Progress...Slow, but Progress!

 Well, campers, we had another "fun" filled week.  First half of the week was in the "fun" category, second half was in the fun category.  You folks are intelligent enough to figure out the difference.

So, the existing houses are ready for showing, all staged and such.  Mrs J is very talented in that arena.  Me?  Well, I am handy with a vacuum cleaner, broom, windex et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. 

Just thought I'd throw that in, one of my favorite movies.

Anyhoo...

So, Mrs J and I got the house on the property pretty well straightened out, and in such a fashion that it can be shifted from functional to showcase with about an hour's notice.  The rental guest houses are always in pretty good ship shape.

So, we got that going for us.

But...What if the 30.9 acres sells?  Where will we live?  Have we thought out a new home strategy?  Questions, Questions, Questions?

Since we've already decided that we would move closer to our Daughter and SIL (AKA College Station), we decided to take a few days off and do a look see.

Yes, Beans, my Brother stayed and took care of the Animals (2 Horses, 4 Dogs, 1 Cat, and many Deer but they don't count).

It was pretty nice to get away, frankly, and to be on the other end of the stick.  Looking at houses.  Our College Station realtor put together a list of 3 houses in addition to the one I showed y'all last week.  She was getting ready to take something I believe is called a "Vacation" and so hooked us up with one of her associates to show us the houses and answer questions.

He did a great job.

The first house was a non starter from the git go.  The driveway was not very wide and was surrounded on both sides by trees. When we commented, the realtor said there was a rule that trees more than 4" in diameter could NOT be removed. Period.  We did go inside, and discovered it was very cramped, not well lighted and the stove did not have a vent.

So... 

Next please!

He agreed.

Skipping ahead to the 3rd house in this discussion.  This one was OK, not great.  Nice looking, but...

Coming in the main entrance, you're met with a curved stairway.  Nice looking, but very steep.  OK, the primary residents (us) are 70+ YO.  We have 3 grand kids under 5 YO.  Those stairs go up to most of the important rooms in the house, bedrooms, bathrooms etc.  So, a bit of risk involved in getting up there.

Nope!  

He agreed. There's another reason for the nope. We had seen something we liked in the second showing we'd had (prior to that house).

Source

 

Second house, was pretty VERY nice,  sitting on ~2.5 acres fenced in.  Nice back yard about half of which is lawn, the rest is forest.  Trees are pretty tall, so keeps the sun under control along with the long porch ceiling.  Nice place to have a quiet sit outside and enjoy an adult recreational libation.  (Whilst reading Sarge's blog of course!)

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Downstairs has an excellent kitchen. (I'm the chef in the family, that's a crucial for me).  Looks out over the family room, so cooking and watching football is doable. Informal dining room fits our needs and is just right of center of this next pic. Formal living room and dining room are adjacent but nicely separated off the left side of the picture and reasonably sized (aka not a ball room).     

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 Oh, yeah and one small, but very nice addition, which we will use quite a bit.

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 Yes, a built in wine storage closet .  Now Mrs J has talked about converting it into a cell for me when I get out of line.  I'm not sure that will be a deterrent if the wine is still in there though.  C'est la vie! 

And, the nicest thing about the house is it is priced in our price range.

So...We've placed a Contingency offer on it and crossing our fingers that our house and property sells fast. 

Our selling agent and buying agent are putting their heads together for options, JIC!

 Oh, and just in case you're interested in some nice property in Central Texas, you might stop by here.

 Peace out, y'All!

 

 

Enjoy the Day ...

OAFS Photo

I am ...

Virginia is for Lovers, Apparently ...

Morning in the Virginia Countryside, Sunrise
OAFS Photo

The Missus Herself and I did not have a traditional wedding, in fact there was no ceremony at all. Just rushing about Seoul to various offices, both Korean and American, doing what seemed to be ream upon ream of paperwork.

Our son did the same, well, he had a bit of a ceremony before a Justice of the Peace out California way. Both daughters, on the other hand, had actual wedding ceremonies, both ceremonies were held outdoors, both in the Commonwealth of Virginia, one of my favorite states. Hence the title of today's offering.

