God, Gals, Guns, Grub has photos of one of the more bizarre targets I've ever seen at a range.
Like him, I've never gotten the whole "oh, I'll just shoot them in the leg" thing. You can't shoot somebody just a little bit. "Getting winged in the shoulder" only happens on old A Team reruns; in real life there's no such thing. Lives are forever altered, even if nobody dies: a shot to the leg can hit the femoral artery, can wreck a knee, can result in amputation.
If you are not legally and morally justified in taking someone's life, you have no business whatsoever pointing a lethal weapon at any part of their body.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Your modern technology fascinates me.
While up in New Hamster, I was left Robin's brand spankin' new Subaru Forester in which to motor about. As someone who's been toying with the idea of a "crossover" SUV, but hasn't spent more than test-drive time with one, it was enlightening.
First, it was obviously superior in every way on dirt and rough pavement. With the Zed Drei, the optional sport suspension and 35-series tires make it ride like a Conestoga wagon on even the smoothest gravel or dirt roads; exceed twenty miles an hour off pavement and your vision will be so blurred by the jouncing and vibration that you won't see the parts that fall off every time a wheel crashes over the minutest of surface imperfections. Conversely, the Forester is so serene and composed on dirt that "I honestly had no idea I was going that fast, officer," becomes a very real conversational possibility.
On the flip side, over a decade of driving a sports car has me used to control inputs that are acted on with alacrity. For instance, to change lanes on the interstate in the Bimmer, you don't so much steer as merely apply pressure in the direction you wish to go. By comparison, the same act in the Forester involved enough action, from the wheel through the steering gear to the tall-'n'-wobbly front tire sidewalls, that it felt like I was ringing down to the helm for rudder changes. Don't get me wrong, compared to the average passenger sedan there's hardly any difference at all, and compared to a truck-based SUV it feels like Handling By Lotus, but it still took some getting used to for me. (And don't get me started on how weird automatics feel, without any direct correlation between engine noise, the tach needle, and how fast the car is going; that's witchcraft and deviltry right there...)
The thing that most delighted me, however, was the modern stereo that takes over your iPod when you plug it in like a lancet liver fluke does to a hapless ant. I may just wind up keeping the Z3 after all and resign myself to another ten years of wind noise on roadtrips and slithery winter driving, but I'm getting one of those fancy dashboard Victrolas.
First, it was obviously superior in every way on dirt and rough pavement. With the Zed Drei, the optional sport suspension and 35-series tires make it ride like a Conestoga wagon on even the smoothest gravel or dirt roads; exceed twenty miles an hour off pavement and your vision will be so blurred by the jouncing and vibration that you won't see the parts that fall off every time a wheel crashes over the minutest of surface imperfections. Conversely, the Forester is so serene and composed on dirt that "I honestly had no idea I was going that fast, officer," becomes a very real conversational possibility.
On the flip side, over a decade of driving a sports car has me used to control inputs that are acted on with alacrity. For instance, to change lanes on the interstate in the Bimmer, you don't so much steer as merely apply pressure in the direction you wish to go. By comparison, the same act in the Forester involved enough action, from the wheel through the steering gear to the tall-'n'-wobbly front tire sidewalls, that it felt like I was ringing down to the helm for rudder changes. Don't get me wrong, compared to the average passenger sedan there's hardly any difference at all, and compared to a truck-based SUV it feels like Handling By Lotus, but it still took some getting used to for me. (And don't get me started on how weird automatics feel, without any direct correlation between engine noise, the tach needle, and how fast the car is going; that's witchcraft and deviltry right there...)
The thing that most delighted me, however, was the modern stereo that takes over your iPod when you plug it in like a lancet liver fluke does to a hapless ant. I may just wind up keeping the Z3 after all and resign myself to another ten years of wind noise on roadtrips and slithery winter driving, but I'm getting one of those fancy dashboard Victrolas.
WHERE U AT? NJ? GET OUT!
So the borough of Fort Lee in New Jersey has passed an ordinance criminalizing "texting while walking".
Explains their ortsgruppenleiter:
I'm dying to see how that law is worded. How is "walking" defined? Two consecutive steps? More than two? "X or more steps in X amount of time"? Does it have to be in a forward direction, or is this like 'traveling' in the NBA? Can you sidestep and text at the same time?
"Not guilty, your honor. My client was texting while Riverdancing, which is clearly not prohibited by the ordinance."
This is the very definition of a bad law, and you New Jerseyites don't have a hair on your collective ass if you don't clog the courts with cases of texting while skipping, jogging, running, moonwalking, et frickin' cetera.
Explains their ortsgruppenleiter:
There have been 23 pedestrian accidents since January, Fort Lee police chief told CBS New York. While most accidents were minor, three fatalities were reported.
"They're not alert and they're not watching what they're doing,"Which sounds like a self-solving problem to me; one that could be fixed by the front bumpers of city buses far faster than by any number of ticket-writing po-po. But no, the city fathers were hired to write laws, and write laws they will, by damn. When the only tool you have is a statute book, then every problem you see is just an act waiting to be criminalized.
I'm dying to see how that law is worded. How is "walking" defined? Two consecutive steps? More than two? "X or more steps in X amount of time"? Does it have to be in a forward direction, or is this like 'traveling' in the NBA? Can you sidestep and text at the same time?
"Not guilty, your honor. My client was texting while Riverdancing, which is clearly not prohibited by the ordinance."
This is the very definition of a bad law, and you New Jerseyites don't have a hair on your collective ass if you don't clog the courts with cases of texting while skipping, jogging, running, moonwalking, et frickin' cetera.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Monday evening stuff...
Hebrew National chili dogs for supper. Good for what ails ya.
Re-reading the omnibus edition of the first three books of The Dragonriders of Pern
(and you really needn't bother with the rest.) They're still fun, but the idea of having a giant telepathically-linked dragon that would be your friend forever and could fly you around and set stuff that annoyed you on fire was a lot more attractive when I was in middle school and grappling with teen angst. Not that I'd turn one down now, but as an adult, all you can think of are the damned vet bills, which must be ginormous. And it probably horks up hairballs the size of VW Beetles.
Incidentally, the panhandler that walked up to my car in the grocery store parking lot today and asked "Ma'am, ma'am! I'm sorry to trouble you, but do you gots a gas can?" made me think "Uh, no. And I didn't have one three weeks ago when you asked me if I had one in the Target parking lot, and I offered to go in and buy you one, but you said you'd rather have the cash and not take up my time, remember?" Three weeks is an awfully long time to be out of gas.
Perfectly cromulent convertible weather here in Indy, BTW, which is a good thing for all those folks zipping around in the single-seater convertibles on the west side of town this month.( I think they're lost, though, 'cause they just keep going in circles.)
Re-reading the omnibus edition of the first three books of The Dragonriders of Pern
(and you really needn't bother with the rest.) They're still fun, but the idea of having a giant telepathically-linked dragon that would be your friend forever and could fly you around and set stuff that annoyed you on fire was a lot more attractive when I was in middle school and grappling with teen angst. Not that I'd turn one down now, but as an adult, all you can think of are the damned vet bills, which must be ginormous. And it probably horks up hairballs the size of VW Beetles.Incidentally, the panhandler that walked up to my car in the grocery store parking lot today and asked "Ma'am, ma'am! I'm sorry to trouble you, but do you gots a gas can?" made me think "Uh, no. And I didn't have one three weeks ago when you asked me if I had one in the Target parking lot, and I offered to go in and buy you one, but you said you'd rather have the cash and not take up my time, remember?" Three weeks is an awfully long time to be out of gas.
Perfectly cromulent convertible weather here in Indy, BTW, which is a good thing for all those folks zipping around in the single-seater convertibles on the west side of town this month.( I think they're lost, though, 'cause they just keep going in circles.)
It's what that double-barrelled 1911 is backup for.
Actual photos of goofy Siamese-twin AR-15 setup are out. Sure to be included as an option in the next Call of Duty upgrade and the talk of every gun shop commando BECAUSE ISRAELI!
Seriously, if you want to hear more BS about any firearm or firearm accessory, all you need to do is associate it somehow with the Israelis and BAM! it couldn't be more tacticool if you'd sewed it entirely out of black Velcro nylon MOLLE webbing.
I have heard all manner of fanciful tales about the origin of the Desert Eagle, from "Designed for Zahal tank crews!" to "Used by Mossad for long-range assassinations!" And don't get me started about how every Sayeret Matkal troopie supposedly has his micro-Tavor bullpup (which is the best gun ever, of course,) fruited up with cheap-ass plastic Mako accessories like a third-grade schoolgirl's notebook with My Little Pony stickers.
Seriously, if you want to hear more BS about any firearm or firearm accessory, all you need to do is associate it somehow with the Israelis and BAM! it couldn't be more tacticool if you'd sewed it entirely out of black Velcro nylon MOLLE webbing.
I have heard all manner of fanciful tales about the origin of the Desert Eagle, from "Designed for Zahal tank crews!" to "Used by Mossad for long-range assassinations!" And don't get me started about how every Sayeret Matkal troopie supposedly has his micro-Tavor bullpup (which is the best gun ever, of course,) fruited up with cheap-ass plastic Mako accessories like a third-grade schoolgirl's notebook with My Little Pony stickers.
Happy Birthday to You.
One of my earliest blogging inspirations, Kevin at The Smallest Minority, is celebrating his ninth Blogiversary! Watch him put a celebratory boot in a commie's ribs!
(tl/dr: TSM turns 9.)
(tl/dr: TSM turns 9.)
QotD: ...And Then You Win Edition
Sebastian's trying his hand at a wine-making project using Welch's white grape juice concentrate as a starter. The irony comes, of course, from the fact that Dr. Welch was an ardent Prohibitionist.
The problem is never about objects: it's about actions. Specifically, the actions of ill-mannered louts with poor impulse control and nothing you could describe as a moral or an ethic. But it is impolite to say so, and so we allow ourselves to believe that if we outlaw _______, we will Uplift the whole human race into some blissful future utopian paradise, when we know damn well that there are those among us who would push other kids into the rivers of milk and honey, eat the lamb, and set the lion's mane on fire.
What the body politic did to prohibitionists is a wonderful lesson for our cause. To the extent there even are prohibitionists these days, they are viewed as out of the mainstream and quacky. We almost have the opponents of gun rights there, provided we keep pushing. I’ll drink a toast to Dr. Welch, and his company, and hope in our current struggle, our opponents suffer the same political fate.Sadly, the urge to Uplift will always be with us and sour-faced crusading busybodies seem to be part of our political DNA. Cut one head off the Prohibitionist hydra and two more spring up; they ban because they can.
The problem is never about objects: it's about actions. Specifically, the actions of ill-mannered louts with poor impulse control and nothing you could describe as a moral or an ethic. But it is impolite to say so, and so we allow ourselves to believe that if we outlaw _______, we will Uplift the whole human race into some blissful future utopian paradise, when we know damn well that there are those among us who would push other kids into the rivers of milk and honey, eat the lamb, and set the lion's mane on fire.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Greek Government Barbie says "Math is hard!"
Glad I'm not heavy into Euros.
You can't kick the can farther down the road when the pavement ended a dozen yards back, there, Alexis. Once you've eaten the goose, there won't be any more golden egg omelets.
One wonders whether the Jerries are deciding whether or not to evict the Greeks from their living room sofa, where they've been camped out for the last several years, swilling Ouzo and chowing down on takeout gyros on their rich northern cousin's Master Card. As painful as booting them out of the Eurozone might be, there may not be a Eurozone left to boot them out of if the decision is put off too long.
You can't kick the can farther down the road when the pavement ended a dozen yards back, there, Alexis. Once you've eaten the goose, there won't be any more golden egg omelets.
One wonders whether the Jerries are deciding whether or not to evict the Greeks from their living room sofa, where they've been camped out for the last several years, swilling Ouzo and chowing down on takeout gyros on their rich northern cousin's Master Card. As painful as booting them out of the Eurozone might be, there may not be a Eurozone left to boot them out of if the decision is put off too long.
The whole point of gun shows...
