Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero, which I understand to mean something along the lines of pluck the day as you would a ripe apple begging to be eaten, but don’t hold out hope for tomorrow.
I’ve mentioned it before, but it bears repeating. If you don’t know what moss growing on a rock looks like, a wide river flowing downstream, or the fantastic twist of a forest….don’t tell me how to live. You are a slave. You don’t know it. You can’t understand what has been taken from you if you never knew it was there in the first place. Living like an insect in a hive is not living at all.
Bullet Points:
** Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign donated $500,000 to Al Sharpton’s nonprofit organization just weeks before the anti-Semitic MSNBC host—who once said that “diamond merchant” Jews have the “blood of innocent babies” on their hands—conducted a friendly interview with Harris. The campaign’s remittance to Sharpton’s National Action Network was part of a flurry of donations—$5.4 million—to black and Latino advocacy groups to win Harris’s support from those constituencies. According to campaign finance records, Harris’s campaign gave two payments of $250,000 to the National Action Network on Sept. 5 and Oct. 1.
** Elon Musk said he wanted to die on Mars, but not on impact.
** SpaceX – shark hunting – and government. Musk is the right guy to put in charge of government efficiency.
** When nuclear submarines are at sea, they remain submerged in a sealed atmosphere. Part of the atmosphere control system functions is to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) since a build-up of carbon dioxide can become fatal. Submarines use a chemical called amine to remove carbon dioxide. When amine is cool, it absorbs carbon dioxide; when hot, it releases it. So the amine is cycled through a machine called a CO2 Scrubber, which alternately heats and cools the carbon dioxide and pushes the gas into the ocean, keeping the atmosphere breathable.
This is a very effective system. The downside is that the amine imparts a rather “unique” smell into the atmosphere, ultimately permeating every part of the submarine interior, including crew members’ clothing and skin.
In addition to the amine smell, submarine crews are exposed to cooking odors, hydraulic oil vapors, diesel exhaust that isn’t entirely captured by the diesel exhaust system, inboard venting of the sanitary tanks, and the smell of a large number of closely confined people. The interiors become fragrant. Crew members become accustomed to it and, after a while, never notice it. But other people do.
** The next generation of AI robotics is on display here.
** Without debate, the Chicago City Council voted unanimously Thursday to reject Mayor Brandon Johnson’s proposed $300 million property tax hike, sending negotiations over the city’s spending plan for 2025 back to square one. I can’t believe the democrats found a tax they didn’t love.
***
Places that may not be the safe option for your next vacation
***
From Mike Rowe
Last week in Baltimore, Uber charged me $85 for a trip that usually costs $20. I looked into how their “surge pricing” model actually works and didn’t like what I learned. So today, after checking out of my hotel in Oklahoma, I called Lyft instead and was picked up by a guy named Mike. He was driving a red F-150, a work truck full of tools and lumber. I sat up front.
“How far to the airport,” I asked.
“Fifteen minutes,” he said. “You in a hurry?”
“Not really,” I said. “Are you?”
“Never.”
As we merged onto the highway and settled into the slow lane, I asked Mike if he was a carpenter in real life.
“Among other things,” he said.
“Jack of all trades?”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” he said. Back in the seventies, I was a plumber’s helper. Then I worked for a spell in the heating and air condition game.”
“How was that?,” I asked.
“Hot and cold,” he said.
I honestly couldn’t tell if he was making a joke or not. His voice had a classic midwestern drawl, and his face had no expression as he stared out the windshield.
“After that, I started carpentry. Trim, then framing. Then, I moved on to building custom cabinets in rich people’s houses. Figured out how to build spiral staircases and furniture. Did pretty good.”
“You retired now?
“No. I build campers these days.”
“What kind of campers?” I asked.
“I build them small ones you can tow pretty much anywhere. They call ‘em teardrop trailers. Got popular during the lockdowns. I build ‘em by hand, one at a time.”
“Yeah? How’s the quality,” I asked.
“Pretty good,” he said.
“Got a website,” I asked.
“Sure,” he said. “Gotta have a website these days.”
