Credibility, Boneyard hardware, an indoor track and ostriches

Yesterday was one of Suzanne’s most memorable days ever. She spent the entire day with Dr Gary Schwartz, PhD, and his lovely wife Rhonda, a very gifted intuitive herself, at Gary’s Laboratory for Advances in Consciousness and Health at the University of Arizona. Suzanne participated in exploratory investigations into the continuity of consciousness with Gary and Rhonda. They cannot discuss any of the details of their investigations right now, but they were all very excited by the results. (I think Suzanne may be earning some frequent flyer miles back and forth to Tucson over the next year...)

The second part of today’s blog deals with hardware; yes, it’s mostly for the guys. We were staying at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base campground, and what was parked just across the fence in The Boneyard? Hundreds of “mothballed” military and naval aircraft. Here you see only a small fraction of their inventory; these are P-3 Orion Navy anti-submarine and patrol aircraft in the background, and B-52 Stratofortresses (also called the BUFF, the Big Ugly Fat Fellow) in the foreground. The P-3’s will be replaced by the new P-8A Poseidon, just now coming on line from Boeing Seattle; the B-52’s are the oldest serving aircraft in the Air Force, and were built by Boeing in Seattle and Wichita. The early models were put into service in the 1950’s, and the B-52 is planned to continue into service until the 2040s. Talk about a classic!

The next picture is of an Iraqi tank, a Russian T-54; it is outside the headquarters of the 355^th Operations Group, a composite group that includes A-10 Thunderbolt II (lovingly called the Warthog, the Flying Gun, and the Tankbuster). It was obviously captured before the Warthogs had a chance to attack it; otherwise it would be in several dozen (okay, several hundred) much smaller pieces. The Hogs destroyed about a thousand Iraqi tanks during the Gulf War.

The black aircraft is a Lockheed U-2, like the one flown by Gary Powers and shot down by the Russians in 1960. The U-2 is still in service and flies in the stratosphere at altitudes of 70,000 feet, about twice as high as commercial jet airliners. The pilot has to wear a space suit because of the physiological effects at high altitude. It carries very sensitive reconnaissance and surveillance equipment. It is said to be the only aircraft that requires an automobile to help it land, due to its very low stall speed; a chase car carrying another U-2 pilot paces the U-2, and the second pilot talks the flying pilot down by calling off the height of the U-2 above the ground as it approaches stall speed on landing.

Before getting on the road today, we went to the gym to run on an indoor track, since the temperature at 10:00 AM was already over 100F. Here are Suzanne and I on the track; we're moving so fast the images are blurred!  I am like many runners; when you find someone just a bit faster than you, you try to keep up with him/her. I was pacing a young guy (in his late 20’s) for a lap or two, and decided to push him a bit. He matched me stride for stride for another couple of laps, then finished his run to go lift weights. We caught up to him in the weight room, and I said, “Hey, you were keeping a pretty good pace for a young guy.” He responded, “Yeah, you weren’t doing too bad either, for an old...er guy.”  J

After our workout, I was topping off our front axle bearing hub seals with SAE 90 weight gear oil. It’s a simple task, just pop off the red rubber seal, pour in some oil, and replace the seal. That’s the theory. In execution, what happened was that the clear plastic cover, now almost 10 years old, had become very thin and brittle with continuous UV exposure, and shattered into about a dozen pieces. Bummer... without the cover and seal, all of the gear oil was running out, making movement of The Bus problematic, to say the least. The local RV repair shop didn’t carry the seals, but could order them if they did the work. Fortunately, they referred me to a local auto parts store, and a 30 minute drive, $15 for two sets (I’ll change the other seal when we get to San Diego), 10 minutes to install, and we were ready to roll! And I saved mechanic’s labor ($90/hr.) 

Lastly, we are now on our way to Yuma, Arizona, and an hour ago passed the Rooster Cogburn Ostrich Farm; they have 1,100 South African Black laying hen ostriches, and are the largest ostrich farm in the USA. I thought about stopping, since I had never been to an ostrich farm, but we decided to keep pushing to Yuma because of our late departure and the fact that the 115F heat was almost unbearable. We were headed west with the sun beating through our huge front windows. It was 94F inside the coach with three air conditioners running! We also skipped Sentinel, AZ, whose sign reads “Sentinel; The Middle of Nowhere”. Gee, sounds like a great place for an ostrich dinner, doesn’t it?  We are REALLY looking forward to the cooler weather in San Diego; we should arrive there Wednesday afternoon. California, here we come!