AShapiro.net

In case you’ve missed them, I’ve uploaded a couple of photos from the brand new Aquarium in Morehead City, NC as well as my shots from NYC. Sorry about the NYC shots, I didn’t bring my camera, so I picked up a $10 disposable from a street vendor at the WTC site. The “construction” photos are from the WTC site or the buildings right around it.

As of 12:01AM tomorrow morning, our house will be on the market.

This week has been hectic at work. I officially started my new duties and I’m already far behind. Not online nearly as much as before, since I’m spending more time in meetings, in the avionics integration lab and on the flight ramp. It’s definitely going to be a busy, busy couple of weeks.

So now it’s time to sit back, crack open a Corona and hope like hell the house sells fast.

Update your bookmarks, the photo galleries have moved to http://gallery.ashapiro.net to make things just a bit prettier.

One thing I forgot to mention, our last dive in NC - the Verbena - was both tk and I’s 100th dive. I’ve now logged over 55 hours underwater as well.

Last weekend, we were in Morehead City, NC for some diving. Well, at least I was going to dive. Mica has decided it’s not really her thing. Definitely a good thing last weekend, the diving was far from easy.

It was quite the trip. We flew into Raleigh-Durham and drove the 3 hours out to Morehead City, stopping for lunch at a very sub-par Taco Bell (and that’s a scary thought, right there). We get into the hotel and Mica decides to take a shower. In the middle of drying her hair, she gets nauseous and dizzy and runs to bed, only to get right back up and make a break for the bathroom. 15 minutes later, she’s on the verge of passing out and I call 911. 4 hours in the ER and they think between having her head between her knees drying her hair, dehydration from the plane and stress from school, she had a temporary loss of blood pressure. Nothing major, they let us out and we meet our friend tk at the hotel for dinner.

This is our first time meeting tk in person. She plays an online game that we do and when I’d mentioned something about going to Pax River for a business trip, she said she lived there. Her husband is in the Navy and flies out at the Naval base there. This was long before we had plans to move to Pax. Well as Boeing has started making plans for me to move, Mica and I have talked more and more to tk about the area. Doesn’t hurt that we have a lot of mutual interests with her and her husband, including travelling and diving.

So anyway, we met, had a nice dinner but we’re very surpised that there’s not a lot of food available in the area. Kind of strange for a tourist area, I think. Anyway, we found a great seefood place on the water, so that was at least good. Mica just had rice, since she still wasn’t feeling well.

On the way into town, we’d run into some short, but heavy storms. They came back that evening. We had almost 10 hours of continuous heavy thunderstorms that shook our hotel room and kept the room almost contantly illuminated with lightning. They said they had sustained winds on the water of almost 70mph for most of the night.

So we’re up and out at 6AM to meet the dive boat. The winds had churned up the visiblity and there were 10′ swells on the water, so there’d be no diving until things calmed down. They told us to come back at 9. We go back to the hotel, have breakfast and return to the boat at 9, when they recommend going to the aquarium and meeting back at 2PM.

So we hit the aquarium instead. It had just reopened that week after a $24mil renovation that had shuttered it for a few years so it was a bit crowded. We got a nice parking spot, but by the time we’d left, the parking was almost a mile out on the street leading in. The aquarium was very, very nice though, and about the only touristy thing to do there besides being on a boat. Three of their largest exhibits included parts or replicas of local shipwrecks, incluiding the Caribsea which we actually got to dive.

That afternoon, we did make it out on the water, and did a dive on the Indra. The storms had the water so churned though, the swells at the bottom were nasty and the visibility was no more than 7′. So we couldn’t see a whole lot, but we did swim around the entire ship. Only one dive Saturday, and it’s probably for the best.

