Blue Angels

The Blue Angels are in town! Woo-hoo! I can't wait to go to the Cherry Festival and see these planes in action!

Actually, I'm kidding. I am so not into the Blue Angels - at least, not from up close. My mom always told me that air shows were dangerous because sometimes the planes crash. Mom was sort of a harbinger of doom. She was well known for washing off the tops of Coke cans ("We don't know what crawled over those in the factory!") and advising people not to run over bags of trash or piles of leaves that blew into the road ("There could be a baby in there!") But I digress. Air shows really can be dangerous, and even though these pilots have lots of experience at flying really, really close together, I still don't want to be anywhere around when somebody sneezes when they're flying in that tight formation and suddenly three jets come crashing to the ground.

Also, the Blue Angels are incredibly loud. I was in Borders yesterday, and as I walked out of the store, the Angels were doing a practice run, and the noise from them - flying nowhere near me - was deafening. I felt like my head was going to explode. I literally couldn't hear anything but the noise of the planes. These planes also burn a lot of fuel. They can't be good for the
environment. I think there might be better uses for all that power than just some pretty planes flying really close together.

I can appreciate the training that goes into being a pilot for one of these planes, and when I see them practicing for their big Cherry Festival gig, I often think, Wow, they're flying really close together, really fast, and that's sort of cool. But that's as much praise as you'll get from me. Fly away, Blue Angels, fly away.

the Blue Angels - D+