The opening photo was taken the morning after the ceremony where The Nuke and Tuttle got hitched. A lovely old farmhouse not far from Charlottesville, VA. They had the place for a long weekend, both families could be accommodated and were present in force.

Morning in the Virginia Countryside, the Backyard
OAFS Photo

The second photo is the backyard of the farmhouse, where much beer and scotch was consumed by certain members of the wedding party around that fireplace in the background. As the photo shows, nothing was damaged or burned down. Much to my everlasting surprise.

The venue for the reception was off to the left, beyond those bushes. The actual ceremony took place in the front of the house, just off the big old-fashioned porch. A lovely place, whoever thought of having this place be a wedding venue was a genius, it is perfect in nearly every way. I hope they have made, and will continue to make, tons of money from it.

The reason for my surprise concerning events around that fireplace is because after the formal reception, son-in-law Big Time and I, along with Tuttle's future brother-in-law (married Tuttle's sister a year of so after the wedding), decided it would be just the thing to build a fire in the fireplace and consume what remained of the adult beverages provided for the wedding. After all, the next day we'd all be driving back to Alexandria and points further north without much room to haul said beverages.

We made a sizeable dent in the remaining beverages all whilst stoking the fire. We did so without dying of either smoke inhalation, burns, or alcohol poisoning. A minor miracle in itself.

But survive we did, though the hangover next day was epic, I've had worse.

So The Nuke got married in the shadows of the Blue Ridge Mountains. As I mentioned before, LUSH also got married in Virginia, her wedding being more of a Navy affair as she and husband to be, Big Time, were both on active duty at the time. A number of folks from both of their squadrons were in attendance at that wedding, which was held outdoors at the Virginia Beach National Golf Club, a very nice place, though definitely not as rural as The Nuke's wedding.

A story I like to tell, tongue-in-cheek of course, is that Satan attended LUSH's wedding.

No, not the Prince of Darkness, not that guy.

Rather, the commander of Big Time's squadron at the time was a fellow whose given name was Damien. With a name like that, and certain other factors I'm sure, it seems almost inevitable that he would wind up with the call sign "Satan." Which of course, he did. (Note: Satan got a mention in a post by Lex some years back, from when he was the XO of VFA-136, you can read that here. Thanks for preserving that Bill. Note that that was the post which brought Neptunus Lex to my attention. Which ultimately led to Chant du Départ. Small world, neh?)

Both weddings were memorable and occupy cherished space in my memories. Makes me wish, almost, that we'd had a ceremony. Before you mention it, I once asked The Missus Herself if she'd like to do a ceremony. We both decided in the negative.

Ah well ...

Editor's Note: No doubt some of you are bereft and distraught at the lack of fictional story-telling going on around here lately. Others of you may be thanking the Deity for said lack. It will return, someday, but perhaps not soon. I think the Muse is still down on Cape Charles, gazing out onto the Bay and marveling at the loveliness of it all. Mentally, I'm still there as well.

The Quiet Mind

Cape Charles, Looking North along the Tree Line
OAFS Photo

Lately I've been re-watching an old Showtime series about the Tudor king Henry VIII, titled, appropriately enough, The Tudors. I was surprised to find that I had missed the fourth season. Like all things Hollywood, there are departures from the historical record, but overall I thought the series very well made.

Having lately finished up a most delightful and relaxing vacation on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. one scene in the series struck me as appropriate to my mood. The scene has Henry Howard (played by David O'Hara), the Earl of Surrey, reading a poem to Charles Brandon (played by Henry Cavill), the Duke of Suffolk. This one ...

The poem struck a chord with me, so as is my wont, I looked it up.