I know I harp on this constantly, but if what you're looking for is a brand-spankin' new SIGlock&K XD11A1, gun shows are generally a waste of time, unless you just want to price shop several vendors without having to drive around or use up airtime minutes on your phone.
Given the economics of setup, teardown, table fees, and the realities of either closing the storefront for the weekend or doubling staffing requirements for ditto, prices on new guns from brick & mortar FFLs usually aren't going to be any cheaper at the show on Sunday than they will be back at the store on Monday.
On the other hand, if what you're looking for is unicorns...
I've been looking for Vetterli ammunition off and on since I purchased the rifle back in... '03? '04? I've acquired a couple of rounds, one to put on the display board and one because... well, because. But usable ammo? Hen's teeth.
Now, the ammunition was loaded by Remington UMC well into the smokeless powder era. The US civilian market has always been a black hole for the world's military surplus, especially before GCA '68, and back in the first part of the last century, US shooters on a budget could pick up one of these old Swiss battle rifles via mail order from Bannerman's for a song.
10.4x38R may have been declared obsolete as a military cartridge by the Swiss, but sold commercially as the .41 Swiss Rimfire, throwing a 300gr outside-lubed lead slug at ~1400fps, it was still seen as a viable short-range deer load. Production of the commercial ammo stopped with the advent of WWII, however, and never resumed afterwards.
When I stumbled across this full box of ammo at yesterday's show, with the lube on the bullets still greasy no less, I had about as much chance of saying "no" as I did of flapping my arms and flying.
Also at the show, I discovered a nice little Bayard 1908 in .32ACP, which would make a nice companion piece for the .380 model I already had. When I read about the hoops that others have to jump through just to keep a handgun licence, it makes me thankful to live someplace where a handgun purchase requires naught but the exchange of money and a handshake. (Although it's customary to flash your INDL and LTCH as your good guy bona fides.)
.380 on the left, new .32 on the right. Also, unfinished projects: Namely, an AR lower and a Ruger MkII 22/45 receiver/barrel assembly, waiting on me to scrounge up a bolt and gripframe.
Given the economics of setup, teardown, table fees, and the realities of either closing the storefront for the weekend or doubling staffing requirements for ditto, prices on new guns from brick & mortar FFLs usually aren't going to be any cheaper at the show on Sunday than they will be back at the store on Monday.
On the other hand, if what you're looking for is unicorns...
I've been looking for Vetterli ammunition off and on since I purchased the rifle back in... '03? '04? I've acquired a couple of rounds, one to put on the display board and one because... well, because. But usable ammo? Hen's teeth.
Now, the ammunition was loaded by Remington UMC well into the smokeless powder era. The US civilian market has always been a black hole for the world's military surplus, especially before GCA '68, and back in the first part of the last century, US shooters on a budget could pick up one of these old Swiss battle rifles via mail order from Bannerman's for a song.
10.4x38R may have been declared obsolete as a military cartridge by the Swiss, but sold commercially as the .41 Swiss Rimfire, throwing a 300gr outside-lubed lead slug at ~1400fps, it was still seen as a viable short-range deer load. Production of the commercial ammo stopped with the advent of WWII, however, and never resumed afterwards.
When I stumbled across this full box of ammo at yesterday's show, with the lube on the bullets still greasy no less, I had about as much chance of saying "no" as I did of flapping my arms and flying.
Also at the show, I discovered a nice little Bayard 1908 in .32ACP, which would make a nice companion piece for the .380 model I already had. When I read about the hoops that others have to jump through just to keep a handgun licence, it makes me thankful to live someplace where a handgun purchase requires naught but the exchange of money and a handshake. (Although it's customary to flash your INDL and LTCH as your good guy bona fides.)
.380 on the left, new .32 on the right. Also, unfinished projects: Namely, an AR lower and a Ruger MkII 22/45 receiver/barrel assembly, waiting on me to scrounge up a bolt and gripframe.
Overheard in the Office:
Bobbi is leafing through a Garrett-Wade catalog...
RX: "'Professional Italian grafting tools'. I'll just bet."
Me: "What are they? New York City politicians?"
Airplane pictures.
Someone, who shall remain nameless but whose name rhymes with "camera", remembered to bring her camera along to New Hamster but managed to leave the camera's SD card in the card reader hooked to her desktop back home. A couple of pictures were taken in airports, and these managed to fill up the puny on-board memory quite handily.
Beech 1900 on the United puddlejumper ramp in CLE. The 1900 was developed from the Super King Air, which makes it sort of a Super Duper King Air. I'll bet you none of those passenger realize how super duper their ride is. (Sure, they seem insignificant on a tarmac full of jetliners, but I was used to looking at them from a hangar full of Cessna 310s. It's all a matter of scale.)
While I arrived at CLE through a jetway that was once again comically trying to devour the tiny Embraer, I departed via airstairs (which was cool,) in the rain (which wasn't.)
Beech 1900 on the United puddlejumper ramp in CLE. The 1900 was developed from the Super King Air, which makes it sort of a Super Duper King Air. I'll bet you none of those passenger realize how super duper their ride is. (Sure, they seem insignificant on a tarmac full of jetliners, but I was used to looking at them from a hangar full of Cessna 310s. It's all a matter of scale.)
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Found in my cell phone...
Spent some time on Monday driving around with the New Hampshire Chamber of Commerce. He made a point of stopping the minivan at a turnoff just down the road from Castle Frostbite so I could get a picture. I have to say, he's got a point:
Here's a picture of a jetway at MHT about to devour the teeny little EMB 145 on which I am expected to fly to CLE.
Here's a picture of a jetway at MHT about to devour the teeny little EMB 145 on which I am expected to fly to CLE.
Saturday Stuff...
To whoever mentioned "C.B. Colby" in my comments section, thank you! I have been totally tortured for years trying to remember the name of those elementary school library staples. It was C.B. Colby books that taught me about such cool things as SEALAB and the M-28 Davy Crockett Weapons System, and helped mold the hopeless nerd I am today.
Spent yesterday morning playing bambalance driver/nursemaid for Roomie. Not having had much experience with people coming out from under general anaesthesia, I was caught off guard by the repetitive question syndrome.
Spent yesterday morning playing bambalance driver/nursemaid for Roomie. Not having had much experience with people coming out from under general anaesthesia, I was caught off guard by the repetitive question syndrome.
"What'd th' doc say?"
"He said everything was great. You got an 'A'."
"Tha'ss good. He was a nice man. Di' he say ever'thing was okay?"
"Yes, he did. He said everything was great. You got an 'A'."Today? Fun show! Hooray! Don't really need anything, but you never know what you might find walking around. Let's sing the Fun Show Song!
Flintlocks and Flop-tops
And Number Three Russians
Black-powder Mausers
From jackbooted Prussians,
Shiny Smith PC's from limited runs
These are a few of my favorite guns.
Socketed bay'nets
On Zulu War rifles,
Engraved, iv'ried Lugers
That make quite an eyefull
Mosin tomato stakes sold by the ton
These are a few of my favorite guns.
Rusty top-breaks!
Smallbore Schuetzens!
And all of Browning's spawn
I just keep on browsing my favorite guns
Until all my money's gone.
Friday, May 11, 2012
RIF'ed? No worries, mate!
It seems that the Australian military is looking for a few good men, and is willing to pay:
And should world events go totally Mad Max, that's going to be an exciting corner of the world in which to be soldiering, what with the Indonesian hordes right to the north.
The U.S. ally down under is seeking everything from submariners to doctors at ranks from enlisted to officers in all branches of its services and salaries can be substantially higher...With inevitable belt-tightening at the Pentagon in the future, one can imagine the appeal, especially because Oz's economy is... well, one of the healthier patients in the cancer ward.
And should world events go totally Mad Max, that's going to be an exciting corner of the world in which to be soldiering, what with the Indonesian hordes right to the north.
Not with a bang, but a whimper.
The end of the Roman Empire in the west came as more and more tribal groups settled inside its borders and its own citizens became increasingly reluctant to defend an empire that was divided into super-wealthy landed gentry and almost serf-like peasantry, causing military roles to be subcontracted out to the barbarian invaders who became, in essence, the Roman army.
The end of the British Empire came when Britannia had been physically bled white by one global conflict and then fiscally bled white by a second and, parting with its colonial possessions, the once-globe-spanning empire shrank back down to its pre-Elizabethan roots as a rainy tourist trap with good beer.
The end of the American Empire came when it was decreed that its fragile children were such precious pearls that they couldn't be exposed to the dangers of drawstrings on clothing. Seriously. This is the inevitable end result of bicycle helmets and rubber playground matting: Your average newborn these days is doomed to a childhood that makes Tod Lubitch look like Johnny Knoxville. No wonder they take up BASE jumping as soon as they get to college.
In the brief span of my lifetime, we have gone from a nation where kids could order a .22 in the mail (with their parents' permission) and go to Sears and buy a kit for casting their own lead toy soldiers to a nation where they are protected from dangerous clothing and would be expelled from school for drawing a picture of a toy soldier.
Sic transit gloria mundi.
The end of the British Empire came when Britannia had been physically bled white by one global conflict and then fiscally bled white by a second and, parting with its colonial possessions, the once-globe-spanning empire shrank back down to its pre-Elizabethan roots as a rainy tourist trap with good beer.
The end of the American Empire came when it was decreed that its fragile children were such precious pearls that they couldn't be exposed to the dangers of drawstrings on clothing. Seriously. This is the inevitable end result of bicycle helmets and rubber playground matting: Your average newborn these days is doomed to a childhood that makes Tod Lubitch look like Johnny Knoxville. No wonder they take up BASE jumping as soon as they get to college.
In the brief span of my lifetime, we have gone from a nation where kids could order a .22 in the mail (with their parents' permission) and go to Sears and buy a kit for casting their own lead toy soldiers to a nation where they are protected from dangerous clothing and would be expelled from school for drawing a picture of a toy soldier.
Sic transit gloria mundi.
...and put this deck chair over there.
I was going to make some comment about what a master stroke of electioneering it was for Obama to use his bully pulpit to get the GOP to pull its teeth out of his economic Achilles' heel and go chasing off after the gay marriage issue, but then I realized it didn't really take any kind of political genius at all. I mean, if you know the dog's gonna chase the stick, you don't have to be Machiavelli to throw it in front of the bus.
And when it comes to chasing sticks, the Republican elephanthound is constant as the northern star; if it ever has you treed up some tricky unemployment numbers, just fling something about the 'bortion or the gays as far from you as possible, and it will bark happily off after it, leaving you free to regroup.
And when it comes to chasing sticks, the Republican elephanthound is constant as the northern star; if it ever has you treed up some tricky unemployment numbers, just fling something about the 'bortion or the gays as far from you as possible, and it will bark happily off after it, leaving you free to regroup.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Overheard in the Office:
Roomie is lost in the intertubes on her computer screen...
RX: "Ice cream jelly spiders."
Me: "Pickle rainbow motor scooter!" (Jump!)
RX: "No, this is a real thing. Which you should link to."
*long pause*
RX: "Do you want the link?"
Me: "Nah, I found it."
RX: "Wow!"
Me: "Well, when you google 'ice cream jelly spiders', it pretty much takes you right there."
Heart of Weirdness.
From Fort Wayne comes this intriguing bit of Hoosier shenanigans:
Or maybe it's because it's illegal to let the kids ride in the back of the pickup truck, while the law is (understandably) vague on the legality of strapping them to the bonnet like Bambi's mom.
(H/T to Shootin' Buddy, whose nose for news of this sort makes him a veritable one-man Indiana Chamber of Commerce.)
Police in Fort Wayne arrested a man after they say he drove three blocks with four children strapped on the hood of his car.The maddeningly cryptic story leaves it unclear as to whether this was being done as a punishment or a reward or just, you know, because beer.
Or maybe it's because it's illegal to let the kids ride in the back of the pickup truck, while the law is (understandably) vague on the legality of strapping them to the bonnet like Bambi's mom.
(H/T to Shootin' Buddy, whose nose for news of this sort makes him a veritable one-man Indiana Chamber of Commerce.)
Ugh.
Blinding headache. Perhaps related to the fact that I could use the creaking of the bones in my face as an altimeter for half the day yesterday.
