It has been said untold times and about an untold number of women, but never has it been as true as in this instance. My partner in cohabitational bliss, Nancy - the long suffering lady who has put up with all of my B.S. and endured a seemingly endless barrage of shows on
The History Channel,
History Channel International, and
The Military Channel, etc., is truly
one in a million.
Allow me to elaborate...
I had pretty much decided I was not going to the
Gathering of Mustangs and Legends. First of all my schedule right now is just too full, school and all of my other obligations seem to have just swamped me over the last month or so. Secondly, the years of abuse I have put my poor body through have taken their toll and I don't get around very well, so airshows are an endless day of approx. 100 yard hobbling jaunts with long rest periods in between. Finally, airshows are something I enjoy most when there is someone there to share the experience with and the only person I thought might be interested can't go.
This brings us to last Thursday night. I came home from classes to find Nancy had printed out a bunch of information about the show and had left it on the coffee table for me. As I scanned over the pages I asked her why she had printed it as, at that point, I really didn't plan to attend.
She replied, “I thought you might want to see it and I thought that, since it is a once in a lifetime experience,
we could go together.”
To say I was dumbfounded by her reply is an understatement. Nancy doesn't share my passion for all things aviation (I don't know how she even tolerates it, to be honest,) and the last airshow we attended together (ironically enough at Rickenbacker International Airport,) was a decade ago and it had been a long, rain-filled disaster.
“Why would you want to go, hun?” I asked her. “You wouldn't have any fun.”
“I'd enjoy it,” she replied. “I'd enjoy watching you enjoy it, just watching you in your element and it's not that far to go.”
Now right there is
proof positive that she is
one in a million.
It has been a long time since I have been so touched by anything someone said to me. Such love and devotion is rare in this day and age and folks and I have no clue what I did to deserve it. But I can say that I am damn
grateful that I have such a special lady in my life!
Now, thanks to Nancy, I'll finally get to see a P-38 close-up, and not just any old P-38, but the “
Glacier Girl”! Thanks to Nancy I'll see more Mustangs than I could ever imagine being in one place together. Thanks to Nancy I'm going to see something that, although I wanted to go with a passion, I had damn near given up on and, even more, I'll have someone to share it with.
So, there you have it. We are going. The tickets have been bought and the plans have already been made. I am looking forward to this more than anyone could ever imagine, except maybe the lady on my life... I am truly the luckiest man in the world and you know what? Looking back in retrospect, I have been ever since I met this
one in a million lady!
Fear not! We'll be taking several cameras along and yes, I'll be posting some of them, so check back sometime around the end of the month!
Beta testing countinues and all seems to be going very well since I identified the problem with the resizer coding. I haven't encountered any problems with the CD using two other versions of the Vista operating system, so I have my fingers crossed that was all there was. I'm going to have about a week off towards the end of the month, so I am hoping that I'll have the chance to tweak some more of the pages after our trip. Hopefully I won't be too sore or sunburned!

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