“What’s your website called,” I asked.
“Mike’s Pretty Good Campers.”
I still couldn’t tell if he was messing with me.
“Your company is called ‘Mike’s Pretty Good Campers?’”
“I like to manage expectations,” said Mike.
“Under promise and over deliver?”
“That’s the idea,” said Mike.
“Is that what you did before you picked me up just now? Building a pretty good camper?”
“Yup. But I was starting to get frustrated. And I don’t like to work when I’m frustrated. So, now and then, I gotta step away.”
“And drive a stranger to the airport?” I said.
“Never too frustrated to drive,” said Mike. “Driving relaxes me. Besides, we ain’t strangers no more, are we?”
“No,” I said. “I suppose we’re not.”
As we turned on Airport Road, I said, “So what’s the plan? Drop me off and wait for another call. Or head back to the shop and finish building that pretty good camper?”
“Ain’t decided yet. Guess I’ll see how I feel in a few minutes.”
“Good plan,” I said. By the way, if I like your website, would you mind if I shared it on Facebook?”
“Why would you want to do that?” he asked.
“I’ve got a few people who follow me on social media,” I said. “I’m not sure why they do, but they do. Maybe some of them are in the market for a pretty good camper, custom-made by a quasi-retired carpenter who drives for Lyft when he’s feeling frustrated?”
“Can’t hurt,” said Mike. “Once people see these things, they fall in love with ‘em. They have conventions all over the country for teardrop trailer owners. Thousands show up. You wouldn’t believe how people decorate ‘em and such.”
“I don’t know about that, Mike. I’ll believe pretty much anything these days.”
As we pulled up to the airport, Mike asked me what carrier I was on.
“American,” I said. “Right here is fine.”
“Pre-check?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“Well then, you don’t want to get out at American. Let me take you to the end. Otherwise, you got a walk across the whole dang the terminal.”
We pulled up to the curb at the end of Will Rogers Airport. I hopped out as Mike dragged my bags out of the bed of his work truck.
“You look familiar,” he said. “Have I driven you before?”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “I would have remembered. Thanks for the lift.”
“No problem,” he said. “Was the ride okay?”
“It was a pretty good lift,” I said. Somewhere behind his mustache, Mike might have smiled as I walked into the only airport in America named for a cowboy who never met a man he didn’t like. There, I boarded my plane and checked to see if there really was website called “Mike’s Pretty Good Campers.”
Son of a gun…
Would you like to see Justice Sotomayor resign
And be replaced by the Ho (who is an attorney of sorts)
Death Wish? Pushing for a Darwin Award?
The Bear-Tu-95’s contra-rotating propellers are 5.6 meters in diameter, and their tips break the sound barrier as they rotate, making them extremely loud. 15,000 hp NK-12 turboprop engines drive them. They could be deaf – but the vibration? Maybe it’s a Russian thing?
How Green is It?
I know the term “fossil fuel” is misleading, but I didn’t want to go down that rabbit hole with this particular graphic. The question of carbon dioxide and how much is a good thing and how much is a bad thing always comes into play, too. Then there is the question of whether we’re headed for another ice age and whether more carbon (CO2) will forestall that.
Identify the Vehicle
1
2
You need to be exact here because there were variants. It was developed at Factory No. 75 in Kharkiv, Ukraine, as a tank that was as light and low profile as possible. Less than 6 feet tall, a flat-12 diesel engine helped to maintain the low silhouette. All crew members, including the driver, were inside the turret. The driver’s position moved independently to the turret to keep him facing forward. A 100 mm M-63 gun served as main armament.
Identify the Aircraft
3
This aircraft has made more than one appearance before – yet it returns.
4
5 & 6
Parting Shot
End
3 is Fairey Barracuda
4 is Saab 32 Lansen
Identify the Vehicle:
1. M110 howitzer
2. Object 416
Identify the Aircraft:
3. Fairey Barracuda
4. Saab 32 Lansen
5. Top aircraft: Leduc 0.10
6. Bottom aircraft: SNCASE SE.161 Languedoc
Yes!
