Happy Labor Day

Misawa Air Festival, 2006

It has been mostly about the Misawa Air Festival this weekend. Every year, the Japanese and U.S. forces open the base to the public for an air show and Japanese-style festival with food, music, and other booths set up along the flight line. This is usually a huge gathering, but they estimated only 10,000 yesterday because the weather was too rainy.

Atop a Humvee, 2007

We enjoyed seeing the planes, especially the Blue Impulse, the Japanese Air Force's version of the US Navy Blue Angels. It is quite something to see those planes flying in formation, even on a cloudy day. The weather was better last year, so there were more flying demonstrations then, but it was still interesting to get up close to the jets, helicopters, and huge snowplows that clear the runway.

helicopter fans, 2006

We spent most of the weekend in activities related to the air show. Friday, we baked 6 cakes for Patrick's cross country team. The high school has a cake sale booth at the air show, which is probably their largest fundraiser all year. Most teams and clubs contribute cakes and each gets a percentage of the profit based on the number of cakes donated.

Saturday, along with the usual chores and errands, Patrick and I delivered the cakes to the school cafeteria where piles of cakes were being gathered for the sale. At the time we arrived, the cross country team had about 100 cakes, with another 100 hoped for. I guess we'll find out next week how many they sold. Since attendance was down, it may not have been such a great fundraiser this year and we may have to do another one sometime.

The festival affects almost everything on base. We don't usually have a Saturday evening Mass, but because of the air show, no church services can be held in the chapel on Sunday. The main gate is closed and pedestrians overflow the sidewalks onto the streets, so driving must be kept to a minimum.

We had fun with the schedule change, though, because there was a dinner after Mass. We visited with some families we hadn't seen much during the summer. Patrick enjoyed dinner with several of the kids from his Confirmation class.

Driving dreams, 07

Sunday we went to the festival, followed by an adventurous return home trying to avoid the traffic and guessing about roads. John is looking on Google Earth this morning trying to figure out where we were. :-)

Today we will probably help a new family move some of their boxes from the Misawa Inn to their new house. And I am going to clean out and reorganize Joseph and Matthew's learning alcove. Then the new family is coming over for a cookout. It's raining again. But we are glad for another cool day. And a relatively restful one.

We hope you have a restful Labor Day, too.