What I did in lieu of Summer Vacation

I have an intense love/hate relationship with photography and photographs. On the one hand, I enjoy taking them, I often enjoy looking at them and they can’t be beat as a nostalgic resource.

On the other hand, I hate ruining the spontaneity of a moment by photographing it, I hate lugging the camera about and stopping to frame shots, I hate having no outlet for them after the fact.

Oh! Delightful website. How I’ve missed ruining your bandwidth with silly photos.

I’ve been many places and done many things since the last time I offered up pics instead of pithy commentary. But they’re good pics and so I’ll start from the most recent and work backwards. Hence, my recent weekend at the Reading Airshow.

I only spent a day and a half lounging beneath this beautiful aeroplane. Other lads spent three days. Neither wind, nor rain, nor heat or dark of night shall deter 601 Squadron from their appointed lounging hours.

My job (heh) is to portray an aircraftsman of the Royal Air Force, 601 (County of London) Squadron during the summer of 1940 – the infamous Battle of Britain. Part of the duty of being the lowest rung on the ladder, affectionately known as an “erk,” is chocking the aeroplanes. That affords opportunities to do suggestive things with tassely bits.

As if wearing woolen kit in the summertime while getting dirty, eating bad food and tramping triumphantly across the country wasn’t bad enough, why on earth would I want to do a different nationality at a different time? I blame it on the fellow to the right – we go way back.

Spending the weekend at an active airstrip does have its advantages. Like seeing this with your lunch:

Or getting up in the morning and wandering about in your bare feet gawking at something like this:

Finally, I was blessed to be in the presence of what I think is the most beautiful airframe ever constructed: the PBY Catalina. Look at these lines and tell me this isn’t as pretty as the curviest damn woman you ever set eyes on:

Of course, I didn’t sit in the cockpit. But I know who did.

And I think he liked it.

So ends another year of the Reading Air Show. Tons of fun. Didn’t get sunburnt. Fell asleep so I didn’t even get too drunk. Although I did miss the dance. No great loss there without a partner, though the music rules.

There are some additional pics here and later on, somewhere in here.