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A Halloween Treat: Death of an old man
For your holiday reading pleasure, I present you with what I consider the scarriest story I ever read.
Death of an old man. By Roald Dahl.
Posted @ October 31, 2007 07:51 PM | Aviation | Comments (2)
One Thousand Blog Posts
On August 13th, 2004 I wrote my first blog post.
It was called “Pardon My Dust” and it was an apology, because I had no idea what I was doing or why.
It's now one thousand blog posts later, I still don’t.
But 3 years and 2 months later, I’m still here. At the time I started this blog at the end of the summer of 2004, the war in Iraq was just a year old, the election was just a few months off and I had no idea what it was I was going to write about or why.
Of course, now 2004 is history and we all know how it all turned out.
But history is like that. At the time you’re living it, it doesn’t seem like history, its just day to day stuff, it may or may not be important at the time, but it doesn’t occur to you that you will look back on a time like the summer of 2004 and have an appreciation for where that time sat in the big jigsaw puzzle of life. At the time I started the blog, there were significant amounts of people who really truly hated George W. Bush.
3 years and 2 months later, there still are.
At the time I started the blog, there were significant amounts of people who really truly believed that John Kerry was the best candidate to beat George Bush in the upcoming election.
3 years and 2 months later, they still drive around with their Kerry/Edwards bumperstickers oblivious to the march of time or that the election is now over. And that their "Dear Candidate" lost.
At the time I started the blog, there were sleepy seaside villages in the Indian Ocean that catered to foriegn tourists. New Orleans, Biloxi and Pascagoula were all parts of the ‘redneck riviera’ known for their laidback lifestyle and excellent seafood.
3 years and 2 months later, all those places have gone from the world in their own way.
3 years and 2 months ago, Bunker Mulligan, Johnny Ramone, Rob “acidman” Smith, Janet Leigh, Gordon Cooper, Theo van Gogh, Yasser Arafat, Price Bernhard, Artie Shaw, Johnny Carson, Max Schmelling, Johnnie Cochran, Terry Schiavo, John Mills, Frank Gorshin, Anne Bancroft, King Fahd, Peter Jennings, Bob Denver, William Rhenquist, Rosa Parks, Richard Pryor, Stanley “tookie” Williams, Willie McCool, Darren McGavin, Harry Browne, Slobodan Milošević, Buck Owens, Louis Rukeyeser, Alex Toth, Mickey Spillaine, Saddam Hussein, Red Buttons, Glenn Ford, Ann Richards, Freddy Fender, Milton Freidman, Jeane Kirkpatrick, James Brown, Gerald Ford, Art Buckwald, Lothar-Günther Buchheim, Robin Olds, Calvert Deforest, Johnny Hart, Kurt Vonnegut, Don Ho, Jack Valenti and my father we all enjoying life in the summer of 2004.
3 years and 2 months later, they are all gone.
What a party it would be to have them all over for one more Thanksgiving dinner. Personally, I get dibs on the seat next to my Dad and Anne Bancroft, but only if Darren McGavin sits on the other side of the table.
The world changes a little bit every day and the weird part is unless you take the time to watch it, you don’t notice it all that much. What has 3 years and 2 months and a thousand blog posts given me? An appreciation for the little things, for the passing of time, the note of the seasons, the smell of rain, the sound of thunder and the extreme temporary nature of everything and everyone you see around you. The world around us all seems like its made of concrete, steel and importance and its something permanent, but its all just so much alka-seltzer in a glass.
This is just a blog, but I like to think that years from now my little scribbled notes about what I was thinking was important at the time will help someone who comes after me know what I life was like for me in this little bubble.
Why did I start doing this? I started because I wanted to teach myself the discipline of writing. I wanted to have a place to go where I could put down in words what was going on in my head on any given day. I thought that blogging was easy. but most of all it was because blogging was, and is, fun. If it wasn’t fun, I would have stopped doing it long ago.
Because blogging actually isnt easy, its hard. Writing is hard. It’s damn hard to sit down and write. It’s hard to put down in words ideas that other people can make sense of or use. Blogging, the little tiny bit I’ve done, has made me appreciate the written word for the art that it is. Because in 1000 blog posts and 3 years and 2 months, Ive probably written about 10 things that were worthwhile.
There are things I don’t like about blogging. I don’t care for the death threats when I upset someones delicate sensibilities about their political beliefs, but you take the good with the bad. Yes, people get really upset when you challenge their beliefs.
So whats the good that offsets the "Death Threats"? Well I’ve been given some pretty good opportunities and I’ve met some real nice people in the process of being a blogger. My personal 'global village' is now populated by some first rate folks who have helped me in ways I don’t think they are aware of.
For someone who’s almost as allergic to meeting people as Howard Hughes was, I've even opened myself up and actually gone out and met other bloggers. I drove all the way to San Francisco and spent a wonderful evening with neo-neocon. Im sure I bored her silly, but I had a great time with it anyway. I could have talked to her for a week without stopping. I think she was grateful for the improvised ability to make a speedy get-away at the first opportunity.
I even once got a link from He-to-whom-I-aspire, James Lileks. Of course, I got it about a week after that arty-farty gasbag James Wolcott linked me with a rather bad review, but that’s ok. He’s a corpulent windbag who lives on the remains of his family name, no one outside of the Borough of New York have any idea who he is. But James who-the-hell-writes-like-this-with-what-seems-to-be-no-effort Lileks once said “oh this looks interesting” about one of my blog posts.
That my friends, was cool. (and Wolcott can still kiss my ass).
