If this…

Posted on by June 13, 2024

Isn’t a slap in the face of our troops, I don’t know what is…

The Biden Administration is facing intense criticism after shooting down a proposal to give U.S. military troops a pay raise. 

The House Armed Services Committee’s (HASC) draft of the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) proposed a $24 billion pay raise to enlisted U.S. service members. However, the Biden Administration said that it “strongly opposes” approving such a “significant” and “permanent” pay raise, citing budgetary constraints. 

On the contrary, the Democratic administration recently just approved spending nearly seven times the amount to fund Ukraine’s ongoing war with Russia. 

Full article, HERE.

Right now, E-1s make $12/hr, assuming 160 hours a month (yeah, right)… E-2s $13.43, E-3s $14.11, E-4s $15.64. It’s not until E-7 that the hourly rate actually gets over $20/hr… sigh

If you use a more ‘accurate’ number of hours per month (240), those rates drop considerably… E-1s drop to $7.98/hr, up to an E-4 at $10.42/hr.

HASC’s proposal was a measly 15% raise for E-1 through E-4s to at least get them a little bit closer to the ‘goal’ of getting them off food banks, WIC, SNAP and other programs so they can put food on the table.

Yes, the federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour. This rate applies to covered nonexempt workers. The minimum wage for employees who receive tips is $2.13 per hour. The amount of tips plus the $2.13 must reach at least $7.25 per hour.

Last year, with an 8% ‘average’ inflation rate, the military/Social Security got a 5.2% raise, e.g. a loss of roughly 3% against inflation. This year, they are predicting an average rate of 4.5%, and apparently the administration is ‘willing’ to go that high… maybe…

Granted, we know the left/administration/dems hate the military, but dammit, this is NOT the time to be penny wise and pound foolish! Behind on maintenance, lack of new ‘tools’ in all services, and huge issues with quarters on base (contracted and not being maintained properly, what a surprise)…

Where does it end?

 

‘Hearing’ the words vs. seeing…

Posted on by June 12, 2024

This came up yesterday at our work day at the Legion. Imagine if you will, a bunch of grumpy old men taking a break and sitting drinking Navy coffee… 🙂

Talking about the ‘old days’ before everything got transmitted via satellite… There was this antique thing known as ‘radio’, as in AFRTS. It was also transmitted on HF, Upper Sideband- Diego Garcia was 12,579 kHz daytime and 4,319 kHz nighttime. That one, a few of us remembered, having spent time there…LOL

That was how most of us on deployment or at sea got our sports…

That led to a discussion about books. RAH, E.E. Smith, Louis L’Amour, Robert E. Howard, Asimov, Spillane, Zane Gray, et al and how they painted ‘word’ pictures that, in conjunction with our imaginations, put us ‘in’ those scenes.

And it brought back even more memories of my grandfather out in his shop, a radio on listening to either baseball or football. He followed the Yankees (Mel Allen), and listened to Dizzy Dean and Peewee Reese, because he’d seen them play and knew they ‘knew’ what they were talking about.

Another memory was the family get togethers, especially in the fall, when the men and boys would be outside, crowded around one of the cars with the radio turned up to catch the college football game while the women did whatever they did inside the house (after they kicked us out).

Did replace actually going to the game? No. Seeing was always better than hearing the announcers, but the words they used, along with your imagination, could put you ‘there’…

As writers, we should be doing that with our writing. That begs the question, how much is too little, or too much that can put our readers ‘in’ those scenes? I don’t have a good answer, and I believe each writer has to find what works best for them.

I know I tend to write ‘sparse’ descriptions of the situation, environment, and characters, expecting the reader to ‘fill in the blanks’ if you will. I also tend more toward ‘showing’ action and less ‘telling’ what happened. Am I right? I don’t know, but that’s how ‘I’ do it.

What say y’all?

A ‘bit’ petty???

Posted on by June 11, 2024

This one makes NO sense…

Major League Eating announced on Tuesday that Joey Chestnut is unable to participate in the 2024 Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest after he partnered with a rival brand.

