After an entire weekend of t.l.c., the Honda has been much more cooperative. As long as you don't park it on an uphill slope, drive really carefully, have patience when trying to start it, and keep well over a half-tank of gas in it at all times. yea...we're still working on it! But it did reliably get me to and from Del Rio Middle School two days in a row. That's right--I had a job for TWO DAYS! I substituted for middle school special ed and, well, I will just leave it at saying it was quite an experience. I had all but repressed my own middle school memories (don't we all?! gosh, what a rough couple of years!), and being in a special education classroom on top of it made the last two days extra interesting. God bless the patient, loving souls who do it on an everyday basis. Don't get me wrong, the kids were very sweet--but it's exhausting! And each day is SO very unpredictable in its events and challenges that come with taking care of special needs kids. Wonder what assignment I'll get next time!
AN ERIC UPDATE:
DISCLAIMER: Please excuse all of the parenthesis and quotation marks--should you get a chance to talk to Eric, hopefully these phrases, acronyms, and abbreviations will help you decode his new language. English has taken a backseat and he almost exclusively speaks this alphabet soup pilotese these days.
Eric, well there's no change with him--he's maintaining his status as a UPT (undergraduate pilot training) superstar thus far. At least in my book :). He's working hard and staying very focused, and it is paying off for him. So far he's had several tests and flown a few simulators. From what I gather, simulators require a lot of thought about a lot of different things at once--much like flying, so it's been tricky--but he's doing well and continuing to improve and get comfortable. This week the "sims" have been on emergency recovery. They'll be flying along and the instructor yells out an emergency that is occurring in their plane which they have to simulate resolving. Next week he'll have his "dollar ride". It's a tradition that pilots-in-training pay the instructor pilots (IPs) $1 for their very first ride in the plane (they don't actually pay though, the name just stuck.) From then on he'll be "on the flight line" every day! (Translation: academics, or "phase 1" is over and he's on to "phase 2", which is about 5 months of flying the T-6 Texan II airplane.) This is when he will also begin his 12 hour days and starting "formal release". Formal release is when the UPT students are required to stay in the flight room, whether they are flying or not, until their flight commander says that they can leave. This way they are forced to study with their classmates in an environment that is conducive to getting work done. We hope this is the case, but...boys will be boys ;) .Most of the time this ends up being 12 hours--the maximum amount of time they are allowed to be on duty before the Air Force's mandatory 12 hour "crew rest" for pilots. Of this twelve hours, it is expected that 8 of them be uninterrupted sleep. Bottomline: things are about to get crazzzy busy! :) Wives come in handy here, because we can come into the flight room as long as we come bearing gifts--the edible kind. This is common practice around here and it gives us a chance to actually see our husbands during waking hours. We're pretty sure the single guys like it more though--free homemade food! Every class has two "flights" or groups of students. Once they finish phase 1, they are officially divided into flights and their home base becomes their specific flight room. Eric's class is divided into the Irish and the Longhorns--he's Irish. The guys are also busy designing their flight patches which they where on their shoulders once told they can do so. I can't wait to see what their flight room looks like and what patch they finally decide on!
The same day that Eric is "hitting the flight line" my mom and grandma are coming to visit! Eric will obviously be super busy, so we'll get lots of girl time in. I plan on showing them around our little town and introducing them to our new friends. We're hoping there will also be a drop night so that they can experience what this whole process culminates in--and drops are just a lot of fun.
I think that's all I have for now...I'll see if I can't get Eric to write his own update sometime this weekend-we'll see :)
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