More when I feel up to impersonating a human being.
More when I feel up to impersonating a human being.
Wednesday, May 09, 2012
Cleveland... Crap. I was still in Cleveland.
The flight from Manchester to CLE was interesting, inasmuch as the only times I've flown in planes smaller than that Embraer 145, I was wearing a headset and sitting in the right seat.
The layover in Cleveland is of the precise length to provoke misery: Not quite two hours. Long enough to feel like forever, but not long enough to make it worth going in and out of security to look up any of the peeps I know on the North Coast.
In the meantime, I sit here in the Gordon Biersch in the secure zone, looking out over the tarmac where the Saab 340 and Dash-8 puddlejumpers are being serviced and loaded via airstairs, No such luck for me though: The CLE-IND leg will be on another Embraer 145, which is exactly like a Gulfstream 550 with three or four times the seats it should have.
And yet, hey... it's still sitting in a chair... in the sky.
WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
The layover in Cleveland is of the precise length to provoke misery: Not quite two hours. Long enough to feel like forever, but not long enough to make it worth going in and out of security to look up any of the peeps I know on the North Coast.
In the meantime, I sit here in the Gordon Biersch in the secure zone, looking out over the tarmac where the Saab 340 and Dash-8 puddlejumpers are being serviced and loaded via airstairs, No such luck for me though: The CLE-IND leg will be on another Embraer 145, which is exactly like a Gulfstream 550 with three or four times the seats it should have.
And yet, hey... it's still sitting in a chair... in the sky.
WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Leavin' on a jet plane...
So all my gear is re-packed at Castle Frostbite: all the sharp pointy things are in my checked bag, the Glock and the Ruger are all packed up, and yet again I spent a week in the woods without busting a single cap of .22, unless you count the single CCI shotshell used to dispatch a house mouse (outside, of course; I'm not a complete savage.)
All the electronic gadgetry is sporting a full charge, and I remembered a dead tree book for the flight
.
Both legs of this trip are going to be on bitty Embraer bottle rockets, changing planes in Cleveland. (I'm still bitter that my flight out of Indy on a Dash 8 was scrubbed; I've never been on a turboprop bigger than a King Air.)
All the electronic gadgetry is sporting a full charge, and I remembered a dead tree book for the flight
.Both legs of this trip are going to be on bitty Embraer bottle rockets, changing planes in Cleveland. (I'm still bitter that my flight out of Indy on a Dash 8 was scrubbed; I've never been on a turboprop bigger than a King Air.)
QotD: Partisan Warfare Edition
Because it's my blog and I can have as many quotes of the day as I want to so there!, here's Roomie on Lugar's concession speech:
[H]e's also said the victorious Richard Mourdock has embraced a partisan attitude that makes it difficult to get things done.
That was the point, Senator. See, the more Congress "gets things done," the smaller my paycheck, either directly through taxes or indirectly by inflation.
QotD: Eat The Goose, No More Eggs Edition
Adaptive Curmudgeon on everybody's favorite South American strongman:
It looks to me like Chavez has beaten his country like a rented mule and his time is just about up. His 13 year socialist reign has been, for want of a better word, “craptacular” for his people. He trashed a nation in less time than most of us take to wear out a Honda Civic.Wisht I'd wrote that.
Na-na-na-na, na-na-na-na!
It is my pleasure to report that Dick Lugar, six-term US Senator from the state of Indiana, former mayor of Indianapolis, a sort of anti-Cincinnatus who has not held a real job... nay, has been a hog at the public trough ...since the year before I was born, is going to need to move his stuff out of his office and start handing out resumes on K Street come January.
I have to say that this was an upchuck long in coming; rarely have I filled in a circle with a No. 2 pencil with such savage glee. It's long past time that this particular boil on the arse of the body politic was lanced, so good riddance, Dick; couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.
I have to say that this was an upchuck long in coming; rarely have I filled in a circle with a No. 2 pencil with such savage glee. It's long past time that this particular boil on the arse of the body politic was lanced, so good riddance, Dick; couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.
Tuesday, May 08, 2012
Overheard on I-89 South:
Went with Marko to catch a matinee of The Avengers yesterday. I'm not, on the whole, a big fan of superhero movies but, like both Iron Man movies and the Batman reboots, this one transcended the genre and was really enjoyable. Plus explosions. Driving back to Castle Frostbite, however...
Me: "You know, I had no problems with Asgardian gods, giant gamma-ray mutant dudes, or flying aircraft carriers, but Scarlett Johansson's teacup Weaver really threw me out of the moment for a second, there. It messed with my willing suspension of disbelief..."I'll also note that I had difficulty wrapping my head around the idea of a Glock 26 in a tactical drop-thigh rig; the sight was jarring like... I dunno... like a space-saver spare on a race car.
Tab Clearing...
- Stupid should hurt.
- Big discussion on chamber-empty carry over at Robb's. I would like to point out that they are called "handguns", and not "handsguns", for a reason.
- That '70s Show. Just as the presence of iridium in geological substrates indicates the "K-T boundary", or the delineating point between Cretaceous and Tertiary layers, so one day will a layer of velour deposits be used to locate the Carter-Reagan boundary.
Problem with the paradigm.
So another terror plot was allegedly uncovered, despite the War on Terror being more or less kinda sorta over. The president offered the vague reassurances that apparently come with the job description:
Declaring war on a noun is pointless and unproductive. You get folks in the wrong mindset, you can't eradicate it, and you wind up going through ever more pointless and draconian steps to try. A War on Terror is ultimately destined to be as fruitless as would be a war against any other wrong: A War on Murder, say, or a War on Shoplifting, or a War on Telling Your Neighbor That Dress Looks Great On Her When It Really Makes Her Look Like An Avocado In A Flour Sack.
Seriously, if you want to eradicate a noun, don't call the J. Edgar Hoover Building or the Pentagon; call Merriam-Webster.
U.S. President Barack Obama was told about the plot in April, and the attempt "underscores the necessity of remaining vigilant against terrorism here and abroad," the White House said.Well, duh. Make sure you lock your doors, and remember to wear your galoshes, kids, because it's raining. This is what people do regarding bad things that may happen to them: remain vigilant. For example, I "remain vigilant" against muggers: This means that I stay alert and wary. I don't declare a "War on Mugging" and run around shooting every shifty-looking character between Broad Ripple Avenue and 49th Street.
Declaring war on a noun is pointless and unproductive. You get folks in the wrong mindset, you can't eradicate it, and you wind up going through ever more pointless and draconian steps to try. A War on Terror is ultimately destined to be as fruitless as would be a war against any other wrong: A War on Murder, say, or a War on Shoplifting, or a War on Telling Your Neighbor That Dress Looks Great On Her When It Really Makes Her Look Like An Avocado In A Flour Sack.
Seriously, if you want to eradicate a noun, don't call the J. Edgar Hoover Building or the Pentagon; call Merriam-Webster.
Monday, May 07, 2012
Random thought...
Measuring interweb advertising effectiveness in terms of "clicks" is like expecting the people sitting in the bleachers of turn three at Daytona to whip out their cell phones and call DuPont every time Jeff Gordon drives past...
.
.
Tab Clearing...
- Everybody wants to save Bengal tigers and pandas and nobody wants to save the anopheles mosquito or the shortheaded hagfish.
- JayG has photos from blogmeet.
- The real life of Julia.
Primary sources...
If you are a Hoosier going to vote in tomorrow's primaries, Roomie has a link to a place where you can find out who will be on your ballot.
While everybody is yammering about who gets the White House, the smart voter will be looking at elections that actually matter to them, and that they have a chance of influencing: county commissioners, tax assessors, sheriffs, prosecutors, et cetera.
It's taken years of neglect of the farm teams to bring things to their current sorry pass in DC, and it's very likely, even probable, that this is all an isometric exercise anyway; ain't no way we're pulling out of this tailspin. But I figure there are people voting at me, so I may as well vote right back at 'em and, besides, it's something to do 'til the lights go out.
While everybody is yammering about who gets the White House, the smart voter will be looking at elections that actually matter to them, and that they have a chance of influencing: county commissioners, tax assessors, sheriffs, prosecutors, et cetera.
It's taken years of neglect of the farm teams to bring things to their current sorry pass in DC, and it's very likely, even probable, that this is all an isometric exercise anyway; ain't no way we're pulling out of this tailspin. But I figure there are people voting at me, so I may as well vote right back at 'em and, besides, it's something to do 'til the lights go out.
No nukes.
So the Japanese powered down the last reactor in their country, and the whole grid is humming along without a single volt originated by splitting a uranium atom.
Environmentalists are probably decorating their cupcakes over this; a major economy forswearing that icky nuclear energy and moving forward into a greener future of unicorns farting luminescent rainbows across solar panels and through wind turbines.
Not so fast, Alex Steffen; we're talking about powering one of the Earth's largest industrial economies, not the Vegan Women's Flax Weaving Cooperative:
Environmentalists are probably decorating their cupcakes over this; a major economy forswearing that icky nuclear energy and moving forward into a greener future of unicorns farting luminescent rainbows across solar panels and through wind turbines.
Not so fast, Alex Steffen; we're talking about powering one of the Earth's largest industrial economies, not the Vegan Women's Flax Weaving Cooperative:
Prior to the Fukushima disaster, Japan relied on nuclear for approximately 30% of its energy. As reactors have come off-line, the country has increased its imports of fossil fuels.All those Priuses and Leafs aren't hand-crafted using organic materials by elves in trees, you know.
Japan's government predicts it won't be able to keep up that pace, and the void will result in an energy crunch this summer, possibly leading to rolling blackouts.
Was there ever a recorded hula hoop death?
Fads come and go, especially with kids. I'm pretty sure however, neither pogs, parachute pants, the Material Girl look, nor friendship bracelets contained the inherent danger of leaving the participant a greasy red smear on the sidewalk.
I'm sure that after a few kids crater in, the fad will fizzle and they'll be on to something saner and safer, like driving the wrong way 'round the МКАД half a bottle of Stoli in the bag and blindfolded.
I'm sure that after a few kids crater in, the fad will fizzle and they'll be on to something saner and safer, like driving the wrong way 'round the МКАД half a bottle of Stoli in the bag and blindfolded.
___________s Suck!
Apparently, the thing to do these days, especially if you're a bald shooting instructor with a Brand Name®©™ and a goatee, is to release a YouTube video declaring that _______s Suck!
By using "sucks" in the title, everyone will know that you're hip and edgy. You'll increase attention to your Brand Name®©™ as hundreds of owners of ________ flock to your FaceBook/YouTube/MySpace/LiveJournal/Geocities page to rebut your slanderous accusations against their beloved _______.
The best part? Your nuthuggers will be inspired to buy more tee shirts and ball caps, all the clicking will drive up your ad rates, and the pièce de résistance is that none of those people who own _______ were likely to come to your class, anyway, so you don't risk any damage to your own bottom line!
Brilliant!
By using "sucks" in the title, everyone will know that you're hip and edgy. You'll increase attention to your Brand Name®©™ as hundreds of owners of ________ flock to your FaceBook/YouTube/MySpace/LiveJournal/Geocities page to rebut your slanderous accusations against their beloved _______.
The best part? Your nuthuggers will be inspired to buy more tee shirts and ball caps, all the clicking will drive up your ad rates, and the pièce de résistance is that none of those people who own _______ were likely to come to your class, anyway, so you don't risk any damage to your own bottom line!
Brilliant!
Sunday, May 06, 2012
Output, Lack Of, Excuse For, 1 each.
I feel like a zom... wait, don't shoot! Tired! I mean I feel tired!
By the time I arrived back at home-away-from-home, it was crowding midnight, and by the time I finally got to bed, it was nearest thing to one AM. And the morning started at 5:00, taking care of the dogs and thebaby juvenile chickens.
Compound this with the fact that I am trying to fight off some wretched bug that has the whole right side of my head stopped up like a Reagan Supreme Court nomination and my nose running like the Italian army, and I's miserable, right?
