The lost episode

We have added another Apple product to the long list of electronic devices in our home.  The Apple tv device will allow us to spend countless more hours on the couch.  Hmmmm......  Not sure this was the best move, in retrospect.  We may actually cancel the costly uverse account, so that might be a good tradeoff.

I was lobbying for a Roku (as I am on an Android kick lately), but I lost that battle.  The Spousal Unit (SU) was right, the Apple tv was incredibly easy to install, and it has a slick interface.

[borrowed from http://chicagomaroon.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/DowntonAbbey.jpg]

I went to bed early last night, and I got up early to find that SU had downloaded the third episode of Downton Abbey from season one.  For some reason, our local public TV station did not buy that episode from the BBC, and it created lots of confusion in our household.

First I blamed it on the DVR not recording that episode.  These mistakes sometimes happen when the tv programming info is not completely accurate.  It happens quite frequently when a sporting event goes longer than scheduled.

SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then the replays of season one came out, and I was sure that we would be able to recover the lost episode, with all the critical scenes when Lady Mary sleeps with the Turkish diplomat.

Tonite is the final episode of season three.  So sad, but at least Game of Thrones will be airing new episodes soon!

Who is in charge?

My husband and I have watched WAY too much of what I would call "News-o-tainment" in the last 6 years.  Given that we are on the left of the political spectrum (in the USA), the bulk of that viewing is centered around MSNBC.  We can spend 2+ hours a night watching this stuff.  I call it stuff because the big issues are discussed by the various commentators one after another.  They all take a slightly different spin on these similar stories, but the major nuggets are still the same.

They are most often discussing craziness inside the Beltway, but all the studios are in NYC.  I started to wonder why they are all in New York when a lot of the stories they are covering are happening in between Maryland and Virginia.

Right now I am watching a segment of "UP with Chris Hayes" where they are discussing what is dragging down the economy.  I must admit that I like TV programs that make me think about things more deeply (as long as they are not messy emotional things.........)

So I had a revelation about why this is, and it has to do with these two guys pictured below.

borrowed from http://www.thegmanifesto.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/bull-and-bear.gif

"Politicians need to understand that governing by polls is a real problem," said Paul Krugman.  He might not have said problem, but I am too lazy to back up the DVR and figure out what the actual word was.  The message is still the same though, and that is that the fiscal cliff was a figment of the overworked amigdullae of certain politicians who think that the stimulus was a REALLY bad thing and the members of the media who like to make things sound more dire than they actually might be.

There was no way that Wall Street was going to allow our nation to default on their debt.  It just wasn't going to happen.

Hence the title of this blog.  Are the legislators in DC really controlling the course of our nation's finances, or is it the two animals pictured above, known for their fury and hibernation, respectively.

Think about it, and please leave a comment if you would like to engage in some political debate!

cool customers

Yesterday was quite fun (exclusive of the TWA 800 flashbacks) but draining.  I participated in an ice rescue exercise in Ohio which simulated the crash of a commuter airplane into Lake Erie.

Lots of adrenaline flowing even though it was not a real emergency.  Everything went pretty well other than one first responder who was injured when she slipped on the ice and fell.  That was a firefighter who did not have ice cleats on.  Bad move when you are try8ing to pull a heavy aluminum skiff across slippery melting ice.  I was so excited to put on my drysuit and play in the cold that I left my cleats up in the building, but I took tiny little steps and wasn't pulling anything heavy.

Here are a few good pictures of the event from the Coast Guard's visual imagery database:

overhead shot from a Dolphin helicopter

coasties waiting to be rescued

amazing what you can do with a chainsaw!

I know it looks like a banana, but this inflatable we call the Skiff-Ice.  You blow it up with a scuba tank.

These are all from the short haul part of the exercise, where the rescuers walk out on the ice to recover people in distress.  The ice here was not very thick, so it could not support the weight of the airboats.  The long haul location was in Sandusky Bay to the south, where the ice was much thicker.

