Airbourne 2018

Hello everyone and welcome to the final geek blog of the year (hooray I hear you say). Unfortunately it's going to be a far shorter blog than I'd like due to the horrible weather than decided to land on Eastbourne last weekend.

Airbourne is hands-down my favourite 4 days of the year, a real festival atmosphere descends on Eastbourne and everyone, even the non-geeks, crane their necks upwards. The moment that the Red Arrows shoot over the beach is the pinnacle of my year, everything that I build up to and the thing that keeps me going through the year.

My happy place

The Thursday of the show is always shorter, I consider if my warm-up day where the seafront and showground are less-busy and I can have a good nose around at the stalls and exhibitions. Unfortunately the weather had other ideas, as I headed out of the house on Thursday lunchtime I watched as the cloud plummeted down over Beachy Head, no chance of anything flying in those conditions! I headed back home resigned to a Thursday rain-off. Luckily I was glued to Radio Airbourne as they announced late-afternoon that they would attempt to get a few things flying. As a brief aside I must mention how good the music-selection they played was - they took actual requests and played Panic! At The Disco, The Killers and the one 21 Pilots song that I can stand 😍 !

Despite it still pouring down I decided that the chance of seeing a Typhoon scream along the seafront (especially as we've never had it for all 4 days of the airshow before) was worth pulling on my waterproofs and heading down. 

Proper Plane-Geek Style

As soon as I got to the seafront things got biblical with the rain streaming down, the 5 other hardcore geeks and I started to wonder at the wisdom of having come down. Thank god then for Chinooks.

As it came in from out at sea to start it's display the headlights on it shone through the rain for a cool, spooky effect. 

We can see you!

We also had the Belgian Air Component A109 which I missed at RIAT.

More spooky helicopter lights

Then the afternoon was made worthwhile by the arrival of the Typhoon! The low cloud meant that it was restricted to it's low display so we got to see it lower and closer - fine by me!

Well worth a walk in the rain!

My highlights video from Thursday -

Thankfully Friday dawned bright and sunny! Sunny days are always far better for photographs as the planes sparkle in the light. 

I was joined by my handsome assistant Corney and yes I'm wearing a Tornado t-shirt for extra geek and nostalgia points!

At this point I must also salute the bravery of my lovely friend Char who braved my geeking for the first time and survived to take some epic Red Arrows pics!

A few snaps from the day -

The Typhoon thundering overhead

Yes I would love a go!

I still want a Gyrocopter

SO pleased with this photo of the Reds

The Strikemaster shooting for the stars

The BBMF need no introduction

I treated myself to this lovely RAF 100 top

Friday highlight video -

On Saturday my unlucky victim was Mum!

I also finally gave into temptation and had one of the most epic milkshakes ever!

Yes I know I'm supposed to be dieting

The weather wasn't quite as nice but we had a full flying programme and I managed some decent snaps.

The Blenheim is so beautiful

The Reds filling the sky with colour

There's a reason why The Blades are one of my favourites - this guy is crazy!

Caught in the geek act by Mum!

Saturday highlights -

Unfortunately Sunday was a complete no-show, the low cloud settled over the town like a blanket and the most that we managed was a pass by the Strikemaster, the Wingwalkers, Rich Goodwin's Muscle BiPlane and the A109.

As gutting as it was for me I feel even more sorry for the organisers and teams who've spent the entire year planning the event, it must have been heartbreaking. A special shout-out needs to go to the commentators and radio presenters who worked really hard to keep the audience entertained with no planes overhead. 

Here's hoping for better weather next year, my fingers are crossed already!

Love Jen

XxxX

PS If you want to see a few more of my photos then check out my Instagram or my Flickr

Pfft

The blog title says it all really. I don’t even have the energy or inspiration to come up with one of my normal, witty names.

At the moment I’m just fed up and uninspired. This time of year I should be happy – the summer is my favourite time, I think I’m still the only person loving this heatwave (although that brings enough guilt on it’s own with knowing how much Esme is struggling).

Not helping is finding out that my ex has had his first child and being the last to know out of my group of friends didn’t help, I appreciate that they were trying to protect me, really I do, but I’d rather have found out directly from them rather than accidentally through Facebook. The kicker is that for most of the time we were together all I wanted was for us to move out and start a family but there was always an excuse, mostly money or needing to stay with his family (the suggestion was always “move in here”, code for pay the bills!). It makes me wonder if he loved me as much as he claimed to since he’s happily done this with someone else, I know I was replaced pretty damn quick with rebounds and new relationships which doesn’t do one’s confidence much good! 

I know I sound like a bitter, psycho ex, we’ve been apart now longer than we were together. I am genuinely happy for him; he will be a great Dad, he’s patient and caring with a lot of love to give. But it does just really rankle that he wasn’t prepared to keep his promises to me. I saw him on Saturday night for a friend’s birthday and I gave him my heartfelt congratulations and it was mostly unwakward (or maybe that was the vodka I downed?). It also bought back some not quite so pleasant memories that gave me a particularly horrible dream on Saturday evening, not helped by one of the current storylines in Casualty (although I must say how well acted and sensitively portrayed it has been).

It just feels unfair, he got to pick straight back up and carry on with his life whereas I’m in exactly the same situation that I was in April 2011 when we split. When is it going to be my time? I’ve had no attention at all in all those years, it really makes me wonder what the hell is wrong with me? Am I that unattractive inside and out? I’m not looking for love but a bit of appreciation would be good for the ego.

Not helping said ego is my putting on a kilo this week with no idea how. I ate really well last week and did a lot of walking so where did it come from? It’s enough to disillusion me and make me wonder why I bother when I miss chocolate so much (and especially when the café at the front of work does a particularly fine white hot chocolate)!  The usual response I get when I complain is “Just give up then” which isn’t particularly helpful when all I’m looking for is a bit of encouragement, there’s not much I can do to impress people but the weight loss seems to have and I don’t want to let people down as is my normal pattern.

Hopefully the next blog will be a little more chipper.

Love Jen

XxxX