Chestnut recently signed a deal with Impossible Foods, a rival of Nathan’s that has launched a vegan wiener.

Thus, Major League Eating ruled that as long as the 16-time winner of the contest has a deal with Impossible Foods, he will not be allowed to compete at the July 4 spectacle.

Full article, HERE from Fox.

Soooo, he didn’t have a contract with Nathan’s, signed with somebody else, and now he’s banned?

What are they afraid of? That he’ll mention his sponsor? How frikken petty is that?

Sigh… It’s…sigh, never mind.

And another ‘petty’ one is, to my mind, the US Olympic team choice to leave Caitlin Clark off the USA team. A lot of folks are trying to ‘justify’ it, one example-

Through 13 games so far, Clark’s 70 turnovers are by some distance the most of any player in the league and her average of 5.4 turnovers a game is well clear of Alyssa Thomas’s 4.3 in second place.

Clark is also shooting just 37.3% from the floor and 33% from three, which is arguably her greatest weapon, and it seems unlikely that the Indiana Fever would command any less attention from opponents on the Olympic stage.

On statistics alone, then, it is difficult to justify Clark’s inclusion; though by the same metrics, Diana Taurasi’s inclusion is even more difficult to explain given she is averaging just 16.6 points on just 37.1% shooting, while contributing fewer rebounds, assists and steals per game.

Full article, HERE from CNN.

Another one I’ve heard is that her fans would pitch a fit if she didn’t get a lot of playing time. Really? So, you’re willing to send all those eyes somewhere else, once again making the Olympic team a ho hum non-event?

Clark, love her or hate her, has brought a LOT of eyes and money to the WNBA this year. Yes, she’s a rookie, she would not have been the first one selected to the team by a long shot.  Four other rookies have been selected- Rebecca Lobo in 1996, Diana Taurasi in 2004, Candace Parker in 2008 and Breanna Stewart in 2016. Note that Taurasi is still on the team, even with her low production…

Oh well, hoist on their own petard, once again…

Ridiculous…

Posted on by June 10, 2024

Apparently the whole Adobe TOS change is real, and totally ridiculous.

Adobe has just changed the terms for subscription applications like Photoshop. Nothing big, just a demand of unlimited use of everything you ever create, forever. Oh, and you’re locked out of your existing work until you agree.

From the Battleswarm blog, HERE.

I guess Adobe thinks since they have the market cornered, they can do whatever they want…

But I’m betting now that the ‘pros’ are getting involved with Adobe trying to access their product, things are going to get interesting and the lawsuits will start coming! Especially from the aspect of NDA type work, and/or classified work done at various locations.

I could never afford to pay for photoshop, so I never went that way, thankfully! I do play with photography, but not that much. Years ago, one of my coworkers found a little freeware program called GIMP that he liked, because he could use it overseas and while at sea to put together AARs and briefs.

HERE is their wiki page.

None of the photo manipulation ‘tools’ are simple (IMHO), but GIMP is free and you can do quite a bit of manipulation with it.

YMMV, IANAL, etc…

Humor to start the week…

Posted on by June 9, 2024

As long as you’re NOT a handyman…

Daffinitions

SKILSAW:
A portable cutting tool used to make boards too short.

BELT SANDER:
An electric sanding tool commonly used to convert minor touch-up jobs into major refinishing jobs.

WIRE WHEEL:
Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere under the workbench with the speed of light. Also removes fingerprints and hard-earned calluses from fingers in about the time it takes you to say, ‘Oh shit’.

DRILL PRESS:
A tall upright machine useful for suddenly snatching flat metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you in the chest and flings your beer across the room, denting the freshly-painted project which you had carefully set in the corner where nothing could get to it.

CHANNEL LOCKS:
Used to round off bolt heads. Sometimes used in the creation of blood-blisters.

HACKSAW:
One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle… It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes.

VISE-GRIPS:
Generally used after pliers to completely round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.

OXY ACETYLENE TORCH:
Used almost entirely for igniting various flammable objects in your shop and creating a fire. Also handy for igniting the grease inside the wheel hub out of which you want to remove a bearing race.

