Brian and Angie's Wedding

Michelle and I drove down to LAX Friday October 31st for our flight back to WI for Brian and Angie's wedding. We met up with Michelle's sister Lisa who was on the same flight, but unfortunately the airplane was booked and we couldn't get seats together. Michelle and I weren't even sitting next to each other although we were across from each other. The guy that was supposed to sit in the middle next to me switch with Michelle so she could sit next to me and he could get an aisle seat.

The flight was uneventful and I was actually able to sleep a little bit of the way (we left around 4:30am so I was tired). Michelle's dad Jack picked us up from the Milwaukee airport and drove us home. We weren't there long before heading over to Mark and Carley's so we could see the kids trick or treating. Tierney was a midnight fairy, Norah was batgirl, and Declan was Aaron Rogers. I took the lamp out of the baggage and set it up to make sure it was still intact; it was but I had to bend it back in to shape a little. We decided to pack the lamp with us since they were gouging us pretty badly to have it shipped.

Saturday morning was lazy, the rest of the family was helping Brian set up for the wedding, but they didn't need our help so we got up slowly. Mark had Ironman so we watched that, it was actually pretty good. We left for the wedding early since we were planning on helping them set up and since Carley needed some time to set up the cake that she made for them. The cake was incredible and Michelle and I worked on melting chocolate for the chocolate fountain. Right about now is when we figured out that we forgot to bring the lamp to the wedding!

The theme of the wedding was Halloween / fall with colored leaves for decoration and a candy bar. I was very impressed with how well the place looked considering they had such short time to set all of this up. The wedding itself was very short and straight to the point, exactly how they wanted it. I thought it was great, I like these kinds of weddings.

They had all sorts of options for the lunch including chicken, vegetarian, beef, veggies, cheese and crackers, etc. and it was delicious. Angie's mom catered the wedding herself (with her crew) and did a fantastic job. Again I was so impressed with how well it turned out so quickly. After dinner they moved some tables and had some dancing, although I don't remember them doing any of the formal dances. I love the dancing pictures, but figured I probably shouldn't post any of them.

Monday evening, Brian and Angie held their gift opening. It was just a few people that went over there, but it was fun seeing what they got and what kind of taste they have.

Congratulations Brian and Angie, now comes the pressure for grand kids!

Kevin and Shelvey Tajii's Wedding September 6th, 2008

This weekend Michelle and I flew up to San Jose for our friends Kevin and Shelvey's wedding. Kevin and Sarah Ford also flew up with us so we were able to planepool and save some money.

I needed to burn just a little gas so that we'd be under the maximum weight of the airplane so I flew for 15-20 minutes or so doing practice takeoffs and landings before we loaded the airplane for the trip. After burning the gas and checking what the Ford's brought for baggage, we were good to go. The trip was extremely smooth the whole way up there and I logged 1.9 hours on the tach including the practice takeoffs and landings.

I decided to fly into Reid-Hillview airport (add another to the map) since it would be cheaper and more convenient to fly into the San Jose International. After we got the rental car (which ended up being a huge extended cab truck since they were out of cars) we went and checked into the hotel early. Normally it would take 6+ hours to get up here not counting stopping for lunch, but were checked in to the hotel in less than 3.

After checking in, we headed up north to San Francisco to tour Alcatraz, but unfortunately the tours were sold out for the day, so we went to pier 39 instead. After getting some ice cream, we went and watched the sea lions. Sarah didn't have the best luck with her ice cream since a sea gull came down and snatched her cone right out of her hand. It dropped into the water and there was a frenzy with the birds. It scared the crap out of me since the sea gull just about hit me it came in so low, can't imagine Sarah since it DID hit her!

After pier 39, we went at drove past the famous Lombard street then headed back to the hotel. After a little swimming we were in bed for the night.

Saturday morning we went to tour the Winchester house. This is a crazy house that the widow of the second president of the Winchester gun company built since a psychic told her to keep building to appease the spirits of those killed by Winchester guns. Since she had to keep building the house at all times of day for decades, there were several unique features. A few interesting things were a staircase that went to all the way to a dead-end at the ceiling, a door out the second floor to nowhere, pillars mounted upside down, etc.




After the house it was time to get ready for the wedding. Unfortunately, we don't have many good pictures of the ceremony itself, but it was a good ceremony. I'll have to talk to Kevin when he comes back from their honeymoon about it. I thought they were going to do a traditional Buddhist wedding, but even though there were some unique parts, it seemed very traditional.




The wedding was fun and I didn't make a fool out of myself since I was the designated driver (only I was on the rental agreement).

Sunday we took off in the morning for the trip back. This trip was a little more interesting with much busier traffic coming out of the Bay and being swapped a lot by ATC while I was getting flight following updates. Then there was a jet that wasn't talking to anybody that was flying right at me. The controllers were finally able to reach him although he still seemed oblivious. While they were trying to figure out what he was doing, I climbed to 12,500 to get out of the way.

I was hoping to stop at Kernville for lunch, but there was a NOTAM that 100LL fuel was currently unavailable and I didn't have all the much fuel. I was worried if I descended all the way down there, I'd be too worried about our fuel level climbing back out to head home so we decided to skip Kernville and head home with 2.0 on the tach. This was Sarah's second trip that we weren't able to get lunch at Kernville, maybe we'll have to dedicate a trip some time...