"The Happy Life"

by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (~1517-1547)

Martial, the things for to attain

The happy life be these, I find:

The riches left, not got with pain;

The fruitful ground, the quiet mind;

The equal friend; no grudge nor strife;

No charge of rule, nor governance;

Without disease the healthy life;

The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no delicate fare;

Wisdom joined with simplicity;

The night dischargèd of all care,

Where wine may bear no sovereignty;

The chaste wife, wise, without debate;

Such sleeps as may beguile the night;

Contented with thine own estate;

Neither wish death nor fear his might.

Source

The concept of the quiet mind explains why I like to go off and just sit by myself in some quiet, beautiful place, such as this ...

Cape Charles, After the Rain
OAFS Photo

Mind you, it doesn't have to be a long period of solitude, it can be mere moments, best interrupted by a grandchild, which often it was while on vacation. But it helps my 和¹, my overall sense of harmony, if you will.

Much in the world is, these days, disturbed and disturbing. Many people fret over this, I do not. What will be will be. Life is too short to get spun up and stay that way.

Won't do the negative waves thing, Moriarity, ごめんなさい (gomen nasai - sorry).

I seek the quiet mind and inner harmony.

Cape Charles, On the Beach
OAFS Photo

I'm getting there.

Cape Charles, The Wooden Horse
Outside my Bedchamber
OAFS Photo

Peace be with you.

¹ The concept of harmony in Japan, I don't fully understand it, but I don't need to, not really. I feel it.

Thoughts on Travel

OAFS Photo

Now don't get me wrong, I rather enjoy travel, under certain circumstances. Traveling to go see friends and family? Love it. Traveling for work? Meh. Good thing I don't have to do the latter any more.

I've traveled for some distance¹ by: car, ship/boat, aircraft, bus, and even by train. Being a control freak of sorts, I prefer traveling by car. I'm in charge, I control the vehicle, and I call the shots. Thing is, that can be tiresome over distances which take longer than three hours to traverse.

Traffic, other drivers, the weather, and even the time of year all have an impact on the relative stressfulness of traveling by car. For instance ...

We returned from Maryland on a Sunday, having done that once before in the spring, noting just how little traffic there was. So ...

Of course April is not peak vacation season, June is the start of said season.

Now I'm not saying that all the traffic we encountered on the road were people returning from vacation (or perhaps setting out on vacation), most of the other vehicles had one or two occupants, some looked loaded up for vacation. Most did not.

We're also in the construction season, which closes down roads, makes others almost unusual, and sends people off in directions they perhaps didn't want to go. (Bothe emotionally and physically!)

I did travel by train, once upon a time. I had caught a space available flight from Okinawa to Korea, normally I could get one straight to where I wanted to go, which was Gunsan. On this day, there were (oddly enough) no flights to Gunsan. Hey, it's rare, happened once in my 12 months of shuttling back and forth between Okinawa and Korea.

Source

The green circle is where I wanted to go, the blue circle is where I wound up. Now a fellow serviceman on the aircraft (a first generation Korean-American in the US Navy) said, "Catch a train, it's easy. You do read Korean, right?"

Well, fortunately I did. The guy was also heading to the train station, so I tagged along. Spoke enough of the local lingo to figure out the schedule, had to go through the yellow circle to the green circle. It's where the train went.

Boarded and the train took off like a shot from a cannon, for about ten miles, then it slowed to damned near walking speed. But I eventually got to Daejon, where I discovered that the next train to Gunsan wasn't until the next day, early the next day, but still over twelve hours away.

Being the impatient type, I stepped out of the terminal. There was a gathering of taxi drivers waiting for folks wanting to depart the train station, myself being one. When they saw me they all perked up. One, the best English speaker, asked me where I was headed. When I answered, the drivers had a quick huddle, after which the English speaker informed me which of their number would haul me the fifty miles to Gunsan, and for how much.

It was pricey, but was actually cheaper than a NYC cab from JFK to Park Avenue. (Which may be a story for the future.)

Finally got home after my "big adventure." Well, I thought it was a big adventure, but it came nowhere near my mother-in-law's adventure of flying from Korea to Germany, all by herself and with a limited understanding of English and no knowledge at all of German.

