B.L

Dick Clark from a couple of weeks ago? BL

Vance 12-05 T-38 F-16 MC-12 with a C-17 follow on to McGwire MC-12 MC-130 T-6 FAIP B-52 A-10 (guard) Congrats guys! Wings in 2 Weeks! BL

Boooooooooo!

Ha. I had a buddy get scolded for wearing his fleece hat from the squadron to his car. The dude said it was only authorized for wear on the flight line. I thought if you are wearing your winter jacket the fleece hat was fine. Made for an interestingly odd stop by a dude in civilian PTs.

Don't sweat the NSS. The more you worry about your NSS the worse you do. You cant control your NSS as it is determined from the 200 bros that finished before you. You could be chuck Yeager and have a bunch of flying gods ahead of you and have earned a 55 NSS. Or you could suck at life and the bros ahead of you sucked worse and end up with a 60 NSS. don't worry about NSS. Fly yor ass off and when you finish your contact/aero/form portion and you may not have done so well don't sweat it because you still have a metric shit ton of instrument sims and I rides left (over half of the program). Grab up all the gouge and firewall 5 the sims (or as close as you can get to it) especially in the early sims when the mif is 2s and 3s. BL: don't sweat the NSS. Just fly an do the best you can do. You'll love flying regardless of what you fly. Lud

What does this mean for dudes graduating from T-38s after 1 Dec? Will it take effect immediately, or is this going to be a slow roll type thing? Lud

My grill you can pick up at Lowes. It's a gas and a charcoal grill. I don't have any complaints, other than the retarded movers strapping my grill on the back of the truck and moving it from P'cola to Vance like that. Now it stands with a slant to the left and the grill won't shut...but when it's not broken, it's awesome! Char Griller duo 5050. It runs for $299 but you get the mil discount...so not too shabby! BL

Whiting VT-2 T-1x1 VT-3 T-44x1 T-1x1 VT-6 T-38x1 Congrats guys! BL

Whiting Track Selects 2 June 2011 VT-2 T-38x1 (ME!!!) VT-6 T-38x1 Congrats! BL

Thanks guys, I appreciate it. I'm going to go and work on the in lieu of thing. I've heard of it before, tricky thing is being on the Navy base, hopefully it works. Thanks again! BL

Quick question. Here's the scenario. I've been down here since December 09, so my lease at my house ran out December 10. I went to renew my lease and tried to get a 6 month because we knew we'd be leaving by July for Vance. Well the realtor told me he didn't do a 6 month. Only a year or month to month, and since we're leaving in July he wanted us to sign a month to month lease. We signed it, come to find out in March he's selling the house. I get a call in May that they've sold the house, and we need to be out by June 3rd. I fought with them and fought with them, and finally got an extention to the middle of the month. Well this all worked out perfectly, because I finished up phase II on Tuesday, before the deadline so I could select today, however STUCON didn't realize when I was telling them that I had a cross country this week, and I'd be done by Tuesday, so they didn't turn my selection paperwork into the Air Force side. So now I'm not selecting until next week, and I'm waiting for orders. I know I'm going to Vance because my number one and two are 38's and 1's, the problem is I don't have orders so I can't move my crap. I'm not expecting to get orders until around the 10th of June, which would be fine, but I have to be out of the house by the 17th. Is there anything that I can do to get TMO to set up the move of my household goods (without orders) until I get my orders, or am I screwed here? Thanks for the help/advice. BL

NSE from Thursday... VT-2 T-1 x2 VT-6 T-1 x2 I don't have VT-3's, so if someone knows please fill in the blanks. Congrats guys! It's been a grind...hopefully I'll be following here in two weeks! BL

When you get to TW-5 you'll wait for a couple of months. You may get a stache job, you may just sit on your ass for two months filling the occasional Phone Duty/DASWO/Duty Driver position. VT-2 is going to be with the T-34 until sometime around next year from what my IPs over here have been telling me. It's been 2 AF dudes a class, and you'll get a report date when you get to TW-5, but that will change about 69 times until you find out about 2 days before you report that you'll be in one of the squadron. Hope it helps, let me know if you have any more questions. BL