I’ve gotten more than my fair share of linkage from Glenn Reynolds. I’m sure he wont remember it, but one of my first forays into the blogosphere was acting as his on the scene reporter for how the media was trying to spin the economics around Christmas one year, so I wrote him and told him that everything looked fine on this side of the country, that people were buying everything off the shelves like usual, thankyouverymuch.
He posted it. That was nice. He does that a lot. I don’t know why he does it, but he does. It means a lot to me everytime it happens. I personally dont think Ive ever written anything worth linking, but he has and I thank him for it.
Getting a link from Reynolds is like when a comedian on the Tonight Show got the nod from Johnny Carson to come over to the sofa after they did their routine. You made it to the cool daddy-o! So come sit on the sofa with me and Ed and lets all head over to the Smokehouse after the show for a big steak with all the trimmings.
I even got a chance to work with Roger Simon on the Pajamas Media thing. Of course, that’s how I got in trouble with James Wolcott, but I was in good company, he hates Roger too.
But because of that contact, I got a chance to get into the A380 when it first came to the United States. I still have my badge that says “MEDIA” on it. I loved it. That was a great day indeed.
Ed Driscoll and the Anchoress are still with me. That’s nice. Stephen Green and David St. Lawrence continue to make me think, and they make me think that I’m not doing enough and that I could and should do more.
I don’t watch TV with any level that I once did. That by itself is reason enough to start a blog.
I’ve had days where I thought that I had enough, that I couldn’t get up the stuff to make another blog post. I’ve had other days where I’m frustrated that I cant get to the blog to write up what just popped into my mind.
It’s become an old friend actually. Its there, you pick it up, you spend a couple of hours and off you go. No expectations, no judgement, you just do what you do.
And that’s blogging really. You just sit down and write what comes into your head.
This is blog post one thousand. An hour ago, I had no idea what it was I was going to say about blog post one thousand, but 3 years and 2 months and another 1000 blog posts from now, I will be able to read this and recall what was going on in my life at the time and reflect on it with a greater illumination than I would have had I not bothered to write it down.
I'm sure that far off in the future some poor Archaeology undergrad is going to pour over all these blog posts from all these blogs and try to make sense of it all and go slightly mad over the whole thing.
And that is reason enough to keep going, so I think I shall.
Posted @ October 29, 2007 10:45 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (7)
Martin Mars update and an announcement
Heres video of the aircraft in flight in Lake Elsinore
As of 9:30 this morning:
"San Diego Fire-Rescue Department officials confirm that the World War II-era flying boat, named Hawaii Mars, flew threw missions Friday, dropping a total of 10,000 gallons of water on the Harris and Witch Creek fires. It is expected to remain in the area to assist firefighters in San Diego County and elsewhere in Southern California."
And in regards to all of the overreaction to the holdup at customs there is the following:
"In response to news media attention and public criticism of the delays in clearing the Martin Mars water bomber through customs last Wednesday, Battalion chief Greg Donnelly of the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department provides this rundown of how the process actually worked:
"Customs agents from both San Diego and Los Angeles regions worked diligently through the night on Tuesday to clear the crew and logistical staff. All crew members were given a telephonic clearance which helped expedite their arrival and availability to initiate work."
From the indispensible SDonline fireblog.
I got held up once at the border with Canada for three days because instead of lying and saying I was visiting friends or going on vacation, I told them the truth and said that I was going up to Calgary because I was working on a software project for Petro Canada, which is exactly the sort of thing that the Canadian Custom service frowns on. People telling the truth just throws the whole system into shock and we just can't have that going on now can we?
So after much legal negotiation and about 72 hours sitting in an antiseptic, orange and blue naugahyde covered bench in the Canadian Customs holding tank, I was eventually allowed to purchase a temporary work permit ( for 800 US dollars which allowed me to work for a grand total of 7 days) This "permit" wasnt exactly wallet sized but was about the size, shape and color of a Dennys placemat only instead of the word "Dennys" at the top with bright sunny pictures of hamburgers, pancakes and sausages, it was pictures of Queen Elizabeth, beavers, bears and trees with the word "Canada" at the top.
And that was all over little old me going to talk to some people in Calgary. No computer gear, no fancy flying machine, just me, my mouth and my brain standing in front of a whiteboard telling people how to set up a payroll system on an IBM 370 with CICS. For that, I needed an 800 dollar work permit that was the size of my college degree(and more ornate!).
So in other words the border crossing for the Martin Mars went as fast as it could considering it was three semi trailer trucks of gear, lots of ground staff and a large unique aircraft with no permits or paperwork so...shaddup you yammering morons.
And here is my announcement:
My next post will not be about the Martin Mars but will be in celebration of having just made 1000 blog posts. Incredible...
Posted @ October 27, 2007 12:54 PM | Aviation
Ok, Let's get moving shall we?
On the status of the big Martin Mars firebomber:
Snip...
"BC's big Martin Mars water bomber will have to wait until later today (Friday) to help fight southern California's massive wildfires.
Aircraft spokesperson Jim Messer says heavy smoke between Los Angeles and San Diego has grounded the massive plane, which is now near Lake Elsinore, "We were anticipating dispatch, so we took the aircraft out to warm up and did some flight checks ourselves. At the time, we and the State thought there would probably be a dispatch while we were doing that. That dispatch got withdrawn and we've been standing by since and now the call has been made that there will not be dispatch because of smoke."
Messer says they will be ready to fly at 8:30 a.m."
...end snip.