I swear, my late, beloved mother-in-law could do anything she set her mind to and God help you if you got in the way. Woman was determined!

I rather miss her. She passed away less than seven months later, it was sudden and it was a shock, but we did get to see her for a month in Germany.

Anyhoo, more travel tales later, maybe.

It's hot here and I ain't much in the mood to write.

Crabby old man syndrome.

¹ By "some distance" I mean anything taking more than an hour to travel.

Yes, It's Hot Here ...

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This coincides with the annual arrival of the season known as "summer."

I see reports of "OMG, this sets a new record!" (With the caveat that in this instance records started being kept in 1905.)

It's all about "look at me/my channel/my website" ad infinitum.

I would also note that the thousands of experts on weather are also experts on economics, military strategy and tactics, politics, human behavior, also ad infinitum.

I really miss hanging out with my grandkids, their worries encompass the basics: when and what are we going to eat, can we get a new toy, do we have to go to bed now, etc.

Hhmm, sounds a lot like what goes through my head since I retired.

For now I sit and wait for the mini-split guy to come by and service the equipment which is shielding us from the "surface of the sun" temperatures gracing Little Rhody on this day. It's a semi-annual thing to make sure the equipment is performing correctly and will continue to do so.

In other news, I need a new oil tank. The old one (came with the house, so it's 42 years old) has developed a minor leak on the underside, so it's time to get a new one. It'll match the new boiler we had installed a few years back. It's been contracted and paid for, just need a date when they can do the ...

And they just called, we're on for next week, sweet.

I swear, the only thing original on the house is the internal structure, we've replaced everything else!

Ah well, the joys of home ownership, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Well I would, but the world doesn't let ya live rent free. Everything costs something.

Sigh ...

I'm Back ...

Gen. Douglas MacArthur wades ashore during initial landings at Leyte, P.I. October 1944.
(Army Photo)

Yes, I have returned.

No, that isn't me in the photo, especially given the fact that I'm not a big MacArthur fan. Ya know, the guy that Eisenhower studied drama under.

All that being said, I'm kinda surprised at being here. Again.

The vacation was superb, both being down south and not having to write something everyday. A fellow could get used to this life of leisure and no responsibility.

I thought I would miss posting every day. Surprisingly ...

I did not.

I am tempted to give it up, for real. But ...

I wouldn't do that to you, not yet anyway.

Kudos to Beans, Juvat, and Tuna for keeping the place up and running. I was impressed with their efforts.

That being said, I'll try and scrape together something over the next few days, let the lads down tools for a bit. They did well, magnificent behavior as might be said in mentions in dispatches. An English sort of thing, cheaper than actual medals I suppose. Or increases in pay!

Prior to setting out for Cape Charles on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, we sojourned in Maryland for a few days. We had gone down early to watch the bairns as there was a gap in their school and camp schedules wherein their parental units would have had to take time off to tend to them. Which would have impacted their later vacation plans, one of which was to come to Little Rhody for the frozen lemonade and such.

So we went there.

While monitoring the weather forecast at our vacation spot (from Maryland), I noticed that much thunderbolts and lightnings were in the forecast (very, very frightening). To the tune of every single day we planned to be there, save the penultimate.

Fortunately, as time progressed and our date of departure approached, the forecast became less and less "oh my" and more and more "I'll take that." We had some rain at night and general cloudiness but the extreme heat of last year's vacation was nowhere to be seen.

And Your Humble Scribe didn't get a sunburn this time. Yay me.

We had a nice relaxing time, though we noticed with some concern, that a new building was in the works adjacent to our spot. Our very private beach appears threatened, though there be room to the south for that place to have it's own beach, using the one we have would be easier. Still and all, a semi-private beach beats the "aitch" "ee" double hockey sticks out of a public beach.

We shall see. (Of course, who knows, we might not be able to score that spot again next year!)

As for now, there is grass to be cut, bills to be paid, and various and sundry household chores to be tended to.

Be seeing you.

Monday, Monday, So Good to me!

 Well, Campers, it's been quite a week, both personally and nationally.