The generic Dayquil knockoff has my mind all... well, whatever would be the word for "awhirl, but in a sluggish and unfocused fashion." Physically, I'm exhausted, but my choices are either lying down and staring at the ceiling, or sitting up and staring at a book, so I chose the latter.
And thus I have done all day. That, and some half-hearted WoW-ing. Other than that? Nada.
I'll tell you this, though: I will sleep the sleep of the just tonight.
By the time I arrived back at home-away-from-home, it was crowding midnight, and by the time I finally got to bed, it was nearest thing to one AM. And the morning started at 5:00, taking care of the dogs and the
Compound this with the fact that I am trying to fight off some wretched bug that has the whole right side of my head stopped up like a Reagan Supreme Court nomination and my nose running like the Italian army, and I's miserable, right?
The generic Dayquil knockoff has my mind all... well, whatever would be the word for "awhirl, but in a sluggish and unfocused fashion." Physically, I'm exhausted, but my choices are either lying down and staring at the ceiling, or sitting up and staring at a book, so I chose the latter.
And thus I have done all day. That, and some half-hearted WoW-ing. Other than that? Nada.
I'll tell you this, though: I will sleep the sleep of the just tonight.
Pro Tip:
If you go out to a sports bar with a bunch of friends on Cinco de Mayo (which, as our esteemed president can tell you, is the day after Cinco de Quatro,) and already feel the beginnings of a sore throat coming on, you're going to want to chain-swallow some kind of lemon & honey throat lozenges on the drive home, or the next morning you'll hardly be able to yell "No!" at the puppy when he piddles in an inappropriate spot.
Sunday Morning Stuff...
Drove down to Jillian's in Manchestah last night for the totally awesome Northeast Blogger Dinner Thingie, organized by the inimitable Jay G.
You know how you meet some people in real life after knowing them on the internet and they're not like you expected? Well, Jay's not like that; turns out he's just like he is on the internet, only more so. And life-size. And in 3D. Totally recommend you catch this one on the big screen if you haven't already, because your laptop just doesn't do it justice.
As a special bonus treat, friend Jenn, who I've only seen, like, once since moving to Indy, drove up from the Cradle (and Grave) of Liberty with Travis of TJIC fame, a man now forever doomed to feed straight lines at blogmeets:
It was all too soon that I had to saddle up the Subaru and return to Castle Frostbite before the dachshunds turned into pumpkins. (...and to get to bed at a quasi-decent hour in preparation for the Morning Group Howl, which kicks off at precisely You've Got To Be Kidding Me Thirty.)
You know how you meet some people in real life after knowing them on the internet and they're not like you expected? Well, Jay's not like that; turns out he's just like he is on the internet, only more so. And life-size. And in 3D. Totally recommend you catch this one on the big screen if you haven't already, because your laptop just doesn't do it justice.
As a special bonus treat, friend Jenn, who I've only seen, like, once since moving to Indy, drove up from the Cradle (and Grave) of Liberty with Travis of TJIC fame, a man now forever doomed to feed straight lines at blogmeets:
"Hi, I'm Travis. TJIC?"Food was et, drinks were drunked, jokes were told, and pool was more or less played. (I was the Less, Mrs. SCI-FI was the More.) I had a grand time and enjoyed good humor and the kind of conversation you can only get with really smart, really cool people.
"No, I am TJIC!"
"I am TJIC!"
"We're all TJIC!"
It was all too soon that I had to saddle up the Subaru and return to Castle Frostbite before the dachshunds turned into pumpkins. (...and to get to bed at a quasi-decent hour in preparation for the Morning Group Howl, which kicks off at precisely You've Got To Be Kidding Me Thirty.)
Saturday, May 05, 2012
Luftverboten...
A list of things normally carried in my pockets and purse that went into checked baggage:
CRKT M16SF pocket knifefrom my jeans pocket and my keychain with steel-cored paracord monkey fist and Simonich Bitter Root from my coat pocket.
And from the turse, a Victorinox SAKI truthfully have no idea how half that stuff wound up in the turse; it just accumulated over time, but it all gets used fairly frequently, so there you go. And if I left it at home, I'd surely find myself someplace with a loose screw in a piece of furniture that was driving me nuts, and then what do you do? Ergo: checked bags., CRKT Eat N Tool
and Get-A-Way Driver
, Leatherman Juice CS4
and MUT
(plus bit set), and last but not least, the dreaded nail clippers, scourge of the friendly skies.
"If you blink, you'll die in the dark."
Bob Vogel absolutely smokes the P-T.com FAST Test:
That is almost exactly one third of the time it took me to do my best run yet at an AFHF class.
Watching these really fast guys, the thing that always impresses me is their incredible economy of motion; there's not a bit of extraneous herky-jerky to their movements.
That is almost exactly one third of the time it took me to do my best run yet at an AFHF class.
Watching these really fast guys, the thing that always impresses me is their incredible economy of motion; there's not a bit of extraneous herky-jerky to their movements.
QotD: Lifeless Man Edition
Caleb, writing on knives:
bribing Marko's kids giving the kids their trinkets) was pop open my poor man's Pelican
and holster up my gat.
Riding out the royal turnpike to the Duchy of Upper Cryogenica, from the rear of the vehicle, Lyra requested assistance in extracting her new plush baby seal (With Real Tail Wagging Action!) from its packaging. I nonchalantly extended a hand towards her and, with that implicit trust children have that adults can solve all their problems, she placed the toy in my hand.
I confidently examined the packaging, reached down to my right jeans pocket, and... uh-oh. I found myself forced to whimper "Uh, Marko, do you have a knife?" Which in itself is an inane question to me; what kind of adult goes about their business without a knife on their person?
I will never forgive the TSA for that moment.
Aside from my Crackberry, my knife is the most useful thing I carry with me on a daily basis. When I have to fly and can’t carry a knife, I feel like half a man. There’s nothing more annoying that sitting on a plane trying to open one of those little deli-airplane lunches you can buy on United without a knife. What am I supposed to do, tear at this packaging with my teeth like some kind of animal?When we left the Manchester airport and threw my luggage in the back of the Munchkin Bus, the first thing I did (after
and holster up my gat.Riding out the royal turnpike to the Duchy of Upper Cryogenica, from the rear of the vehicle, Lyra requested assistance in extracting her new plush baby seal (With Real Tail Wagging Action!) from its packaging. I nonchalantly extended a hand towards her and, with that implicit trust children have that adults can solve all their problems, she placed the toy in my hand.
I confidently examined the packaging, reached down to my right jeans pocket, and... uh-oh. I found myself forced to whimper "Uh, Marko, do you have a knife?" Which in itself is an inane question to me; what kind of adult goes about their business without a knife on their person?
I will never forgive the TSA for that moment.
Slow start...
Can't brain yet this morning. Have the dumbs. Possibly because I was up 'til midnight playing this great new game I discovered. I don't know if y'all have heard of it; it's called World of Warcraft.
Thanks a lot, Marko; you're a real pal. If I ever get a heroin habit or something, I'll be sure to share.
WX in NH still bleh. I've run through the entire list of sun gods at Wikipedia, twice even, but still bupkis.
Young pup Henry, sensing my weakness, has been like a "No!"-seeking missile since he was freed from the durance vile of his crate at 0MG30. I am going to go perform the coffee ritual and see if the world looks better when viewed through caffeine-colored glasses.
Thanks a lot, Marko; you're a real pal. If I ever get a heroin habit or something, I'll be sure to share.
WX in NH still bleh. I've run through the entire list of sun gods at Wikipedia, twice even, but still bupkis.
Young pup Henry, sensing my weakness, has been like a "No!"-seeking missile since he was freed from the durance vile of his crate at 0MG30. I am going to go perform the coffee ritual and see if the world looks better when viewed through caffeine-colored glasses.
Friday, May 04, 2012
Speaking of accents...
A friend back in Knoxville used to love to relate the tale of the time his car's transmission went out. As he was trudging along the road, he was given a ride by an obviously well-to-do older woman in a nice car.
They're driving into town and she asks him what happened to his car, and he explains that the transmission probably needs replacing. "Oh," she exclaims, "Ah'll just bet that'll cost like a wahpenzion!"
Caught off guard, he replies "Wow, I never would have taken you for a Trekkie! That's neat!"
"A which?"
"A Trekkie. A fan of Star Trek."
"Ah'm sure Ah don't know what you mean."
...because, of course, where his geek-like-me ears had heard "cost like a warp engine", she had used the old colloquialism "cost like a war pension."
.
They're driving into town and she asks him what happened to his car, and he explains that the transmission probably needs replacing. "Oh," she exclaims, "Ah'll just bet that'll cost like a wahpenzion!"
Caught off guard, he replies "Wow, I never would have taken you for a Trekkie! That's neat!"
"A which?"
"A Trekkie. A fan of Star Trek."
"Ah'm sure Ah don't know what you mean."
...because, of course, where his geek-like-me ears had heard "cost like a warp engine", she had used the old colloquialism "cost like a war pension."
.
You're putting the emPHASis on the wrong sylLABles.
I lived in Chicago 'til I was nine, before moving to Atlanta. I spent the bulk of my life there before migrating to Knoxville, and thence up to Indy. Therefore, I have limited experience with accents.
Obviously, there is a distinct Chicagoan accent, and then there are the various shades of Southern accent, with which I am familiar, but in Indianapolis, you are exposed to that particular tone of speech, spoken in a swath running from Cleveland through the Circle City and on to Saint Louis, that, thanks to over a half century of national network newscasters, is as close to Received Pronunciation as you can get in American English; a sort of accentless accent.
I can't tell regional New England accents apart worth a damn; my untrained ear can't spot the difference between a Downeast Mainer telling me "You can't get theah from heah, ahyuh," and a denizen of Southie saying "Gimme your $%^&#@ wallet or I'll $%&^* stab you in the #$%@& kidneys," so this week at Castle Frostbite has been a real treat for the ear. You see, Marko and Robin have contractors doing some work on the place and every time I step outside for a smoke break it sounds, to my southern ears, exactly like I'm on the set of This Old House. It's awesome.
Obviously, there is a distinct Chicagoan accent, and then there are the various shades of Southern accent, with which I am familiar, but in Indianapolis, you are exposed to that particular tone of speech, spoken in a swath running from Cleveland through the Circle City and on to Saint Louis, that, thanks to over a half century of national network newscasters, is as close to Received Pronunciation as you can get in American English; a sort of accentless accent.
I can't tell regional New England accents apart worth a damn; my untrained ear can't spot the difference between a Downeast Mainer telling me "You can't get theah from heah, ahyuh," and a denizen of Southie saying "Gimme your $%^&#@ wallet or I'll $%&^* stab you in the #$%@& kidneys," so this week at Castle Frostbite has been a real treat for the ear. You see, Marko and Robin have contractors doing some work on the place and every time I step outside for a smoke break it sounds, to my southern ears, exactly like I'm on the set of This Old House. It's awesome.
Thursday, May 03, 2012
Off the Shelf...
Knocking out some vacation reading...
The first in the queue was Carpe Jugulum
, which I knew I would enjoy, being a Discworld book starring the Witches of Lancre. It was a particularly poignant read, however, as it was the last Discworld novel I had left unread. I'd been saving it and finally decided not to put it off any longer.
No telling how many more Sir Terry has left in him, but one can always hope...
Currently finishing up You Are Not So Smart
, an entertainingly written, but pretty entry-level, guide to the ways your brain works. In a couple of places, the author lets his politics show through a bit blatantly, so if you're the kind of person who discovers you're reading a book written by a pinko and throws it against the wall, I'd avoid the Kindle edition.
The first in the queue was Carpe Jugulum
, which I knew I would enjoy, being a Discworld book starring the Witches of Lancre. It was a particularly poignant read, however, as it was the last Discworld novel I had left unread. I'd been saving it and finally decided not to put it off any longer.No telling how many more Sir Terry has left in him, but one can always hope...
Currently finishing up You Are Not So Smart
, an entertainingly written, but pretty entry-level, guide to the ways your brain works. In a couple of places, the author lets his politics show through a bit blatantly, so if you're the kind of person who discovers you're reading a book written by a pinko and throws it against the wall, I'd avoid the Kindle edition.