One possibility for this is that the fires have dropped to the point where they are being managed effectively with the rest of the air assets. I would imagine that the priority would go to CDF aircraft and helicopters before the turn to outside contactors like the operators of the Martin Mars.
Posted @ October 26, 2007 07:01 AM | Comments (0)
UPDATE: Bobby Calvin
The now famous reporter for the Sacramento Bee who was upset at a checkpoint in Iraq has been now been vetted by co-workers as "OK", and he has apologized to "doc weasel" and rebuilt his blog with the stored version that the good doctor had on hand, with the now famous entry intact.
Since he really didnt have to do any of those things, and since everyone gets to be a total jackass at least once, I say no harm no foul. Its ok to screw up, you just have to own up to it. He seems to have done that so he's off the hook with me.
For now anyway.
Since he works in the same town as I do, I might stop by and see if he can give me the real 'Bobby Calvin' story when he returns. And if he finds out about this offer and takes me up on it, the beer will be on me.
(apology and vitriol aside, It's still pretty funny...)
Posted @ October 25, 2007 09:30 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
Martin Mars: Video of arrival at Lake Elsinore
The subtext of the day is the Bush administration delayed its arrival, due to customs issues at the border.
For the record, aside from one trip down to the Harris fire, shes been sitting on the lake all day.
Posted @ October 25, 2007 04:21 PM | Aviation | Comments (0)
The music is reverseable
While out driving today, I discovered a little trick to help me get a sense of clarity. You see, people often use code words to say something that they know is offensive, but they want you to buy into it anyway.
For example, let's try this small example.
In yesterdays example of clarity, Senator Reid gave us the following:
"As you know, one reason that we have the fires burning in Southern California is global warming. One reason the Colorado Basin is going dry is because of global warming."
Ok, a quick turn of my newly created "liberal ideology" decoder ring reveals the following message:
"As you know, one reason that we have the fires burning in Southern California is because you have too much money. One reason the Colorado Basin is going dry is because because you have too much money."
See! thats as clear as anything, and you know it makes sense. Because calls for "solving global warming" always go after just one solution, taking away more of your money.
So try it yourself. Just substitute the words "you have too much money" in every bit of gobbledygook you get from the "I heart the earth" people. I'm going back into the codex to see if I can decypher any more hidden messages. Hey, someone tell the boss that the water tank at Midway island is broken and they are all out of fresh water. Now where did I leave my ELO cd's...
Posted @ October 25, 2007 01:38 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (2)
NASA brings UAV to fires
NASA Ikhana UAV. A predator drone used for gathering data about wildfires.
From a NASA press release issued today:
...Snip
Jim Brass, NASA's co-project manager of the Wildfire Research and Applications Partnership, said the plane was designed to put in hours of service under conditions that would be too "dull, dirty and dangerous" for human pilots.
"We're flying through a lot of smoke - a pretty dangerous place to have a pilot flying for a long period of time," he told me. Today, Ikhana was scheduled to fly for 10 hours straight, going as high as 23,000 feet in altitude. It will likely be sent out for another long shift on Thursday.
Brass recalled an earlier tryout of the Ikhana system in the Bay Area, where a fire manager breathed a sigh of relief after seeing the airborne imagery. He said the team leader told him, "This has saved us a million dollars, and I can sleep tonight because I know our backfire has worked."
"His next question was, 'Can we trust this?'" Brass said. "Yes, you can."
...End Snip.
UAV's at work, saving millions of dollars and providing quality data in a timely fashion right on the front lines.
Just one more example of the slow and inept response to this emergency by the Federal goverment under George W. Bush.
Posted @ October 25, 2007 08:11 AM | Aviation | Comments (0)
Martin Mars update
She's down in Southern California, based inland at Lake Elsinore. They are repairing a bird strike this morning on the horizontal stablizer and they will be off and runing.
I havent found any live video of her in action on this fire, but I will keep an eye out. Those of you in the San Diego area should have quite an airshow today. The Martin Mars, two CL-214 waterbombers, the CDF P-3's and S-2F's as well as the National Guard C-130s should be in the air.
Good information on the 'air war' from a San Diego Televison Station can be found here.
Posted @ October 25, 2007 07:20 AM | Aviation | Comments (5)
No kidding, who would have thought such things?
It's true. Anti-American, Anti-war movies dont sell.
Quote from within:
"Brandon Gray, president and publisher of www.boxofficemojo.com, says audiences seek out movies for inspiration, for laughter and to be moved. "Many of these recent dramas fail on all those fronts," Mr. Gray says."
Thats ok, I'm sure these movies will do well overseas where they can inspire so much love and admiration for this country and its servicemen and women.
Posted @ October 25, 2007 07:14 AM | Comments (0)
Im still laughing...
'Der Professor' had an item up on his blog about a reporter from the Sacramento Bee in Iraq who was upset that an American checkpoint didn't know who "Knight Ridder" was when he tried to go through the checkpoint without the proper id.
That was funny enough, but the best part was the reporter has a blog of his own and wrote about it there too. And yes, the blog has comments.
And yes, the comments are hilarious. For those of you not from the Central Valley and Capital city of the fair state of California, you should know that the Sacramento Bee is to the left of Pravda and just about as accurate. You could read "the daily worker" and get a better sense of reality than you get from the Bee.
"Knight Rider, Ted Knight, Riddler Rattler, Cake Batter, I dont give a damn who you are, you come through my checkpoint sunny Jim, you better have your act together and your paperwork in order and don't get mouthy with me, Mr. Johnny Smartass "I went to J-school-and-all-i-got-was-this-lousy-t-shirt" or youre going to need to start wearing a cup. You gettin' my general vibe on the situation there slick?
