Murphy was a Grunt

Word, as in The

2010-06-27T10:54:00.002-05:00

Bwahaha.

Verily, for I say unto thee, go here and read.

Amen, n' stuff.

ETA: Ruh-Roh, for those with no FB account, try here.

Powndouchery

2010-05-04T12:24:00.003-05:00

One of the greatest gifts the Corps has given me is the ability to determine the potential FAIL of others rather than learning by my own failage. Granted, this is a rather easy example, doesn't take much to figure out which way this one is going to go, but it did make me chuckle.

Helpful suggestions for teh internets:

Get off of 'em every once in a while.
Don't piss n' moan about the Significant Other...
... especially if she works 50 hours a week, takes a full load of classes, and is your baby momma.
If you do decide to piss n' moan about the SO, understand that it might come back to bite you in the ass.
Leaving your account logged in is an open invite to getting bit in the aforementioned ass, you ass.
Learn to quit while your not too far behind.

Sure there are more suggestions, but I've not finished reading the over 100 pages of peanut gallery color commentary.

LULZ

ETA: read Page 1 for the the set up, then Page 2 for her response. After that, it appears to all be icing on the cake, especially when the douchnozzle keeps responding...

2010-04-09T13:42:00.003-05:00

Been thinking about political asshattery in general, and a few politicians in specific. I try not to dwell on things too much, 'cause, well, there's only just so much bs that I find I can stand, nowadays. I thought it was interesting when my chain of thought took a different track, of sorts.

It started with Georgia's finest, opining on the possibility of military folks decidin' to up and go Guam tippin'...

Bounced around a bit, and then landed on another 'Call me Senator' who apparently got their panties in a bunch in re: the grievous insult of being called, "Ma'am". (Loved how she didn't address him as General during that little exchange, that was the topping on the cake!)

After some twists and turns, my little train wound up on sections of just about every General Petraeus clip that I've heard...

What's the connection, you ask? Political asshattery? Well, yes, but more so than that, was, the bearing of the Admirals and Generals when they have to deal with politicians.

Now, I've done my fair share of pissin' and moanin' about the really-really higher ups, but for the most part, it was more about them than directly because of them. Gettin' to formations 5 hours prior, hand scrubbing an already friggin' immaculate floor in a back room of the out-of-the-way berthing area on ship because the Division's CG is visiting in the same port as us, running fake personal security details / low-tech mine sweeping ops in Iraq, that sort of thing.

I've had to directly, face to face deal with stupid (much lower ranking) Officer questions, but truth be told, they were long and few in between, and for the most part, I'd give 'em credit; they didn't know something, so instead of pretending to be totally on the ball they put it out there and asked someone who did know what was going on. Good on 'em, sorta.

But what struck my mind when thinking about these incidents, and what I'm probably going to keep a look out for in the future is, their bearing. In all of the above mentioned scenes, there was no scoffing, snorting, wtf-ing, laughing, mouth-dropping, or hell, any kind of reaction other than the 100% professional response.

Is there some sort of Command-Staff College Poker class for advanced players going on out there? Holy Hey Zeus, can you imagine if the military got tired of the BS and just informed everyone that any and all future hearings would be responded by Gunny Ermey? Now there's a show I'd like to watch...!

It's Been That Kind Of Day

2010-03-22T07:02:00.002-05:00

source.

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt, bumper sticker, and new set of cammies, afterward. Didn't find it humerous at the time, if I recall, but it sure puts a smile on my face, nowadays...

Pop Quiz

2010-03-21T13:48:00.002-05:00

When, at the range, your pistol mounted gun-light decides to abandon ship upon nearly every shot, it is properly classified as a:

a) weapon or gear malfunction

b) operator error

c) Bush's fault

d) a theoretical enemy diversional tactic

e) karma for pretending your previous shit-hot shooting was anything but pure luck.

Semper Fi...

2010-03-20T11:12:00.004-05:00

... now with extra Moto!

I recently read about this salty senior Lance Corporal in a recent Marine Corps Times, if I recall correctly. Interestingly enough, he has a website. Read the 'toons and the articles beneath, from crazy libo attire, nicknames, the big green weenie, and p.o.ed SNCO-HMFICs, he's done a bit of the same stuff that I've written about, just funnier. Good thing he's getting out, doesn't take a genius to figure out that someone, somewhere, eventually would get all butt-hurt about one of the strips sooner or later. Hopefully, he keeps up with his page now that he's rejoining the really-real world.

No comment from my peanut gallery, m'kay?

Also, a slight word of caution, it is a strip about Marines, so there are going to be the occasional creative variations on the f-word, references to lower-orifice recreational activities, and the like.

Also also speaking of the like, if one should find themselves on Facebook, one should look up a page for F'N Boot!. Marines of a certain type of humor, likely grunts, are probably going to wax nostalgic whilst trying mightily not to spew coffee (or pee) all over the place. And that's just for the wall comments. Venture on to check out the pictures (and related comments) for that page at your own risk. I did mention that Marine grunts would like it, right? Let me put it this way, I'm reluctant to even link from here, if that's telling you anything. Some pictures (but mostly comments) are definitely not suitable for polite, mixed, adult, civi, or any other type of company.

Ever.

Hell, I'm offended by some of 'em.

They tend to go off on anyone who's ever been; a boot Marine, female, reservist, infantry, non-infantry, Officer, on camera sober, on camera drunk, in blues & alphas, on downtime in the States or deployed, tattooed, - basically, anyone who isn't a unanimously acknowledged bad-ass of Marine Corps combat history. Mostly hilarious, in other words.

'Special Attention' is bestowed to those who are photographed while wearing uniforms and awards not legitimately earned.

Should you happen to check out the pics, my personal favorite at the moment (and coincidentally enough my current desktop image at the house), is this one.

Yeah, it's that kind of page.

Pshaw, Whippersnappers

2010-03-05T13:55:00.004-06:00

Not too terribly long ago, I was over at a track, killin' time trying to get a feel for how my shins were. I was wandering around looking for a semi dry spot to stretch when I saw something that caught my eye.

A pair of ratty old USMC issued PT sweatpants.

I sidled up to the owner of said sweatpants and asked the ever popular gettin' to know you question, "So, who're'you with?"

He told me his old unit, and it just so happened that it was the same bunch that my unit relieved over in Iraq.

"Great outfit, says I", deciding that my shins were merely tender (and thankfully not worse), "good group of guys. We actually relieved y'all at Camp Cupcake in '04..." I prattled off, reliving some fond memories.

He let me continue for a while, doing his own stretches, before he interrupted with a grunt and a "Sheeit dude, I wasn't there way back in 2004, I was in boot camp then."

"Way back", sheesh.

It Walks, It Talks...

2010-02-07T23:07:00.003-06:00

Well, not really, but y'all already knew that.

See, what had happened was that families, doing what they do, tend to expand with the additions of new little ones. A particular little one, curious and with a mischievous monkey-like climbing abilities, managed to apparently to defeat the eagle eye of his mommy, hump up a set of stairs, and either did a max set of pull-ups on the fancy bed blanket thing or directly onto the bedside hooya where I kept my laptop.

Yup, "kept".

Seems to me that HP make a pretty good laptop, as it was fairly old, and considering who used it (moi), you can bet it was pretty much the definition of used hard and put up wet.

It was not, apparently, drop proof.

I thought it was a cute touch, however, when My Love had placed the laptop back on my bedside thingy (table? dresser?), with the power cable's new jaunty 45 degree angle connection to the laptop, and all but completely recessed into the body of the laptop.

Yeah, it was kaput. Would've cost more to fix it than it was worth, all my pics were duped onto the pc and on disc... so, yeah, it's sitting up on my closet shelf, perhaps waiting for a final use at the range, one of these days...

You might be pleased to know that while I declined to mete out any punishment due to the young age of the offender (under 3), not even researching local and country-wide orphanages, I have started a runing countdown, all for the momma's sake, of course, of when that little booger turns of legal age to be sent away to Marine boot camp.

Internet access has been apparently noticeably sporadic since, but hopefully, not too much longer.

In Response to Already Observed Overly-Enthusiastic Holiday Spirit...

2009-11-07T07:28:00.000-06:00

Bah Humbug.

Marvel

2009-10-29T08:32:00.004-05:00

For your viewing pleasure... click and marvel at the dainty tinkle of this zoomie's sterling silver set o' balls!

linkypoo.

n.b. Grunts may want to put down any and all beverages before watching the video. Seriously, I think I damn near literally busted my gut.

Random Internetosity

2009-10-11T12:00:00.001-05:00

"President Obama for the Heisman" (amongst other awards).

I LOLed.

2009-10-06T00:26:00.001-05:00

A good man is in need of good thoughts and prayers.

Whoda thunkit?

2009-09-14T22:34:00.003-05:00

Holy moly, did y'all hear about this?

Kayne West Told to Leave VMAs After Upsetting Taylor Swift.

Now, to be fair, all I really know of these two is 1) She's purdy and 2) She's how young? 3) Hasn't this schmuck done stuff like this before?

Not really sure I could name any songs either have done. Might be able to get kinda close with one or two, and I'm reasonably sure I could point out a song or three if I heard 'em, but that's not what gets me about this story.

What really sticks out to me after hearing about his outburst at her award reception is,

MTV is playing music videos? When did this happen?

WTF, Over.

2009-09-04T16:40:00.004-05:00

When I was in Iraq we had, on occasion, the odd journalist or two posted at our FOB. Officially, we were to extend every courtesy, if asked. We were instructed to provide non-sensitive information if questioned and, for even a suggestion of uncertainty, to professionally and politely refer them to our chain of command, blah, blah, blah.

Unofficially, the word got out that they were to be regarded in the highest of suspicion.

We went with the unofficial word.

This is a pretty good representation of why.

ETA:

Sweetness.

Condolences go out, of course, to the families of the translator and the soldier.

Feliz cumpleaños, Salma!

2009-09-02T09:13:00.004-05:00

1) Nod to Bobby G for the pic, and it's a nice one!

2) You better believe I knew what day it was!

3) *sigh*

I Shouldda Stayed In...

2009-08-26T08:06:00.004-05:00

Hmmm,

Looking at the picture above, what is your first thought?

1) Oh, cool. You can see the mortar round just leaving the tube!

2) (sucking at teeth in a decidedly Senior Staff NCO fashion) where in the &#*@ is their $@&-$^%%!@ kevlar helmets!?

Yeah, me too.

For that and many more cool military pics, go over heah.

For Those Guys In The Baby Namin' Window

2009-08-19T15:31:00.003-05:00

I found out back in the day that baby namin' was a bit like weddings. Once the conversations were out in the open, I realized that My Love had already been planning things for quite some time, I just never knew about it. Also like wedding plans, my input was not exactly needed, followed, or generally appreciated, but I still had to give it. Books and books (and yet more books) of baby names and their various meanings started appearing all over the place. There were still a few lessons to be learned, though.

If there is a particular name passed down from generation to generation, hopefully, this is something that's already been covered with your significant other. Thankfully, we'd already covered this, and there was little debate about what any first-born male child would be named.

She reminded me of the history of twins in her family, and that it might be a good idea to have other boy names ready, in case and for eventually. Good point.

Proposing 'Sue' as an alternate boy's name was kind of funny because I didn't consider myself a country music fan, and I remembered the reference. She's much more the fan of the genre, and didn't.

Superhero names were out, not even up for consideration (she was a party pooper, that way).