On the national front, I don't have much to say.  Frankly, I'd like to solve problems between nations on a diplomatic front.  And, I suppose most current and former military personnel, especially those in combat organizations, would prefer the same option be taken.  

But, when diplomacy hasn't worked for, what? 40 some odd years?  And the same fecal matter is still being flung at us, it's about time, IMHO, to up the costs.  Looks like the Israelis have been doing an outstanding job taking out some targets.  It also seems that the promises of the B-2 capabilities were true.

I know, I know, but I just liked the picture for some reason! ;-)

 

Source 

 

Well done, lads.

As for comments yesterday about comeback from Iran, I ask, with what?  It seems the only weapon they have now is "refugees" in the US.  That's definitely a concern, but what logistics chain is going to keep them supplied/paid/armed?  I also suspect many of them will turn in their weapons and ask for asylum.  The government of Iran is virtually dead. Who's going to support them? Again, IMHO. 

Anyhow, we'll see what we will see.  There was an interesting article yesterday that said people should legally arm themselves if possible. Just in case you ran into the wrong someone/something, well… better safe than sorry.

Ok, on with the show.  Been a very long week and while I tried to help out with postings, frankly I was one, very busy getting the house ready to sell as well as move, resulting in... two, I was very, very tired.  I had one post that didn't make it to life.  I had it in the ready rack and when I went to edit, refine and publish it, it had disappeared.  Entirely, possible I hit a button marked delete thinking that was the original Roman word for publish.  

Who knows?

But, Beans and Tuna did a great job keeping the blog up and running. Good on ya' Mates!

 Mrs J. did a fantastic job figuring out and prioritizing the things that needed to be done.  The Listing goes live today, and we've already got somebody that might be interested.

Breakfast!  Cab is in front, Merlot is behind her

 

As many of you may know, we have two horses (Cabernet and Merlot).  I had gone to my hay supplier and while paying up, he'd asked me if our property was up for sale yet.  (We had previously talked about our moving.) 

I told him it was going up shortly, he asked for all the particulars, which I gave him along with the realtor's info.  Seems the lady involved lives in the Dominion in San Antonio (a very pricey/ritzi area) and her daughter raises and trains horses.  The lady was getting on in age and was looking for a place to relax and get away from the hustle and bustle while also helping her daughter do her stuff.

So....Maybe.  We'll see.

On the other side of this transition, we went over to College Station last weekend.  We wanted another look at the house we were interested in.  It had been on the market for a very (very, very) long time and we had spent a lot of time looking at pictures of it and asking the realtor questions about things we observed in the photos.  Things were not going in the right directions.  Unfortunately, our realtor's father was admitted to the ER with AFIB the day we got there, and, she was unavailable.  We swung by the house anyhow and saw this.

I find it hard to believe we missed this on our previous visits, so maybe something new?

 

Hadn't seen that before. and that was the final straw.  Texted the agent that picture and she agreed, I don't know if that damage was new, but I doubt we'd have overlooked it.

Anyhow, the realtor’s father was doing better after his ER visit, so she set up an appointment with us for another house she thought we might like for the next day.  We drove by just to get a quick look.

 

Realtor.com

 

Pretty nice!

The next day we visited the house and had a walk through.  Very nice, and, even nicer, in our price range.  The only down thumb was no fence for the dogs.  Easy enough to fix. 

The green trees are along the hill above the Brazo's River.  Yes the house is outside the flood plain.

 Realtor.com 

 

Could be the one!  We'll see.  So, potential buyer and potential seller.  Somebody just MAY be looking out for us.  As I said, we'll see! But, we’ve got 4 more identified as possible, so…we got that going for us!

Oh, and Happy Birthday to my Brother should he happen to read this! :-) 

Peace out, y'all! 

 

An Unpleasant Topic

 As I am sure you all are aware, the US military, under orders by President Trump, bombed 3 of Iran's nuclear facilities Saturday.

My response?  Good.

Why?