Alert the Ministry of Irony.
A couple days ago, Stephen King cranked off another one of those "Tax me more!" diatribes that squizillionaires are turning out these days, apparently in hopes of not being confused with those other evil rich guys so please keep reading my books/listening to my songs/going to my movies/buying my stuff America. These get on my nerves like those songs that whine about the miseries of life as a rock star ("Oh the road it gets so lonely,/With all the hookers and the blow...") so I've had it open in a tab and finally got around to reading it this morning.
In the opening paragraph, he tut-tutted Governor Christie, commenting that "it may be a comment on the coarsening of American discourse that his brash rudeness is often taken for charm."
The subsequent three page screed is full of gems like "Here’s another crock of fresh bullshit [sic] delivered by the right wing of the Republican Party," and sharp elbows and thumb gouges to Tea Partiers, Southerners, and pretty much everyone else he doesn't see eye-to-political-eye with.
Wow, Steve, just wow; way to elevate the discourse, there. I'd like to say that I'm all in a huff and not going to buy your books anymore, but truthfully, I stopped buying them quite some time ago. Back then, it was nothing personal: Once you got Too Big To Edit, I just decided to stick with your short story collections and avoid the rambling phone-book-sized novels. Now? Now I get to feel good about not buying your books. Thanks!
In the opening paragraph, he tut-tutted Governor Christie, commenting that "it may be a comment on the coarsening of American discourse that his brash rudeness is often taken for charm."
The subsequent three page screed is full of gems like "Here’s another crock of fresh bullshit [sic] delivered by the right wing of the Republican Party," and sharp elbows and thumb gouges to Tea Partiers, Southerners, and pretty much everyone else he doesn't see eye-to-political-eye with.
Wow, Steve, just wow; way to elevate the discourse, there. I'd like to say that I'm all in a huff and not going to buy your books anymore, but truthfully, I stopped buying them quite some time ago. Back then, it was nothing personal: Once you got Too Big To Edit, I just decided to stick with your short story collections and avoid the rambling phone-book-sized novels. Now? Now I get to feel good about not buying your books. Thanks!
Phrasing!
The link at CNN said simply "Obama vows to 'finish the job'".
With visions of the U.S. economy hemorrhaging gouts of blood as it crawls grimly forward on its hands and knees and Barry stepping up behind it, rolling up his shirtsleeve as he contemplatively hefts a framing hammer, I clicked the link.
Turns out it was about Afghanistan.
I think it's telling that the only job I could foresee Obama talking about finishing is also the only one that I can see that he's really started.
With visions of the U.S. economy hemorrhaging gouts of blood as it crawls grimly forward on its hands and knees and Barry stepping up behind it, rolling up his shirtsleeve as he contemplatively hefts a framing hammer, I clicked the link.
Turns out it was about Afghanistan.
I think it's telling that the only job I could foresee Obama talking about finishing is also the only one that I can see that he's really started.
Wednesday, May 02, 2012
More-or-Less-Instant Karma
So, apparently there was this cat running loose, stinking up the streets of North Carolina. Despite a felony rap sheet full of crimes like kidnapping and multiple counts of the especially-icky-sounding "Indecent Liberty With A Child", the penal system had given him nothing worse than some probation and a whole three month stretch in the pokey, which isn't even a metaphorical slap on the... er, wrist.
Finally the universe apparently decided to do what the North Carolina justice system had inexplicably thus far refused to: It ran his ass over with a train.
From what I can tell, it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.
Finally the universe apparently decided to do what the North Carolina justice system had inexplicably thus far refused to: It ran his ass over with a train.
From what I can tell, it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.
Okay, they finally did it.
As most folks know, I am generally into older, collectable guns; I like my guns to have a bit of history to them. I used to have all kinds of scary black rifles and all different manner of funky newer pistols and revolvers, but I've jettisoned them all over time except for a handful.
The few modern/new guns I have, I use for CCW, practice, or (in the case of my AR) just in case the dead rise from the grave and walk the earth in search of human brains. My practical guns aren't chosen based on any criteria other than a proven track record, suitability for their purpose, and how well they work for me. I don't care about whether they look cool or not, or what funky new mechanism they incorporate, or which alphabet tactical operators use them, or which SF movie or video game they star in...
...until now. This UTS-15 shotgun might be a complete malfunctioning ball of suck and fail, I don't know and I don't care, because its aesthetic hits me right in my Starship Troopers wheelhouse. I never fell for the FS2000 or PS90 or RFB or KSG or KRISS... but I sure hope the UTS feels real chintzy in person, or I am likely to do something foolish and buy a shotgun I totally don't need.
The few modern/new guns I have, I use for CCW, practice, or (in the case of my AR) just in case the dead rise from the grave and walk the earth in search of human brains. My practical guns aren't chosen based on any criteria other than a proven track record, suitability for their purpose, and how well they work for me. I don't care about whether they look cool or not, or what funky new mechanism they incorporate, or which alphabet tactical operators use them, or which SF movie or video game they star in...
...until now. This UTS-15 shotgun might be a complete malfunctioning ball of suck and fail, I don't know and I don't care, because its aesthetic hits me right in my Starship Troopers wheelhouse. I never fell for the FS2000 or PS90 or RFB or KSG or KRISS... but I sure hope the UTS feels real chintzy in person, or I am likely to do something foolish and buy a shotgun I totally don't need.
Tab Clearing...
- Fred goes outside to fetch a pail of air.
- A classic sporterized Springfield. There's a big difference between a clean vintage sporter and a bubba hacksaw job. (The apex predator of the sporterized warhorse environment being, of course, Griffin & Howe.)
- If there's a less American concept than "Loyalty Day", I can't think of what it might be. I mean, we were basically founded on disloyalty to our then-sovereign ruler. Either our Permanent Ruling Class is utterly tone-deaf, or I am an anachronism completely out of touch with the tenor of the times. When are they going to pick a date for "Fealty Day", for Hamilton's sake?
See Don. See Don Make $#!+ Up. Don't Be A Don.
Just like back in Knoxville, discharging a firearm (except at a range or to bust a cap in a bad guy) is prohibited in the city limits of Indianapolis, but there's no ordinance against ordnance out in the county, which is weird, because Indy and Marion County supposedly fused into this "Unigov" thing years ago...
Anyway, there's some agitating now to expand the ordinance to the county line, allegedly in the name of safety to prevent yahoos from shooting bullets into the air on New Year's Eve, whence they will now plummet to earth onto Lexus SUVs instead of cornfields and the occasional startled cow.
Ever ready to cram his mug in front of the local news cameras and shiv the Second Amendment in the liver in return for some free airtime, local gun shop owner Don Davis, owner of Don's Guns, former Hoffa bodyguard, and all-around douchebag and general tool, offered up this gem:
Now, it would be one thing to come out and say "Yes, I agree that the 'burbs have encroached on Farmer Johnson's backyard range, and maybe we should look into this," but the bit about the guns he sells today not being like the guns he sold 35 years ago is just gratuitous B.S., mugging for the camera, and he knows it. The AR-15's he's selling now are no more potent than the ones he was selling in the '70s. I am once again proud of the fact that I have never set foot in this jackhole's shop, nor will I ever.
(H/T to Roomie.)
Anyway, there's some agitating now to expand the ordinance to the county line, allegedly in the name of safety to prevent yahoos from shooting bullets into the air on New Year's Eve, whence they will now plummet to earth onto Lexus SUVs instead of cornfields and the occasional startled cow.
Ever ready to cram his mug in front of the local news cameras and shiv the Second Amendment in the liver in return for some free airtime, local gun shop owner Don Davis, owner of Don's Guns, former Hoffa bodyguard, and all-around douchebag and general tool, offered up this gem:
"Indianapolis has grown and it used to be right out here at 38th street was the city limits. Under Unigov, they're now out to the county line roads. And, all the guns I sell today are not like I sold 35 years ago. These guns go a long way. So this is a big city, it's time we should do it, and it doesn't effect the indoor shooting."It will not, perhaps, surprise you to find out that Douchebag Don has an indoor range.
Now, it would be one thing to come out and say "Yes, I agree that the 'burbs have encroached on Farmer Johnson's backyard range, and maybe we should look into this," but the bit about the guns he sells today not being like the guns he sold 35 years ago is just gratuitous B.S., mugging for the camera, and he knows it. The AR-15's he's selling now are no more potent than the ones he was selling in the '70s. I am once again proud of the fact that I have never set foot in this jackhole's shop, nor will I ever.
(H/T to Roomie.)
New business venture!
Attention New Hampshwegians, or whatever y'all's proper demonym is: Announcing Professor Tamara's Weather Control Service!
If ever you are suffering from a withering drouth or a blistering heat wave, just call 1-800-BRR-YUCK and arrange for Prof Tam (Doctorate Of Climate Control Voodoo from Draw Tippy Turtle U.) to fly to your fair state on trash day at Castle Frostbite, where it is a dead cert that she will be schlepping the trash can down the steep driveway to the muddy roadside in piss-pouring icy rain that needs only a couple guys in coal-scuttle helmets trying to push a tank out of the ditch to look like a scene from the Russian Front.
Guaranteed success rate! Never failed yet!*
*Well, we're two-for-two, at least.
If ever you are suffering from a withering drouth or a blistering heat wave, just call 1-800-BRR-YUCK and arrange for Prof Tam (Doctorate Of Climate Control Voodoo from Draw Tippy Turtle U.) to fly to your fair state on trash day at Castle Frostbite, where it is a dead cert that she will be schlepping the trash can down the steep driveway to the muddy roadside in piss-pouring icy rain that needs only a couple guys in coal-scuttle helmets trying to push a tank out of the ditch to look like a scene from the Russian Front.
Guaranteed success rate! Never failed yet!*
*Well, we're two-for-two, at least.
Tuesday, May 01, 2012
They finally got their fangs into their bête noire.
The headline story, as well as the BREAKING NEWS banner across the top of the page at CNN.com this morning read:
I hope CNN's web guy had some Kleenex at his desk to use after he finished typing that in. I wonder how you pronounce "Mouch" in an Oxford accent?
I'm sure that the headlines at MSNBC.com are similar, and will be appearing on signs at today's scheduledcommunist festivities Occupy $WHEREVER protests. (Occupiers hate Fox and love MSNBC because Fox is run by evil oligarchs, while the board of directors at MSNBC are actually all unpaid interns at a zero-emissions organic commune in Berkeley.)
I hope CNN's web guy had some Kleenex at his desk to use after he finished typing that in. I wonder how you pronounce "Mouch" in an Oxford accent?
I'm sure that the headlines at MSNBC.com are similar, and will be appearing on signs at today's scheduled
I've got bad news, Ambassador van Winkle...
Wow, how did I miss this column?
A little over a week and a half ago, apparently, some cat by the name of Dan Simpson launched another one of those ban-all-the-guns screeds that are so poignant and quaint because they're so out of touch with on-the-ground political realities. He goes on with the usual blatherskite and folderol of "too many guns" and "Stand Your Ground is a license to kill" and blood in the streets, yadda yadda.
He then veers into fantasyland about wanting hunters to have to keep their guns in central armories and people to have to apply for a one-year license to keep a single gun in the home for self defense, and all kinds of other fantasies. Hey, Dan, I want Kel-Tec P32s sold in blister packs at the checkout lane at WalMart, so I realize that it's good to have fantasies, but try and do like I do and keep them attainable, okay?
The part I kept coming back to was this, however:
Well, Mr. Simpson, during the last twenty years while you were ambassadorin' on the far side of the moon and out of radio contact with planet Earth, we pretty much got the whole "concealed carry laws in many states" thing finished. There are a couple holdouts, but their day will come.
You're on the wrong side of history on this one, Dan; go sit on the ash heap.
*That's my favorite shibboleth of theirs: "The arms industry". In overall dollars, it's probably slightly ahead of the skateboard industry, but in sheer monetary terms, I'd bet it's dwarfed by Big Cookware.
A little over a week and a half ago, apparently, some cat by the name of Dan Simpson launched another one of those ban-all-the-guns screeds that are so poignant and quaint because they're so out of touch with on-the-ground political realities. He goes on with the usual blatherskite and folderol of "too many guns" and "Stand Your Ground is a license to kill" and blood in the streets, yadda yadda.