When hounded by My Love as to what girl names I really liked, 'Candi', 'Bubbles', and 'Honey' weren't terribly popular suggestions. In my defense, we'd been talking baby names for a long time by then ('bout 10 minutes or so), and my brain was gettin' tuckered out at the time. Shoulda just quit while I was ahead, because 'real' girl names of Salma and Rosalyn got equally chilly responses... go figure.

Random Fun

2009-08-09T18:09:00.003-05:00

Hey, Dancing around with some catch me - do me's on and at risk of nipple chafe isn't as easy as it looks... so I've heard.

Always Faithful

2009-07-29T09:52:00.001-05:00

Read.

More on Parties

2009-07-25T06:20:00.001-05:00

So speaking of parties, I think the best part about house parties is the fact that you can show off your stuff. New grills, shotguns, cars, boats - heck, sometimes the house itself is the new item to show off / check out.

All of that, of course, has nothing on showin' off the babes at the party.

*wink*

Now, there's a progression of the quality of stuff that gets shown off, when movin' on through the years. A few years back, the 'new' stuff was just new to the owner, and usually showed up at the apartment at random intervals usually around when folks would drag stuff out to the corner or out to the dump. Some creative application of school money and / or food cash might lead to a relatively high-quality television entertainment center. Some years later, more & consistent pay and a bit of discipline in spending will inevitably lead to better and better stuff.

At about the time when the majority of my friends were getting married, a few things inevitably happened. They ran out of cash and didn't go to any more parties? No, silly, just the parties themselves changed a bit. When most of the guys have their significant others with them we tend to be a bit better behaved (shocker). The food got a bit better too, come to think of it. More folks kept most of their clothes on (usually), and the get togethers became more about, well, gettin' together and hanging out than what they were in the past.

Inevitably, some couple will announce that they're expecting. Soon after, big ole bellies become on the of the things gettin' showed off at parties. This, of course, leads to the babes mentioned earlier.

There's a few funny things, 'bout baby-attended parties.

First of all, when a baby's gotta eat, they eat, and momma's gonna feed 'em. Most of the ladies got their Hooter Hiders (no kiddin', that's what they call 'em), but I've learned that the covers aren't strictly needed to feed the kiddos, apparently. Now, I'm a fan of the boobies as much as the next guy (mebbe more), and I understand what they're alleged main purpose is really for, and while I'll admit to seeing some level of boobage at parties before, seeing a partially topless good friend can give one pause. Lot's of the guys adopted a practice of entering the house via the laundry room, making a bit more noise when entering a living or dining room, or plain announcing their entrance in a room with one or more feeding babies. Generally, whenever we could we'd just hang out in the garage or out on the driveway / porch with the grill, swappin' stories and/or lies with the rest of the guys.

This is where another thing started to happen, with a disturbing regularity.

More often than not, the new dad(s) would be tellin' horror stories about the delivery, and all the other guys would be listening like so many Pfc's gathered around their grizzled old Sergeant.

"So there we were, the doc in it about to his elbows, when he reaches back and grabs the biggest pair of scissors you ever seen..."

"Hey, Zeus", just about in unison from the rest of the guys.

'Bout this time one or two of the ladies would just happen to wander outside in search of their significant others, and ask them inside. The gathered guys would immediately tend to the grill, their beers, or whatever they could, in somewhat of a 'maybe if I don't see her, my neck will be spared' kind of thought. When the condem-er, said named guy has been called out, there'd be some claps of the back, and well wishes from the spared guys, and a few relieved sighs from those not picked.

What happens when you get called in is something of a practical application test for prospective dads, in a room full of ladies. Sweetness, huh.

First of all, there's holding a baby.

Now, I suppose it's a good idea to practice this sort of thing, but my life experiences weren't exactly geared to holding and caring for small children. Mebbe if they needed some disassembly, oiling, loading and whatnot, but basically a small wriggling infant would be thrust in my arms and a room full of ladies would start giving me / barking advice, all at once. 'Support the head', 'tuck the blanket', and possibly 'raise the bottle' would start flying around the room, all accompanied by the critical gaze of My Love, and the even more critical gaze of the new momma.

Actually reminded me of going in front of a board, somewhat...

The best part of baby-attended parties was the number of baby-oriented conversations that we'd have in the weeks following. My Love was strongly in favor of starting a family immediately after each baby-party, hearing of a co-worker having a baby, seeing a baby on the television, or even hearing one cry out somewhere in the neighborhood. She had the fever, in other words. Me, I was of the opinion that things were going much too well for her to get preggers. Money was coming in pretty good, we were still paying off the credit cards at the time, purchase of the house was then not too far away, we had a little left in the bank at the end of each month, etc. I figgured that I'd lose my job immediately after paying the down payment for the house and right before totaling the car, and then we'd find out that she was pregnant. With twins. Regardless of my thoughts, I was always the thoughtful husband and allowed how we might need to practice the sort of actions that brought about the babies in the first place. Purely selflessly, of course.

A Joke and a Party

2009-07-10T23:47:00.000-05:00

An oldie, recycled, but still somewhat humorous and applicable to a recent story.

Three vets are all walking towards the same intersection in the middle of a small town. They served in different branches of the service, doing different jobs, many years distant, but they had a few similarities. They liked to wear various Marine Corps or Army caps, perhaps a VFW pin, maybe even a set of old comfy boots. The one thing that they all have identically in common is that they are all dragging one leg behind them as they walk.

As they near talkin' distance, the first veteran slaps his right hip and says, "Vietnam, back in '69".

The second vet nods at the first, pats his thigh and says, "Fallujah, back in '04".

The third looks at the other two, grins, points a thumb over his shoulder and says, "Dog turd, 'bout 2 blocks back".

Vets can be like that, about their wounds.

War wounds might be brought up in conversation between vets as a part of story time, a sort of 'life really sucked, back when...'. Sometimes, when the source of a scar might have a more humorous shine to it, it can be more of a 'lemme tell you 'bout the time my dumb-ass tried to change a tire with my forehead right in the middle of a sand-storm'-type story. Other vets don't really run away from talking about their scars, they just don't ever seem to get around to it, either.

I was at a party recently, a birthday party of a buddy o' mine, as it were. Now, I knew that he had taken a round in Iraq back in the day, but that was about it. I didn't serve with him, so I wasn't there when he got hurt. We weren't shower buddies in the civvie world, so everytime I saw him, he had long pants on, so I never even saw his scars. Over time, the one conversation where he mentioned that he'd had a somewhat Really Bad Day more of less faded.

Until the party.

See, his kid was of an age that part of the festivities included various water activities, including getting tossed down a slip and slide, sprayed with a hose, or getting heaved into the kiddie pool. As this is Texas and it's currently hot enough to melt the hair on your head, just about everybody was in shorts and tees, haning out in the shade of the trees and occasionally getting hosed down with water.

Good times.

Good times were kept good by a discrete conversation with some about 1) letting him bring up the scars on his leg, if he wanted to, he would 2) yes, that's probably the entry wound. 3) yup, that would be the exit wound 4) that too, another exit 5) yeah, it's about half as big around as it should be, I would imagine that it hurt like hell - probably still does.

True to form, he came over a bit with a couple of beers (this guy, brining me a beer - sheesh!), patted his leg and said, "good thing I'm already married, 'cause I dunno if I could get many chicks with this leg, huh." I responded by telling him that different ladies go for different things but I still wouldn't want to test out that particular theory, as I've met his wife and have no desire to get on her bad side, at all.

Signal Flare

2009-07-05T10:19:00.004-05:00

Yup, still alive.

It's a shame that I have a no-blogging about-work-rule, because what with all the time I've been spending there in the past month or so, there's some awesome stories. I might have to write a few up and wait for the inevitable time when I'm no longer with this particular company... On a related note, at least to a couple of posts back, money is great (hell, I've at least doubled my usual in my last three paychecks), but time spent in the yard has diminished greatly, to the point where the grass is a lost cause... except for that mutant section, of course, that part just looks mildly pissed-off.

Rumor has it that I might actually have a day off next week, and what with this week's hours continuing the decline by dipping into the low 60s, one would hope that time for just about everything other than shower, sleep, and work (read: mebbe even posting a bloggy post or two) should show signs of improvement.

Reminders

2009-05-16T12:41:00.003-05:00

Stamps have now gone up to 44 cents.
The metric ass-ton of 1 and 2 cent stamps are still in the computer room/office/library/spare bedroom/ah, the hell with it toss that crap in The Room-room from the last time, and for the nest time.
Really should get those last of my bills set up for that automatic withdrawal thingy.
While I'm at it, I should probably take the stack of mail to the Post Office. This is all the crap that is addressed to the old owner of the house I live in. [Yup, the same guy that moved out Over Three Years Ago! Not too pissed about in essence delivering this guy's mail for him (and without those schnazzy shorts, neither), except for...]
Try not to think about my lost letters, plans for reduced delivery 'service', or their creative relocation programs while pondering too much about any of my mail (like say credit card apps.) getting sent to old addresses.
Better go ahead and check my credit report, again.

2009-05-09T02:34:00.003-05:00

Is this thing still on...?

What the hell, am I made of money?

meh

Awhile back when My Love first pitched the idea of cutting back her hours at the office, she mentioned that she could always return to full-time hours, if needed. As I am the somewhat reluctant 'saver' in the relationship and she the buck-wild, former credit card melting, bane of savings accounts everywhere, patron saint of sales clerks' childrens college funds etc etc, I immediately told her she needed to stay full time. Heck, pick up some OT, while she was at it.

After further discussion, we decided that it would be a good idea for her to go part-time.

meh

She's now gone from part-time to no-time, at that job.

meh

Now that she's 'spending' (meh) alot more time at the house, making plans for future upgrades, paint-schemes, redecorating, future purchases and the like, I've been putting in quite a bit of time outside of the house, in the yard. Now, before I get to much further, I should mention that we're fortunate in that her quitting her job is not the end of the world, financially. (I just like to piss and moan). As it looks, we might have to tighten our belts a bit, but nothing that'll lead to me hanging out on the corner showin' a little leg... yet.

Back to the yard.

My yard is lookin' awesome.

Know what really helps out, yard maintenance-wise, besides a wife that's planning to paint the downstairs bathroom for the 12th time?

That's right, the recent run on ammo.

See, I haven't actually bought ammo for a quite a few months now, and while I'm not resigned to collecting rocks for slingshots or anything, I've started to keep an eye on my 'cache', with a mind to conservation. The question arose then of what to do with my ammo acquisition funds. I was mowing my rocks and weeds one day, thinking these deep thoughts, when the mowers started kicking up something totally unexpected. No, it wasn't forgotten lawn ornaments, my feet, feral cats, or small children, but grass. Lush, thick, green grass.

Yeah, 'WTH' was my thought, as well.

I remembered the fertilizer and composts that I was playing around with a couple years back. I had bought a few different type of compost, place some here, scattered some there, and in the end usually managed to sequester roughly half the bag in my pants cuffs for the trip inside the house. It worked pretty good, but after a buddy mentioned some types of fertilizer, I made a trip over to the local Home Depot. I bought a bag, brought it home, poured the stuff in the spreader, and started out. Of course something came up, as it usually does (if I remember correctly it was buying antique furniture), and the bag o' fertilizer spent a bit more time in the spreader than is probably recommended.

I believe it was about 3 or 4 months-ish.

Come spring time (of '08), I dragged the spreader out of the garage, and promptly dropped the ass-end of the spreader (and the solidified fertilizer it held) onto the driveway. I'm not a pro, but I figured that fertilizer on the driveway wouldn't help out too much, and the solid mass of of fertilizer should probably go in the yard. It wasn't all solid,though, there was some brownish liquid that spread out quite nicely with a healthy application of the hose. There was a strip of 'grass' between one side of my driveway and the neighbor's yard that was my lawn-products test strip, so that's where the fertilizer went. All of it (enough for most of the front and back yards) went in that strip.