Mike Rowe is a national treasure. From the looks of Mikes pretty good campers website, he doesn’t have any problem selling them now. He’s going to be swamped.
I’ve ridden drag on the south end of a bunch of north bound cows outside of Foreacre Oklahoma. I would much rather breath the dust and flatulence then the exhaust of a 1,000 cars in lockstep driving down the road.
Add a bellering, (or bellowing if you prefer) wiggling, few days old calf that’s too weak to trail across your saddle and legs. Add the excrement and pee that goes with it, while an anxious mama cow stays close and you’ve got the whole picture.
I spent my junior high school summer pulling cattle out of quicksand in the Green River in Southern Colorado (and into a few miles of Utah) and liked it well enough, but I was young and strong. Often the calves stuck in the sand would drown because they couldn’t keep their heads up even though the water wasn’t that deep. Sometimes I saved them. Sometimes I wasn’t there in time riding the river as I did. Before that I herded sheep in the summer as a relief herder for a couple of weeks at a stretch and lived in a sheep camp trailer (sturdy contraption). They had one on the Green but a lot of days I didn’t get back to it. It wasn’t like riding drag on a herd because I was by myself. The cattle boss left food in the trailer for me since our paths seldom crossed.
**
At the risk of making it sound too ideal, I met a lot of cowboys who were 35 going on 200. A lot of them rode the rodeo circuit and were thrashed (days before helmets, vests, or safety equipment of any kind). It wasn’t a fate that I wanted for myself. So I took off and found another physically demanding job that also beat me up. I’m not too bright.
Survival of an animal being stuck in mud/quicksand/injured/etc., always seemed to me to be a crap shoot. But, with them being in your care you do the best you can to save ’em, even if it’s a scrub.
IDV:
1. M110 howitzer
2. Object 416
IDA:
3. Fairey Barracuda
4. Saab 32 Lansen
5. Top aircraft: Leduc 0.10
6. Bottom aircraft: SNCASE SE.161 Languedoc
IDV correction:
2. Obliekt “Object” 416 a.k.a SU-100M prototype light tank
More correct on #2.
*
I know you weren’t a cannon cocker, but did you ever play with the M110s when you were in the green machine?
The M110 SASS where great for urban combat operations. They could be outfitted with just about any optic, suppressor or compensator you could think of. Very versatile and held a 1.1MOA with 7.62×51 boat tail. I shot .67 MOA shot groups at 100yds. Though not popular choice I threw a Leopold MK4 optic that I would change out for the “Brick” AN-PVS10 depending on what the mission called for.
If you are ever in Paris, and have a bit of extra time, visit The Musée de l’air et de l’espace. That is the French national air and space museum at Le Bourget Airfield. The online tour doesn’t give the viewer a good look at what is really there. There are the usual planes and rockets, but also there are the sole surviving examples of early French aviation, a gondola from a WW I Zeppelin, and of course Concorde 1 which is open to walk through. Then the experimental planes, such as the Leduc series are on display and the imagination of interwar and post WW II aircraft is amazing. It is well worth the visit if you like planes or aviation history.
What do you mean submariner smell different? Being 37 days underwater before pulling into Toulon just before Christmas (the whole French Mediterranean fleet in port and lit up for the holiday did make one question why we has to go back to sea on the 26th, darn Russians or something) doesn’t affect one’s smell, especially after a submarine shower. The ladies in the perfume shop we smiling the whole time. The girlfriend loved the Opium (French connection too). The lingerie shopping was a blast too. Lord knows what that would be like in Biden’s navy. (66 days 19 hours to go. Not that I’m counting or anything)
Yes, a lot of the 688 and newer boats are out for six months at a stretch. Some push it longer if a maintenance issue keeps their relief in port.
The ole swayback (now long scrapped) was commissioned before I was born. Our deployments were 8-9 months from homeport. Not all that time is at sea though. Stores load and all that. She ran better the longer we were up and running. Less health issues after the first week or so as the various respiratory bugs ran through everyone’s system.
