For want of a Nail…er Turnbuckle…

Posted on by March 6, 2013

 YACHT DELIVERY

85 foot custom-built motor yacht complete with 4 state rooms, a state-of-the-art galley, GPS System and radar for navigation, twin supercharged diesel engines, etc. $7,474,793.00

Champagne, chocolate covered strawberries with cream and music dockside for the excited ‘soon to be owner’ and a small group of his friends.  $1500.00

Two corporate representatives, crane, and rigging $2,500.00 a hour minimum…

a faulty turnbuckle… $25.00 

Watching your 7 million dollar dreamboat nose dive into the harbor, accompanied by two corporate Representatives from the company that built it just prior to ‘inking’ the final paperwork and handing over a $7+ million dollar cashier’s check… 

So, how is your day?

In OTHER Stupidity…

OMB is out with an even DEEPER cut in travel for Government agencies, but there’s a bit of a twist…

There is supposed to be a 30% cut from the 2010 levels saving $8B a year, now extended to 2016. BUT, see below to see where the ‘savings’ are going…

In consultation with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), agencies shall direct all immediate savings achieved through this reduction towards investments that improve the transparency of and accountability for Federal spending and therefore serve taxpayers by further reducing wasteful spending over the long-term. Investments should include activities necessary to provide more robust tracking and public reporting of Federal spending, as well as internal audits and investigations to root out fraud and error in Federal programs and activities.

The entire document is HERE.

Lemme count the stupidity here… Ah, to hell with it… and this methodology will save a ton of money? As opposed to reducing the JSF program, or reducing significant outlays in foreign aid, or reducing entitlements…etc.?

Penny wise, pound foolish… Again…

Humor for your Monday…

Posted on by March 6, 2013

Pretty good twists on the ‘standard’ definitions…

   1.  ARBITRATOR: A cook that leaves Arby’s to work at McDonalds


  2.  AVOIDABLE: What a bullfighter tries to do


  3.  BERNADETTE: The act of torching a mortgage


  4.  BURGLARIZE: What a crook sees with


  5.  CONTROL: A short, ugly inmate 


  6.  COUNTERFEITERS: Workers who put together kitchen cabinets


  7.  ECLIPSE: What an English barber does for a living


  8.  EYEDROPPER: A clumsy ophthalmologist


  9.  HEROES: What a guy in a boat does


10.  LEFTBANK: What the robber did when his bag was full of money

11.  MISTY: How golfers create divots


12.  PARADOX: Two physicians


13.  PARASITES: What you see from the top of the Eiffel Tower

14.  PHARMACIST: A helper on the farm


15.  POLARIZE: What penguins see with


16.  PRIMATE: Removing your spouse from in front of the TV

17.  RELIEF: What trees do in the spring


18.  RUBBERNECK: What you do to relax your wife


19.  SELFISH: What the owner of a seafood store does


20.  SUDAFED: Brought litigation against a government official


Y’all have a good week, ya hear!!!

A Little Humor…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
It’s blonde jokes… 🙂

A friend told the blonde: “Christmas is on a Friday this year.” 
The blond then said, “Let’s hope it’s not the 13th.”
————————————
    Two blondes find three grenades, and they decide to take them to  a police station.  
One asked: “What if one explodes before we get there?”  
The other says: “We’ll lie and say we only found two.”
————————————
A woman phoned her blonde neighbor and said: “Close your curtains the next time you & your husband are having sex. 
The whole street was watching and laughing at you yesterday.” 
To which the blonde replied: “Well the joke’s on all of you because I wasn’t even at home yesterday.”
————————————
A blonde is in the bathroom and her husband shouts:  “Did you find the shampoo?”
She answers, “Yes, but I’m not sure what to do… it’s for dry hair, and I’ve just wet mine.”
——————————     
A blonde goes to the vet with her goldfish. 
“I think it’s got epilepsy,” she tells the vet.  
The vet takes a look and says, “It seems calm enough to me”.  
The blonde says, “I haven’t taken it out of the bowl yet”.
————————————     
A blond spies a letter lying on his doormat.  
It says on the envelope “DO NOT BEND “.  
He spends the next 2 hours trying to 
figure out how to pick it up.
————————————     
A blond man shouts frantically into the phone 
“My wife is pregnant and her contractions are only two minutes apart!”
    “Is this her first child?” asks the Doctor. 
    “No”, he shouts, “this is her husband!”
————————————     
A blonde was driving home, drunk as a skunk.  Suddenly she has to swerve to avoid a tree, then another, then another.
    A cop car pulls her over, so she tells the cop about all the trees in the road.
    The cop says, “That’s your air freshener swinging about!”
————————————
    A blonde’s dog goes missing and she is frantic. 
Her husband  says “Why don’t you put an ad in the paper?”
    
She does, but two weeks later the dog is still missing. 
    
“What did you put in the paper?” her husband asks. 
     