So here we are, more than a year later, and I have some sort of mutant grass in that strip that grows roughly three inches by the time I've finished mowing it, isn't afraid to reach up and turn the spigot for itself when it gets thirsty, and, (coincidence?) the neighbor lady's cat Fluffy is still missing.

So yeah, I've been putting down compost and fertilizer all over the rest of the yard, in an effort to help it catch up to the mutant-strip.

That, putting in some plants and flowers, re-planting the flowers that died right after planting, replanting those flowers that somebody *innocent whistle* forgot (again?) to water, digging a garden we wanted, filling in the preliminary holes that we dug when we decided that we wanted our garden in a slightly different position, and well, that's what I've been doing for the past month or so.

Wha?

2009-04-16T10:10:00.003-05:00

You know, this is something I never really thought about before, but since you brought it up, Coopster....

0:50

We didn't ask, why do you think he had to tell, hmm?

Morons, 1 - Darwin, 0

2009-04-11T01:55:00.004-05:00

Wowwwww....

I dunno if I'm more upset at the actions in this clip, or the fact that the vest didn't fail outright, leaving future reproduction a terrible possibility. Apparently, these post-operative brain donors have never heard of Murphy's Law, using your head, - or hell, a game of pool.

Warning for language and for friggin' idiots...

Bulletproof Vest Test Goes Wrong - Watch more Funny Videos

2009-04-01T06:53:00.002-05:00

A pretty good example of my wicked-awesome 'puter skillz. Unfortunately, now I have to worry about that worm / viurs / thingy timed for today, anybody else having these kind of issues?

n.b. #1 warning: language.

n.b. #2 minesweeper rocks!

2009-03-28T11:38:00.003-05:00

Yeah, I'd say this fits the bill for amusing... my type of 'amusing', that is. It's not mine obviously, but sent to my email from a friend. HI-larious! Thought the Mommies (and a few of the Daddies) out there would get a kick out of it...

A 3-year-old tells all from his mother's restroom stall.

My little guy, Cade, is quite a talker. He loves to communicate and does it quite well. He talks to people constantly, whether we are in the library, the grocery store or at a drive-thru window. People often comment on how clearly he speaks for a just-turned-3-year-old. And you never have to ask him to turn up the volume. It's always fully cranked. There have been several embarrassing times that I've wished the meaning of his words would have been masked by a not-so-audible voice, but never have I wished this more than last week at Costco.

Halfway, through our shopping trip, nature called, so I took Cade with me into the restroom. If you'd been one of the ladies in the restroom that evening, this is what you would have heard coming from the second to the last stall:

''Mommy, are you gonna go potty? Oh! Why are you putting toiwet paper on the potty, Mommy? Oh! You gonna sit down on da toiwet paper now? Mommy, what are you doing? Mommy, are you gonna go stinkies on the potty?''

At this point I started mentally counting how many women had been in the bathroom when I walked in. Several stalls were full ... 4? 5? Maybe we could wait until they all left before I had to make my debut out of this stall and reveal my identity.

Cade continued: ''Mommy, you ARE going stinkies aren't you? Oh, dats a good girl, Mommy! Are you gonna get some candy for going stinkies on the potty? Let me see doze stinkies, Mommy! Oh...Mommy! I'm trying to see In dere. Oh! I see dem. Dat is a very good girl, Mommy. You are gonna get some candy!''

I heard a few faint chuckles coming from the stalls on either side of me. Where is a screaming new born when you need her? Good grief. This was really getting embarrassing. I was definitely waiting a long time before exiting. Trying to divert him, I said, ''Why don't you look in Mommy's purse and see if you can find some candy. We'll both have some!''

''No, I'm trying to see doze more stinkies...Oh! Mommy!''

He started to gag at this point.

''Uh - oh, Mommy.. I fink I'm gonna frow up. Mommy, doze stinkies are making me frow up!! Dat is so gross!!''

As the gags became louder, so did the chuckles outside my stall.. I quickly flushed the toilet in hopes of changing the
subject. I began to reason with myself: OK. There are four other toilets. If I count four flushes, I can be reasonably assured that those who overheard this embarrassing monologue will be long gone.

''Mommy! Would you get off the potty, now? I want you to be done going stinkies! Get up! Get up!''

He grunted as he tried to pull me off. Now I could hear full-blown laughter. I bent down to count the feet outside my door. ''Oh, are you wooking under dere, Mommy? You wooking under da door? What were you wooking at? Mommy? You wooking at the wady's feet?''

More laughter. I stood inside the locked door and tried to assess the situation.
''Mommy, it's time to wash our hands, now. We have to go out now, Mommy.'' He started pounding on the door. ''Mommy, don't you want to wash your hands? I want to go out!!''

I saw that my wait 'em out' plan was unraveling. I sheepishly opened the door, and found standing outside my stall, twenty to thirty ladies crowded around the stall, all smiling and starting to applaud.

My first thought was complete embarrassment, then I thought, where's the fine print on the 'motherhood contract' where I signed away every bit of my dignity and privacy? But as my little boy gave me a big, cheeky grin while he rubbed bubbly soap between his chubby little hands, I thought, I'd sign it all away again, just to be known as Mommy to this little fellow.

You must pass this on to all the mothers who have had embarrassing moments with their children. Isn't it great to be a parent!!!

Blergh.

2009-03-25T08:21:00.001-05:00

My Great-Grandmother passed this weekend. At... [counting fingers n' toes]... well over 100 years old and with her slowly deteriorating condition (acute well-over-100-years-old-ia), nobody can really say that it was much of a surprise, and I'm sure her latest doc is relieved that she hasn't outlived him like his several predecessors, but it's still somewhat difficult, most of all for the fact that she lived in south America, leaving visits for those of us here in the States too few and far in between.

If this had been the only loss the (extended) family has undergone recently, it would be easier, but unfortunately that hasn't been the case. Been a rough few months, just part of life...

Add to this some fights with an insurance company (Grrrr), miscellaneous medical bills (save for one rump-rogering exception small but numerous), work (too much), sleep (lack of), and realizing that my pants gathered around my ankles is a good indicator of tax time and, well, postings have been at times somewhat of a struggle. This is just a heads up to those sorta kinda in the know and with those with curiosity how things are plodding along here.

More (hopefully frequent and amusing) soon...

Coming Back Home

2009-03-19T08:58:00.005-05:00

Everything is so... damn... green...

I was staring out the window of the bus taking most of my platoon from the base where we landed to Camp Pendleton. I was touched by the reception of the Fire Department's water arch, the volunteers and vets shaking hands and handing out munchies, but my most distinct memory of that ride was the landscape.

It was early Spring, just past the end of Winter, so in reality the area was most likely moving along just as normal, just showing the start of real vegetative growth, but after the sand and rock of Iraq, it was a bit overwhelming. My wide-eye and nose-squishing view of the relative greenyness of real, live, actual grass (and, holy crap, trees!) was interrupted by the flashing red and blue lights of the escort squad cars, leap-frogging the bus convoy to block another intersection.

'Polowsky', in an actually pretty spot-on accent, exclaimed, "Oye, Cortez, la migra, la migra!". 'Cortez' responded with the appropriate (and expected) finger. Both were staring out the window, like myself.

As we approached the base, the buses first crossed the outskirts of the city, where we first started seeing the folks out on their front yards, then in front of their offices, and even a few just walking around. Seemed like a larger number than I would expect were waving and holding 'welcome back' signs. After extended periods of time seeing nothing but the same scruffy Marines, seeing random ladies waving and greeting us was a bit overwhelming, as well.

One of the last speeches that we got before stepping off the bus was from the platoon sergeant. He rose from his seat, called for our attention, and said a few short words. Paraphrasing, he acknowledged that he wasn't going to be too long, because he knew it wouldn't sink in if it was too long.

He told us to enjoy returning home, that we deserved it, for a hard job, done well He told us to remember that just because we were home, well, the job still wasn't completely done, quite yet. He told us to remember that there was quite a few of our Marines that were recuperating, waiting at Camp Pendleton, but still others in hospitals that hadn't recovered enough to greet us.

No reminder was necessary, but he mentioned the 12 Marines that were already home, but that we'd never eventually see or talk to again.

Coming back home was alot like that.

There was almost nearly constant surprise, seeing how much has changed, and realizing that some things had just changed in my perspective. The elation was off the charts, what with guys meeting newborns, reacquainting with wives, taking calls from long-distance family, and beginning the process of unwinding. Every once in a while, though...

From what I understand, a fairly usual homecoming.

Memory snippet above has been rolling around in my head for a bit, but was prompted by an email pointing out a music video by Pat McGee. Good stuff.

snorfle

2009-03-14T01:00:00.001-05:00

Helluva idea.

link. (NSFW-ish.)

Dunno if it'll catch on, though...

Well, Looky There!

2009-03-12T18:00:00.000-05:00

How about that! I just logged into my gmail to see my li'l blog in the 'top recommendations' panel of my reader-thingy. Thought process follows...

Top Recs? I rule!

*clickity-click*

Ah, I see... 'Recommendations for new feeds are generated by comparing your interests with the feeds of users similar to you.' Probably means only I saw the false new-found indicator of my future fame and fortune, huh.

I don't rule, after all.

Holy crap! 74 subscribers?

I rule again!

General Order #4 and Spontaneous Hand and Arm Signals

2009-03-12T09:52:00.000-05:00

4. To repeat all calls from posts more distant to the guard house than my own.

from the General Orders for Sentries.

The General Orders are something that all learn (and well), in boot camp. The way that this one was explained to me was that, back in the 'Old Corps' (which you might remember is the time period of everything up to one day earlier than you entered), before company squad or personal radios, GPS, satellites, and all that happy trash, Marines had to call out to the sentry on either side of them. Leaving one's post is not always possible, due to little things like rules & regs, sneaky bad guys, and worst of all - cranky NCOs. This would ensure that vital word got passed down, you know, stuff like changes in orders, where the enemy was currently attacking, or what, uh, 'entertainer' the guys were going to go visit that night.

This order was reflected, in a way, throughout my time in the Corps, on the 81mm mortar gun line.

Mortar firing ranges are a bit larger than some others, due to a number of factors. Gun positioning mandated that we were at least 40 meters apart, taking into account the killing range of an 81mm round, terrain, our comm abilities, cover and concealment, etc. We were also usually placed into a more or less 'W' shape, to further spread ourselves out, avoid making an easy target by being on line with each other, and the like.

Kinda got to the point where we had to have good comm to function, at all. 'Good' comm(unications, i.e. radios) was not always easy to be had. Heh, on some occasions we were reduced to screaming the commands to guns farther down on the gun line, noise discipline be damned. At least the sounds of the Platoon Sergeant getting about neck deep in the radioman's ass warmed our hearts, 'cause if he was yelling at him, he wasn't chewing us out... as much... usually.

It kind of evolved into a SOP that if the Platoon Sergeant started sounding off at the top of his lungs, you took for granted that either all radios were down, or that perhaps just one line was out. It was then 'OK' to sound off yourself, at least to pass the word. That first word was to make sure that the radio of the gun in question was actually bad, or the gun team leader had his head outta his ass.