He then veers into fantasyland about wanting hunters to have to keep their guns in central armories and people to have to apply for a one-year license to keep a single gun in the home for self defense, and all kinds of other fantasies. Hey, Dan, I want Kel-Tec P32s sold in blister packs at the checkout lane at WalMart, so I realize that it's good to have fantasies, but try and do like I do and keep them attainable, okay?
The part I kept coming back to was this, however:
The arms industry* is also pushing "concealed carry" and "open carry" laws in many states. It is going to be increasingly difficult to avoid such places as these laws become more widespread.It seemed a little out of touch, until I noticed at the bottom of the page that Mr. Simpson is a "former U.S. ambassador". Ah! That explains that.
Well, Mr. Simpson, during the last twenty years while you were ambassadorin' on the far side of the moon and out of radio contact with planet Earth, we pretty much got the whole "concealed carry laws in many states" thing finished. There are a couple holdouts, but their day will come.
You're on the wrong side of history on this one, Dan; go sit on the ash heap.
*That's my favorite shibboleth of theirs: "The arms industry". In overall dollars, it's probably slightly ahead of the skateboard industry, but in sheer monetary terms, I'd bet it's dwarfed by Big Cookware.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Tab Clearing...
- "Worse Than SOPA" passes the House on a party-line vote, with the "Small Government GOP" backing the legislation that is opposed by a pretty broad spectrum of people. Barry O is making veto noises, which is more than his predecessor would have done. And I can't believe I just typed that last sentence.
- So Iran is making threatening noises about NYC, and Saudi Arabia has pulled its ambassador from Egypt. Meanwhile, low-grade civil war continues in Syria. So the situation's pretty normal in the Middle East.
- $5,000? "A ____ and his _____ soon are ______." Fill in the blanks. Ready? Go!
QotD: Gentlemen's Blood Edition
From Roger, The Real King Of France:
I will argue that this toxic atmosphere was far better than the "comity" we now suffer. No law passed without a fight is far preferable to the nanny state. If the Bladensburg dueling grounds were still active, a whole generation would today have no clue about the names Pat Leahy, Ted Kennedy, or Chuck Schumer.Perhaps we could get legislation through exempting elected officials from the laws against dueling?
Oceania still at war with Eastasia.
Despite the end of the "War on Terror", I still have friends in Afghanistan, I still got Porn-O-Scanned at the airport, and little kids still get scared by the monsters in Scooby Doo reruns.
Leon Panetta (who, in some kind of bizarre game of political checkers, inexplicably wound up as my Secretary of Defense,) came out the other day and admitted that there was "no kind of silver bullet" available to expunge a noun from the language, but if we just kept giving them billions of dollars and a few more of our civil liberties, they'd try real hard to eradicate it, at least by right after the next elections.
Just wait! Vote for us! We'll fix it!
.
Leon Panetta (who, in some kind of bizarre game of political checkers, inexplicably wound up as my Secretary of Defense,) came out the other day and admitted that there was "no kind of silver bullet" available to expunge a noun from the language, but if we just kept giving them billions of dollars and a few more of our civil liberties, they'd try real hard to eradicate it, at least by right after the next elections.
Just wait! Vote for us! We'll fix it!
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Eyes without a face.
Those Guy Fawkes masks are so last decade. The new hotness? Dazzle camouflage for your mug.
Spoof it wherever you can.
.
Called CV Dazzle (short for "computer vision dazzle;" more on the name later), Harvey's project is a provocative and largely theoretical response to the rise of surveillance cameras on street corners and face-detecting technology that's been incorporated into social networking sites like Facebook and Flickr.There are cameras everywhere now, and more and more of them are connected to the intertubes, and when you combine that with the fact that digital storage media has become so cheap, it will eventually be likely, (and sooner than we think), that there will be a central biography of your life, based on cameras, GPS readings, credit card transactions, recordings of phone calls, tracking of your vehicle, et cetera, all on your very own personal DHS hard drive.
Spoof it wherever you can.
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Sunday, April 29, 2012
I'm mysteriously going to start talking like this.
A massive European satellite the size of a school bus that has mysteriously stopped communicating with Earth has been spotted by another satellite in orbit."Mysteriously stopped communicating with Earth"? Oh, you mean it broke. I'll note that the satellite was from the ESA, so the first thing I'd do is check the list of subcontractors for the usual suspects, such as Lucas, Renault, or Fiat.
This must be one of those things related to price tags: A Kia Rio is broken down on the side of the road, while a Mercedes SL500 has "mysteriously stopped running." My desktop computer gets a broken power supply, but a Cray XK6 "mysteriously fails to power up." Your Taurus Millennium is a piece of junk, and my Kimber Pro Raptor II is experiencing "mysterious failures to feed."
(H/T to Unwanted Blog.)
You want the cute? You can't handle the cute!
Puppies generally tend towards cuteness, but Marko wasn't kidding when he said that Henry was pretty cute even for a puppy.
There's a step up to the hallway at the back of the house that is dachsie territory, and said step has about a ten-inch riser, which is to say 'over a dachshund's head.' Guinevere, Henry's grandmother, is slowing down a bit and tends to take it with a hop and a bit of scrabble, while her three children clear it on the run like cruise missiles in terrain-following mode.
Henry, on the other hand, will try to emulate his mother and uncles by charging headlong at it, only to wind up chinning himself on the step two or three times as though he were trying to catch Bob Saget's attention. I will try to capture this on video. If I do, you will say "Awwwww," because you won't be able to help it.
There's a step up to the hallway at the back of the house that is dachsie territory, and said step has about a ten-inch riser, which is to say 'over a dachshund's head.' Guinevere, Henry's grandmother, is slowing down a bit and tends to take it with a hop and a bit of scrabble, while her three children clear it on the run like cruise missiles in terrain-following mode.
Henry, on the other hand, will try to emulate his mother and uncles by charging headlong at it, only to wind up chinning himself on the step two or three times as though he were trying to catch Bob Saget's attention. I will try to capture this on video. If I do, you will say "Awwwww," because you won't be able to help it.
Saturday, April 28, 2012
usa.gov: Childhood illusions crushed while you wait!
Unc is engaged in the process of home wine-making, strictly for domestic consumption and which will in no way ever enter the stream of interstate commerce, except in a vague Filburn-ish sense. His daughter notes that he could make money, were he to sell some of it. He tells her that the .gov has declared that to be illegal.
The money quote?
The money quote?
At seven, she then says So, you can’t just make stuff and sell it? I said to her that if you did, you’d be breaking the law. After a few seconds, she says that’s stupid.Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings...
"This Public Safety Director's from New York City!"
Indianapolis's Public Safety Director, Frank Straub, imported from New York with promises to clean up Indy's streets and take a new broom to the IMPD, apparently forgot to bring his bristles and is being sent packing.
It's definitely for the best. A guy who believes in the dangers of firearms in the hands of people who don't have badges and shiny low-quarters to go with them just wasn't going to be a good fit in the land of the $100 lifetime carry permit and stiff state-level preemption laws. I guess when the only play in your playbook is "get the guns off the street", maybe you weren't such a lucky draft pick after all.
It's definitely for the best. A guy who believes in the dangers of firearms in the hands of people who don't have badges and shiny low-quarters to go with them just wasn't going to be a good fit in the land of the $100 lifetime carry permit and stiff state-level preemption laws. I guess when the only play in your playbook is "get the guns off the street", maybe you weren't such a lucky draft pick after all.
There was a jingle, too...
I dreamed I met my roomie at an indoor range to do some shooting. It was the only indoor range I've been to with a dirt floor.
I'd forgotten to bring any .22, so I went to the counter to buy some. They were out of all CCI except for shotshells and CB Longs and Green Tag and suchlike, and completely out of Winchester and Federal. I bought the last carton of Remington Yellowjacket, leaving a couple forlorn cartons of unplated Remmie deuce-deuce as the only cheap ammo they had. The guy behind me in line was peeved.
Anyhow, in Dreamlandia, we were about to be invaded by $RANDOM_DREAM_FOREIGN_ARMY_WITH_ACCENTS and the government was trying to urge citizens to form themselves into armed neighborhood militias and resist even if the army got overpowered.
The catchy name for these that they came up with was "Zombie Squads", which I'll bet even Hussein himself would agree sounds a lot cooler than "Saddam Fedayeen". There was even a Public Service Announcement with a catchy jingle extolling the virtues of joining your neighborhood Zombie Squad. Now I have an earworm from a song that doesn't exist outside my head...
I'd forgotten to bring any .22, so I went to the counter to buy some. They were out of all CCI except for shotshells and CB Longs and Green Tag and suchlike, and completely out of Winchester and Federal. I bought the last carton of Remington Yellowjacket, leaving a couple forlorn cartons of unplated Remmie deuce-deuce as the only cheap ammo they had. The guy behind me in line was peeved.
Anyhow, in Dreamlandia, we were about to be invaded by $RANDOM_DREAM_FOREIGN_ARMY_WITH_ACCENTS and the government was trying to urge citizens to form themselves into armed neighborhood militias and resist even if the army got overpowered.
The catchy name for these that they came up with was "Zombie Squads", which I'll bet even Hussein himself would agree sounds a lot cooler than "Saddam Fedayeen". There was even a Public Service Announcement with a catchy jingle extolling the virtues of joining your neighborhood Zombie Squad. Now I have an earworm from a song that doesn't exist outside my head...
Friday, April 27, 2012
Overheard at Castle Frostbite:
Quinn: "It's snowing!"
Marko: "It really is?!?"
Tam: "Oh my god, it's snowing. Wait 'til I tell the internet!"
Marko: "I'm not joking when I call this place Upper Cryogenica."
The impossibility of parody.
Two years ago, Brian J. Noggle joked about starting an Urban Chicken Rescue Organization, to take care of the little egg factories that had been purchased by well-meaning yuppies who discovered that anything much more maintenance-intensive than a Pug or a Prius didn't fit well with their lifestyle, no matter how many eggs it laid.
Today, the difficulty of parody in this modern world has yet again been illustrated, as Poe's Law comes to Portland.
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Today, the difficulty of parody in this modern world has yet again been illustrated, as Poe's Law comes to Portland.
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My guy triangulates. Yours is a weathervane.
The last time I came out to New Hamster was in 2010, and the timing of the trip caused me to have to go down to the City-County Building and vote early, since I would be on the road on election day. This time around I had to go down and vote early because I would not be in town for the Hoosier primaries.
Having almost single-handedly successfully thwarted Santorum's appearance on the ballot in IN by being one of the eight petition signatures he failed to receive, I proceeded to nobly throw my vote away by ticking the box next to Doctor Wookie himself. I also voted for what's his face... that Not Dick Lugar guy.
Downticket I stuck with what research I had done, avoiding people who were incumbents or who thought the greatest perils facing our nation right now had more to do with the gays and the 'bortion than with the fact that we are flat frickin' broke and spending ourselves into oblivion on stuff that would make Thomas Jefferson choke the living $#!+ out of us, were he only alive and possessing 600,000,000 hands.
Granted, this will have about as much effect on the process as bailing the Titanic with a teaspoon, but, like the Sudoku puzzle in your in-flight magazine, it's something to do while you auger in.
Meanwhile, at the national level, it appears that someone turned Mitt upside down and gave him a couple vigorous shakes, exactly as predicted:
Having almost single-handedly successfully thwarted Santorum's appearance on the ballot in IN by being one of the eight petition signatures he failed to receive, I proceeded to nobly throw my vote away by ticking the box next to Doctor Wookie himself. I also voted for what's his face... that Not Dick Lugar guy.
Downticket I stuck with what research I had done, avoiding people who were incumbents or who thought the greatest perils facing our nation right now had more to do with the gays and the 'bortion than with the fact that we are flat frickin' broke and spending ourselves into oblivion on stuff that would make Thomas Jefferson choke the living $#!+ out of us, were he only alive and possessing 600,000,000 hands.