If you check out this site, you can see more of the pictures from the sunny day near USCG Station Marblehead.

Odd / Even Conundrum

I used to have a thing about not liking odd numbers, but I think I am gradually getting over that.

I was born in an even year, most of my graduations occurred in even years, I got married in an even year......  I think you get the picture.

It wasn't until I met my friend Chris that I started to think more favorably about odds.  I mean, I had friends in school that were one year older or younger than me, but one day Chris made a funny statement that I HAD to follow up with more questions.

We were at some work meeting, and she was chatting away with some CAPT that she had just met, and they really were hitting it off; in that electric way where you can almost complete the other person's sentences, and they laugh at most of your "new person" jokes.  [A "new person" joke in my book is one that you can tell someone you just met, without much fear of offending them.]

I didn't really interact much with this CAPT during the meeting, but at lunch Chris mentioned, "I could tell that he was an 'odd year' before I even asked him!"  When pressed for more information, she explained that at the USCG Academy the odds and evens have a strong affinity for one another.

I guess it is similar to my all girls Catholic high school experience, where each member of the new freshman class get a junior to look out for them.  OK, there is some hazing involved, but nothing too serious.  The nuns make sure of that........

I think that the hazing Chris went through was a bit more significant, and it was coming from the 'evens' who had been there one year longer than she had.  The second class 'odds' were the ones making sure that the 'evens' didn't get out of hand with the new fourth class cadets.

She went on to explain things I can't even remember the specifics of, but it was something along the lines of, "You can always tell an 'even' by their {add desired characteristic here}."  I started to think back on all the Academy grads I had run across during my career, and if I knew what year they were commissioned, I tried to decide if they fit the picture Chris was painting.

Sometimes it made sense, and other times it didn't.

It reminded me of the reversible polyester pinnies that we wore during soccer or field hockey scrimmages in college.  They were not as nice as those pictured below, but they allowed us to easily switch teams so the coach could try out new combinations of players together.

[borrowed from http://bceagles.cbscollegestore.com/store/Vendor396/fullscale/rsz_bc_league_womens_pinnie-c.jpg]

Ours were gold on one side, greyish on the other, so the common chant was, "Gold is great!  Grey is gross!"  Luckily both those words started with G, so it was easy to switch the order around if you got moved to the 'dark' side of the force.  If it was too cold to just wear the pinnies over our sports bras or t-shirts, we wore our sweatshirts inside out, or rightside out, as the case may be.

I cannot remember what the chant was for sweatshirt weather.  Maybe it was, "Gray is great!  White is weak!"

[interesting change in spelling I made of the colour in that last quote, as the President of the University was Dr. Gray during my time there.  I wonder if she was ever passing by Stagg Field and heard us chanting??????  Did she think we were talking about her?]

But, as usual, I digress.  The point of this blog is that a leopard can change its spots more easily than you would imagine, and even an 'even' like me can finally make piece with the 'odds'!

The great whiskey barrel experiment

Every day at work I can look out my window and see the shores of Windsor, BC.  On a good day, when I get to spend some time outdoors, and if the wind is blowing JUST the right heading, and the Hiram Walker distillery on the opposite bank of the Detroit River is off-gassing at the right stage of their liquor processing, I can smell some really nice results of the fermentation process.

I think that part of my inspiration for this experiment may have been the MANY barrels of various kinds of liquor that poured across the liquid (riverine) border with Canada during the years of Prohibition.  There are may houses on the small rivers and canals in the areas in and surrounding Detroit which have basement boat bays that facilitated the smuggling of this precious commodity.  The liquor was brought across on a boat, and left the building sometime later in a truck.

[borrowed from https://www.reuther.wayne.edu/files/images/27833.preview.jpg]

This summer I bought two whiskey barrel halves to use as planters in the back yard.  The first one was a VERY well charred barrel that I purchased at the exchange.  I left it in the back seat of my trucklet for a few days (because the bed was too full of other crap, mostly sporting equipment like softball gear and golf clubs), and the aroma of whiskey residue was quite pleasant.