Any updates on the housing down at Vance? I'll be down there in July for Phase III. I see they have new housing. Is there a good amount of them, or is it just a few and mostly older houses? I've been screwed the past two places I've lived off base (currently my landlord is making me move out at the beginning of next month because they decided to sell the house while I'm still living in it, and I don't have orders nor have I finished up Phase II (10 sims 16 flights left)!), and have been screwed pretty bad, so figured living on base is a little more secure. Is it still pretty bad? Thanks, BL

I'm PCSing from NWhiting to Vance here in the next couple of months. Don't really want the wife to drive from here to there. So the question is, if I tow her car, with my own tow dolly, would I get paid for the weight? Would it count toward the partial DITY? What would be the difference if I bought my own tow dolly, or rented one from UHAUL? Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks guys. BL

I found out the day before I classed up. You'll get a tentative start date when you finish API and check back into TW-5. As with everything in the military it's all up in the air and subject to change. Chances are you'll be a T-6 dude, because VT-6 just accepted their last T-34 guys last week, or coming up next week, so that will only leave VT-2 to carry the load of the T-34 training. BL Edited, because it's my 69th post of mostly meaningless dribble! Congrats to me!

Yeah, there is a handfull of us out at the other two squadrons. It's most of the dudes that showed up around the end of 2009 to the beginning of 2010 time frame. I've heard some BS that CNATRA wants more Navy studs flying the T-6 and that's why we got bumped to the other Squadrons, but that really doesn't matter, and I don't know how much stock to put into that. When we can fly, flying is great, and the T-34 isn't as Gucci as the T-6B but it's a fun plane. I'm on the one flight a week program right now, wich sucks (all weather cancellations, minus one for smoke from a controlled burn turning the field from VMC to IMC), just luck of the draw with scheduling and weather I guess. BL

The other thing to think about is the time it takes to become an aviator. On the AF side, it's a year-ish. On the Navy side, it's whenever they get around to getting you into the required classes, BS, and queep, like API, where you have to go through some queep classes and rediculous tests so they can weed you out if you don't have a 94% average on those tests (saw a lot of good dudes get bumped to SWO and NFO because their "NSS" from API wasn't in that 94% average, and one in particular who was off by maybe one or two missed questions on one of those tests). Then you have to wait until they pick you up to go to ground school, and so on and so forth. I'm AF on the Navy side, and I regret coming down here every minute, because I know I would be at a minimum into Phase III right now. But once I hit the flight line (next week...oh please GOD let it be next week!) it's going to Rock! Just do your research, look at the mission of the aircraft, because either way, it's a crap shoot to get a pilot slot. Work hard, and you should have no problems. BL

They're doing a ground search now. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AI5EE20101119 The article says something about the fact that they don't know whether the ejection seatis at the crash site (attached to the aircraft). They've had three days with the crash site already, wouldn't they know if he ejected yet or not? Is this something difficult to figure out or does it vary with the severity of the crash? Prayers to the Captain and his family. I hope this ends with a good survival story and a safe pilot returning home. BL

I guess it's more ammo for that Captain Board right....makes you in that top 95%? Have fun with that, I'm glad I went when it was just taking a test, and nobody cared about it!

Not good...Alaska can be unforgiving this time of year. Thoughts and prayers to the friends and family! Hoping and praying for a safe return, definatally not a good couple of months for Elmo. Cheers BL

"....the Wounded Warrior Program and the military funeral honors program at Arlington National Cemetery, Stefanek said." Isn't this a little ironic given the circumstances? Is she the right person to be working these, after spitting in the face of so many wounded soldiers with her schenanagins?

Wishing I was one of those Students getting 34's! Ha, I've been here since last December, and I wont' start Primary until 14 Feb...gotta love the Navy! I wonder if the AF ever wonders why they are paying us to do nothing for so long? BL

Not sure, but the article doesn't match up with the SIB or what the Student Pilot said...maybe just trying to talk up a local that gave his life in service?

Anything about the T-6B yet? Ha I have until 14 Feb next year to get some gouge! Damn slow Navy! BL