Sunday, we did get out at 6AM. The first dive was the Caribsea, which we had seen part of at the Aquarium. The visibility was great and there were a couple of 4-6′ sandtiger sharks, a gorgeous baracuda as well as a nice sized school of jacks. Definitely the best wreck dive I’ve done. The last wreck, the Verbena, was horribly silted and we had less than 4′ visibility (couldn’t see your own fins) so there wasn’t a lot to say there.

Overall though, the trip was nice. It was great to meet tk, and the weather was perfect outside the storm the first night. Not a place we’ll probably go back to, but it was a nice break.

Can’t wait to go out to North Carolina this weekend. Really looking forward to doing some real diving and it’ll be great to meet a friend from Pax out there. Give us a chance to meet before we move out there in a few months.

Looks like we’re down to about 3 months until we move. I can’t wait. Lot to do between now and then. I’ve been busy working on the house when I’m at home. Last night, I patched up some exterior wood that had some water damage. Last homeowners just painted over the problem and we didn’t realize it until it was too late. But it definitely was there before - there’s paint in the holes that should have been patched. Just about got everything restored, have one more small area to fix, then I need to repaint the exterior trim around our front door, garage door and bay window, seal the deck, finish cleaning the siding in the back and trim all the shrubs, and the exterior is ready for sale.

Gonna be a busy week. I don’t think we’ll have everything done in time to put the house on the market early next week - may have to push that off one more week. :( Soon though. Very, very soon.

Work has actually be nice for the last week or so. Things are finally starting to slow down for me. Since December, I’ve been so busy I haven’t had time to think. Today was a peer-review for one of my teams and it was one of the last major projects I needed to complete. Now I just have some maintenance work as I’m training my replacements. That’s a whole other story; one for a different day though.

Still not 100% certain when I start my new job. Supposedly, sometime this month. Should know soon, but I’ve heard that before.

I put more photos up on the Gallery. Most of our vacation photos are up. First time I’ve actually gone in an fixed the colors on some of my dive photos.

More to come over the next few days.

First up, I finally got a photo gallery installed. More pictures to come soon.

Second, it’s only 2 weeks until we go out to Morehead City, NC to dive. Mica’s doing her advanced diving certification class tonight and we do her dives next weekend. I’m shooting to do 4 dives with her - which should take me to the 100 dive mark!

We met with the realtor earlier this week. Looking to have our house on the market right after Memorial Day. I’m working on getting the outside cleaned up (powerwashing the siding redoing the exterior paint, etc.). The estimate on the house came out right where I was expecting, so that makes me happy. We will make a decent profit off of it.

Work’s sending me back to NY at the end of the month. Yet another trip out to Long Island. At least this trip won’t be as hectic as some. I’ll be there almost 48 hours this time. And I’m in one of my favorite hotels: The Inn at Fox Hollow. Now let’s see how well American does on the flights out there.

Last, but not least, I put yet another order in with Adagio Teas last week. Just got 1.5 lbs of assorted oolongs, a few black teas and a white tea sampler. Mmmmm. Tea.

I’m back from California. It seems like the more I travel, the more AA likes to screw up. My last two trips have both involved cancelled flights. Bastards! All of them!

Otherwise, it was a long, uneventful trip. Long, long meeting sandwiched between two hectic travel days.

The weather is finally getting warm here, gotta start getting out on my bike. Due for a good trail ride sometime soon. Unfortunately, the first pretty weekend we have here, I’ve got a lot of work to do on the house. Washing the siding, repainting the trim, resealing the deck. Spring maintenance + putting the house on the market will be keeping me busy for just a bit.

I did meet my future boss last week. He was in town for a briefing I had to give. I think we’ll get along just fine. I’m definitely looking forward to going out there. Looks like I’m officially transfering to flight test this month. I’ll still be in St. Louis for a bit as I get up to speed and support first flight here in STL, but the budget should be approved very soon for the whole plan. I’m excited.

3.5 weeks until Memorial Day. It’ll be great to be back in the ocean. Can’t wait to get back in the water. Now if only my dive gear from my birthday will arrive…