Granted, this will have about as much effect on the process as bailing the Titanic with a teaspoon, but, like the Sudoku puzzle in your in-flight magazine, it's something to do while you auger in.
Meanwhile, at the national level, it appears that someone turned Mitt upside down and gave him a couple vigorous shakes, exactly as predicted:
For Republicans and certain presidential nominee Mitt Romney, the best defense appears to be a good offense on issues and themes being pushed by President Barack Obama and Democrats.
In recent days, Romney has come out in favor of steps also advocated by Democrats to hold down interest rates for federal student loans and renew the Violence Against Women Act.This is my shocked face.
Status update...
Impolitely glancing over shoulders at the airport yesterday, I gleaned that all the cool kids nowadays will snap a picture for a check-in status update of "zomg totally at the airport" in 140 characters or less, while only a complete nerd would actually sit down, break out a keyboard and hash out "1) Here we are at Reagan National, spending a two-hour layover in the
midst of the seething mob of aberrant humanity that is Concourse B..." Complete sentences: a dying art.
I will say that, as far as any airport could be said to be "nice", Manchester airport is. I was greeted by Marko & Munchkins, bribed the kids with a dinosaur book and plush baby seal that wags its tail (tiny plush tee ball bat not included) because I know how to buy friends, and then we boarded the minivan and drove past the end of my cell phone coverage and off the edge of the map to Castle Frostbite.
I almost don't have the heart to click on CNN.com and find out what's happening out there that needs mocking, but that's my job, so...
I will say that, as far as any airport could be said to be "nice", Manchester airport is. I was greeted by Marko & Munchkins, bribed the kids with a dinosaur book and plush baby seal that wags its tail (tiny plush tee ball bat not included) because I know how to buy friends, and then we boarded the minivan and drove past the end of my cell phone coverage and off the edge of the map to Castle Frostbite.
I almost don't have the heart to click on CNN.com and find out what's happening out there that needs mocking, but that's my job, so...
Thursday, April 26, 2012
The Longest Day
1) Here we are at Reagan National, spending a two-hour layover in the midst of the seething mob of aberrant humanity that is Concourse B, while our luggage exists only as a cloud of probabilities, which will not collapse into one state or another until I actually lay eyes on the baggage carousel in Manchester.
2) I will note that the multi-terabyte Flash-heavy entry portals for these airport Wi-Fi networks were not designed with a netbook with rather less proccessing power than a Suunto watch running Eebuntu in mind. On the upside, I didn't have to watch the ghey mandatory commercial video at IND because no Flash.
3) Remember when Washington DC was such a backwater that it was practically a hardship posting? Now it's replacing NYC and LA as the center of the nation's fiscal gravity field. The guy the place is named after would be positively ill. Short final at Reagan is a pretty sight, though...
4) What does it say about the state of the nation that I was moderately surprised to find that some humorless functionary hadn't appended my name to the no-fly list for no better reason than my constant harping on the fact that the TSA is a worthless sack of bastards who accomplish no function other than turning millions of taxpayer dollars into annoyance and frustration?
2) I will note that the multi-terabyte Flash-heavy entry portals for these airport Wi-Fi networks were not designed with a netbook with rather less proccessing power than a Suunto watch running Eebuntu in mind. On the upside, I didn't have to watch the ghey mandatory commercial video at IND because no Flash.
3) Remember when Washington DC was such a backwater that it was practically a hardship posting? Now it's replacing NYC and LA as the center of the nation's fiscal gravity field. The guy the place is named after would be positively ill. Short final at Reagan is a pretty sight, though...
4) What does it say about the state of the nation that I was moderately surprised to find that some humorless functionary hadn't appended my name to the no-fly list for no better reason than my constant harping on the fact that the TSA is a worthless sack of bastards who accomplish no function other than turning millions of taxpayer dollars into annoyance and frustration?
Bored KindleBlogging
Arriving at the airport early for an 0930ish departure will make you REALLY early for an 1115 departure.
The old Blogger interface's WYSIWYG post window was incompatible with the Kindle Fire's browser. The new interface carries on that proud tradition.
The old Blogger interface's WYSIWYG post window was incompatible with the Kindle Fire's browser. The new interface carries on that proud tradition.
Not my day...
Proof that the universe hates my guts:
I arrive at the Indy airport to find that the puddlejumper to Cleveland has been canked. United sends me to US Airways, for a flight connecting through DC.
Except US Airways can't find the reservation.
After it gets ironed out, I go through the Porn-O-Scan, and cool my heels for ten minutes while they decide if they want to mess with my Glock or not. (Glock: The disposable pistol for travelers! If you wind up diverted to NYC you can just say "Screw it" and ditch the heater without regrets.)
I get to the concourse and note that my phone is down to about 30% charge and the charger is in my checked baggage.
Boot up the Eee and discover that IND has managed to ghey up their wi-fi access since 2010, adding all kinds of mandatory ads and crap.
Further, the New! Improved! Blogger interface is no longer compatible with the Eeebuntu version of Firefox I'm using. It wanted me to download Chrome, but Chrome wouldn't install.
So I'm typing this on a screen layout that looks like a Dadaist version of a web form, and now I'm just going to start clicking the cursor randomly around the screen and hope one of these pixels is hiding the "Publish" butto
I arrive at the Indy airport to find that the puddlejumper to Cleveland has been canked. United sends me to US Airways, for a flight connecting through DC.
Except US Airways can't find the reservation.
After it gets ironed out, I go through the Porn-O-Scan, and cool my heels for ten minutes while they decide if they want to mess with my Glock or not. (Glock: The disposable pistol for travelers! If you wind up diverted to NYC you can just say "Screw it" and ditch the heater without regrets.)
I get to the concourse and note that my phone is down to about 30% charge and the charger is in my checked baggage.
Boot up the Eee and discover that IND has managed to ghey up their wi-fi access since 2010, adding all kinds of mandatory ads and crap.
Further, the New! Improved! Blogger interface is no longer compatible with the Eeebuntu version of Firefox I'm using. It wanted me to download Chrome, but Chrome wouldn't install.
So I'm typing this on a screen layout that looks like a Dadaist version of a web form, and now I'm just going to start clicking the cursor randomly around the screen and hope one of these pixels is hiding the "Publish" butto
QotD: Chariots of the Gods Edition
Seen in a list at Adaptive Curmudgeon's place:
38. The world will not end. It’s a calendar carved on a rock by people who didn’t have enough technology to make an electric toaster…get real.Heh.
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
You keep using that word...
Here's an interesting sociology project!
The following paragraphs were fished from the spam filter here at VFTP Command Central by our elite team of sewer commandos. They obviously originated in China, and I am betting that they were carefully written in Chinese with the aid of some translation software. "Self-Reliance Day" is obviously meant to be "Independence Day", now referred to amongst the vulgarians as "The Fourth of July". (It's okay, the paragraphs have been carefully stripped of links to black-market viagra, internet porn, and Christian Louboutin knockoff shops by our highly-trained link strippers, all former fugu chefs; you can touch them now.)
The following paragraphs were fished from the spam filter here at VFTP Command Central by our elite team of sewer commandos. They obviously originated in China, and I am betting that they were carefully written in Chinese with the aid of some translation software. "Self-Reliance Day" is obviously meant to be "Independence Day", now referred to amongst the vulgarians as "The Fourth of July". (It's okay, the paragraphs have been carefully stripped of links to black-market viagra, internet porn, and Christian Louboutin knockoff shops by our highly-trained link strippers, all former fugu chefs; you can touch them now.)
Traditionally, Self-reliance Day time is frequently related to parades, bbqs, fireworks, carnivals, festivals, a picnic, concerts, baseball games, politics events, community speeches and private gatherings. Today, most Americans continue to honor the custom and commemorate the respects of our Promise of Self-reliance. But will it be nice to bring the zest into the special event of our country's independence?There is obviously a very different cultural mindset at work here, if you take your time to pick through all the implications contained therein.
Outlined below are great tips and listing of homemade presents to commemorate the birth of freedom of the United States of America.
Wear a loyal home made shirt showing the flag of the usa, the Stars and Stripes style. You might create your own shirt using fresh paint or use emulsion paints for a better look. If you don't have much time, there are a lot of shops that offer imprinted t shirts. You could make one for yourself and provide some to your family and friends.
While wearing your customized loyal shirt, go to historic places and monuments. Especially locations that creates an ambiance of freedom and historic pasts. Honor ancient monuments of great People in america who fought, die and lived with an recognition of doing some thing ideal for our nation.
If cooking food and baking is the expertise, why not produce freedom goodies for everyone. Produce Stars and Stripes cookies, sweets with the United states banner, design desserts subsequent Granddad Sam's cap or portrait and thousand other kinds. Request your friends and family to commemorate your day of independence in your yard and barbeque grill some hamburgers, pork, meats, American sausages, marshmallows, surf flags, sing patriotic song and turn on some shines.
Produce homemade medals, records or rock monuments and keep people who you believed created an impact to enhance the lives of Americans. Fashion a brief speech using what they do and give them the name InchExcellent AmericanInch. I highly recommend this if you have friends or if someone in the family is on Navy blue or if there is a battle veteran. Awards can be given to public slave or someone who required the name of America in success.
Fireworks are also part of the Self-reliance Day time celebration. If you're good at it, create a pyromusical fireworks show for the entire community to see. Use excellent loyal songs as the music activity. Of if you are not too good at it, buy sparklers and enjoy lights all of them with friends and family. You may even produce battery operated sparkless shines with star style for the children.
Create hairpieces or costumes from the revolutionary time period and also have a outfit celebration. Produce a perform and amuse everybody. Be a musician and function people with drinks and food popular in those days.
This day we don't just celebrate our Self-reliance but we also celebrate the lives of people that died battling for what we're encountering now. They fought with fervor and honor. So, we should benefit from the freedom they had provided and celebrate this Fourth of July with a blast.
Overheard in Roomie's Bedroom:
The TeeWee has come on with the morning news...
Me: "Did you hear that? Somebody kidnapped a four-year-old out of a St. Louis hospital, and he was next on the list for a heart transplant. Part of the BOLO was that he was wearing a drug-injecting medical backpack with only 24 hours worth of heart dope in it. What kind of monster..?"
RX: "A pervert."
Me: "Or a congressman."As it turns out, it was the far more common and prosaic non-custodial parent sort of thing. Classy! Folks, can y'all at least wait 'til the kid gets his new ticker installed before you pick him up by the ankles and try to beat each other over the head with him? Thanks, that'd be great.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Tab Clearing...
- Cool werewolf story that you should totally read if you haven't already. (I got to read it in dead tree format last time I visited Marko, but I happily read it again.)
- Because Race Gun, that's why.
- More stuff in one place about Site R than you'll find anywhere else outside of Raven Rock.
- The truck driver that took a wrong turn into Mexico with the load of ammo and got locked up should have just told them that Eric Holder sent him and the stuff was from the BATFEIEIO.
- Off The Shelf: Killing Monsters: Why Children Need Fantasy, Super Heroes, and Make-Believe Violence
. Rather timely, given all the pearl-clutching going on over Brevik's game-blaming claim.
Overheard in the Hallway:
Me: "Man, E.B. Misfit is still going on about Bush & Cheney. I thought the human rights violations going on right now were happening under a new Commander-in-Chief?"
RX: "Yeah, but he didn't start them. That was Bush. And you can't just stop! I mean, if you just stopped raping babies, then the whole baby-raping industry would collapse!"
(Incidentally, 450 million rounds. Any real threats out there probably laugh when good guys get distracted by BS...)
...and then you wake up in a bathtub full of ice...
I sometimes jokingly refer to my local gun store as "Death Camp Guns & Gear" because it's practically across the street from the Amtrak repair yard in Beech Grove that the Reynold's Wrap yarmulke crowd insist is a secret FEMA extermination camp, based on a video that went viral amongst the conspiranoiacs on the internet years ago.
No matter how many times this rumor gets proven to be the ludicrous pack of nonsense that it is, it keeps popping up like mushrooms in a cow pasture, and fertilized by much the same stuff.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Only someone who is barely multi-celled and dumber than Jell-o could look at all the evidence and still believe that it is a secret FEMA death camp.