I give the reporter credit for leaving the post and comments up, but he is a 'class-a' toetapping jackass of the first order. He's lucky he can still walk upright.
UPDATE: The blog is down, but as you know, on the internet, you can run but you cant hide.
Posted @ October 24, 2007 09:03 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
Harry Reid to Las Vegas: Drop Dead
“One reason why we have the fires in California is global warming,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) told reporters Tuesday, stressing the need to pass the Democrats’ comprehensive energy package.
Thats right kids, the senator from Nevada is talking about global warming. The brownest state in the union, also known by my circle of freinds as "Gods catbox", the state where the biggest city runs 24 hours a day and you have to drive thousands of miles to get to it from anywhere.
Yes, that Senator thinks that global warming is a problem.
I guess that means the Senator is going to go home and tell his constituents in 'sin city' that he's going to free all that electricity from Hoover Dam so that we can power our Prius'(Whats Plural for Prius? Priuii?) in California.
(I love Nevada I really do, I've lived there, my sister was born there, my grandmother is from Rhyolite, but lets face it kids, its like 'civet coffee', its an acquired taste and not meant for amatures or sissies. If you want maple trees and lakes, then stay home in Indiana or some other lovely place.)
Harry Reid is the least Nevadan of any person I've ever met.
Posted @ October 24, 2007 03:17 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (3)
San Diego Fire: Martin Mars firebomber on its way!
from SignonSanDiego:
"A Martin Mars waterbomber is expected to arrive in San Diego County this afternoon to help fight the area's wildfires. The plane, which is based in Canada, is capable of dropping 7,200 gallons of water in a single drop, enough to drench three acres.
The plane also can drop a gel that can coat structures in the path of fires, said San Diego Fire Chief Tracy Jarman."
Dig it baby!
Here's their website. Welcome home old girl...
UPDATE: "Coulson's Jim Messer said a crew to fuel and service the plane left Vancouver Island in two tractor-trailers Monday evening while another crew worked Tuesday to take the aircraft from partial winter storage to full operational status.
"It looks like we'll fly early (Wednesday) morning, say seven o'clock we'd depart British Columbia, and about 1 p.m. we'd be over San Diego," said Messer. "We'll have four hours of fuel available and we'll go straight to work."
From Canadian Press.
Posted @ October 24, 2007 07:53 AM | Aviation | Comments (3)
DC10 Airtankers in action
Click here for video from KNBC on the DC10 airtanker at work in Lake Arrowhead.
This is a drop of 16,000 gallons of "foscheck" which is a fire retardant material. The DC 10 airtanker is just one of the air assets that are being used to fight this massive fire.
Below is what it probably looked like from the ground.
Posted @ October 23, 2007 07:21 AM | Aviation | Comments (2)
Santa Anas and Firestorms
People who live in hurricaine country always compare earthquakes and hurricaines, but people who live in Southern California always compare earthquakes with Santa Anas, which people whos only knowledge of california comes from the annual visit to that place in Anaheim have no knowledge of. Earthquakes get the headlines because they are exotic, but Santa Anas are what people in the southland truly dread. You can prepare for earthquakes, but there is nothing you can do to prepare for the twice annual arrival of the damned 'Santa Anas'.
If you've never been in the Santa Ana winds, you just have no idea what they feel like. But for comparison purposes, Its like having poison ivy, then having the upper layer of your skin rubbed raw by latex ballons while you stick your head in an convection oven.
Its not just the heat, its the way the wind makes you feel crazy that makes the wind especially creepy. And to make matters worse, the desert scrub that grows on the hillsides burns like gasoline, as do the tops of all those palm trees. Once the fire starts, it just races from house to house until it gets to the beach, the only thing that seems to slow its progress are the freeways and the cement river channels. Notice I said "slow", because Santa Anas feel like they have a life of their own. Nothing stops a Santa Ana, it stops whens its good and damned ready to stop and not before.
Once upon a time, I lived in Anaheim right next to the big amusement park dedicated to a mouse. One day during a Santa Ana wind, I went to work in the morning and as I drove down Katella Ave, I looked behind me to see a small fire at the top of a telephone pole just a few streets away with a fireturck or two at the bottom trying desperately to put it out.
The small fire I saw that morning ended up engulfing and devouring several blocks of homes, apartments and stores. It became a fire big enough to be seen from where I worked in Tustin. It started because one palm frond on one palm tree touched a powerline and it just spread down the street, block after block after that. And thats how it goes, you go to work in a neighborhood of homes, you come back into the debris of disaster, all because of a few knots of wind blowing down from the desert. One minute you live in the center of calm suburban normality, the next minute its all under a foot of ash. Once the firestorm gets started, theres nothing in the world that will stop it. It stops when its done, not because of anything you do.
How bad are firestorms? Well, I've lived through earthquakes and firestorms, and I will take earthquakes any day. The biggest earthquake I ever lived through, the loma prieta quake had several of my co-workers displaced for several months. They did they best they could, and their spirits were up for most of their displacement.
By contrast, the Oakland fires that happened just a small time later were much more emotionally distrubing. I dont remember anyone leaving the Bay Area over the quake, but after the Oakland hills firestorm, I knew a large number of people who not only left the bay, but the state. I saw more than a few people break down in tears over the fires. I never saw that happen over the quake.