Since I have wanted a backyard fish and turtle pond for some time, I decided to fill the barrel with water and buy a handful feeder fish to live in there for the summer.  I think the barrel was a bit too charred and saturated with alcohol, because none of the 6 fish that I bought survived more than 3 days.

A few weeks later a bought a nicer quality (and much more expensive) barrel half at a local garden store.  This one I also filled with water and threw in maybe a dozen fish.  This time I think the problem was that the weather was too hot, and the poor things were getting boiled to death.  I grabbed a few out before they expired, and put them in with the turtles in the basement.

There were three HUGE goldfish in there already, as goldfish tend to grow very quickly when you feed them turtle pellets.  I gave one of the large guys to a colleague after her son's fish had died.  For the first few days he (Fred) refused to eat the regular goldfish food.  He probably thought that it was dust falling into his new, much smaller home........

Someone left a donut on my battery

The title sounds better if you sing it to the tune of "Grandma got run over by a reindeer!"

As I popped the hood on Bruce the Baja today to make sure that my bug (i.e., windshield wiper) juice dispenser was full, I was surprised to find a partially nibbled upon donut on top of the battery.  Maybe it was a bagel, it was pretty nibbled upon, but the circular shape and the hole in the middle made it fairly recognizable.

I have heard that cats can get inside the engine compartment of many cars and trucks, but the nibbles were so small that I assume this piece of carbohydrate joy was dragged into my car by a hungry little mouse or squirrel, maybe even a vole!

I was about to leave for an appointment, so I didn't take a picture of the offending time before removing it from the battery.  I assume that was the location they chose to store the item because it is nice and flat.

But why didn't they finish the munching, I started to wonder.....

• did the item become distasteful because of some leaking battery acid?
• did the little rodent become forgetful about where it left its comestibles?

It had been a very warm fall, so it is possible that there were so many food options that the little bugger found some more tasty options, like my lily bulbs, for instance.

I can say from a very scary and pukey experience several years ago, that lily bulbs, while they may LOOK a lot like wild onions (especially when someone has mown over the bulk of the original foliage.....), should not be consumed, EVER!  [I will have to check and see if I already wrote about that episode in another blog.  If I haven't, that is a good weekend project for me to document.]

South of US = Canada

I know that most NFL commentators have not had the opportunity to serve as Rhodes Scholars, but it offends me that they have such a poor schooling in geography to make statements like, "this is the only city in the US where you are north of Canada."

There isn't an NFL team in Alaska, but most places in AK are at least West, if not North of the bulk of Canada.

[borrowed from http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/namerica/usstates/aknewzz.gif]

Maybe I would not be so sensitive to these inaccuracies if I had not lived in AK for 4 years, but I am not completely sure about that.  Back to the football game where Megatron is trying to break one of Jerry Rice's records.  

Words create worlds

When I wake up early on the weekend, I try not to disturb the spouse and cats on the bed, gather up my electronic toys/leashes, put my sea otter slippers on, and paddle quietly down to the kitchen.  Once there, I turn on the radio, make (or reheat) some coffee and check my email.  Sometimes I feel inspired enough to do some cleaning or create a blog.  Today I have done both, and it is not even 1000 (that's 10 AM for you non-military types).

credit:  John Goodwin
[borrowed from https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9VJx12PND7Te6qBLAYPSX_ceX-G_3JCFicA8MpM0osLDD8QObyscCS2D9BhRao7dd6LBA-_uuXlOmX4Ovt1aHPRDTj9OzFI8Eg-RJ0SsGi6DdyBvxBHI2AFO715eCCqd8fu-MZtEctqk/s400/Heschel.jpg]

One of my favorite weekend radio programs is "On Being" with Krista Tippet.  This morning she was discussing the life and work of a rabbi who was a friend of Martin Luther King.  His name was Abraham Heschel.  Krista was mentioning something that her dad always told her, that "words create worlds".