TABLE SAW:
A large stationary power tool commonly used to launch wood projectiles for testing wall integrity.
Very effective for digit removal!

HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK:
Used for lowering an automobile to the ground after you have installed your new brake shoes, trapping the jack handle firmly under the bumper.

BAND SAW:
A large stationary power saw primarily used by most shops to cut large pieces into smaller pieces that more easily fit into the trash after you cut on the inside of the line instead of the outside edge.

TWO-TON ENGINE HOIST:
A tool for testing the maximum tensile strength of all the crap you forgot to disconnect.

PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER:
Normally used to stab the vacuum seals under lids or for opening old-style paper-and-tin oil cans and splashing oil on your shirt; but can also be used , as the name implies, to strip out Phillips screw heads.

STRAIGHT SCREWDRIVER:
A tool for opening paint cans. Sometimes used to convert common slotted screws into non-removable screws and butchering your palms.

PRY BAR:
A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 cent part.

PVC PIPE CUTTER:
A tool used to make plastic pipe too short

HAMMER:
Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive parts adjacent the object we are trying to hit.

UTILITY KNIFE:
Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door. Works particularly well on contents such as seats, vinyl records, liquids in plastic bottles, collector magazines, refund checks, and rubber or plastic parts. Especially useful for slicing work clothes, but only while in use.

SON OF A BITCH TOOL:
Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the garage while yelling ‘Son of a bitch’ at the top of your lungs. It is also, most often, the next tool that you will need.

Veterans…

Posted on by June 8, 2024

Do what it takes to get the job done, then and now…

Maintainers slogging back to the hangar after working on a bird in a snowstorm in Kef, 1983.

To understand a veteran you must know:

We left home as teenagers or in our early twenties for an unknown adventure.

We loved our country enough to defend it and protect it with our own lives.

We said goodbye to friends and family and everything we knew.

We learned the basics and then we scattered in the wind to the far corners of the Earth.

We found new friends and a new family.

We became brothers and sisters regardless of color, race, or creed.

We had plenty of good times, and plenty of bad times.

We didn’t get enough sleep.

We smoked and drank too much.

We picked up both good and bad habits.

We worked hard and played harder.

We didn’t earn a great wage.

We experienced the happiness of mail call and the sadness of missing important events.

We didn’t know when, or even if, we were ever going to see home again.

We grew up fast, and yet somehow, we never grew up at all.

We fought for our freedom, as well as the freedom of others.

Some of us saw actual combat, and some of us didn’t.

Some of us saw the world, and some of us didn’t.

Some of us dealt with physical warfare, most of us dealt with psychological warfare.

We have seen and experienced and dealt with things that we can’t fully describe or explain, as not all of our sacrifices were physical.

We participated in time-honored ceremonies and rituals with each other, strengthening our bonds and camaraderie.

We counted on each other to get our job done and sometimes to survive it at all.

We have dealt with victory and tragedy.

We have celebrated and mourned.

We lost a few along the way.

When our adventure was over, some of us went back home, some of us started somewhere new and some of us never came home at all.

We have told amazing and hilarious stories of our exploits and adventures.

We share an unspoken bond with each other, that most people don’t experience, and few will understand.

We speak highly of our own branch of service and poke fun at the other branches.

We know, however, that, if needed, we will be there for our brothers and sisters and stand together as one, in a heartbeat.

Being a veteran is something that had to be earned, and it can never be taken away.

It has no monetary value, but at the same time, it is a priceless gift.

People see a veteran and they thank them for their service.

When we see each other, we give that little upwards head nod, or a slight smile, knowing that we have shared and experienced things that most people have not.

So, from myself to the rest of the veterans out there, I commend and thank you for all that you have done and sacrificed for your country.

Try to remember the good times and make peace with the bad times.

Share your stories.

But most importantly, stand tall and proud, for you have earned the right to be called a veteran.

Who had…

Posted on by June 7, 2024

Flying spiders on their bingo cards???

