December 2009 CHECKPOINTS By J. J. "Lou" Michels, '77 Class Scribe

I am sorry to inform the class of the passing of one of our members. Steve Slate passed away unexpectedly on September l9 in Colorado Springs. Steve, an economics PhD, was a former missile launch officer, an economics in­structor, and Department head at the Academy. I extend the sympathy and condolences of the class to Carla and the family. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

All we are saying: I received unique nevus regarding Mike Weinstein's (Bonnie) Military Religious Freedom Foundation-Mike and his group have been nomi­nated for the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010. As some of you may remember from past Checkpoints issues, I'm one of Mike's board members, and I want to ex­tend my congratulations to him, if for no other reason than, unlike a recent Prize winner, Mike has actually accomplished something. In fact, Mike's no­tice said "You may already be awinner". Maybe some of Ed

McMahon's people will show up at his door next year. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Appearances: A couple of our folks got some mention in the mainstream media. Tom Jones (Liz) had an op-ed piece in the New York Post discussing the future of NASA and the Orion Project. Tom is as cogent and persuasive in print as he is doing television interviews. Mark Shackelford (Kathy),who is now a three-star and assigned to the SecDEF Office of Acquisition, is scoping out Iraq's next aircraft buy. Mark was quoted back in September that the Air Force is trying to convince the Iraqis to buy light attack aircraft, notwithstanding the Iraqis desire for something a little flashier, like F­16s. I guess the 16s will go well with the MiG 29s that the Iraqis are trying to get back from Serbia. You know, true counter-insurgency aircraft. Good luck,Mark.

Unlimited Access: Bill Lord (Cindy) wrote to tell me that he has been nomi­nated for a third star as the Air Force's chief information officer, having been at Barksdale for all of . . . well, not for very long. At least Bill and Cindy did not have to weather a hurricane on this tour. Bill's been working with Al Wachdorf (Lorrae) at Barksdale, and with Kurt Bedke (Ina) to get the cyber stuff up and running for the Air Force, just in time to merge all that into STRATCOM. As part of that process, Bill bumped into Greg Hanson (Linda) in Greg's role as a con­sultant to the IT industry in DC. Bill also reported that he had a chance to go back to the Zoo and eat lunch on the staff tower- "it only took me 31 years to get an invite up there." Yeah, and they're still serving woodcocks for lunch (a scribe "tip of the hat mention in the column" to the first person who e-mails me with a description of this most bizarrely named meal). Finally, Bill ran into TC Jones (Lisabeth) at a Falcon Foundation dinner, noting that bumping into the grown children of our classmates doesn't help our self perception of age. Neither do the pictures below, Bill. Thanks for the updates, and all the best on the DC posting, again.

Mark Castellani (Susan) has been a regular and verbose contributor, and that hasn't changed. Mark was prowling Falcon stadium on the Falcons open­ing day massacre and bumped into Jim Ilse and his doolie son at the game. Sitting next to Jim was Doug Leibrand (Launa). Jim and Doug are both at WorldCom in the Springs, while Mark continues to push metal around for United. He continues to see or fly with a bunch of classmates-Tom Logan (Rochelle), Earl Enix (Candy), Don Dobias (Hope) and Dave Stephan (Cynthia) -as well as occasionally touching base with Jim Miller (Marian ne), who flies with Delta out of Austin. Mark bumped into Chip Lamb (Tricia), who used to fly with American, but is now flies warbirds for local airshows. That sounds like a positive career change, for sure. Another great update, Mark, and many thanks.

Roger Smith (Patti) wrote to update me on his world. He is flying for Southwest ourt of Chattanooga where he and Pam live. Their oldest son manages Genesis Elevator in Atlanta, while their daughter has come back from two years in the Peace Corps in Western Samoa and is now getting her PhD in Civil Engineering at Texas. In his travels, he bumped into his old roommate, Reuben Silva (Karma), who flies for FlexJet out of Dallas.

Roger and Reuben

Thanks, Roger, and 1 hope we can take you up on your invite. I assume we can see the Tennessee Navy from your place on the river.

Scott Harrod (Nita) sent this picture from Gruene, Texas, where a group of former CS-33 troublemakers get together for the Americana Music Jam.

The disreputable group includes, left to right, Scott, who is working at Randolph; Don McCune (Bernie) still chasing aviation legal issues out of Charleston; Monty Montgomery (Neana) who's at Delta/Northwest /what­ever; the aforementioned Greg Hanson (Linda); and Lee Bauer, who's work­ing as a general manager for SIBRE Brakes America. Please note Greg Hanson's tee shirt, which says "Born to Rock." Greg, of course, has his own band that performs in DC, and anywhere else former aircrew and similarly tone-deaf types are to be found. Thanks, Scott, it appears everyone stayed conscious.

Career Closeout. It would be a disservice to all if I did not finish with the retirement of Dave Scott (Leslie) from his Major General slot in Special Ops at MacDill, in July. In true Chode style, the retirement ceremony was conducted at an improv comedy club in the Old Town part of Tampa, and began with a comedian. Not Dave, another comedian. The ceremony ended with now­ retired General Scott firing up his Harley and driving it out of the club's double doors to start his retirement tour of the open road. Jim Maskowitz (Rita) who flies for American, dropped me a line detailing the evening's festivities, which included onsite hand-rolled cigars, at least one minor altercation, and two of the guests "going horizontal" (I hope not together) and having to be carried out of the bar. Sounds like a pretty typical retirement ceremony to me. Masko also sent the following picture, which purports to be the day after, although these people all look far too good to have survived such an evening so recently:

Left to right the group features Monty Montgomery, the now-retired General Scott (who is currently somewhere in the heartland on his Harley), Mike Weinstein, Lee Bauer (who is standing) Don McKune, Mr. Maskowitz, and P .R. Helm (who is working as a production acceptance pilot for Lockheed). Again, I direct your attention to Mr. Helm's T shirt, which features the exhortation, "Carpe Brewski".  And so they did. Some of you are complaining that a number of these people appear in the first picture; what can I say? Start living more exciting lives and you'll get your pictures in the column too.

Close Out: That's it for this Fall. Keep hoping that the Falcons football team will get an offense, and the hockey team will get a win. Be seeing you.