Iran has been at war with The Great Satan the moment that feckless idiot Carter engineered the downfall of the Shah and the release of Khomeini.  The moment, after seizing power, that odiferous weirdbeard got a microphone in front of his face he called out for our destruction.

Members of the military and security police, not-so cleverly disguised as 'students,' invaded our sovereign soil, that being the US Embassy in Tehran.

Members of the Iranian military have shot at our planes.  They've shot at our ships.  They've taken sailors captive.

Members of the Iranian military and their proxies like the Houties have killed our citizens and our military personnel, injured our citizens and our military personnel, all over the Middle East.

Since 1979, Iran has almost daily called for the death of The Great Satan.  Weekly are reports, not reported in US media of course, that Iran has and is calling for jihad against the US.  

Carter, Clinton, Obama and whomever was running the Autopen for Biden basically paid tribute to Iran to not attack US personnel, assets and interests and to not build nukes.  How'd that work out for us?

President Trump has put his foot down.  Actually made a line in the sand that he'll stick to, unlike Carter, Clinton, Obama and Biden's handlers.

The fact that nobody high up in the US government took any of the threats by Iran seriously is astounding.  Looking at you, US State Department.  But what do you expect from a government organization that was complicit in the coverup of the Holomodor in the Ukraine by Stalin, and was pretty much bought by Stalin according to its own internal reports, of which Senator McCarthy based his commie hunt on.

Hat tip to Joe McCarthy for being right.  Man's one of those unsung heroes. Makes me wonder how much of his loathsomeness was fakery and humbug by the owned-by-the-KGB US press and in Hollywood.

Back to Iran, I've seen way too many people on blogs and twitter and in not-news blurps act all shocked and horrified that we dared attack the peace-loving government of Iran.  And that we're being controlled by our masters in Jerusalem.  

Bah!  Feckless idiots.

This is like when your kid, after being bullied all year long at school while the teachers and administrators look the other way, finally pushes back in order to get out of a tight spot and he/she gets suspended and potentially expelled.  What?  What about all the documented cases of bullying?  The cell phone videos?  The cafeteria ladies who back-channel you with information?  Yet you and your family are wrong for standing up to the bully?

That's the way the rest of the world and a lot of our own news media are looking at this.

Seriously, since High School I have heard from Iran's government and many Iranians (the not-Shah supporting refugees) that they will destroy us and they are at war with us.

Well, if it's war they want, it's war they'll get.

Does anyone believe that Iran, after stating for 30 years that they'll use nukes against Israel and Us, won't use said nuclear weapons against us?

As President Thomas Jefferson Robert Goodlow Harper said regarding tributes to the Barbary Pirates, "Millions for defense, not one cent for tribute."*

Discuss.  Feel free to call me an idiot and a warmonger.  Or support my stance, or have your own stance that fits somewhere on the scale of "Beans is an idiot - to - Beans is right" or even past either sides of said scale.

* I always believed that President Jefferson, since he was the one to authorize the expedition against the Barbary Pirates, which led to that whole "Shores of Tripoli" that the Leathernecks sing about and the firing of the USS Philadelphia by Lt. Stephen Decatur, was the one who said that.  My bad.  It was Robert Goodlow Harper.  He even got a town/city in Liberia named after him.  Amazing man.

Blah blah blah... and Tanks

 Long day.

Brain fried.

Alive.  Is good.

Nobody home inside my head.

If you want a fun time, find the anime "Girls und Panzers" which is about high school girls competing in tank warfare.  Tanks only designed before end of 1945 are allowed, though they can be upgraded if the school has the resources.  Funny, brilliantly written, the action (though highly improbable if not downright wrong) is good and the technical details of the various tanks and spgs are spot on.  Most of the schools are based on nationalities, with the Italians running Italian tanks, the Germans running German tanks, French running, duh, French tanks etc.  Except our heroines who run various vehicles from various nationalities, including a friggin Mark V from WWII.

Best Battles #3 off of Youtube

When I saw it, it was on Amazon.

Hidive (an anime streaming service) also has some of them.