One day we were at the range, just about 20 minutes from going hot, all the guns laid in, just waiting for the word. The call came over the radio, "Gun line, gun line, this is FDC... comm check, roger up when you're good to go, over." Following our own procedures, the gun team leaders got on the radio and transmitted their gun and status. "Gun 1, up", followed by "Gun 2, up", and so on and so forth.

I believe I was the Gun 4 gun team leader, at the time.

The gun line radio transmissions came and went down the line... until it got to the last gun, Gun 8. Gun 8 seemed to be our problem child for a while, not 'cause that's where we stored all our shitbirds, but just that it was their bad luck to always be on the ass-end of pretty much everything - the armory draw, PFC allocation, radio issue, last to get the word, and the like.

The Platoon Sergeant had left the FDC (Fire Direction Control, or the 'brains' of the mortar platoon) to check out his gun teams. He had moved more or less straight ahead to the position that Gun 4 occupied. After ensuring that everything was progressing more or less on schedule, he performed a right flank and proceeded down the gun line to Gun 1. One would assume that after completing his checks of 1st section (Guns 1-4), he would then frolic on over to eyeball 2nd section (Guns 5-8). It was when he was at Gun 1's position when Gun 8 failed to come up on the radio to confirm that everything was good to go.

As the radioman was hustling down to the Gun 8 position, the Platoon Sergeant decided to inquire WTF was the hold up. Rather than hop on a radio to ask Gun7, he bellowed out from faaaar right, 'PULL YOUR HEAD OUTTA YER FUCKIN" ASS, YOU!!!'

Remember what I said about passing of word?

Yeah, well, true to form, the entirety of Gun 2 promptly turned to the Gun 3 crew and unanimously passed the word along, at top volume, prompting them to continue the favor down the gun line.

I think hand and arm signals were initiated somewhere between Gun 3 and Gun 4. Really, there was no reason for silent signals as we were screaming at the top of our lungs, but the fact was that by the time Gun 8 got the word, all of Gun 7's crew was doing the same thing - PULL YOUR HEAD OUT (open hands, on either shoulder, moving up as if pulling one's head out) OF YOUR FUCKIN' (violent standing hip thrusts) ASS (*slap*), YOU (pointing).

The Gun8 response detailing how their radio had 'shit the bed' (was out of action) was passed back down with equal speed and humor. Don't think the hand and arm signals (squat w/grunt and folded hands under the head) were passed along to the Platoon Sergeant, though. Just guessing, on that...

Something To Think About

2009-03-09T09:57:00.003-05:00

The Marine Corps SOP class dealing with immediate actions for countering a (close distance) ambush is probably the easiest class to sum up. It is in a word, this;

Attack.

The Marine Corps is big on teaching immediate action drills. These drills ideally will provide the individual Marine with available actions to be done automatically and almost as a reflex to a likely complicating situation. A good example of this is when your rifle or pistol fails to fire, what do you do? If you're anything like me, taprackbang takes longer to type and say than to actually do.

My personal belief is that keeping in mind IA (immediate actions) to a near ambush is just as important subject to address in civilian life, as well. A near ambush as defined by the Marine Corps was one within 50 meters, a distance that falls right into the danger close zone. In your everyday life and without an issued m16/m4, you definition of danger close might vary. Probably the very last thing an enemy can anticipate happening when opening up with all the element of surprise is, instead of his hapless prey flailing about in a panic begging to be disposed of, is to have some or all of his potential targets immediately turn and charge his position. It is this brief hesitation that will provide you with the brief window to re-assume command of the situation and break it off in his ass. In a worse case scenario, it will at least allow you an opportunity to redeem yourself for finding yourself to be in a position to be ambushed, and provide a better chance of survival for others on your team. Your 'team' might not be fellow Marines, or even a friendly acquaintance, but might be friends and family members...

I can't help but think about and be grateful for at times, when watching the news, that there are those that understand this concept - they will not lay down and die, but will fight. They might have not had endless training sessions or even their own weapons, but they had their minds, bare hands, and a determination to stop the attack.

Semper Fidelis.

2009-03-04T10:02:00.003-06:00

Buddy o' mine through work, also a former military guy, calls me up most every day. He's always a bit on the chipper side, and more often than not I'll respond in a growl to his upbeat, "Good morning!" with the ever classic, "What are you, a fuckin' weatherman now?" as an inside joke to our impression of select senior staff NCOs. link

Always good for a chuckle and a few memories...

For further explanation of differences between some of the higher ranks, go hither.

Book Pimpin'

2009-02-25T10:52:00.000-06:00

Awesome.

I got AD's book a little while ago, actually, and wound up reading it fairly quickly. I suppose that it's partly due to the fact that I'm a fairly quick reader, but mainly because of it's a helluva read. It's reads quite a bit like his blog, 'cept that I gotta say that the comments section doesn't seem to work too well (Har!). Seriously though, for being pretty much a completely different subject than my experiences in the Corps, much like his blog, there's quite a few similarities if you know where and how to look.

As an added bonus, Mom really liked it, as well. She spent a short while as a volunteer when we lived in Nowhere, AZ, and she said that it brought back some memories, good and bad and in between, about her time slingin' needles and strappin' bodies. She would've returned it quicker, but...

... Gramma got a hold of the book, and while she reads alot, she doesn't read as quickly as either Mom or I. Gramma was not really a fan, mainly due to the language. Guess she's used to a certain standard of intimidation that'll make a combat vet (and everyone else, really) mind their p's and q's around the teensy and lovable Gramma (as long as you're using nothing more vulgar than an occasional, 'dangit'). Said personae doesn't translate too well to book intimidation, I guess. Heck, that shi-er, stuff just makes it more flavorful to my reading palate!

Can't win 'em all...

Things That Make You Go 'Hmmmm....'

2009-02-23T07:10:00.000-06:00

Two things wrong with this pic... can you tell what they are?

2009-02-21T09:15:00.000-06:00

So, got a call the other day, whilest I was fast asleep.

It was from Baby Sis, and My Love picked up the phone.

Know how you can be kinda-sorta asleep, aware enough to register familiar noises but not really be disturbed by them? Yeah, well this nap was not to be. I could tell almost immediately that My Love was going into comfort-mode, and that Baby Sis was crying. A few seconds more was enough to tell me that it wasn't due to a recent break-up or anything, but due to a 'death in the family'.

Shit.

When I was told that it was that Lazy Bum had died, my thoughts were roughly;

1) Thank God.

2) Er, that didn't sound right...

3)... thank God that it was just one of the cats.

4) Guess I can't really claim to be all that much of a cat person now, huh.

As nap time was pretty much kaput, I threw on some shoes and moseyed on over to Mom's house. Mom was kind of upset, completely understandable due to the fact that she's a stereotypical cat-lady and that this was one of 'Dad's cats'. Lazy Bum was everybodys cat, really, largely due to the fact that he was so dang lazy anyone could pick him up and pet him. Heck, he wouldn't even get outta the way of the over-amorous toy-poodle that Mom dotes on. But he and Dad used to cuddle on the couch, so...

So Mom and I hung out a bit, enough to establish that she'd be ok, more or less. We talked a bit about Dad, all of her 'beasties- those that have died and those that are still roaming around- and that she wanted to bury the cat in the back yard, mebbe plant a tree in a bit. I volunteered to dig the hole with Mom's 2ft shovel and reminisced about good times with an e-tool. Eventually got a little bit of a chuckle out of Mom, telling her about the days in the Corps when a young PFC Murphy had to complete his e-tool qualification, so that was good.

Meh, the whole time that Mom and I were talking, her mother was just sitting on the couch, with an odd expression on her face. See, to her, cats were for killing mice in the barn, and not really much else after that. She was trying to understand, you could see it on her face, but it just wasn't quite working. Guess Gramma definitely fits into the dog-person type.

So, here's to you, Lazy Bum, may the mousies run slow, the milk pour just right, and all the poodles find someone else to bother. Say 'Lo to Dad for me...

Just Passing A Little Word...

2009-02-21T08:30:00.001-06:00

link.

Think of the kittys.

2009-02-17T10:37:00.003-06:00

This Friday, February 20, 2300 CST, Mark is doing another Preparedness Show, focusing on food storage preparations.

Interesting... There's somewhere else besides Mah Belleh to store food...?

Unfortunately, I already know I will be eh, 'at' work, so I'll have to catch this one after the fact. Still looking forward to it, though.

Note To Self: Follow Instructions

2009-02-14T00:03:00.005-06:00

When calling in to Mark's show, the recorded message instructs the caller to press '1' to notify the host that he has a caller on-hold. It might've continued by reciting that the host would be notified anyways, but I took that moment to take a sip of my drink... and decided to just listen on my phone for a bit. Riiiiight about the time when my thought was solidifying about the how to of spreading knowledge and the previous glassy-eyed looks I'd received from some family when it came to talks of ditty-boppin' to San Antonio, or the Valle-

"...a caller from the 512 area code, hello? Hello?"

Nuts. Am I on?

All in all, good show, from all. Plenty o' food for thought when it comes to planning, from starting small, not getting carried away, 'insurance', thumb-drive info, generic posted info, and the like. Good stuff.

Fire In The... Hole?

2009-02-13T20:19:00.006-06:00

Way back in the day, probably similar nowadays, there were a number of ways to identify, off-base, if a guy was a devil-pup. An involuntary, momentary brain-lock upon being addressed in Marine-jargon was most likely a hold-over to recruit days, or those from the School of Infantry, when every Marine was in trouble at one point or another, would be a good sign. Likewise, a subtle shifting to the position of parade rest when addressed by a senior Marine was another. These signals were abandoned as soon as possible by the new Marine, so you couldn't always rely on those to ID who was in SOI or a recent grad.

Another, really easy way to spot an SOI libo Marine, besides the presence of the war-bag ((BOOOT!!!)), would of course be the moto-Ts. Motivational T-shirts were usually decorated with at least 17.5 symbols of the Marine Corps and/or nekkid ladies, death, big ta-tas, weapons, frisky females, other service disparagement, and finally & for a bit of variety, nekkid ladies.

Truly, high fashion it was.

Inevitably, moto-Ts were destined to fall out of favor with most Marines on libo, either due to the 'appropriate civilian attire' requirements that couldn't be wriggled out of, or just plain better fashion sense, as the Marine grew up a bit. This wasn't to imply that the Marine stopped getting moto Ts; oh no, we did, we just stopped wearing them so often on libo. Heh, one somewhat memorable pre-liberty soliloquy that I remember from one of my First Sergeants was the speech, shortly after threatening the well-being of any Marine that found himself in the local pokey at the end of liberty, was the part where he spoke of proper liberty attire. He always said something along the lines of, '... closed toed footwear, no exceptions. Trousers, and if it has loops, a belt, no exceptions. A collared shirt, no exceptions. NO motivational T-shirts, no exceptions. Now, I can't control what you wear out and about in town, but when you leave my area and exit my gate, you will most definitely not be wearing any t-shirt that says something along the lines of,

Eat the

and fuck the

I never actually saw any moto T that had this (or would that be a DE-motivational T?) on it, but then again every time the First Sergeant said it, I know there were a few Marines fantasizing about making one up, just for him...

One important exception to the moto-T rule was, of course, the company T. Every so often, usually during or after a float (deployment on ship), school, combat deployment, or as desired, a unit would come out with a T-shirt. Said shirt would have as its primary color camo green and would usually have a small unit logo on the front and a somewhat larger decoration regarding the units activities on the back. The T would often find its way into the rotation of wear under the cammies, where few would see it. The absence of nekkidness on the T would even make it ok for the odd boots and utes PT, depending on the command, of course.

