Airshow Today I loaded up the family in the old war machine (minivan), and went to the Air Show at Randolph AFB. Summary version: We saw some cool shit, and had a pretty good time* *void where prohibited, some things weren't great, but we tried to not let it ruin our fun time. Longestversion: Due to the heavy rains on Friday (this also becomes important later) , the field that was gonna be for parking on Randolph was not gonna happen. They scrambled and arranged to have Shuttles go to a mostly abandoned mall, and a nearby highschool. So seeing this info last night we planned ahead. First shuttle leaves the mall parking lot to the base at 830, and that's exactly when we got to the mall. Unfortunately a lot of people got there first, and there was a pretty long line. That we stood/sat in for quite a bit before finding out that the area we were all standing was on the wrong side of the mall. Mad scramble to get back in the minivan and get to the other side where we got in a very long line. Due to them not being organized, or something, after the first like 2 or 3 buses they had take people, we sat for about a FUCKING HOUR. During that time, 5 other buses showed up. They sent them a bit forward of where the hop on spot was, and at the time we thought it was just to free up the traffic that was trying to get into the lot. But they never put anyone on these buses. And the buses left. "Weird, maybe they're just going back around so they can be at the pickup spot." They never came back. (but those exact buses were being used at the end of the day to take people back, so wtf was that about? They sent 5 buses empty away even though there was like a 2 mile long line of people waiting?. Then after a long ass time, about 8 buses arrived. We finally got on a bus a little before 10AM (yeah, almost 1.5 hours after we got there). It took the bus about 20-30minutes to get us to the Airshow drop off spot. Then another 5 or so minutes to get through security. Finally we at the air show! We walked around/under/in the bomb bay of a big ass plane. We walked through the largest plane the Air Force has (C-5 Galaxy) We saw some other cool static planes and helicopters on the ground. Laura got someone elses poop on her hand... Wait? What? We stopped at a line of porta-potties so she could use the bathroom. She didn't notice it when she went in, but when she went to wipe the back of her hand touched something not great. She opened the door with this look of horror on her face. We used the hand sanitizer dispenser they had it in (THANK GOD) and some toilet paper to clean it off. LOTS OF Cleaning. I think she about used half the dispensers hand sanitizer because OMG EWWW. I felt really bad about it. That sucks. I'm sorry she had that happen. <3 you honey! Anyways... Since we were VERY late getting to the airshow due to the mornings highjinks, we started heading out to a grassy field you could go out to a fence next to the flightline to set up our chairs and stuff for all the activities. The field. It rained a LOT yesterday. It was not a great time walking the hundreds of yards (it was about 1,000 feet from the pavement to where we set up). Muddy shoes. The wagon with our chairs got gummed up with mud and it was more like I was dragging it instead of rolling it behind me. But we made it, we got a place right at the fence. I trekked back and forth from our spot to the pavement THREE other times (After we first set up to get drinks, a little after noon to get lunch, and another time to get more drinks). So much mud. Things flew around us. Announcer tried to announce things. We saw all kinds of cool things that I could fire my Autistic mode off and tell you about every performance, but I'll try to make this not novel length, so just some highlights, not in the order we saw them: The F22 tells physics to go fuck itself. Amazing acrobatic stunts with small planes. A MOTHER FUCKING A-10 (one of my absolute favs) Mig-17 go FAST AS FUCK. A Truck with THREE Jet Engines? LOUD AND FAST YES PLEASE! Parachuters are dumb I came to see planes not idiots with a backpack sheet strapped to them. HOLY SHIT AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR (not on their list of things) was A GOD DAMN B-1 BOMBER DOING A FLY BY! And of course the fucther mucking THUNDERBIRDS! Notable bummer things during this time: The re-enactment of the Pear Harbor attack where the announcer rattles of things about that day and some Japanese Zero/Torpedo planes fly around like an attack (with explosions set off way off in the distance) was nice...BUT. The past few times we've gone to airshows and they did this, there were American P52's and other craft that take-off / fly-in to try to stop the attack (much like during the real attack). They did not have it. It was literally just the Japanese planes flying in bombing/attack runs. Still cool, but could have been way cooler. Our daughters phone battery died. She being 14 did not take this well. She was placated by being allowed to use mom's phone to take photos and videos. She killed the battery on mom's phone like an hour later. Lunch? Alright, $4 for a 20oz of soda or water isn't the worst price I've paid for drinks at some event/concert. Fine. But $15 for a burger? (It did come with cheese, lettuce, and tomato, but if you didn't want any of that it was still $15?) No sides. No chips. Just the burger Yikes. A 10" cheese pizza was $16. A hotdog was $8. And it's not like fancy hotdogs this was the kind of shit you would make at home. When it was time for the Thunderbirds to start, there was some technical difficulties so between the stuff before it and them actually starting. Like 30ish minutes of technical difficulties. It was kind of brutal being the end of the day and we all tired. We applied sunscreen, but not enough, and didn't get some things. I look like an unripe tomato cause I'm read from my cheeks down, but 'white' eyes up (Hat, sunglasses). When it came time to leave, the cart wheels were jammed with mud and so we had to DRAG it back out of the muddy field. That sucked too. Then, since shuttles/buses are the only way to get back to the parking areas, there was a FUCKING HUGE LINE. Like half a mile (not kidding). It took us at least an hour or so to finally get on a bus back to the minivan. From there got some drive-thru and went home. Still overall, the air show was amazing. I was giddy with excitement. We walked roughly 2 miles (almost 3 for me cause of my drink/food runs). Laura, who had a miserable time getting back to the car 4 years ago (before her knee replacement surgery) had a much easier time and isn't in serious pain/exhaustion this time. She fucking kicked ass today. In fact, originally I was planning to go solo to the Air Show again tomorrow, expecting her to be maybe too tired or something, but she wants to go with me. We're leaving earlier. We're going to the park and shuttle place a little closer to the base. We're gonna take cream suntan lotion (we were using the spray on kind) for better coverage. Some umbrellas to block out sun between shows/waiting in the line to go back. Portable fans maybe? Air Shows are one of my favorite things. I refuse to not go both days because I don't know when I'll get a chance again since the last one was 4 years ago.