One of my best friends in high school became a sonar tech on a boomer. He hated it as they hardly ever did anything except creep away from any “interesting” contacts. Very occasionally they would set up a mock attack, but not all that often. He got in despite one lazy eye that pointed off in the wrong direction. He was as surprised as I was that the military had no interest whatsoever in our (Navy) dependent medical records that covered our entire lives to that point, so they didn’t know about his asthma. When he had an attack of it while in Puerto Rico for training while the Blue crew was on patrol, he ended up getting discharged. That was ironic, because the one place he never, ever had any issue with asthma was at sea on the boomer.
I will post a Navy tutorial in the future for reference.
Fast attack, everything else is a target. We had a reactor operator develop diabetes. Got a medical discharge and went to work at Millstone as an RO. Made about 3 times what we did and sea time, of course, went to zero.
The plot of CO2 emissions of the rest of the world and why we get hammered but the big one doesn’t is just the start. For example, a recent study of historical temperatures showed that when they compare our current global average temperature to the 1850s, it’s not just the start of the industrial age. It’s the coldest point in pretty much the last half billion years. A question I’ve never seen talked about is isn’t that too cold to use as the “normal” comparison?
.
Yet another question we never see asked is “what’s the uncertainty of those predictions?” We know that the predictions of gloom have been horribly overstated. That gets posted as meme around once a month. The question is they’re predicting around 3 degrees increase in temperature by 2100 if we don’t basically shut down the world, how certain is that? I’ve seen the real uncertainty is from 20 degrees warming to 15 degrees cooling, so the uncertainty is over 10 times the predicted increase (35 vs. 3). How many people have to die for an uncertainty that bad. “Sorry, grandpa (that would be you or me) that we let you die to keep the globe from getting hotter when it actually got MUCH colder.” As an engineer, I’m expected to give some predicted specifications to within a couple of percent (depending on the job) of what the circuit delivers. In what world is an error 10 times the prediction allowable? 1000% error?
If you’re woke, you spout bullshit and expect the rest of us to swallow it. And you’re shocked when we don’t. Because we don’t we need to be beaten into submission until we love Big Brother. — and that’s why Pres. Trump won.
Here in PA they’re trying to steal Ken McCormick’s seat with a recount. They argue that not all the Casey ballots were counted. The left is trying to enter just enough ballots to put Casey back in. They also claim they will not accept the results from the official PA election judge(s) until the vote goes they’re way…petchilant blue haired children. I know Dems that voted for McCormick.
We say, “Too big to rig.” PA Dems say, “Hold my beer.”
1. our 9th grade English teacher had us read (and try to interpret) the four stanza’s of R. Herrick’s poem ‘To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time’; we were also supposed to finish reading a translation of all of Horace’s Odes in Book I by the end of the year (and turn in a paper on one of them [or we could repeat the year]). This was in a public school in a small truck farming town in upstate NY; go ahead: compare it to the education the kids receive today.
2. amazing! “Places that may not be the safe option for your next vacation…” somehow correlates quite well with the USCCA Concealed Carry Reciprocity Map. why is that I wonder!
3. Carbon Dioxide, my person impression:
I think that one of the low-level people who was going to become a staff writer on one of the “wymin’s magazine” had to take a chemistry class in high school which he/she/it hated and only passed because… this person heard in the dim recesses of what passes for a mind that that carbon monoxide is poisonous and thought that since carbon dioxide had an extra oxygen it was twice poisonous.
I honestly think that’s how we got to this confusion about the need for this life-giving (for plants) material.
Though I will say this: there was a time (in the late ’50s) when driving back home from upstate NY, my eyes would start tearing. it wasn’t ’til much later that I understood that I was entering an entirely different atmosphere; there was a bubble of red air hanging over “Da City”, a mixture of carbon monoxide, nitrous oxide and other noxious elements; it has cleared today – somewhat.
Oregon is a perfectly safe place to vacation, just avoid Portland, Eugene, Salem, Bend (not dangerous, just too big & crowded), and Corvallis (not dangerous, just too many liberals & college kids).
The beaches are beautiful, but if you feel an earthquake, you have 15 minutes to get inland and/or above 250′, or you will die in a tsunami.