“Here boy!” she replies.
————————————
     A blond man is in jail. Guard looks in his cell and sees him hanging by his feet. 
“Just WHAT are you doing?” he asks. 
“Hanging myself,” the blond replies. 
“It should be around your neck” says the guard.  
“I know,” he replies, “but then I couldn’t breathe”.
————————————
(This one actually makes sense…LOL)

An Italian tourist asks a blonde: “Why do Scuba divers always fall backwards off their boats?”
To which the blonde replies: “If they fell forward, they’d still be in the boat.”

And a really funny way to play Frogger…

It’s not often you see an actual FROG used…

And the ONE Pepsi ad that really had me laughing. Originally saw this while in Sigonella (Sicily) which is home to the Mafia…

Armed Forces Day???

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Did anyone other than Snigs even remember???


Well, it seems that Panetta DID have a press release…

Panetta Praises Troops on Armed Forces Day


By Army Sgt. 1st Class Tyrone C. Marshall Jr.


WASHINGTON, May 19, 2012 – Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta today thanked troops and their families for their service in an Armed Forces Day message, in which he also noted the importance of the upcoming NATO Summit in Chicago.
“Let me take this opportunity to wish all our troops and their families the very best on this Armed Forces Day,” Panetta said in the message. “I hope you know that all Americans join me in gratitude for everything you do to keep us safe.


Panetta said the efforts of troops are noted and appreciated.
“Wherever and however you serve, you are an inspiration to me and to millions of your fellow Americans,” he said.

The service and sacrifices of men and women in uniform allow Americans to lead peaceful lives, he said.
“You fight for peace so that others don’t need to,” he said. “You work for peace, at home and abroad, so that others may know a better life. Your families share in that labor and in that sacrifice, so that other families need not endure the pains of separation and of strife. There is, perhaps, no more admirable calling.”


I dunno, did anybody hear about a parade?  Or a thank you for the troops, or discounts for dinner maybe???  


Anyone???


Beuhler???


/Crickets…


Thank you to all of you that have served and ARE serving, and to the families who stand by you. 

Random stuff #346…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional,illogical minority, and rapidly promoted by mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a piece of shit by the clean end…


And a pro travel tip…


Two inch lifts and six inch heels may make your ass look like two puppies fighting in a sack, but when you trip over your bag and break a heel off, end up on your ass with your micro skirt up around your navel, and your tit hanging out of the two sizes too small tube top; AND you start screaming and cussing like a sailor at the folks trying to help you, you WILL get laughed at…


Oh yeah, and if you’re gonna wear a thong, you ‘might’ want to do some lawn maintenance…



CONDOM HISTORY

Interesting piece of history!

In 1272, the Arabic Islamic Muslims invented the condom, using a goat’s lower intestine.

In 1873, the British somewhat refined the idea by taking the intestine out of the goat first.

Don’t thank me, I do this as a public service for the advancement of Education.


And you can go HERE and see an absolutely WORTHLESS hunting dog 🙂

Time Travel… Kinda Sorta…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
I got an email asking me how I deal with jet lag or desyncronosis as it’s more properly known; so here goes…



A caveat here, is this is MY personal way of dealing with it, and not necessarily what will work for everyone.


West is best, and East is worst for jet lag, due to the circadian rhythm issues; e.g. you can ‘recover’ more easily going West than East.  More about that in a bit…


Anything up to three hours either way, I pretty much ignore and just stay on ‘home’ time.  When I go to the Left Coast, for example, I just go eat early, and go to bed early, and get up about 0300-0400.  This way, I’m not dealing with sleep problems, and I can still get a productive day in.  I do usually get something like breakfast bars, or energy bars to eat at that time of the morning, so that I’m ‘simulating’ what I do at home.  


For the longer trips, say 8-12 hours in either direction, I have to add a caveat here- That being I don’t sleep on airplanes, so I’m up for the duration.  I don’t do sleep aids, either melatonin (gives me BAD nightmares), or prescription stuff. The reason being, if something DOES happen in flight, I want to be coherent and able to deal with it (but that’s just me). Also, I don’t drink on airplanes for the same reason. I drink lots of water to stay hydrated because most airlines run cabin altitudes at 7000′ above sea level, and humidity at about 3% (to keep the PACS from freezing up).  I also get up and walk about every hour to keep the circulation going. 


Another thing to be aware of is you WILL build up gas, and you WILL need to relieve the pressure on your Eustachian tubes HERE in the ears; otherwise you may pay for both of those things later in the evening… Just sayin…


Going West, takeoff is around 1200 my time; when I land, say in Japan, it’s about 1600JST, so about midnight to my ‘body’ clock.  I’ll eat a very light dinner, hit the bathroom, and stay up until about 2100JST, and go to bed then (and no alcohol). At this point, I’m over tired, but I ‘know’ I’ll only get a 4-6 hour nap in, and be wide awake again (not trying to do TMI, but your ‘movements’ will normally wake you up about then, since they ‘think’ you should have taken care of them).  I’ll eat a breakfast bar, start drinking coffee and work until others are up, then go to breakfast.  Then it’s a full day, again staying up until 21-2200, and usually sleeping though until about 0500 the next day. At that point, I’m pretty much on cycle for that time zone.