Strange as it sounds, in California, you are prepared for quakes which happen randomly and rarely, but nothing can prepare you for watching not just your house but you entire neighborhood burn to ash down to the foundation in just a few hours. The Santa Anas come twice a year, and there's not enough alcohol in all the bars of LA to calm the jittered nerves of the southland when they come.
Posted @ October 22, 2007 08:58 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (3)
Staring out towards the horizon
Sir Francis Drake. Sailor. Circumnavigator. Pirate.
In June of 1579, an English ship landed on the coast of a remote place that would eventually be known as California. Sir Francis Drake on the run from the Spanish, had the audacity to sail north from the Central American trade routes and not south like everyone had expected. He and his crew explored the coast, found a good spot, and careened the ship and repaired the hull.
For three weeks, Elizabethan era sailors walked along the sand of California beaches, thousands of miles from the nearest European, and no one had any idea where they were, or where they were going next.
For all their connection to what was then called civilization, they might as well have been on Mars.
California, or what would become California, had the same moderate climate that it has today, had plenty of food and most importantly, it was very sparsely populated. At least by comparison to what would come later.
I’ve often wondered about what that was like, to be thousands of miles away from anything remotely close to civilization and all the compromises comes with it.
I’ve also wondered if any of the crew found the temptation to stay as attractive I would have found it. I wonder if "the good Captain" left anyone behind or if during those three weeks ashore if anyone went out for firewood one morning and just didn’t return,
Along with a firearm or two, a hatchet, a knife or two and a couple pairs of shoes.
I was thinking about that just the other day as I swam through the flotsam of what had been a bad meeting at work. Lots of yelling and finger pointing and as I stood at the podium with my powerpoints illuminating the wall behind me I found myself saying in my inner dialog:
“If I could leave, I mean really leave, I mean leave as in “Alpha Centauri or Bust” leave, I’d be so totally gone right about now”.
Its one thing to think about going to Alaska or New Guinea, Gilf Kibir or some island the South Indian Ocean, yes there are parts of those places that are remote, but you just know every sunrise or sunset you can look up and see a satellite brightly go into the terminator and there’s a jet contrail over most parts of the sky anywhere in the world. Signs of civilization are in every corner of the modern globe. My guess is that we live in a time where there is no place you can go and be as remote as those Elizabethan sailors with Drake were.
But the laws of physics and the expense of space travel aside, what is it that keeps us here in civilization? Why not just keep moving like our ancestors did? Until about three generations ago, that was what people did; they kept moving along. There’s a certain value in moving beyond the potential improvement in economic condition, there’s a sort of lifestyle “car wash” that occurs with immigration that allows you to re-invent yourself at the next stop.
I’ve traveled past most of the immigrant trails in Utah, Nevada and California (yes, 150 years later, you can still see the wagon trails in the dirt, the graves, the inscriptions on rocks that mark the passage of all those people) and I always find myself asking what it was that made them walk, I mean literally walk over that territory.
The conclusion I’ve come to is that it was about something more than the money.
To me, it was also the ability to “get away” as much as what they were going to that mattered to them. It was the ability to start over, to leave it all behind that mattered. They weren’t just going “to something”, it was that they were leaving something behind.
On purpose.
In the end, that was the whole idea. That’s why they didn’t stop in Nebraska, Wyoming or Idaho or other places that were just as nice as what they would find in California and Oregon. Those places were just too close to all that they hoped to leave behind. Too easy to be found, too close for someone to bother going to find you. 300 years after Drake even for the people of the world of the “49’ers”, California and Oregon might still as well have been Mars, and frankly that was probably the real attraction.
Today, no matter where you go, no matter how far, there’s a McDonalds just around the corner, A TGIFridays, Macaroni Grill in the same part of the neighborhood as the Applebee’s, a Target right across from the Home Depot, the Lowes on the other side of the street and the busiest store in town is always Wal Mart.
The most uncomfortable feeling in the world is to be traveling on business, to be tired and worn out walking through a Wal Mart at 2:00 am for aspirin and for just a fleeting moment, you forget what city you are in because all the stores are the same, they same layout and floor plan, the same goods on the shelf.
And overhead, cameras watch your every step. There’s a camera watching you and someone watching the camera every step of the way. Forget innocent till proven guilty, in the modern mercantile business, you are a criminal until you cross the threshold of the store, after that you are a disgruntled customer.
Everytime you go through the register, a little bit of data about you is gathered but it’s like the old thing about natives not wanting their picture taken because they felt you would be stealing a part of their soul. For me, everytime I buy something and the person behind the counter tells me to use my “bonus card”, I feel like a part of me besides me money has been taken from me. Sure, its only data but it still bothers me. Right now they just want to know what I’m buying to help them predict what to put on sale and when but some day, it’s going to be more than that. Someday, someone is going to want that data about certain individuals to prove a point in court and then it wont be funny anymore. Soon, our purchases of cough medicine, aspirin, hemmroidal creams or contraception will all become fodder for the legal world.
Cameras at red lights, traffic cameras at bridges and freeways being fitted with license tracking software. GPS in your car so the insurance companies can track your mileage and travel habits. Bank records come with with your every use of your ATM.
All of that data, all about you and its all out there for just waiting for the subpoena and some day the subpoenas will come. Good people standing for office or even applying for jobs will be called to explain why they purchased various things at various times from various stored or why they were in parts of town they shouldn’t be in or why they constantly broke traffic laws. That’s how civilization is made. The tall non-compliant grass is mowed down by the dual motorized blade of “were only looking out for your best interests” and “its for the good of the children”.
