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I've shared too much already. I don't think I have many secrets anymore.
Did I tell you about the time I was on a hot air balloon crew? I think so, but I'll go into more detail.
My neighbor when I was a teenager was a chiropractor who called himself Doctor in social settings. I was friends with his kid. They were "rich." One day, the Dr. decided he would get into hot air ballooning. So he bought a balloon and got his pilot's license. They had a big back yard that met our back yard in back, and launched the balloon probably 20 times over the course of 3-4 years from that back yard. I hung out with them all the time, and was on the launch and chase crew for most of their launches. I got to go up 3 times. It's a tremendous amount of fun to go for a hot air balloon ride. No wind, because you are traveling with the wind. Very quiet and peaceful. You can hear people talking on the ground, and dogs barking at you when you go over their houses. No sense of movement at all. It's a little scary if you are afraid of heights when the ground drops away. That's not poetic talk. The ground really does drop away when you first go up. You have no sense of motion. You're just standing in the basket watching the world go by.
Here's a picture of me (in the hat) at a balloon fest, and one I took of my house on my first flight from their back yard.
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