Enormous, invasive Joro spiders could spread across the Northeast, a study says. And they’re not expected to disappear anytime soon.

Since their initial sightings in Georgia in 2013 and 2014, their population in the state and other regions of the Southeast has expanded.

In the study, researchers from Clemson University determined that the species is fast expanding outside South Carolina, and data suggests they may be found in most of the eastern United States.

Full article, HERE from USA Today.

 

Yes, the females do grow to 4 inches across, but they don’t ‘fly’ when they’re that big. And the males are much smaller and less ‘colorful’…

And there is much panic about them…sigh

I’m betting more people will panic walking through a spider web than they will by seeing one, or being bitten. They are venomous, but it’s apparently about like a bee sting, so less dangerous than the brown recluse.

They seem to be centered in Georgia, probably came in via the port of Savannah, and are moving up the east coast. So y’all have fun with that (yay for a prevailing wind from the west)!

Oh yeah, and they supposedly ‘thrive’ in an urban environment…

Science…

Posted on by June 6, 2024

Is not always ‘settled’…

From last July from Ars Technica

On Wednesday, researchers announced the discovery of a new astronomical enigma. The new object, GPM J1839–10, behaves a bit like a pulsar, sending out regular bursts of radio energy. But the physics that drives pulsars means that they’d stop emitting if they slowed down too much, and almost every pulsar we know of blinks at least once per minute.

GPM J1839–10 takes 22 minutes between pulses. We have no idea what kind of physics or what kind of objects can power that.

Full article, HERE.

And from yesterday’s Ars Technica…

Roughly a year ago, astronomers announced that they had observed an object that shouldn’t exist. Like a pulsar, it emitted regularly timed bursts of radio emissions. But unlike a pulsar, those bursts were separated by over 20 minutes. If the 22-minute gap between bursts represents the rotation period of the object, then it is rotating too slowly to produce radio emissions by any known mechanism.

Now, some of the same team (along with new collaborators) are back with the discovery of something that, if anything, is acting even more oddly. The new source of radio bursts, ASKAP J193505.1+214841.0, takes nearly an hour between bursts. And it appears to have three different settings, sometimes producing weaker bursts and sometimes skipping them entirely. While the researchers suspect that, like pulsars, this is also powered by a neutron star, it’s not even clear that it’s the same class of object as their earlier discovery.

Full article, HERE.

So, a ‘chance’ discovery is once again upsetting the science… what a surprise!

Something that ‘can’t exist, but does, and now another one that is even worse. Three ‘modes’, changing polarity, almost an hour between pulses, etc…

Richard Feynman, one of the theoretical physicists who worked on the A-bomb, was the father of quantum electrodynamics, and a Nobel prize winner.

He also came up with his ‘list’ of scientific principles (e.g. first principles).

  • “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.”
  • “Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty — some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none absolutely certain.”
  • “Permit us to question — to doubt — to not be sure.”
  • “Have no respect whatsoever for authority; forget who said it and instead look what he starts with, where he ends up, and ask yourself, ‘Is it reasonable?'”
  • “There is one feature I notice that is generally missing in cargo cult science (junk science) … It’s a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty.”
  • “If you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid — not only what you think is right about it.”
  • “Scientific knowledge is an enabling power to do either good or bad — but it does not carry instructions on how to use it.”
  • “If we suppress all discussion, all criticism, proclaiming ‘This is the answer, my friends; man is saved!’ we will doom humanity for a long time to the chains of authority, confined to the limits of our present imagination.”
  • “We make no apologies for making these excursions into other fields, because the separation of fields, as we have emphasised, is merely a human convenience, and an unnatural thing. Nature is not interested in our separations, and many of the interesting phenomena bridge the gaps between fields.”
  • “Mathematics is not just a language. Mathematics is a language plus reasoning. It’s like a language plus logic. Mathematics is a tool for reasoning.”
  • “I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.”
  • “The real problem in speech is not precise language. The problem is clear language.”
  • “The only way to have real success in science, the field I’m familiar with, is to describe the evidence very carefully without regard to the way you feel it should be.”
  • “And therefore when we go to investigate we shouldn’t pre-decide what it is we are trying to do except to find out more about it.”
  • “The exception tests the rule.”
  • “That is the principle of science. If there is an exception to any rule, and if it can be proved by observation, that rule is wrong.”