Also the gas prices are a hazard to your wallet.
I was very close to moving to the Applegate Valley instead of to the White Wolf Mine (Mogollon Rim, AZ). Grant’s Pass would have been Ok (Josephine County) but the policies that govern the place are dictated by turds in the big city. You could argue the same thing of Arizona but the reality is that Arizona is the Old West (still) and Oregon isn’t. Political shitbirds and misfits in Phoenix may talk a good game but they’re ignored elsewhere.
Don in Oregon, boy howdy you have that right. Oregon boy here, left in 2000 for greener pastures in the mid-west. Moved back about a year and half ago to Douglas County. I am planning to move back to the mid-west in March of next year. Kevin in Oregon…
The closer to Idaho or Nevada, the better Oregon gets.
Oregon is a lovely state. It’s a shame that so many communists have settled/squatted there.
Tom,
we finally departed from Orygun, far SE exurbs of Portland with 8 acres in Doug Pine.
even leaving Lung Eil’nd many moons before wasn’t that much of an absolute relief,
our area went from a slight, if I may say it, lavender, to a dark navy blue. almost ultra-violet, but high socialist-progressive, the color you can still see in Kalifurnya
we’re very happily outta it
problem is, no matter how much ur neighbors may think as you do, it’s still governed outta Slayem.
“no matter how much ur neighbors may think as you do, it’s still governed outta Slayem.” That tipped the scales for me away from OR.
I need to get that T-shirt!
X2
LL, what a cool story about Mike Rowe, my hero! I pilfered the story and posted it over at BN. Thanks! If I was was 30 years younger I would have one of those campers, but being fat and crippled… I like my 19′ Jayco travel trailer with my full side bed and mu commode.
You have to go with what works. I don’t mind people stealing what I’ve stolen and posted here. There is no honor among thieves.
Russians are the definition of fatalistic. Get minced into atmospheric haze by a gas-turbine powered
blender? Meh. No worse than any other day in Russia.
*
– Kle.
They are not as bad as the French (Life is shit – La vie est de la merde) though the most important word in Russian seems to be dermo (Жизнь дерьмо) which means the same as merde. Russian leads the world in chess masters and axe murders. Russians brood about things and with the French there is a cultural difference that is not quite cognitive dissonence.
Russia has always wanted to be France. They even have the same flag.
I think Peak Russia was the Napoleonic Wars, when they got to celebrate despair
with France continuously for almost a decade straight in an immense, futile
bloodbath.
*
… good times…
*
– Kle.
“reject Mayor Brandon Johnson’s proposed $300 million property tax hike”
Perhaps it wasn’t enough …
Re the 688 funk, it’s STILL worlds better than a diesel boat! One of my OCS classmates went to 555, his wife would not let him in the house until he’d taken a shower and threw out all of his uniforms after every underway, because there was no way to get them clean or stop them from stinking! And yes, MIke Rowe is a national treasure!!!
Spending as much time as I did on the Iowa, and all the time at sea with Boeing, I came to appreciate the various different smells on the two ships. And every time I got back from the Iowa, SLW wife joked I “Smelled Like SHIP!”….
When I returned from the Republic of Korea (reeking of Garlic), MRSLL made me undress in the garage and throw laundry into the machine before entering the house. It took a few days to sweat out all of the garlic.
Ummmmm…..KIMCHI!
.
One of my Korean buddies and his wife used to make amazingly good kimchi. They used recipes from their great-great-great grandparents that had been handed down over the years.
I like the LA infographic in this informative post, but that’s just me.
I’m a refugee. Of course I fled pre-Covid.
“I’ve mentioned it before, but it bears repeating. If you don’t know what moss growing on a rock looks like, a wide river flowing downstream, or the fantastic twist of a forest….don’t tell me how to live. You are a slave. You don’t know it. You can’t understand what has been taken from you if you never knew it was there in the first place. Living like an insect in a hive is not living at all.”
Well said! Must quote you.
So de we. Getting out of the L.A. basin was the best thing we’ve ever done, besides getting married.
Getting my son out was icing on the cake…..