There are 3 things you know:
The things you know. The things you know you don’t know. And the things you don’t know, you don’t know.
I love learning about things I don’t know, I don’t know.
Being exposed to something that is totally foreign to me is awesome. It gets me thinking in totally different ways about things I never thought about and I love that.
I find that when I learn about things I don’t know, I don’t know; I look at the things I do know, with a fresh set of eyes and it’s very refreshing.
One of the things I didn’t know, I didn’t know was about airplane racing. I also didn’t know how big of a deal it is for so many people. Millions and millions of dollars are poured into these hobbies (or really I should say obsessions) by extremely wealthy aviation enthusiasts who love flying and love speed.
My mom (a retired high school English teacher) has an aviation apparel company with my step-father, and part of what they do is travel around the country to different Air-shows selling aviation apparel to these die hard aviation enthusiasts. You probably don’t know what an Air-show is.
That’s okay. I didn’t either.
An Air-show is, well, a show where Aviation enthusiasts go and they watch their favorite planes or helicopters do demonstrations. So like the F-14 Tomcat (made famous in Top Gun) or the F-117 Nighthawk (easily one of the coolest planes on this Earth), or the B -2 Spirit (by far my favorite aircraft) or the CH-53 Super Stallion helicopter and on and on.
It’s fascinating to watch these planes in action and it’s even more remarkable to find out the price tag for some of these planes.
Did you know that the B-2 Spirit Stealth bomber plane reportedly costs $2.1 billion as of 1997?!?!? $2.1 billion dollars per plane.
Did you know that an estimated $23 billion was secretly spent for research and development on the B-2 in the 1980’s? That’s our tax dollars at work. But hey – if it keeps our country safe I am all for it!
So tomorrow morning, I’m flying out with my mom and meeting my step-dad in Reno, Nevada for the 45th Reno Air Races and Air Show where they will be a vendor.
Supposedly John Travolta flies in every year on his own Boeing 707 who is obviously a die hard aviation enthusiast.
The show ends on Sunday and then we’re headed to Yosemite National Park which I’m really excited about. I fell in love with the outdoors when I went to Lake Tahoe a few years back. The hiking there is insanely gorgeous and you don’t believe the scenery is real. Words or pictures don’t describe it, at all.
I loved the thoughts I was thinking while there a few years back. And my mom tells me Tahoe is nothing like Yosemite so I’m really pumped.
I always come back from vacations (although this is going to be 80% work) even more fired up and I expect with the scenery I’ll be seeing in Yosemite this time definitely won’t be any different.
The deal with my mom is a free vacation for free work. Done deal.
And as they say in Reno, “Fly Low – Go Fast – Turn Left!”