No matter how many times this rumor gets proven to be the ludicrous pack of nonsense that it is, it keeps popping up like mushrooms in a cow pasture, and fertilized by much the same stuff.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Only someone who is barely multi-celled and dumber than Jell-o could look at all the evidence and still believe that it is a secret FEMA death camp.
Monday, April 23, 2012
Overheard in the Hallway:
Me: "The reason I'm more worried about tornadoes than FEMA death camps is because the government can't afford to pay the union labor to build the death camps."
RX: "It's a sad day when a government is too broke to exterminate its own people."It's a good thing the government can't use illegals; they'd build death camps for cheap, but they might not be code-compliant.
Tab Clearing...
- How much longer is Germany going to pull that wagon?
- Heh. I like that. A "Bad Things Happen To Good People Bag". Remember: You're a whole lot more likely to wind up using the contents of your "Bug Out Bag" in a Holiday Inn after your home's been hit by a tornado or burned to the waterline than you are in a FEMA death camp.
- Buy-A-Gun Day and Colt .380s.
The heart of the matter...
So, two hot-button topics that are sure to get a rise out of a wookie-suiter like me are torture and internal passport checks... er, I mean, "enhanced interrogation techniques" and "intermodal antiterrorist checkpoints". As Joel sums it up:
Unfortunately, it seems that America, a land where you could walk down the street without worrying about ever hearing those two phrases (unless you were guilty of certain heinous crimes like being swarthy in public) is as quaint a historical relic as those Saturday UHF reruns.
But I grew up indoctrinated with the notion that there are two main "tells" for a police state - the bad guys. One is torture: The good guys never torture people. America, of course, crossed that river several years ago.Yup. Watch any of the old war movies or spy shows that were weekend UHF (ask your parents, kids) rerun staples when I was growing up, and you can tell when the good guys are behind enemy lines and in deep dookie when you hear one of two phrases: "Your papers, please," or "Ve haff vays of making you talk."
The other is internal checkpoints. "Your papers, please" is a sign that you're living under SecPol, and no longer in the Land of the Free. The bad guys do that, the good guys would never dream of it.
Unfortunately, it seems that America, a land where you could walk down the street without worrying about ever hearing those two phrases (unless you were guilty of certain heinous crimes like being swarthy in public) is as quaint a historical relic as those Saturday UHF reruns.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Joe Versus Mad Anthony's Bones.
So I'm reading the Wikipedia article on the movie Joe Versus the Volcano
, which I have always loved, and noticed that there was a link to "flibbertigibbet", a word introduced to my vocabulary by the movie.
Apparently, in addition to being ye olde slange terme for "scatterbrained chatterbox", Flibbertigibbet was also a character in one of the local legends surrounding Wayland's Smithy, a barrow tomb in England, where some of the remains show signs of excarnation before interment.
What is excarnation, you ask? Why, the removal of the flesh from the bones so that only the skeleton is buried.
While this sounds like something that only heathen savages would do, General Mad Anthony Wayne, for whom a tenth of everything in Indiana is named, expired on the road home from Detroit. He was buried in Erie, Pennsylvania, but his remains were dug up and boiled down to the bones which were carried in saddlebags along what is now US 322 in Pennsylvania to the family plot on the other end of the state.
Apparently the General's ghost wanders the verge of the highway on his birthday, January 1, looking for stray skeleton bits that may have bounced loose when the horse hit a pothole.
, which I have always loved, and noticed that there was a link to "flibbertigibbet", a word introduced to my vocabulary by the movie.Apparently, in addition to being ye olde slange terme for "scatterbrained chatterbox", Flibbertigibbet was also a character in one of the local legends surrounding Wayland's Smithy, a barrow tomb in England, where some of the remains show signs of excarnation before interment.
What is excarnation, you ask? Why, the removal of the flesh from the bones so that only the skeleton is buried.
While this sounds like something that only heathen savages would do, General Mad Anthony Wayne, for whom a tenth of everything in Indiana is named, expired on the road home from Detroit. He was buried in Erie, Pennsylvania, but his remains were dug up and boiled down to the bones which were carried in saddlebags along what is now US 322 in Pennsylvania to the family plot on the other end of the state.
Apparently the General's ghost wanders the verge of the highway on his birthday, January 1, looking for stray skeleton bits that may have bounced loose when the horse hit a pothole.
The standard response on the internet...
...when faced with a total case of writer's block is to say "Look! A cute cat video!"
The thing with Huck is that, being a cat, he doesn't associate being asked to do something with getting a reward for obedience; he just realizes that when he flips on his back, a snack is produced, so any time you're in the kitchen and he's feeling peckish, you'll hear the basement door start thumping against its jamb as Huck is intently somersaulting away, looking up at you expectantly between reps, wondering why you aren't breaking out the treat bag.
Video courtesy of my roomie.
The thing with Huck is that, being a cat, he doesn't associate being asked to do something with getting a reward for obedience; he just realizes that when he flips on his back, a snack is produced, so any time you're in the kitchen and he's feeling peckish, you'll hear the basement door start thumping against its jamb as Huck is intently somersaulting away, looking up at you expectantly between reps, wondering why you aren't breaking out the treat bag.
Video courtesy of my roomie.
.
Saturday, April 21, 2012
A day in the life...
This morning I met commenter Global Village Idiot at Iggle Crick so that one of his squaddies could get some time cramming for marksmanship quals with my M&P15-22. His daughter was along for the ride and had a blast with the deuce-deuce M&P carbine and my Mk III 22/45. What can I say? I'm an enabler...
Then I met Brigid and PA State Cop for a sort of micro-blogmeet lunch out on the west side at Claddagh Pub in Plainfield. As a result, I horse-traded into the first Glock I've owned since 2004.
Got home, puttered around the house, and read a few more chapters in Voodoo Histories
.
And now I am going to give in to the pillow's siren song...
Then I met Brigid and PA State Cop for a sort of micro-blogmeet lunch out on the west side at Claddagh Pub in Plainfield. As a result, I horse-traded into the first Glock I've owned since 2004.
Got home, puttered around the house, and read a few more chapters in Voodoo Histories
.
And now I am going to give in to the pillow's siren song...
3000 Miles to Roseholme
Driving down to Knoxville, I went via Nashville. Despite being almost exactly a hundred miles longer, it had the important advantage of the highway being intact the whole way there, a feature not shared by I-75 South.
I had planned on coming home via I-75, but Shannon showed up in the gunsmithing shack yesterday morning with a cheery "You're boned. Someone flipped his eighteen-wheeler across the median of I-75 just south of Mt. Vernon, Kentucky. The whole interstate's closed 'til at least noon." so it was back through Memphis again.
Somewhere around Crossville, I overtook Wesley Strader, apparently a professional stalker of the wild bass. Perhaps Walmart could use some of their sponsorship dollars to send him to a fancy driving school, where they teach things like "When a car is overtaking on the left, that's not your cue to speed up and keep them from getting back in the right lane." I will say that from Crossville all the way to the eastern outskirts of Nashville, Wesley was a dedicated, albeit frequent, user of his turn signals.
It had been a while... late '07? ...since I'd been on the Nashville-Knoxville stretch of I-40. I note that the giant U.S. flag that flew on the hilltop on the north side of the highway around mile marker 299 has been replaced with an equally huge, auto dealership-sized, Third National. at some point between then and now. Someone's not feeling as patriotic as they used to, apparently.
Cops were, like usual, few and far between, unlike my recent experience on I-40 in west Tennessee. On the eastbound trip I saw one pair of county mounties in Crown Vics parked in a conspicuous location on the median, probably shooting the breeze. I prefer this form of highly visible display to skulking in the bushes with a laser. I doubt they were paying much attention to passing traffic, but if your front bumper had given a big ol' mens rea nosedive, it might have caught their eye. I rolled past with the cruise control set at 69.5 kias, (78 mph ground speed according to the GPS.)
On the return leg, there was one Black and Tan with a guy pulled over up on the plateau. That's comes to one po-po sighting per hundred-'n'-fifty miles of interstate. Not much for 'em to do in the ticket-writing department, anyway; it was pretty tranquilo out there.
My clever plan to avoid the flipped semi in the median was foiled by an idiot who flipped his pickup and camper trailer into the median about fifty miles south of Louisville. I got there early enough that the back-up was only about a mile-and-a-half of clutch-melting stop 'n' go. I can only imagine how bad it got after I squeezed past.
I chewed my steering wheel in half as all the minutes I'd carefully whittled off the "ETA" on my GPS came ticking back, one at a time, like Chinese water torture, while I sat and fumed, immobilized in traffic.
Eventually, I got past and proceeded to make up for lost time, only to hit Indy in time for Friday rush hour. Joy.
I am so glad to be home.
.
I had planned on coming home via I-75, but Shannon showed up in the gunsmithing shack yesterday morning with a cheery "You're boned. Someone flipped his eighteen-wheeler across the median of I-75 just south of Mt. Vernon, Kentucky. The whole interstate's closed 'til at least noon." so it was back through Memphis again.
Somewhere around Crossville, I overtook Wesley Strader, apparently a professional stalker of the wild bass. Perhaps Walmart could use some of their sponsorship dollars to send him to a fancy driving school, where they teach things like "When a car is overtaking on the left, that's not your cue to speed up and keep them from getting back in the right lane." I will say that from Crossville all the way to the eastern outskirts of Nashville, Wesley was a dedicated, albeit frequent, user of his turn signals.
It had been a while... late '07? ...since I'd been on the Nashville-Knoxville stretch of I-40. I note that the giant U.S. flag that flew on the hilltop on the north side of the highway around mile marker 299 has been replaced with an equally huge, auto dealership-sized, Third National. at some point between then and now. Someone's not feeling as patriotic as they used to, apparently.Cops were, like usual, few and far between, unlike my recent experience on I-40 in west Tennessee. On the eastbound trip I saw one pair of county mounties in Crown Vics parked in a conspicuous location on the median, probably shooting the breeze. I prefer this form of highly visible display to skulking in the bushes with a laser. I doubt they were paying much attention to passing traffic, but if your front bumper had given a big ol' mens rea nosedive, it might have caught their eye. I rolled past with the cruise control set at 69.5 kias, (78 mph ground speed according to the GPS.)
On the return leg, there was one Black and Tan with a guy pulled over up on the plateau. That's comes to one po-po sighting per hundred-'n'-fifty miles of interstate. Not much for 'em to do in the ticket-writing department, anyway; it was pretty tranquilo out there.
My clever plan to avoid the flipped semi in the median was foiled by an idiot who flipped his pickup and camper trailer into the median about fifty miles south of Louisville. I got there early enough that the back-up was only about a mile-and-a-half of clutch-melting stop 'n' go. I can only imagine how bad it got after I squeezed past.
I chewed my steering wheel in half as all the minutes I'd carefully whittled off the "ETA" on my GPS came ticking back, one at a time, like Chinese water torture, while I sat and fumed, immobilized in traffic.Eventually, I got past and proceeded to make up for lost time, only to hit Indy in time for Friday rush hour. Joy.
I am so glad to be home.
.
Friday, April 20, 2012
Can I see your license for that keyboard?
Arizona reporter Kellie Mejdrich writes that she obtained an Arizona CCW permit over her lunch break and it only cost her a c-note, despite the fact that she had never handled a firearm before in her life. (I should point out that she's saying this as though it's a bad thing.)
She points out that now she'll "be able to carry that concealed weapon into restaurants that serve alcohol, most national and city parks, near schools — and 36 other states that recognize [her] permit."
I will point out that the keyboard on which she's exercising her First Amendment rights, which is practically identical to the one used to write The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf, is legal in all fifty states and she didn't have to show any license (or proof of the ability to think clearly) before setting down at it and letting fly in public.
She points out that now she'll "be able to carry that concealed weapon into restaurants that serve alcohol, most national and city parks, near schools — and 36 other states that recognize [her] permit."
I will point out that the keyboard on which she's exercising her First Amendment rights, which is practically identical to the one used to write The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf, is legal in all fifty states and she didn't have to show any license (or proof of the ability to think clearly) before setting down at it and letting fly in public.
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