Frankly, it’s all starting to make me feel just a bit uncomfortable. It’s starting to make me look out at the horizon and think about what it means to leave. It’s also made me long for a time when you really could get away, just by walking towards where the sun comes up or goes down until you run out of land. And then you make a boat, and keep going.
If you could get away today, would you go? I mean really get away, not take an RV up the Alaska Highway and stay at KOA’s all the way to the arctic circle; I mean go “away”.
There are days when I think that it’s a good thing that we don’t have the technology to leave the Earth and the solar system as easy as we would like, because if we had anything like that, the Earth would probably be a ghost town in a week. Not because the Earth is such a bad place mind you, but because all of human civilization has at its core a way of making you want to leave it just as soon as you can.
Maybe that’s what makes us human, the desire to leave all the other humans behind.
I envy the men of the Golden Hinde and I admire all they accomplished, but I’ve always wondered what it was that made them come back to Elizabethan England after seeing a place like Wild California. Because I think I would have stayed right there on the beach and waved as Captain Drake, the crew of the Golden Hinde went over the horizon taking that little piece of civilization with it.
Posted @ October 21, 2007 12:49 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (3)
life is what happens when your making other plans
I thought I would be right back and I could finish the story of my experience in the '89 loma prieta quake.
Then life interrupted and threw me off my game.
I will get to it soon, but its going to have to wait for revenue producing work to subside.
Posted @ October 18, 2007 09:35 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (2)
Happy Loma Prieta Day
On October 17th 1989 at 5:05 pm, The San Francisco Bay Area was struck by a large earthquake. And where was I? under the Bay Bridge(pictured above- the 'after' version), under the bay itself, standing inside a packed BART train. We felt a bump, and then about 3 minutes later the train stopped and we waited well inside the dark train tunnel just under the shore of West Oakland.
Inside the tunnel, we waited for what we thought was just a typical daily, dead simple no big deal delay to clear, so we could get home. Baseball fans took out their portable tv's in hope to catch a few minutes of the World Series Game that was being played just a few miles to the south of us, as they travelled home.
My wife was on the train just 10 minutes behind mine. When we left work that day, we thought it would be a typical hour long trip home.
We were wrong.
(I'll be back later to finish the story.)
Posted @ October 17, 2007 04:25 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
Kathy and Woz: The odd couple
Kathy Griffin and Steve Wozniak? Who would have guessed? Like my friend Corinne used to say: "God makes them and they get together. You never quite know who or why!"
This is probably the worst single picture of Woz in his whole life. All I can think of is the subtitle should be something like this:
Kathy Griffin: [singing] If you're blue, and you don't know where to go to, why don't you go where fashion sits...
Woz: 'UTTIN' ON THE 'IIIIITZ!!!!
I wish them the joy that comes from making us all look stupid.
Posted @ October 17, 2007 12:03 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (1)
good news - bad news
Good news: Phil Hendrie is back on the air.
Bad News: George Lucas wants to make a Star Wars TV show.
Here's my thing on Star Wars:
1. Loved Star Wars.
2. Really loved Empire Stikes Back.
3. I absolutely hated 'Return of the Jedi' all the way down to the zippers on the ewok costumes. The whole Star Wars thing just went straight down hill from there. Once, a story tightly told, only to be betrayed by the teddy bears from hell.
I distinctly remember sitting in the audience and wondering what the hell happened to George Lucas. Little did I know that Return of the Jedi would be the one I hated the least. By the time we watched 'little ani' become Darth Vader(yet another really bad idea),
I was looking at my watch anticipating when it would finally at long last, be over. Fine, so he's Darth Vader, ok, we get it.
I should have been in tears but instead I was doing the "potty dance" and thinking about how I was going to tell the kids I really didnt care if we got the dvd when it came out.
I really thought the ewoks were the worst idea I had ever seen. Then I saw Jar-Jar and I knew that there was a whole new basement in the outlet store of 'bad ideas'. You see, this is what happens when you have too much money, theres no one to slap you upside the head and say "Have you lost you mind? Teddy bears? A flop eared malaprop spewing swamp goon? Come on George let's try to do something really good here, ok?"
I hope that Mr. Lucas takes the time to remember his last foray into television, because I sure havent forgotten it.
Ladies and Gentleman, put on your pukka shell necklace, your bell bottoms and adidas shoes to return with me to 1977. For your viewing pleasure I present "The Star Wars Holiday Special".
Avert your eyes if you have an allergic reaction to the likeness of Bea Arthur.
Posted @ October 17, 2007 12:30 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (2)
Varifrank's Laws
1. You dont get paid by how hard you work, but by how hard you are to replace.
2. A man without enemies is a man not living up to his full potential.
3. The universe is not an entirely rational construct, therefore science and mathematics have their limits as tools of discovery. Sometimes you just have to guess.
4. All great discoveries occur because of a random accident colliding the irrational persistence of a man who didnt know any better than to keep working when everyone else had already given up.
5. The worlds large monuments, such as the Pyramids of Giza were made for no other purpose than to simply keep people busy. There is nothing more dangerous to governments than well fed people who have free time, no common purpose and most importantly no need of control or organization by said governments.
6. The migration of Homo Sapiens around the planet after the end of the last ice age was fundamentally powered by the genetically ingrained desire within all members of the species to get as far away from their inlaws as possible.
7. The core idea of western civilization is the phrase "none of your business".
8. The core idea of fascist and communist thought is "you have no business".
9. There is no leftist thought, except that no matter what the situation is "America is always wrong".
10. The collapse of civilization begins when your next door neighbor takes an interest in whats on your side of the fence.