I have found, now nearly 4 years (!?!) after getting out, that most of my old moto-Ts are getting back into my wear-rotation. Might be a shocker to hear, but I don't get out to the bars nearly as often (or at all, really) as I did before, so the Ts are nearly always worn during my puttering about the house, landscaping, during my 'runs', and whatnot. Some are so frayed and 'holy' that puttering about is about all they're fit for.

Moto-Ts have also become something of the 'easy gift' for My Love. One day she ran into this website, and it quickly became a go-to place for gifts, for me. It's a website devoted to not only the moto-T (and they have come a long way), but bumper-stickers, coins, flags, patches, rank items, and just about everything you could slap an Eagle, Globe, and Anchor on. As I am in danger of entering into 'crusty old bastard' Marine status, even the stuff that was in fashion, then not, and now again is good to go, for me. They send us a nice catalogue every month or so, and apparently the models they use are actual Marines, their wives, girlfriends, and kiddos.

Methinks the inclusion of the ladies cuts down quite a bit on the 'nekkidness' of some of the old stuff that I remember. Sure it's still out there, just not so much from this company.

Anyways, I got the most recent catalogue the other day, and pretty much as soon as I opened it, I saw something... interesting.

Now, I really hope that this is something for the ladies...

I really hope that this example is not in fact 'man-panties' that are now standard issue...

And mebbe it's just me, but 'fire in the hole' is not something that should be used on a pair of panties, man or otherwise. Seeing the phrase, 'fire in the hole' just makes me think that if a Marine were to take 'the li'l General' out for a little 'close order drill' with a 'training buddy' that had 'fire in the hole' on their panties, well, said Marine might have to later 'get his bore punched'.

Any Marine can tell you that 'getting ones bore punched' is never, ever, ever a good thing, probably because that big beefy Doc remembers every crack you ever made about his beloved Navy...

One slightly chuckle-worthy item aside, they are otherwise good-to-go and officially Murphy-approved, as dubious as a distinction as that is...

2009-02-12T13:12:00.000-06:00

Stamps going up... again.

Hey, that reminds me, I have to take some letters (delivered to my house & for the previous owner) to the Post Office. Hell, it's only been almost three years, and his name and that of my wife do share a few letters, so mebbe this'll be the year they figure it out. While I do that, I'll have to try to keep from thinking about all of my mail that's probably still being delivered to random addresses in California and Texas. On a related note, time to pull my credit history again, and check to make sure that no one opened up a credit account for me from one of those addys, as well. After all o' this, I do have that one mortgage bill that I need to switch over to direct withdrawl.

Thanks, USPS!

Good Idears

2009-02-11T10:42:00.000-06:00

Courtesy of Ahab, I ran across this story, about plans in the works in the event things down south go, uh, south... or move north.

Call me crazy, but shouldn't there be somebody, somewhere, who's main job is to think of the crazy, maybe, improbable, possible, prolly never happen but what the hell might as well type situations in the world... and make a rough plan for them? Or is that just me? (I'm ready for your attack, Canada!)

Speaking of preparedness, and how it's nearly always better to have some thoughts before things get froggy, I got an email from Mark about his show. Sounds like he's going to have some interesting folks on, this Friday.

Highlights

2009-02-08T14:48:00.000-06:00

Highlights, from this past Saturday, at the Bracken Range.

Take a wild shot in the dark as to who managed to leave his directions to the range at home... give ya a hint, look at my blog title...

Well, at least I still know that my 'navigation by guesstimation' still works, more-or-less.

I still called, though.

The first thing that we did when we were paid up at the range office, guns on the table, range hot was... grab our cameras.

Perhaps the best benefit of shooting a Glock with a 56.43 lb trigger pull is when you shoot that Kimber 'Big Sexy' by merely looking lustily at it. It was like buttah...

Shooting that CZ-52 made me want to do my Tim Allen man-laugh.

I wasn't entirely sure that I was actually shooting those .22s, but there were cute little holes appearing in the paper, so I was happy.

I really should get me some .22s...

And a CZ-52.

And a Kimber 'Big Sexy'.

I think a laser might be good for a few training applications, but I'm afraid that (for me) too much of it would wind up with me looking like one of my mom's cats, just chasing it round and round...

It's probably not just me, but I like to see all kindsa folks at the range. White, black, old-timers, whipper-snappers, church youth, cops, good ole boys, military, men, wimmen, and... was that family sikh? Cool.

Even better than the folks are the guns and being able to, for the most part, randomly walk the range and strike up conversations about folks' different collections.

And the random discussion(s) of how guns are (and are not, besides the obvious) like boobies.

Mosin-Nagant. [insert more Tim Allen here].

That last one didn't sound quite right...

Few might know this, but the Mosin is actually a dolt-action rifle. Yeah, that's when, after the first round, you turn your head to give your best cheerio-droolin' grin to the rest of the group, get behind the rifle again, squeeeeeze that trigger, and then when nothing happens sheepishly rack the bolt, load another round, and fire.

I have it on pretty good authority that I wasn't the only one to do this...

Evil. Black. Rifles. Mmmmmmm....

Enthusiastic trigger work does get a visit from range personnel in the form of a warning to slow down the shots... for us.

I think the rapid fire that didn't raise any eyebrows from the range folks was the concealed class, perhaps? Regardless, looked pretty well populated, good stuff.

I'm not an advocate of spray-n'-pray for the hell of it, but it is nice to be able to practice multiple shots. I got the feel it was more of a 'hunters rifle range' though (slow fire, bench rest, etc), so I understand - their range, their rules.

When that guy came over to eyeball our EBRs, ask what caliber they were, prices, and why we would want them in the first place, considering that "they were for killing folks", I had to bite my tongue from replying, 'you say that like it's a bad thing...'

I don't think he would have understood my answer.

Whoever responded with the more pc (and overall better) answer of hunting, training, and fun, kudos to you.

Speaking of which, time really flies when you're having fun, huh.

2009-02-05T15:40:00.002-06:00

Final head count for this Saturday's festivities right ovah hyaw.

Looking forward to it and hope to see y'all there!

With My Luck...

2009-02-01T07:30:00.003-06:00

"Ok Murphy, as the new guy on the R&D team, you've been designated as the man to *cough* test out the prototype bio-mech combat suit for the range trials."

"Sweet! Is this the one that makes the wearer almost super-human?"

"Suuuure..."

"What kind of Camo does it have?"

*snicker* "Huh? Camo?"

"You know, is it like a ghillie suit, twigs & foliage n' stuff?

"Not so much foliage as much as... fur..."

*snort*

2009-01-31T03:50:00.001-06:00

I remember a conversation that I had with a pair of my gun teams, in Iraq. The conversation was actually part 3(?) of what had started in an argument between a few of my guys. The argument itself wasn't really all that important, and honestly, I don't recall exactly what it was about. I do remember generally that eventually it had something to do with citizenship, either natural born or naturalized.

We were up on a lonely hill, watching a whole bunch of nothing, again. The only item of interest that had occurred was that one of my guys had invented/discovered that, with only minor modification, a wooden ammo case can make a pretty good shitter, for field use. He was quite proud of this, and tried to insist that everyone take a look at his ingenuity.

Yeah, it was a real slow day.

After mean-ole Sgt. Murphy made him dispose of his 'perfectly good' shitter, the conversation took a turn towards when we would see (if ever) an influx of Iraqi-born servicemen in the U.S. military. Most seemed to think that there would be a few here and there, but most likely no huge numbers, for a long while. Some pointed out the ING soldiers that nearly killed their fellow soldiers in training and ops, to support their dim views of the prospects. Others pointed out the soldier we nick-named 'Old Blue', as damn near the highest mark of respect for a crusty old bastard.

Even our translator got into the mix.

'Yusef' was a good guy, a bit older than us, in his late 20s - early 30s, very bright, motivated, and interested in a lot more than just collecting a paycheck. His family was Christian, and therefore didn't do all that great before but were managing ok, in their current situation. He was happy to have work far from home to protect his identity, but even still he would cover up on some of the ops in town of larger populations. His accent was only medium thick, his grasp of subtleties, innuendos, and whatnot was kind of tenuous, but he could definitely read between the lines. He was able to tell when to immediately stop whatever he was doing if say we needed to un-ass an area, post haste. He would at time saunter up to us, and with a whisper and a nod, tell us that the two detainees in the line were educated Saudis, and therefore the guys that we might really be interested in taking back to the detainee facility. He taught me a lot of Iraqi Arabic, and I taught him a little bit of Spanish. He had asked about Marine Corps training at one point, but honestly admitted he might have a better chance at going Army, due to his age and conditioning. His main goal was to one day live in the States.

Shortly after we were rotated out, the unit that replaced us took a pretty bad hit due to a land mine strike. KIAs included too many Marines, one doc... and one translator.

There was no word for a while, and eventually / for the longest time I assumed that he was the unnamed translator onboard. Word eventually came in a roundabout way that it was another translator that died, and that he was not only alive, but had figured out a way to make it to the States.

A little bird told me a while back, so I'm not sure of the exact date, but I'm just going to mark it down here for me how happy it makes me to hear that soon (if not already), 'Yusef' will complete his training and become a fine addition to the United States Army.

Hooah.

Now This Makes My Leg Tingle

2009-01-30T21:34:00.004-06:00

Update for the Blog get-together right over hyaw.

2009-01-28T12:33:00.004-06:00

From my inbox, the other day;

"Are you the J. 'Old Goat' Murphy that went to Undergrad at Oregon State?"

Nope, but all indicators are that I'll be an 'Old Goat', one day...

What followed was a nice back and forth with someone looking for an old friend. It's a bit of a stretch to say that this'll work, but stranger thing have happened, right?

So, other Murphy, OSU class of '90 and deployed Lieutenant(?) in Iraq around 3 years ago, shoot me a mail, you got an old buddy looking for ya.

Sweet, Sweet, Merciful Death...

2009-01-26T10:17:00.003-06:00

... take me now.

Just follow the trail of crumpled tissues, pitiful moans, and gurgled hacks up the stairs to the couch. You might not be able to actually see me, what with the additional tissues, 'medicinal' bottles, lozenge wrappers, blankies, and whatnot, but I'm really here, lying on the couch waiting for your touch.

blergh.

Edit to add:

Bwaha *hack-coff-whimper-hack* haha...

The Six Things/Habits/Quirks meme

2009-01-23T00:57:00.001-06:00

1) I like memes, but rarely find myself following them to a T...

2) In a recent financial-type discussion with My Love, I jokingly mentioned that, after reading our latest and 'greatest' investment reports (long story short, t.u.), I should pull some money out to invest in... 'precious metals'. She sounded pretty receptive to the idea. Now, I'm sure that her idea of precious metals doesn't include those that come in firearms form, but as I consider them precious to me, I'm currently debating my desire for sound, diversified, and solid financial planning (international and domestic, of course) vs. my desire to enjoy living, and sans one of her high-heels through my sack.

3) I spent much of last year testing out different fertilizers for my lawn. I fear that landscaping is going to be yet another one of my hobbies/second jobs (too much time, too much actual work, too much money, etc). I started with my back yard, mainly because I figured that I could hardly screw it up more than it already way. In the portion of the yard that actually has grass, there area sections that have the normal winter look to it, some that seemed burnt to the dirt, and a nice, pristine, lush area covered in dark green grass.

I've forgotten what type of fertilizer I used for the green area.

4) Since I've started planning a trip down south for my great-grandmother's birthday later in the year, I've been craving ceviche and pisco, two things I rarely have.

