Andy's Blog

When Allen, Glenn and I travel, we sometimes take Glenn's plane. What I enjoy about that is we always stop off at Waffle House before proceeding onto the airport. I love the contrast of sectors of life (for those who don't know, Waffle House is kind of "dumpy" - but awesome waffles). Well today topped that. Why? Because there aren't too many days you wake up in a Motel 6, only to board a private jet. And that isn't where the fun ended.

We all know I am an aviation nerd. So when Pete (CJ's boss) offered to send the private jet to pick up CJ and I in Charleston, I was ecstatic.

We show up at the airport with our jet and Andrea and Asher's jet sitting next to each other on the tarmac. I try and look smart by picking out which jet is which, but I end up just making myself look stupid by picking out the wrong one. Luckily for me, I covered well and said, "ohh I have just been following too many flights on FlightAware." This prompted the co-pilot (Wes) to say, "ohh, are you a pilot?" And I responded, "I am trying to be." He responded, "well then, we'll have you up to flight deck." I think, "Awesome."

Right as we are hopping onto the plane, Boeing's DreamLifter was taking off out of Charleston. 99.9% of you aren't going to know how cool that was, but for the aviation nerd, this was a very rare site. The plane is designed to transport large parts of the 787 from the factories around the world, to Boeing's factory in Seattle.

We take off and head directly to Fort Wayne. At about 12,000 feet (10 minutes into the flight), Wes comes back and asks if I would like to sit up front. I was thrilled. I sat down and for the next hour or so, sat at the controls. It was AWESOME!

Then the most amazing thing happened. The pilot (Steve) and I are listening to air traffic control (like we should be), and then all of the sudden we hear instructions to another plane reference Air Force One (President Bush's plane). Steve and I quickly look at each other with a "no-way" face. He said he has been flying for years and never been in the same airspace as Air Force One.

We landed directly into FWA around 12:05 - right behind Asher and Andrea's plane. Asher and Andrea hopped in the ambulance. Lisa was waiting to pick CJ and I up. Dropped off the luggage and then went to Lutheran Hospital.

All and all, quite an exciting morning. Maybe that is why I passed out for 3 hours this afternoon.

Well that's about it for now. I will update you on the three things I learned while in Charleston (preview: one of them is that married people suck at being wingmen). But for now, just thought I would update you on the awesome day I had.