11. News is not information. News is just the airtime that exists inbetween car commercials; its only purpose is to keep you watching long enough to make it to the car commercials. If they thought they could hold your attention by broadcasting a lava lamp, they would do it.
12. The only part of the news that you can really use is given to you by the weatherman, who is almost always the station idiot.
13. You can teach anyone who can think logically how to code software, but you cannot teach anyone to think logically; they either have it or they dont. You would really be shocked at how few people think logically.
14. Most humans are sane and rational, but all human organizations are insane and irrational. The bigger the organization, the more insane and irrational. Therefore, avoid joining all large organizations the same way you would avoid making eye contact with the crazy homeless people that you see on the way to work.
15. If you cannot own property, you are property.
16. No matter how important you think you are, 10 years after you are dead, the only people who will remember you ever existed or what you looked like are related to you. Use your time accordingly.
17. Having children is the only method of time travel to the future that is allowed by science.
18. Utopia is the single most destructive idea ever invented by mankind.
19. If you find only yourself at the center of the purpose of your life, your life has been wasted.
20. If you feel the need to whine about the current circumstances of your life, imagine yourself standing on the stage of a college lecture auditorium, in the audience sit all the members of your ancestry extending back all the way in time to the stone age. Father, grandfather, great-grandfather, great-great grand fathers and mothers and so on and so on. Now, imagine trying to tell them how tough you have it and then try to imagine how hard they would laugh at you for complaining about the air conditioning on your lexus not working or your condo in florida going down in value.
Posted @ October 16, 2007 11:26 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
Sure is a lot of activity going on in little old Syria lately
From October 14th 2007:
snip.
"...the official North Korean Central News Agency said the speaker of North Korea's parliament, Choe Thae Bok, has left for a trip that will take him to Italy and Syria. The report gave no other details."
end snip.
Given the fact that the world now recognizes that what Israel struck in the Syrian desert was a North Korean designed nuclear site, it makes you wonder what intelligence briefings Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi ( Third in line to the Presidency) is getting.
Which makes me wonder about something that has been rattling around in my head for a long time about the intelligence briefings that are being received by the Democratic leadership in Congress.
This site in Syria had to have been known to many intelligence teams for some time, certainly it was known to exist before Speaker Pelosi stepped on a plane to give the Jihadi enemies of this country a photo-op, she must have been given some sort of "briefing" on the nature of the folks she was meeting with.
As such, I can only conclude the following:
- The Democratic leadership get them, but dismiss the conclusions, due to ideology.
- The intelligence briefings are laughibly bad and full of nothing but double talk and CYA language, rendering them largely neutered of any valuable or timely information.
- The Democratic Leadership get them, they are accurate in their assesments....
...and they dont care!
Given that the Democrats are now hell bent to destroy a strategic alliance with Turkey, for no other purpose than the destablize the region, I can only conculde that they not only dont care about Syria dangerously escalating the world towards nuclear war, they are in some ways working to see that it happens.
visted Syria this year. Do you think they will be proud of that if the North Koreans are
Posted @ October 14, 2007 10:08 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
clarity
"...The two Guevaras(Che's daughter Aleida and son Camilo), who left the Islamic Republic in some haste, managed to anger some Iranian progressists. The siblings refused to mention the mass arrest of workers' leaders throughout Iran in the last few months or condemn the current wave of repression against trade unions, women's organizations, teachers and farm workers.
"These people don't give a damn about the toiling masses," says Parviz Jamshidi, a lawyer for imprisoned trade unionists. "To them workers represent nothing but an abstraction, an excuse for appearing left and chic. They don't see that the Khomeinist regime is at war against the poorest sections of our society."
The rest of this amazing piece can be found here.
Posted @ October 12, 2007 12:20 PM | Comments (2)
trick question
Aside from the "Representatives of the lollipop guild", who walks with their arms crossed?
Chris Matthews!
He didnt come right out and say so, but I get the impression that Chris is voting for Hillary.
Posted @ October 05, 2007 07:28 AM | Comments (0)
Guess the author!
In an article written today, who was the journalist who said:
- "President Bush has no better friends than the spineless Democratic congressional leadership."
- "Some supporters were outraged at the obfuscation by the Democratic front runners"
- "To have major Democratic backing to stay the course in Iraq added up to good news for Bush."
- "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is another Democratic leader who has empowered Bush's war."
- "Is it any wonder the Democrats are faring lower than the president in a Washington Post/ABC approval poll? Bush came in at 33 percent and Congress at 29 percent"
Click here to reveal the answer.
I think someones been getting way too much saltpeter in her morning cream-o-wheats.
Posted @ October 04, 2007 08:52 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (2)
"...like khaki dolls hanging below green lampshades..."
Click here to hear the broadcast
Thats the way that Edward R. Murrow described a drop of US Paratroops into Holland as part of Operation Market Garden in September 1944. A perfect 'word picture' to describe to people who only knew of war from what they saw in magazines what men falling to the earth from thousands of parachutes might look like.
You can think of this as a journalistic "palette rinse".
This broadcast describes the drop of paratroops from a Douglas C-47 into the fields of Holland. This is recorded at the actual event. You hear the engines of the aircraft, you hear the wind through the door and you can feel the moment in his voice.
Its electric, the moment fills me with tears.
Occasionally, its nice to be reminded of a time when journalists were on the same side as you and your country, instead of the 'perfumed preening pimps for socialist utopia' that we have today.