The last four are, IMHO, critically important and are truly the point of the spear, if you will (or petard, depending on which ox is being gored).

The last few years, there have been a lot of hue, cry, blamestorming, retractions, etc. around different fields of science (you can list them or not) and Alma had a post a couple of days ago HERE at Cat Rotator’s Quarterly, and another HERE at Eaton Rapids Joe, that kicked off my thoughts on this.

I spent over a dozen years developing test matrices based on first principles to test new ‘technologies’, some of which were novel uses of science and technology. Not all of them worked, but we learned from all of them.

Sadly, it seems to me that ‘learning’ is taking a backseat to the $$$ and ‘desires’ of scientists today…

YMMV, I’m NOT a scientist, and I didn’t stay at Holiday Inn Express last night…

D-Day from the Navy side…

Posted on by June 5, 2024
Gleaves Class Destroyer- This particular one is the USS McCook. See below for more…


We all know of the heroism of the Troops that hit the beaches on D-Day, June 6. What many people don’t realize is the Navy, in the form of Destroyers, were providing covering fire and taking the shore batteries from basically point blank (4000 yards and less) range to try to put them out of action and save the troops lives.

Three particular Destroyers stand out- The USS Corry, DD-463, which was the lead Destroyer, and was actually sunk by counter-battery fire from the shore. HERE is a link to her story, with an interview by Edward R. Murrow of the Commanding Officer, LCDR Hoffman.
Another is USS Fitch, DD-462, she was also on the line and was doing the same thing as Corry. The Fitch actually came to the rescue of the Corry personnel, saving many of them, in addition to continuing to counter-battery against the Germans on the shore. HERE is a link to their deck log. Interesting reading, to put it mildly!
Lastly the USS McCook, DD-496. McCook departed with Destroyer Squadron 18 (DesRon 18) and ships of Assault Force “O” for the coast of France. Early 6 June, she arrived in the Baie de la Seine and at 03:20 commenced bombardment of the beaches and waterfront of the Pointe du Hoc–Vierville-sur-Mer area. By 06:16 she had neutralized her assigned targets (three pillboxes, 13 machine gun nests and three shore guns) and had begun to take on targets of opportunity. By the end of the day, she had added to her score seven pillboxes, eight gun emplacements and ten stone houses, in which enemy machine guns and snipers had been placed.
One of the things McCook did was take out the batteries at the top of Pointe du Hoc, allowing 2nd Ranger Battalion to actually make the climb.
I know this is not the standard D-Day post, but I wanted to take a little bit of a different tack than what you normally see…

Busy month…

Posted on by June 5, 2024

During WWII…

June 3-6 1942 was the Battle of Midway in the Pacific, the first ‘win’ for the Americans against the Japanese… HERE is the Navy combat narratives from the battle.

Midway was also where the US lost the USS Yorktown, the second carrier lost (USS Lexington was lost at Coral Sea).

Two years later, Operation Neptune kicked off June 5, 1944 with the largest amphibious force ever assembled getting underway heading for the beaches of France, with the planned landings occuring on June 6th.

After General Dwight D. Eisenhower was appointed Supreme Commander, he and General Sir Bernard L. Montgomery modified the plan, expanding the size of the beachhead and the number of divisions in the initial assault. This, led Allied leaders to set June 5, 1944, as the invasion’s D-Day. But on the morning of June 4, meteorologists predicted foul weather over the English Channel on the 5th, leading Eisenhower to postpone the attack for 24 hours. The delay was unnerving for soldiers, sailors, and airmen, but when meteorologists forecast a brief window of clearer weather over the channel on June 6, Eisenhower made the decision to go. It was one of the gutsiest decisions of the war. 

Detailed timeline and pics HERE from the National WWII Museum.

The folks that fought WWII were truly the Greatest Generation, IMHO.