5) I love the COPS-type shows, but I don't really consider them a reality show nor do I consider them to be the end all be all of techniques and tactics. It can be a heckofa comedy, though...

6) Speaking of comedy, I really get a kick outta this guy...

Schweet.

2009-01-22T22:45:00.003-06:00

Go here for details re: blogshooty goodness, and the list of prospective attendees.

Pucker Up, One Last Time

2009-01-15T08:55:00.004-06:00

Peter had a post recently, here, about a li'l old lady that brought what she thought was a land mine to her local police station. Kind of humorous, in the end, due to the fact that no one was seriously injured by the antique... thing.

Reminded me of a story 'bout those who play by 'Better Safe Than Sorry', and those who should.

It was during the left seat / right seat, them in the left seat. This is to mean that the new Battalion was essentially running the show and that we had a few guys stay behind to sit 'right seat', to offer last minute advice, instruction, and anything else that might help.

Guess who was one of those that was initially told his services wouldn't be needed.... and then they were?

Yeah, I got a good picture of all my boys givin' me the friendly one finger salute as their 7-ton pulled out of the FOB.

We were out on patrol one day, nothing too extravagant, just moseying up and down our AO, seeing what was crack-a-lackin', and I was pointing out items of interest to the VC and crew that I was riding with. The reason I was talking to the Vehicle Commander and not the Squad Leader was that my Captain and the new companies OIC were chit-chatting in the vehicle, with the squad leader. That only leaves room for a driver and a gunner, both most likely Lance Corporals, and if anything was gonna get done in that vehicle, they'd need both of the work horses there. Besides, I had sat down with the new Squad Leader already, he looked like he had a good head on his shoulders - nobody I needed to worry about.

I was continuing a conversation that I'd started with a bunch of the new Lance Corporals - where we'd been hit, where we suspected the enemy was moving, how to read the roads, our immediate action drills according to specific situations, particularly spectacular convoy failures, the worthlessness of the average ING and IP when our Battalion started and some of their improvements, enemy tactics, their IED and land mine camouflage - you know, a few odds and ends here and there.

One of the Lance Corporals had asked me about our actions with landmines vs. IEDs, and what my personal thoughts on the matter were.

I started by telling him that there was definitely a progression in the ability of the enemy to set up, camo, and implement their weapons. During the time of my deployment, I'd noticed landmines that I couldn't see from more than 4 feet away and on foot, armor piercing MG rounds wrapped around arty rounds, incendiary IEDs, all building up to where our forces were at that day. The weren't too many stupid Jihadi Joes left, 'cause we'd already killed most of 'em. Our usual action once we determined that we had an actual threat was to call up EOD and let them take care of business. I stressed the fact that EOD was going to be escorted by some of their sister squads on their 'off' days, so it might be nice to know that when your squad is rolling out of the racks after only 2 hours of sleep that you can be pretty sure that you aren't going to get called out to disarm a bag of trash, a dead sheep, or a pillow. I told them that even if they were Blue Falconed that way, in my opinion it was always better to be safe than sorry. I'd take a shit-talkin' every day of the week for calling out a false alarm if it meant I could avoid a KIA, particularly moi.

One of 'em asked about shooting the IEDs. I told them that we hadn't, and that it would eventually be up to their command whether that flew or not, but from my experience, there was quite a few IEDs that were set up interior to a city, on a local bridge, or otherwise in an area where shooting it wouldn't be an option, really. If, on the other hand, they just happened to be out in the dunes oh, say, randomly conducting a test fire and 'just happened' to hit an IED, well then...

They got the idea.

It was about at that time that the lead vehicle spotted a possible land mine in the shoulder of the road, left side, immediately before crossing the bridge. The road was littered with previous craters lining both sides of the road and various vehicle debris, so it was something that definitely looked promising.

The call went out over the radio, the lead vehicle hauled ass over the bridge, the second and third were kind of stuck on account of terrain, but made do the best they could. Another vehicle started to make their way, off road, to link up with the lead victor, just in case. My vehicle stopped in place, turret faced to the rear, and the VC and I got out to check our area. I could hear the initial vocal tension of the FNGs' voices over the radio, and the relative calm as they realized they weren't dead, there was (initially, at least) no further threat, their figurative cherries were kinda-sorta popped, and there was still a job to do.

As the VC and I checked the area, I asked him for a verbal run-down of immediate actions that his vehicle and the squad needed to do. Once we established that our vehicle was secure, we pushed out a bit to face-to-face with the next vehicle and to cover ground in likely areas of attack. I had a separate radio on my gear, for my guys that were right-seating in other vehicles. One of 'em asked me to head up to his position, if I wasn't too busy. He was closer to the suspected mine, had better eyes on, and wanted me to confirm something for him. As the VC and I walked back to the road, I pointed out debris from convoys that littered the area. I wasn't trying to scare the guy, just impress upon him that this particular area was one to keep in mind, for the future.

As we were walking up and over the last of the hills before the road, he asked if I had any EOD (Explosive Ordinance Disposal) trained Marines in my squad. I - still examining old tire, motorcycle, bicycle, sheep, and herder tracks - responded in the negative. I told him we had some former EMTs, some recreational gun-nuts, one radioman, one guy who liked to work on low-riders in his spare time, and an Irishman in some serious throes of alcohol withdrawal, but no EOD guys.

He paused, and asked if we had no EOD, why was one of my guys working on the landmine?

It was the guy who had called for me earlier.

The image that flashed though my head at the moment was one of a curious monkey poking a stick into a potential grub hill, for some reason. Brain Donor was using his k-bar to gently poke around the edges, at a good 45 degree angle, around the circular edge of what, from my closing distance and perspective, could be the edge of the pressure plate. As I contemplated getting blown up two days after my squad officially stopped patrolling, he managed to fit his knife under the device, and more or less pried up...

... what looked like an old, dusty, large paint-can lid that had been embedded in the dirt.

Good thing I had left a few extra pair of clean skivvies for the return trip to the states...

Here.

2009-01-13T10:00:00.000-06:00

Death in combat is something that, for some, is not really talked about too much. Just by the nature of the environment it is commonly accepted knowledge that there are plenty of risks in war, everyone is exposed to them, and sometimes, your number is called. When someone dies, you console yourself with the knowledge that the person died 'fighting the good fight', doing what they volunteered for and were trained to do, alongside their buddies.

It's still never easy.

Death, in training, is something that is possibly even harder to bear, but it does happen on occasion. The soldiers here still volunteered, were still among buddies, and even though it happened in training, I believe that they were still fighting the good fight.

Thoughts and prayers to the families of the broken and broken-hearted.

link

2009-01-10T14:15:00.003-06:00

Interesting...

I got an email recently from SpeakerTweaker, and he had a interesting proposal. The idea that he had was to suggest a gathering of like-minded bloggers in our area (roughly San Antonio to Austin) for food, firearms, and fun. Some others have held similar get togethers and have managed to have a great time. Well why not us, then?

Indeed.

During a recent planning conversation/spitball session, we chatted a bit about guns, better halves, Christmas guns, ammo, kiddos, possible ranges, recently purchased guns, rising prices, bare gun shelves and the like.

This could take awhile...

So, in the interest of testing the waters so to speak, we're both planning on tossing this out there to all who might be interested.

Bueller...?

Pretty much everything is up for debate right now, from location, ranges, food, dates and times. As I understand it, responses and those interested will determine exactly where (what city) this'll be held, and from there where we go, etc.

Anybody up for this can email Tweaker or myself to let us know of your interest, make suggestions, offer sponsorship for my ammo fund, and/or donate small children for the post party clean up.

2009-01-09T04:15:00.000-06:00

Via Snigs.

1. Do you like blue cheese?
Nope, as a rule I toss it before it gets medium-dark green.

2. Have you ever smoked?
Cohibas are pretty good...

3. Do you own a gun?
a) Uh... no. They are scary, evil, death machines that should only be used by other, better trained... guys.
b) Sumdood stole 'em.
c) I lost them all in a freak accident whilst on a boating/poetry/nature communing trip.

4. What flavor of Kool Aid was your favorite?

'Red'.

5. Do you get nervous before a doctors appointment?

Only if they were to say that I was going to get 'tutored'.

6. What do you think of hot dogs?
I'm not one of those sick puppies...

7. Favorite Christmas movie?

Full. Metal. Christmas.

8. Favorite thing to drink in the morning?
Coffee.

9. Can you do push ups?

Not like I used to.

10. What’s your favorite piece of jewelry?

Hip metal.

11. Favorite hobby?

I dunno if it qualifies as a 'hobby'...

12. Do you have A.D.D.?
Huh, what?

13. What’s one trait you hate about yourself?

I'll tell you later, sometime... mebbe.

14. Middle name?
Yes.

15. Name 3 thoughts at this exact moment?
1. Two is one, one is none.
2. I should probably run.
3. Mmm, pizza good.

16. Name 3 drinks you regularly drink?

Coffee, coffee, and coffee.

17. How many siblings do you have?
Two.

18. Current hate right now?

Close race between the Sham Wow guy and B. Mays...

19. Favorite place to be?

At home.

21. Where would you like to go?
To visit familia and Dad.

22. Name three people who might complete this:

No idea.

23. Do you own slippers?

With or without duckies?

24. What shirt are you wearing?
T. (Not 'Mr.', but 'white'.)

25. Do you like sleeping on satin sheets?

Dude, really?

26. Can you whistle?
Yes.

27. Favorite color?

Black.

28. Would you be a pirate?

Nope. Definitely a Ninjer.

29. What songs do you sing in the shower?
Row, Row, Row Your Boat.

30. Favorite Girls Names?

'Peaches', 'Bubbles', and 'Candy'.

31. Favorite boy’s names:

Sorry, bro, Homey don't play that.

32. What is in your pocket?
Pocket pool balls.

33. Last thing that made you laugh?

Previous post (link) & comments.

34. What vehicle do you drive?
Car.

35. Worst injury you’ve ever had?

I had a bad hang-nail once...

36. Do you love where you live?

Sure.

37. How many TVs do you have in your house?

3.5.

38. Who is your loudest friend?
?

39. Do you have any pets?

Quite a few dust bunnies.

40. Does someone have a crush on you?
Heck if I know.

41. Your favorite book(s):
Lotsa.

42. Do you collect anything?

Yes.

43. Favorite Sports Team?
Swedish Bikini Team.

44. What song do you want played at your funeral?
Uh, I'll be dead, what's the difference? As long as folks aren't clappin' and dancin' in the aisles, I'm good.

2009-01-08T07:57:00.003-06:00

Oh my. The possibilities are endless with this one.

link.

I can't really get behind this... can you?

I hate to think of Francis and Flynt down on their knees beggin' for this kind of package.

This just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

This is truly a sign of today's hard times.

I'm sure that all of the 'jobs' in the porno industry aren't all at risk.

Lot more companies are more hard up than I thought.

Too big to fail? Methinks they exaggerate a bit.

BOHICA.

Hope they don't go tits up.

Not sure of all the details, but I'm sure that the taxpayers are gettin' screwed in the end.

Customer Satisfaction...

2009-01-04T08:03:00.001-06:00

... we'll get it, one way or the other.

Blog Pimpin'

2009-01-03T17:10:00.003-06:00

Voting for the 2008 Weblog Awards starts on Monday, January 5, go and check out the finalists.

Heh, I'm sure that I was this close ][ to making it to the 3rd alternate, honorable mention, sub-list 3(c), 'other guys'.

