Sunday, August 17, 1986
Made banana bread from very ripe bananas before going to
Mass. Had an early lunch, then drove to N Kingston for the Quonset Airshow. It
was overcast as we drove around the area looking for a place to park. Finally
decided to pay the money and go up close. As we joined the line, we saw a
couple parachutists in the distance, then three planes flying in formation with
one daredevil plane.
The guy selling the tickets made sure we realized that
both Kyle and Erich were under five years old in order to pay the minimum of $1
each. Kent and I couldn’t pass, so we had to pay $6 each. After parking we had
a long roundabout walk to the airfield. An F-16 took off to roar around and
show off its capabilities as it flew ahead of its sound. We checked out the
helicopters, private planes, and cargo planes that were on display, as a
father-son stunt team did their thing above us, often seeming to head straight
at each other. Some unidentified plane arrived to fly around to “Avenger”
music. Kyle and Erich spent their $2 each of allowance savings on buttons with
a rabbit foot keychain.
A larger F-14 zoomed around, later to fly in
formation with a little prop plane, one going its fastest and one its slowest.
We went to look at more planes and a cargo helicopter as the Bud Light stuntman
swooped around and did spins that looked out of control. Next were the Guardian
Angels team of parachutists, with their gold and black guidable parachutes that
they could steer to land on a target. One guy had a regular (round and white!)
parachute that he deployed to show that they each had a second reserve
parachute. The finale for us was to see four parachutists stand on each other’s
shoulders.
It was about 16:00 and we had been standing for about three hours
(except Erich who sat and would lie down whenever he could). We left although the
show went on, and even though the weather was holding out after the initial
sprinkles when we arrived.
At home we had a cookout and played badminton
before taking the kids to their mom’s.
Saturday, August 23, 1986
After lunch we went to Westport, MA to look for the Water
Slide Park, which we found on US-6. All the boys got tickets for $4.50 for
seven rides on the curvy Flume slides. The Lightning Bolt straight slides were
six rides for $3.50. It was sunny but cool, and we thought this would be better
than the beach, but it made them colder. Kent stopped after six slides.
 |
| Kyle's head |
 |
| Erich's appendage |
 |
| Erich, Kyle, and Kent |
 |
| Waterslide |
We
tried Cue Ball, with 18 mini billiards tables set up in a mini golf type
course. The narrow bumper pool tables were not truly flat, but it was fun
trying. Each spot had a white chalk mound for hands, and pink for the cure
sticks. We each had our own ball. We didn’t keep score.
We drove home via a
couple vegetable stands.
