bag"
and that was that, he spent the rest of the day
jumping up and down and singing
"MARSHMELLOWS!"

and if you thought I was going to rhyme "day"
with "horray!"
or "yay!"
or "Play!"
then you totally missed
(and I insist
that you look,
it's like the title of a book!
You can't just think
that the title ain't a link
to the reason that I write
so silly and so trite
because you might just have missed)
the title of this post.

I have, for some time now (specifically, about three hours), been trying to figure out why I have been, for some time (specifically, three days), been behaving in such a manner as I have been, for some time now (specifically, three minutes), like writing a sentence that is essentially an expletive.

Interesting Point:
ex·ple·tive - noun (plural ex·ple·tives)

1. linguistics swearword: an exclamation, especially a swearword

2. grammar word with no meaning: a word that carries no meaning but has a grammatical function in a sentence. In the sentence "There are three books on the table," "there" is an expletive.

Except I don't think that sentence had ay grammatical meaning. It served only to illustrate the issue at hand, whither I shall now explicate : I am insane.

It took me a couple hours to arrive at that conclusion, but it seems now to be the only explanation.

Well, perhaps one more: it's my period, I'm cranky, I hurt, and I have mood swings larger than 180 degrees. Possibly even larger than 360 degrees. Don't ask.

Word of the day: perdurable