Seriously though, I'd encourage all of yous to go and check out Big Tobacco. A cigar smokin', coffee chuggin', tail chasin', snark spewin', menorah lightin', FOB livin' kinda guy whose blog just seems to fit my sense of humor - what's not to like? Heck, his post from yesterday could have been taken pretty much word for word from my 'dating' days. Good times.

Word is that this just might be a good step along the road to book authorship, and that would be pretty cool.

I can heartily recommend BT even if he is, you know, one of them Army guys.

Good luck, bro.

Dammit.

2008-12-31T07:28:00.002-06:00

This really, really sucks.

link 1.

link 2.

Both links are in regards to a recent event in a city just north of me. To make a long story short, a cop stopped to assist a disabled motorist. Officer Keith Laughlin, 26, was apparently between his squad car and the SUV when a drunk driver crashed into the SUV, pinning the Officer between vehicles.

Laughlin, despite having what would most definitely qualify as a Pretty Bad Day, was able to call in to, you know, request some help for his crushed legs.

I don't care who you are, that takes some big brass ones, right there.

It has been reported that the Turd-in-Question had the smell of alcohol on him and, (surprise, surprise) has been arrested for DWI as recently as Christmas Eve.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year, asshole.

The few 'good' things about this story, I suppose, is that it sounds like Officer Laughlin is going to be ok. I don't know if the man is going to be able to resume his career in Law Enforcement that he started in friggin' April (on patrol for only 2 months!), but at least he'll be able to eventually go home to his wife and 7 month old child. As it happened on duty, I trust that Keith's expenses are going to pretty much be taken care of, but there are a few drives set up and hats being passed around for him and others here and here.

The timing of this will hopefully impress upon those that need it the importance of planing ahead. Walk, get a ride, call a cab- hell, sleep it off somewhere if you have to. In this day and age, there are even organizations that will give folks a free ride home, if all else fails.

Holiday Hangover, pt 1

2008-12-30T08:37:00.005-06:00

Everybody have a good holiday?

I know, I know, too short and too expensive.

Perhaps the best thing that we did, starting a few years back, was the 'gifts fund'.

I had been at the time perusing the on-line bank accounts funds withdrawn and- debating between razor-blades, exotic poisons, or high-buildings- decided that we needed to do something about overspending during the holidays, without going back to putting everything on credit cards... it was getting outta control.

We made a list.

We checked it twice.

*bleurgh*

Immediate family got an amount penciled in for gifts spending. Extended family and some friends got another. A calculator and a few choice words later, and the amounts eventually got down to a somewhat manageable level. We took this final number, divided it by the number of paychecks, and we had an amount that we'd take out of every paycheck, in anticipation of future purchases. We weren't always successful with taking the intended amount out from every paycheck (still learning), but fairly close and we usually made up for it when the next one rolled around.

It wasn't all that much, but it added up.

What made it real interesting was, when the Gifts Fund started to add up (along with other accounts and funds), I started noticing more and more deals on my Man-Toys. Talk about torture! Fortunately, I was able to suppress the urge(s), (more or less), and continue to save up.

Now, last Christmas wasn't all that great due to a non-financial situation, so this year was the first where we were able to utilize the 'buying gifts from the Christmas Fund' plan. After thoughts... I'm going to need to increase the amount taken out per check, but only by a little bit. When it comes to planning gifts for female kin that are 'in a family way', I'm going to take a large step back (read: run like hell) and let someone else handle the actual purchasing.

Some friendly advice re: (any) guy shopping for a (pregnant) woman.

1: Be very, very, very, careful.

2: Wear protection.

3: Yes, 'protection'.

4: (if applicable) No, not that type, horndog - too late.

5, 6, 7, 8... 101, 102, 103... : Be prepared to apologize. Profusely.

1,346,233: You are wrong.

1,346,234: Hell hath no fury like a woman. (yes, that's a period) ((no, not that 'period'))

fin: Eventually, you'll figure out the benefits of staying out of sight and out of mind...

Hmmm, sounds kind of like a good start for Rules of Marriage, actually...

merry... christmas.

2008-12-25T06:00:00.000-06:00

Only 365 shopping days left...

One More Day

2008-12-24T12:00:00.002-06:00

Less than, actually.

I just got back from the super-wallymart for a couple of gallons of milk, and I damn near killed 12 annoying people, 3 shopping carts, and an overhead music system....

...'in a pear tree'. (<---there's my Christmas Spirit, drink it up, y'all.)

Justifiable homicide, I'm certain.

It's also a rough time if you tend to have a news channel on somewhat regularly, as I do. Like now, for instance, just tippity-tappiting away on my laptop, I can almost guarantee hearing the following upon flipping through the channels...

"...the world's most perfectly cut diamon-"

*click*

"... [orgasmosigh & flashing ring] he went to Jarro-"

*click*

"... so come to America's number one jewelry sto-"

*click*

"[woman, sitting on bench] ...but I don't remember this spot. [man, kneeling] you will..."

*bleurgh*

"... every 'kiss' begins with-"

*sigh*

Almost makes me long for ole Billy and whatever crap he's selling nowadays, as weird as that sounds... well, not quite.

Things That Make You Go, 'HHHhmmmm'

2008-12-24T11:46:00.003-06:00

I'll be the first to admit, there's some stuff that I've done shooting-wise that aren't dancing-through-the-daises safe, in both training and deployed 'festivities'.

I was joking about the forward roll thing, from the last post...

2008-12-22T10:29:00.005-06:00

(Quite Obviously) Volk &/or Tam, I ain't.

Like I said before, rode hard & put up wet a time or two, but still...

...shoots pretty good.

Take your pick of shooty info:

a) One (1) full magazine, emptied rapid-fire (weak hand), after first leaping from a moving vehicle, executing a forward roll, dodging flaming arrows from ninjas, shooting behind the back and blindfolded. Ready for movie roles, $$$, and groupies.

b) From a distance of .5 yds, supported kneeling, 1 rd/min (approx), utilizing spotter, windflags, and jerry-rigged scope. Ready to invade internet forums with mah awesomeness.

c) Shooting from a distance of, "bout here's good" and at a medium pace. Having fun w/every shot.

Good times.

Inter-Service Moto

2008-12-21T07:59:00.003-06:00

Schweet!

A couple of posts ago, I linked to Big Tobacco's blog, regarding a vid he did.

Motivator noticed the awesome swell of (near) double-digit traffic, and graciously sent me the embed.

I've heard that Army song a couple of times since seeing his clip, and it's made me chortle every time. Probably will too, for awhile.

Watch, then go and be snarky.

Speaking of Gifts...

2008-12-19T08:51:00.003-06:00

Not funny.

I mean it.

Nuh-uh.

No, not even as a joke.

Bah. Hum. Bug. (part doh!)

2008-12-18T08:31:00.002-06:00

Guess what I'm getting as an early Christmas present?

Four new car tires!

Yaaay.

Semper Hooah.

2008-12-17T09:25:00.001-06:00

The War on Big Tobacco: Burn Before Reading

Click play and feel the motivation wash all over ya.

Outstanding.

Bah. Hum. Bug.

2008-12-17T07:51:00.003-06:00

A couple of years back My Love and I bought our first house. That is a number of stories in and of itself, but I'll skip forward a bit to the point of this post. What comes after purchasing a house?

You get to put stuff in it.

Now, I'm a guy [last time I checked] so, in typical guy fashion, I'm not really too big on interior decor.

Shocker, I know.

That's not to say that I don't appreciate having stuff, I really do. Lemme put it this way; in my previous - [insert marriage-mandatory descriptions of; cold, lonely, miserable, solitary existence, without the benefit of the guiding light of my life, without whom I would continue to be a miserable excuse for a wretched human being] - bachelor life, for a short while I kept my clothes in a bag and slept on the floor of my apartment. So I appreciate having nice stuff, it's just that right now we already have stuff, it's the spending money on upgrades that I'm not exactly crazy about.

It was a battle, of sorts, and I appreciate her letting me think that I ultimately had any choice in the matter.

Said battle was on the spending of money. We'd already paid off everything but the mortgage, and had a bit of cash saved up. I was all for continuing to save, or perhaps spending it on truly worthwhile stuff like guns, ammo, big-screen tvs, fancy cigars, a bar, and perhaps a motorcycle or three. She wanted to buy nice furniture to replace the second hand stuff we'd used in our previous apartment/hovel.

So off we went, furniture shopping.

She did the research, I did the sulking and pining away for Daddy's oft-delayed toy collection, and eventually 'we' decided that 'we' had found exactly what 'we' always wanted for 'our' house and 'our' bedroom set. We walked into the local Furniture Store to pretty much get a last minute eyeball of the bedroom set and to start making the purchase.

Saleslady was good to go as far as they go, friendly and nice. My Love knew what 'we' wanted, but she had spared me on exactly what the price was. I had only just come-to after hearing the sticker price when some bastard explained to me that the number wasn't even for the whole set, just for the one fancy hoo-ya that you put a tv and blankets in. Some fancy-frenchy sounding name, and it didn't even come with a frisky-Frenchy, to ease (my) financial pain.

At the price, I thought it really should.

So we gave the lady our cash, she took down our info, and we were all set. She did kind of push hard for us to purchase the entire set (yeah, right!), but we explained to her that we'd be paying cash, not credit- no thanks, don't want to finance through the store, thanks - yeah, we understand that the set could go out of production (pleasepleaseplease, baby Jesus!) - just this one piece, for now, thanks. I didn't really begrudge her for the push, just her job, after all.

That whole process went ok. We got the delivery confirmation call a few days later, moving guys brought it in, dragged it upstairs, set it up and everything. It really does look good, and I'm sure we'll have it for the foreseeable future.

A few months later I decided to order the li'l tables you put on either side of the bed, for her birthday. I had scrounged up a bit more cash, took another long, depressed look at my various catalogues, and sulked my way back to the store. Same lady was there, and we did the dirty deed. Not as pricey as the first time, but it was still grimace-worthy.

Now, blame it on the mortars, IEDs, or what-have-you, but I hear (ha!) that the volume on my phone is a bit on the loud side. It works for me, so that the level I keep it at. I was having a grand old time tormenting My Love with false clues as to what she was going to get for her birthday one afternoon, sitting in the living room chatting, when my phone rang. Loud enough for apparently the entire neighborhood to hear, as she tells it, the lady from the furniture store yammered on about the delivery confirmation for our new bed-side tables. Mystery was kaput, after that, but she still loved the heck outta the things.

It was awhile back when I landed on the idea of what to get her for her Christmas gift. This was going to be the truly bend-right-over-and-take-it-in-the-wallet-pillaging item, so I knew that she didn't expect it at all. I had scrimped and saved like I usually do, mournfully drove right past the local gun store to the evil furniture nemesis shop of my doom. Quite surprisingly, they were again more than happy to take my money.

mumblegrumblemumble.

Well, I got the delivery-confirmation call yesterday afternoon from the store.

I was napping at the time.

Industrious lady / recent arrival to My List (and brand new top 10 member), after not getting ahold of me, looked into the store's records. Searching way back to the original purchase, she located another contact number for us.

It was My Love's cell phone number.

Bah!

Mmmm, Holiday Food

2008-12-16T09:28:00.000-06:00

Is it too late to add this to my favorite Christmas songs list?

Great Googly Moogly!

2008-12-15T16:59:00.003-06:00

You don't see this every day.

U.S. anti-kidnap expert kidnapped in Mexico.

Reports from the article was that the guy was down south for seminars dealing with his area of expertise. It also mentions that the area he was in was 'relatively safe' *snort*. He was taken after stepping outside a restaurant to take a phone call.

Whoops.