When I go East, takeoff is usually around 2000-2200 my time; when I land in the middle East, it’s 15 hours later (I do the same things on the airplane going East too), and usually around 1930 Local.  So my ‘body clock’ says it’s not time to sleep, so I’ll eat a good meal and either a beer or wine with dinner (if available), and it’s usually a fight to get to sleep. It’s VERY hard to wake up at 0500, because the body clock thinks I should be sleeping another 5-6 hours (hence the easier to go West, than East).  I usually get up an hour earlier than normal going East, to have time to ‘take care of business’, and have time to get enough coffee in me to be coherent, and functional (I cannot do the 30 minute prior wake up and out the door anymore). I’ll eat a breakfast bar, and that is usually it, as I’m not hungry. Then it’s a full day, but will eat lunch (simulating breakfast), and then a light dinner.  Going East, it usually takes about 3 days to drop into the time zone going East.  


If I’m splitting differences, e.g. Hawaii or Europe, I just modify either the West or East plan slightly to match up to that time zone.


As I said, this is what works for me.  As a former aviator, I just don’t like drugs for ANY reason; AND I stay away from spicy foods the day before departure and initially on arrival (you can guess why).  I know others that will use drugs to mitigate the effects, and there are any number of jet lag ‘cures’ out there… Personally, I don’t believe any of them actually work.


You can go HERE and read more than you want to know about jet lag from the medical perspective…


So I hope this answers the email, if not, please let me know.

Well Dayum…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Strange things happen, sometimes a long time later…


A couple of years ago, I was talking to a good friend (non-smoker), and I mentioned that I collected Zippo lighters.  

Today, he walked up to me at the conference and handed me this!!!


It’s a brand new (1983) brass presentation Zippo, still in the original box from the Kitty Hawk…

Never been used, and was stored in a cruise box for years.  I offered him what it’s worth, but he wouldn’t take a penny, saying he’d remembered our conversation, and the fact that he ‘knew’ I’d take care of it!  He’d gotten it as an E-6 for being the Sailor of the Quarter…

And found it last weekend when he was looking for something else.

Thanks Snake, it IS appreciated!!!

Horse’s asses…

Posted on by March 6, 2013

 This one’s for BZ and WSF 🙂

My Grandfather on my Mother’s side was an engineer for UP back in the early 1900s…


The U.S. Standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That’s an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that’s the way they built them in England, and English expatriates designed the U.S. Railroads.

Why did the English build them like that? 
Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that’s the gauge they used.
Why did ‘they’ use that gauge then? 

Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.


Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England , because that’s the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So, who built those old rutted roads?

Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (including England ) for their legions. Those roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads?Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels.


Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome , they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore, the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. In other words, bureaucracies live forever.
So the next time you are handed a specification, procedure, or process, and wonder, ‘What horse’s ass came up with this?’, you may be exactly right.Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses.

Now, the twist to the story:When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, you will notice that there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah.

The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit larger, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses’ behinds.

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world’s most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years agoby the width of a horse’s ass.
And you thought being a horse’s ass wasn’t important!

Now you know, horses’ asses control almost everything…explains a whole lot of stuff, doesn’t it?


And I’ve been dealing with horse’s asses all week, except they are the two legged kind…

h/t- JP

Oh HELL no…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Well, I can scratch Virgin Atlantic off my list of airlines I’ll be flying on…


When they start allowing phone calls, texts, email inflight; I’m done with em…


It’s bad enough to listen to some pax prattle to the seat mate, much less have to listen to one sided conversations.


You can read the whole thing HERE. And I agree with this comment…

“At the very least, the airline will have to restrict times of day when passengers will be able to scream into their phones ‘Can you hear me now?’ at 40,000 feet, in order to not wake up fellow passengers on overnight flights,” says George Hobica, president of AirfareWatchdog.com. “But you know what will happen–no one will listen. There will be screaming matches, glares, and probably fisticuffs.”
Virgin Atlantic’s chief operating officer Steve Griffiths told the U.K. Daily Mail: “We have listened to what customers want and connectivity in the air is always on the wish list.”

Okay Already…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Geez, I put up TWO Air Force videos and I get accused of being a ‘fanboi’…


So in answer here’s something from the Navy side of the aisle!  And HERE is an excellent post by Peter on some of the machinations that are going into upgrading the systems to the Growler (EA-18G)…


Anyway, some shots of EA-6B Prowlers doing their job and some gratuitous A-6 Intruders thrown in for fill…  All set to Radar Love 🙂  



Wayne did a good job with this one, and there is at least one ‘real’ shot from Nam in it… The original (done back in the 80s) had LOTS of mission data from Nam included, which is probably NOT politically correct these days…


And the whole PSH over drones and recording stuff over the US?  That’s been going on since the 50’s… Just sayin…