HOME AT LAST!

We made it. We started in the jungles of Arkansas (taken at Cabela's headquarters in NE)...

...traveled through the plains of Nebraska (this is seriously what it looks like...if you are lucky enough to find a place that is inhabited)...

...and trekked through the snow of Wyoming...

...and ended up in the Treasure Valley.

It was a good trip that went smoothly for the most part. The only exceptions were when a trucker ran me off the road in Kansas City and I left parts of the passenger side mirror on a roadside barricade and when we encountered 50+ mph winds in scenic Nebraska. It really was white knuckle driving with the wind blowing that hard. I, no kidding, had to have about 15 degrees of turn in to keep going straight down the road and passing 18 wheelers was a very scary adventure because of the wind coming around them, not to mention they were getting blown all over the road as well. Even my trusty passenger was on high alert...just not when I took this picture.

We arrived to a house that was all taped up because it was in the middle of being painted. Our carpet still has not arrived, so we have everything in our garage and are living on a air mattress. We figured there was no need to move it in and then back out a week later...except for the important pieces...

In the photo you can see the new wall color we selected. It looks very good and we are excited about seeing how it looks with our new carpet, not to mention we can start moving things in to our house and actually "live" in it. We also purchased some furniture to replace the camp chairs...I guess Candi thinks they didn't match well enough.

Candi started back at her job, but found she could get more done at home like she had been doing...so she is now back to working from home for a few more weeks. She is glad to be back home, but had a good time on her 1 year hiatus. I started at Gowen Field on Tuesday as well. I have been running around getting all my in-processing paperwork done, as well as putting together Dash 1s (owners manuals for planes) and getting prepared to fly this next week. I should get my first flight on Friday, which I think will finally make this being home thing sink in.

Both Candi and I thank you for your support, prayers, and thoughts during our journey to Texas and Hillbillieland. It really hasn't hit us that we are home yet, but as our lives start to get back to normal, we both think it will start to seem real. We are blown away at all the current construction and how much things have changed in the last year or two because the last few places we lived were so slow economically. Everyone here is all doom and gloom about how the market is around this area, but it is far above Texas and Arkansas.

I just want to say thank you to all those who read my blog and/or commented and/or e-mailed me with their support. I will continue to post updates, but not as frequently as I have over the past two years. Candi is making a scrapbook of all my blog posts including the pictures and if she is ever going to get it together, I am going to have to slow down with the new information. My thought is that I will keep it going and then when something new or exciting happens, I will post it. When I am deployed or activated, I will post more regularly, just like the past few years. Thanks again for reading my written thoughts- I hope you enjoyed the read...BUT PLEASE KEEP CHECKING THIS AND KEEP IN TOUCH WITH ME!

I AM DONE...MAMMA, I'M COMING HOME

If you don't believe in God, here is something that will make you a believer: Jeremy Presley is now a qualified c-130 co-pilot! Yeah, that makes walking on water not look so tough!

Anyway, I passed my checkride with no downgrades and we are packing to go home to Idaho. Plan is to still hit the road on Thurday. Stay tuned for more, but thought I would share this great news!

One Flight From Going Home

I have some really good news and some not so good news. First the good: I have been put on the fast track the last few weeks and now I am only a checkride away from being done with this program. The bad news is that I am scheduled to do that on Tuesday morning and that coincides with a rare phenomenon around here called STORMS. Yes, once again the storms that are required to take place weekly by Arkansas law are supposed to take place Tuesday through Thursday.

I flew a few times this past week and even got proficiency advanced through a flight (didn't have to fly it, just got credit for it) to get me to take a tactical emergency procedures evaluation (EPE). EPEs could equate to a verbal checkride to ensure that you know your required knowledge. It is usually a big grilling by an instructor and not the most fun to see what penguins have fallen off your iceberg. They all say we have "knowledge icebergs" and that penguins represent bits of information. You can only fit so many penguins on the iceberg until some start to fall off...the idea is to have the penguins that the instructors are looking for on the iceberg when they are looking for them. Granted my iceberg floats in warmer water and is therefore smaller, but the instructors still do penguin inventory on my iceberg.

Anyway, I somehow got ahead of most of my class and I was supposed to have the EPE with one of the toughest instructors and by myself. To do an EPE is bad enough, but normally they will do them with another student which gives you some support and if you really don't know something or are way off, they will usually say something to help you out. I was worried about it, but my prayers were answered and the instructor cancelled and I had an extra day to study. On top of that, I got to do it with two other students...one being my roommate Peaches. The EPE went really well and wasn't nearly as bad as I had thought.

That leaves me with one checkride, which is comprised of two routes. If all goes well, you fly them back to back and it takes you a couple of hours to fly and then you are done and can start to out-process. The "plan" is to fly Tuesday morning (weather cooperating) and then start out-processing which will probably take me into Wednesday morning. After out-processing, I will pick up a U-Haul for Candi to load and then after I get back from golf, I will inspect the packing of the truck. If all is still on schedule, we will leave for the 1823 mile joy ride on Thursday morning. The biggest things will be 1) passing the checkride, 2) having good weather to fly, and 3) having no maintenance problems on the plane. Long story short, keep me in your thoughts and prayers this week and I just might get out of here.

Other than packing, we really haven't been doing a whole lot. Candi and I went on a walk along the river this weekend and we saw a swan. I had never seen one, outside the Cloverdale Cemetery grounds, and they are huge. The one we saw looked like an ostrich in the water with its long neck. Here is a picture and this beast was a long ways away.

Well, hopefully next post will be from the road or from Idaho. Monday is a down day for all training bases throughout the Air Force since we have had three fatal crashes in the last month with student pilots and instructors. We have to attend a briefing to talk about safety, but we can't fly...and of course it is supposed to be clear and nice weather! Remember me on Tuesday! C-YA!