This is my last post for 2010. Are you ready for the new year? Are you in the camp of folks who sets resolutions every year? Or, are you in the camp that jumped off that bandwagon years ago? Or, maybe you're somewhere in between? As for me, I'm a resolution maker. I set goals throughout the year, but my new year resolutions are always the biggies. 
I'm still working out the details, but here's the gist of my 2011 goals: write 2 books, get my lazy bod back into shape, and see someplace new. Not very creative. Far from it. But for me, resolutions are about taking the conscious effort to revisit my priorities and realign them if necessary. Life's too short to get sidetracked on the wrong grass strip for very long... especially when there are so many other grass strips out there to see. 
How about you? What do you hope to accomplish in 2011? 
Whether you're a resolution maker or not, I hope you set a final 2010 resolution to come to the Half Fast New Year's Eve Party at our Ames hangar friday night. Brian, Craig, Christian and the Sokos are hard at work preparing for the event (while I'm just hard at work... well, just at work). 
Party starts at six pm. Food and drinks provided. Kids and dogs welcome. And the only thing we need you to bring is your friendship! 

Dan Soko just sent us the picture of the women pilots at Oshkosh this year. Diane and I are somewhere in the left back, Lisa Lockard is just a few heads in front of us, and I'm still looking for Amy Sawhill and Lisa Woldow.  Did I miss anyone?

Oh, yeah, and I haven't found THE Waldo yet. 

Thanks to Jeff Beckley for loaning his kick-ass RV for us to fly down to Arkansas for Brian's mother's big birthday. It has auto-pilot (yay!). Here's a video from some of our trip. Enjoy!

The Sokos stopped out for a visit this weekend, and the four of us worked on some very important projects in the hangar...
Such as stenciling PRE-FLIGHT and POST-FLIGHT on the fridge. You can take a guess at which side stores the booze. You're right, it's the empty side. ;)

The picture doesn't show it that well, but here Brian and Dan are finishing up hanging a large, insanely cool B-29 model that Keith Campbell built. For those of you coming to the New Years Eve party, be sure to look at all of Keith's airplane models. The guy is a friggin' genius when it comes to designing and painting airplanes, regardless of size. 

On a related note, Keith's wife Janet passed away on Thanksgiving. She was a wonderfully kind woman who we will miss very much. Our hearts go out to Keith and his family and friends. 

It's that time of year again. Where every panel and inspection cover comes off and we (by "we", I mean "Brian") get our hands dirty performing annual inspections on all the warbirds. To cut back on grime under the finger nails, we like to start by giving each of the birds a thorough clean and wax. Here's a snapshot of the shiny spinner on the Red Baron Stearman after Brian polished it (I think he's happy with how it turned out, don't ya think?).

Two planes done, one to go. Volunteers anyone?  :)