This started me thinking about the 'crisis' du jour inside the beltway.  [See my blog from yesterday if you aren't sure what beltway I am referring to....]

Some are calling it the 'fiscal cliff', others are calling it a 'debt crisis', all terms which are meant to be scary and dire.  It is interesting that they are choosing those specific words.

The better explanation of what is going on, in my humble perspective, is just a lack of teamwork.  The two major political parties are so busy scoring points off each other, that they cannot fathom what it would be like to work together.

The words they use to describe one another are almost always divisive, so no wonder they don't want to compromise and get this stuff done before Christmas.

Fear and loathing in the Capitol

I love our nation's Capitol.

I love politics.

Unfortunately for us, politicians are humans, and there are some of them who just don't act very nicely...... especially these last few years in the USA.

[borrowed from http://aoc.gov/sites/default/files/styles/artwork-node/public/images/buildings/6345373408_e4f8fb2728_o_0.jpg]

I was having a long teleconference on tuesday with two colleagues from work.  We were discussion a contentious topic that really makes my blood boil.  At one point I blurted out something along the lines of, "unfortunately for us, we have to deal with humans who will not always tell the truth.  In fact, it is in their interest to lie in certain situations."  I have been in some interesting diplomatic negotiations where you KNOW that the person on the other side of the table is stretching [actually, tearing apart] the truth, but you have to sit there politely and keep your mouth shut.

For me, that is NEARLY impossible.  It helps when you are conducting the negotiations with non-simultaneous translation, because you have time to think of the right way to say, "uh uh!" in a much more graceful manner that doesn't cause an international incident.

I believe that the gentleman whose statue is shown in the picture above, good ole General George, would have been very disgusted with the way that our elected officials in the two houses of Congress are not getting along very well.  We sent them there to do good things on our behalf, but they spend WAY too much time making people worry about made up stuff.

They want us to fear some sort of fiscal cliff, they want us to worry about the future of social security, and one of the minority leaders spent the last four years devoting himself to trying to unseat the president.  Why was he focusing on that, rather than representing the people of his state, and doing things that need to be done?

I know the answer, and it makes me so annoyed that I am going to stop blogging right now and get some breakfast.

Have a great weekend everyone, and try not to be so fearful!

Legacy of service

I only met one of my great grandparents, but I still think that I can draw the connections between some of them to myself.  Having been associated with the military for the past two decades, when you meet someone for the first time and they find out you are a career military member, they often ask you if your parents were in the military.

I love to tell the story of when my dad was in the NJ National Guard during the Vietnam War.  He was a helicopter mechanic, but he didn't really want to fly in the thing after he had worked on it.  It had nothing to do with his confidence that he had maintained or repaired the machinery correctly, he just didn't want to go up in something that didn't have wings.

I frankly don't blame him, but I have enjoyed most of the helo rides I have taken during my time in the service.  However, there is something more comforting about being in a big C-130 fixed wing aircraft that might have a chance of gliding back to terra firm should something bad happen to all 4 of its engines.  I understand the theory of auto rotation of a helo's blades to bring you less precipitously back to earth should its engines fail, but I do not want to experience that first hand.

My dad's brother was a Marine during the same time frame, and though neither of them deployed overseas, they still did their part to serve their country during a very unpopular war.

My Norwegian great grandparents were soldiers of a different stripe.  They both served in the Salvation Army in New York for many years.  One of them achieved the rank of Colonel.  I am not sure exactly what that means when you are trying to save people's souls in terms of what I know of the US military chain of command, but it still sounds pretty impressive!

[borrowed from http://kxlt.images.worldnow.com/images/20171502_BG1.jpg]

I always think of these ancestors in particular during the holiday season, when I see the folks with the red kettles outside stores collecting money.  Please be as generous as you can during the holiday season (and the rest of the year as well) to great philanthropic organizations such as the Salvation Army, American Red Cross, Red Crescent, Heifer International, etc.

Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year to all!