And for the "kids" out there, Operation Market Garden didnt go that well for our side. Its very likely that a large number of the men Mr. Murrow witnessed in the jump from that aircraft, died within in the following weeks.
The sound of those engines on the C-47. Theres nothing quite like that.
Posted @ October 03, 2007 02:39 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (0)
Scenario of the day
Imagine in todays hypersensitive political age that a General in Iraq visited a field hospital and in the process came across two soldiers who were weeping and crying, and geerally being a couple of complaining little whiners.
Now imagine that the General publically slapped the crap out of both of them in full view of the press and other Officers and Enlisted men in the hospital.
Imagine that in the early days of this mans career, he was also engaged in fighting against an insurgent guerilla army, and having ambushed several local guerilla commanders, shot and killed them then strapped their dead bodies to the hood of his car and put them on display for the press.
Ok, you get it, he would have never had a career in the modern day United States Military. He would be a subject of 'Hardball' for months on end, TNR would run this character on the front page, along side pictures of Abu Ghirab as evidence of American atrocities and "why do they hate us? here's why!". John Kerry would probably call him General "Jengis Khan".
Now go ask your veteran family members how many more Americans would have died in World War II and how much longer the war would hase gone on, had they not been under the command of George S. Patton.
Then sit and wonder what sort of 'idealogical cheesecloth' we are using to filter our military leaders of today and what it will eventually produce.
More Wesley Clarks? or more George Pattons?
You decide.
If you have a teenage boy in your family, ask yourself what type of man you want leading your kinsman if he were to be called into a war?
Wesley Clark or George Patton?
You decide.
Posted @ October 03, 2007 10:06 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (1)
Blog Radio - The Rick Moran Show
Rick Moran of Right Wing Nut House has given me the honor of appearing on his Radio Show today at 1:00 Pacific today.
Little does he know that my voice has a timbre that lies somwhere between Don Knotts being kicked in the balls and fingernails being dragged down a chalkboard...
UPDATE:
Click the icon above to listen to the show. I start rambling on like Dutch Schultz on his deathbed about 15 minutes into the show.
Posted @ October 02, 2007 11:00 AM | Current Affairs | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
Democrats and Board Games
Not content with just being known to history as "defeated for 7 years by the powerhouse political strongman George W. Bush",Democrats have now decided to attack a man who owns the airwaves for three hours a day.
Apparently he said something about 'phony soldiers' and they didnt want him cutting in on their act because they consider the "false accusations about the military" their street corner and they arent going to give it up without a fight.
What was once said about "not starting an argument with someone who buys ink by the barrel" can also be said about someone who's voice can be found in every populated area of the western hemisphere for at least 3 straight hours every day.
3 hours a day, 5 days a week, repeated on Saturday and Sunday, with newsletter and website and podcast for a low,low monthly subscription. Democrats seem to have collectively decided in their "moment of triumph" with a whopping 24% approval rating to wander into the idealogical bull ring, not dressed as a matador, but wearing a red union suit, clown shoes and a big red nose, and then bend over while facing the other way and waving at the kids in the front row of the stands.
Right in the path of the charging enraged bull.
And now we know why it was that a Democrat managed to get us into a land war in Asia (not once ,but twice - Korea and Vietnam - Truman and Johnson ) a complete lack of understanding of the fundamentals of strategy.
It was once said that the wars of england were won on the "playing fields of Eton". In America, your grasp of strategy comes down to the board games you played as a kid.
Remember when you were a kid and there was always this other "snot nosed kid" who considered himself above playing kid games like Risk, Stratego or god forbid a little 'penny ante' Poker, three of the four foundations for a really good fundamental understanding of strategy**. Well that kid probably grew up to be a Democrat. Always true to his high principals and 'impossible to impress' standards, but completely deviod of the common sense that only comes from knowing why Australia is only continent on the game board worth holding on to.
Picking a fight with Limbaugh.... Can they be bigger idiots? Whats his downside? hmmmm,nothing really. I get material for lifetime of shows and a dozen book deals, so bring it on!. Whats theirs? oh, gosh lets see, an invigorated right wing electorate who already hates you and sees you with nothing but suspicion. Sure, that works, lets go pull the lions tail Gumby, that will great be fun!
What else can the Democrats do thats in the realm of common sense things that even children know better than to do? Perhaps pulling on Supermans cape, spitting into the wind? pulling the mask off the Lone Ranger? or dare I say it, by messing around with Jim?
Does their complete lack of fundamental economic sense also come from their idealogical rejection of the game "Monopoly"? Did inner city communist parents even allow the game of "Monopoly" in the house? Is this why they can't understand why owning the hotel is much better than renting, even on Baltic Avenue?
You and I get this basic fundamental ecomonic fact before we are out of elementary school, but ask your average leftist if owning is better than renting and they rub their chin and go off into a debate about the real question being "is renting really greener than owning?"
Is this why leftism has always failed?, because its core ideas cant be condensed to work in game theory and little bitty charms that you use a random throw of the dice to move across the board? Milton Pennybags, icon of ruthless capitalism!, but where is the little "mini-fidelito" working his way through the world of guerilla warfare?
Will there ever be a "CHE! - By Milton Bradley, batteries not included"? Of course not, because who wants to play a game where the object is that everyone loses and you blame your inability to win on the people who live in the house next door.
Democrats. The Poindexter Party.
**(Chess being the 4th, but I'm too much of a nerd to admit it)
Posted @ October 01, 2007 02:56 PM | Current Affairs | Comments (8)
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