And you can buy the dvds.

Other than that, weekend.  Whew.

I don't know how, with so little to do each week I still get behind in work.

I kind of do, as my allergies have been rather horrid this year, which between the metabolic load of allergens and the metabolic load of allergy meds, leaves me wandering around like some zombie or House Member...

Hawaii Revisited

Since Sarge is on an extended leave of absence and Beans has been pulling more duty than an aviator in hack, I figured I would try to help. 

That opening photo is recent, just last week when wifey and me were visiting Oahu for the first time in many years.  We decided on that island since we were bringing first timers in the form of my sister-in-law, her husband, and their recently graduated 18-year-old. We prefer the less busy islands like Kauai or Maui, but Oahu is perfect for the newbies. 

I think I was last there in 2018 or 19, before COVID, at some conference that I can't recall, but that was during my previous job which I have load shed when it comes to some of the memories.

Punchbowl National Cemetery

The ladies at the memorial to those who died on Wake Island, which includes their great grandfather.  

Big Mo

Much of my time on the island was spent over on the Leeward side at Barbers Point NAS where our annual ASW qualifications were achieved. My squadron would either ride the carrier over from Japan for RIMPAC and fly back, or fly there and back with stops on either Johnson atoll or Wake Island.  No, we didn't have the legs of an Israeli F- 35 😉, as our 4-plane division flight required a refueling "stop" halfway there from Hawaii, and halfway from there to Japan.  Thanks Air Force!

Barbers in 1958 By Father of JGKlein, used with permission, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10907334

Our resort happened to be on the Leeward side so our grocery shopping was in the vicinity of where the NAS was. In fact some of it was actually on land that once was part of the air station. That side of the island has grown massively since I was there in the late '90s, with many more houses, schools, and malls from what I remember.  The base itself, which was turned over by the Navy to the state of Hawaii seems to have transitioned well, with several Hawaii government agencies and organizations taking up residence there.  A huge FBI office building has been built just inside where that gate was.  The old BOQ and BEQs have been converted to apartments, some of the hangers are taken up by the Hawaii National Guard, and the runway is still in operation as a Coast Guard Air station. But there's still a lot of surplus buildings that seem to be falling into disrepair.  It's nice to see that the street names have maintained their Naval history character such as Boxer and Midway, Lexington, Yorktown, Saratoga, Saipan, etc.

From Google Maps

Another historical note is that the former base is also home to Naval Air Museum Barber's Point featuring only a few airplanes, ones that served from the site.  Apparently there was a battle, and maybe a bit of corruption, that prevented this museum from growing, to the benefit of the one on Ford Island. 

From Google Maps

From Google Maps

This was the hangar my squadron trained from.  It looks just a little worse for wear, but the Pacific Aerospace Training Center for the Univ of Hawaii has taken up residence and it seems they have taken some care of it.

I do wonder what became of the base housing there, which was seemingly new when I trained there while in Japan.  Google maps shows that they are lived in, but how the Navy handled that transfer makes me curious. States don't like to be landlords I don't believe.

Okay, I did some more research and found out that the Navy retained the housing, but that's quite a trek to Pearl Harbor.  I guess base housing is better than the high costs outside.

Anyway, a lot has changed there so I guess the adage 'you can't go home again' still rings true.  Although Barbers was never my home, yet it was a place where we could get a little bit of America while stationed in Japan.

As for the vacation it was wonderful. I drove the family up to the North shore, over to Kaneohe, up that beautiful drive that is the H-3 South through the tunnel, and a little bit of backtracking to see the Pali Lookout.  Did a luau and took the kid Waikiki for a surfing lesson which he loved.  Finally, we spent a bunch of time around the pool sipping Mai Tais, with an occasional dip into the lagoon for some pretty great snorkeling.  

All in all, a good vacation was had by all. I got back to work in time to take Juneteenth off the next day.  Don't get me started, I think it's a stupid name, but I will gladly take the day off thanks to the taxpayers.   

Hope your summer kickoff is as memorable.