It's Fitting: Happy Birthday Brian

So last weekend, because we were yet again, apart for the entire week, we had to pull some strings to see each other.

It was Brian's.. um... 29th... ummm.. birthday (right) and so I drove up to glorious Lemoore (Central Valley CA) to go see him. It actually was a great drive up, 5 hours past LA, over the grapevine, past Bakersfield... etc etc etc... The fun thing was, I got out of work early and got on the road at a reasonable hour. 5 hours of show tunes and snacks later, I was on base at NAS Lemoore (did I tell you how MUCH I love getting on base??? Ugh, I always feel like they are going to tell me no, I'm some impostor that can't come in there... ).

The first night, Brian's actual birthday, we grabbed a quick dinner then settled down in the extremely crowded movie theater to watch, "Watchmen". Eh, I don't recommend it. It was really really long and really violent. The most appalling thing was that this idiot couple had their 3 month old baby with them at the theater... Brian and I were shocked.

The next morning though, Brian had to go fly, so I drove down to Bakersfield to have lunch with my girlfriend Nikki. Nikki and I met after an intensive 5 week pilates training course and any time we are in each others neighborhoods, have to stop by. It was TONS of fun, especially since I was totally bonding with her cutie patootie 2 year old, Hunter. He loves me :-) .

So, after lunch, it was back to base, and to the hangar to go meet Brian's Skipper and some of the guys. I think this was also synonymous with, "Hey boss, the wife is here, can I go home now???" :-) Then we got an awesome phone call from our friend Eddie, who's house we were going to dinner at later... "Do you guys want to go up in the plane for a sunset flight?" ... Ummm. DUH.

Now this was not a flight for the faint of heart. Well, the two navy pilots would disagree with me... but it was pretty fun/intense. I love to fly, but had never been up in anything that small before (pictures below), and had never been up with an old Navy pilot who liked to pull G's. Hrm.
It was however, a TON of fun, and only lasted 20 minutes and I only almost passed out once. Coming into the break I got a little gray and fuzzy... it was a pretty tight turn. But it was AWESOME. I am so exciting for the next time we can get up there and for when I can start taking flying lessons!!!

The rest of the weekend was great, seeing Eddie's girls and his mom and having a bonfire at their house. Roasted marshmallows and everything!! It was a perfect birthday weekend :-)

Da plane Da Plane!!

This is our crazy pilot John - Call Sign Eddie Don't you feel safe with him behind the controls :-P

Brian in the backseat... it was actually quite spacious back there... for a 4 seater.

This is us about to take off. So I couldn't quite understand why we weren't climbing as we skimmed along the top of the runway... pretty low. I found out about 5 seconds later when he pulled up QUICK. See below.

I did SO good though. Just had a death grip on the door handle, but other than that... was awesome!

Then he handed me the controls. So I look like I'm having a blast here... I'm actually shaking like crazy and was like... OMG TAKE THEM BACK!! I just couldn't figure out what the plane was going to do when I moved the yoke. It did stuff too... it was sensitive... I need to take lessons before I do that again :-)