Is there nowhere truly safe, anymore?

Give y'all a clue. Nope.

Now of course I hope for the best when it comes to this unfortunate fellow, that he is released quickly and without harm. I couldn't help but think that if only he had access to some means of defending himself, some method of ensuring that he would be able to keep from harm should he be attacked by those who would bring him ill-will, maybe he wouldn't be in this unfortunate position...

Yes, I'm talking about dodge-ball classes from the President's personal trainer. Whoever that guy is, give him a raise.

Now, I understand that there were most likely many requirements, restrictions and considerations that the security detail were working with, but holy-hell, that's the friggin' President of the friggin' U.S. of friggin' A.! There should have been at the very least a hit that would've made any NFL defensive player weep tears of enlightenment and types like me cackle at the righteous violence. Now, I'll give 'em credit, they subdued the guy fairly quickly, as well they should have- you notice the guy's white socks? Heck, even I know that white socks are a no-no in that attire. We should have seen a few flying elbows and/or noogies, just for the socks.

Things that go boom...

2008-12-12T12:38:00.004-06:00

In May of this past year, I attended a family reunion of my mother's side of the family. Other than size, it was fairly typical of a standard family reunion, some folks I haven't seen in awhile, some who probably wish it could have been longer between reunions, more of my cousins with kiddos of their own, etc.

My favorite part is meeting new boyfriends/girlfriends of some of my younger cousins and seeing the expression on their faces when they realize that quite a few folk weren't even able to make it. (I can usually get away with introducing myself by at least 3 or 4 different names, 'cause it's almost all going in one ear, passing behind the glazed eyes, and out the other ear.) Yeah, my grandparents had well north of a dozen kiddos, so multiply that by significant others, their children (my level), and then great-grand kids... well, it can be slightly overwhelming. Heck, I have to review the family tree sometimes just to make sure I have it straight re: who's married to who- the offspring of aunt & uncle so-and-so.

Even with the no-shows it was a pretty large gathering, so last years reunion was held at one of my uncles farm, with some staying at the main house, some in RVs, some younger kids in the barn I think, and others in crappy, overpriced little hotels in the neighboring town (guess where I stayed).

Lots o' space on my Uncle's farm.

Plenty of uncles who hunt, recreationaly shoot, and collect guns n' stuff.

Yup, didn't take long for a shooting range to be set up down the way.

Of course, once the shooting started my ears sorta perked up and swiveled around and I lost interest in BBQ & conversation, causing My Love to laugh. She cautioned me not to spend too much time shooting with my uncles and cousins...

So the first day of shooting was pretty much handguns and a few shotguns, nothing too wild, just whatever some of the guys had in their trucks, RVs, or laying around the farm. The second day, well, that was special.

Early the second morning some of the uncles broke out their hunting rifles, project guns, antique guns, how-the-heck-does-this-thing-still-shoot guns, reloads, dare-ya-to-shoot-this guns, gizmos to measure bullet speeds, and (my favorite), old stories. My grandfather showed off and let us shoot a few pistols and rifles that he brought back from WWII and some that he had collected throughout the years. Most of my uncles had seen and shot these weapons many times before, but I was like a kid in a friggin' candy store [drool]. Grandfather asked me if we had been able to keep personally owned 'emergency pistols' over in Iraq, and seemed kind of disturbed when I told him that we were most definitely NOT allowed to do so. After I told him about the many, many, many shakedowns that we underwent to prevent anyone bringing anything back he grunted and told me how when they were sailing back the only restrictions on bringing back weapons was that they not be loaded. Some of his buddies had bags o' guns...

Gah!

Other than the 'story guns', one of the pistols that I particularly liked was this old CZ-85. It looked like it was older than I am from apparently serving a bit of time as a truck gun, resulting in plenty of wear and tear to the finish. The slide stop and safety lever were thumbed silver from repeated use and contrasted nicely with the rest of the gun. The grips were wood, faded and dirty, complimenting the overall dirty/dusty color of the rest of the gun. The right side of the rear sight was the only one that had all its paint left, and it was pretty faded.

It shot like a champ.

This was surely due to the fact that I'm a natural born pistol-yoda, but the fact that it's still a good gun on the inside might've had something to do with it, I suppose.

Later on in the festivities, I was talking to Mom about family plans, people, and whatnot,when she asked me about the shooting. She told me that she had heard that Baby Sis and Little Brother had also fired off a few rounds and even managed not to shoot any eyes out. I told her that they did pretty good, we all had a great time, and I had been smitten with this little 9m that I had shot. I was already contemplating getting ahold of one to use for personal plinking and to offer a bit of variety to my humble collection when it came to going to the range with new and/or tentative shooters.

She took note of which of my Uncles it belonged to.

Fortunately for me, he had been considering finding it a new home, someone who'd take care of it and give it some TLC. He felt kind of bad at some of the treatment it had undergone, and was happy to send it off to a new home.

Score!

Sorry all (&/or Jay), I seem to be having some camera issues (no pics for you!), but in the vein of personal shooty goodness, there's some stuff I kinda like over here.

How Silly

2008-12-10T08:45:00.000-06:00

... to think that any man ever really gets out of the doghouse...

link.

And no, I don't want to talk about it... I'm in enough trouble as it is.

WTH?

2008-12-10T08:30:00.003-06:00

From yesterday's post,

...due to our geographical location, the concept of snowy fields was negotiable...

Yesterday's high temperature here in Central Texas was 81 degrees, as some reported.

It snowed last night and this morning.

I'm still waiting for the word that Texas has been closed for the day...

Go ahead, marvel at my power.

An Age Old Question & Finding Perfection

2008-12-09T11:26:00.000-06:00

Well, maybe not age old, but fairly well debated, nowadays.

Real vs Fake: what do you prefer?

Just about everyone has their preferences, of course, and most will let you know about 'em.

'Real ones tend to sag, droop, and look a bit lifeless after time, whereas falsies stay perky forever.'

'I want mine as nature intended / Fake ones just feel weird.'

'My man paid for it.'

'Real, fake, whatever.'

'It's not what's above, it's what's below that counts!'

Was that last one a bit much?

Interestingly enough, most women that I know have very strong opinions about sticking au natural- see, Christmas just wouldn't be the same, otherwise.

What?

I'm talking about Christmas trees, you pervs!

So anyways, My Love and I a few years back had The Big Christmas Tree Debate. I didn't really have strong opinions either way, but my folks always had a fake tree, and we did all right. Fake trees might cost a bit more, tree for tree, but I was kind of keen on the reusability factor. No muss, no fuss, just toss that bad boy down from the attic, set it up, and voila! - time to decorate everything else risking life and limb on the rooftops..., and risking life and 'limb' when you find out that her treasured childhood stuffed animal collection is NOT to be staged in an erotic fashion.

Anywhere.

And especially not on top of the Christmas Tree, mantle, dining table, or guest beds when family is expected. (In my defense, I didn't know they'd be there that early, honest!)

Back to the story and quite naturally, my opinions were duly pondered (for about this ][ long) , and rejected. See, My Lovely had always had a Real Live (sort of) tree for Christmas, growing up (her, not the newly hewn sacrifice to the Christmas Spirit). She had visions of us searching pristine and well ordered fields for The Perfect Tree. As I came to understand it, due to our geographical location, the concept of snowy fields was negotiable. Excess Christmas Crack pulsing through her veins was not. Bah.

Interestingly enough, after much excruciating searching of the area, we found that in our area of the great state of Texas, these idyllic fields of Christmas Trees are all located at the local Home Depot, outdoor area.

I was only slightly enthused by the fact that there appeared to be an overeager young kid to assist us with our purchase. I'll give the guy credit, he was crawling all over the place, searching amongst the stacked and bound offerings to find 'that perfect one'. Finally, she was satisfied and I was only slightly homi/sui-cidal from the temps (low), time (long), and nearby shoppers (annoying).

He offered to help strap the tree down for us.

It was at this time that I remembered a few smaller items that I was meaning to get (read: stuff she told me to fix around the house but I just remembered about). So I tossed her the keys, reminded/mumbled to her about her previous marching orders, and off I went. I returned to the car just as the kid was slapping his hands of the roughly 20 lbs of needles produced/min that our tree gave off and tightening the last knots of the cords that held the tree strapped to the car's roof.

She was all smiles. I, for about the first time that evening, was also sporting a grin. Immediately noticing the change in my countenance, she was probably suspecting a psychotic break and asked me what was wrong. "Oh, nothing, my love. Let's just get in the car and go home, m'kay?"

I let her tug on the door handle a couple of times before I pointed out that the cords, while excellently tied, very effectively secured all four doors shut. I suggested that we enter the car Dukes style, but that idea got shot down as well.

Not that big of a deal, we got the tree tied down correctly (I was just happy to find that I wouldn't have to drive w/one hand out the window, holding that sucker down while cruising down the highway). Off we went.

Back at the house, I expeditiously removed the tree from the car's roof (cut the cord with my knife and heaved ho, ho, ho-ed), dumping another 50 lbs or so on the yard, quite conveniently covering up at least two of the dead-grass brown spots. I managed to drag that sucker up the short walkway, up the steps, and into the house, losing ever more needles (I figured I'd turn the naked half of the tree to the corner of the room). It only took about two tries before we realized that our tree was too tall for our living room, by the roughly 6 in skid-looking marks on the ceiling that faintly exist to this day. Awesome.

Finally, the tree was trimmed, somewhat still nettled, propped up and decorated. Yay, 'cause after you get the tree up, yer done preppin' for Christmas, right?

Riiiiight.

I did have fun positioning those stuffed animals, though... I always do.

I Can Be Such A Li'l Stinker

2008-12-07T05:03:00.000-06:00

Seems like it's always those sporty-type cars that're riding my bumper like I'm a big booty gal shakin' what my momma gave me (Hay-ay!)... Well, a few days back I was driving down the road, minding my own business, when I had one of those right on my ass....

I was minding my own business, be-boppin' to the surely-to-be classic, 'I Kissed A Girl' (Man, that song never gets old, just as good the millionth time as the first!). I looked in the rear view mirror to see this car come speeding up right behind me. Something red, pretty asspensive, and very shiny. The driver, Miss Sweet Thang, was applying her make-up while talking on the phone.

Don't ask me what she was steering with, I'd be afraid to realize it was her penis...

What? She... (?) was a good lookin' chica!

So anyways, she's on my butt *snicker*, in the right lane, at the speed limit. I figure she's in a hurry to make the next exit ramp.

Nope. Not that one, at least.

She stays on my ass, close enough that I can't see her headlights, for two more exits.

I glance around at the sparsley occupied lanes to my left. I look around at my 10 yr+ old car, back at her shiny and new, clean car.

Hmm, her clean...

My windshield sure is dirty, must've been all that driving on those dirt roads...

*squirt, squirt*

I LOLed.

'It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...'

2008-12-06T01:49:00.003-06:00

Some pictures that bring out the true sentiment of the Christmas spirit...

link.

... for me.

Somedays, It's Just Better To Stay In Bed

2008-12-05T13:29:00.001-06:00

Oy.

Why did I run those stairs again...?

Went to the range this morning, and I'm on the verge of declaring it a 'learning experience'.

Started out as I usually do, dry-fire from the holster, low & high ready, everything feeling good. COLD, but gun-wise good.

Got my ears on, called range hot, and started firing a few practice relays. The dummy rounds I put into my mags kept me honest, for the most part.

I quickly found out that my jacket is too 'poofy'.

Why yes, that is a technical phrase.

I found that as I would draw from the holster (right-handed), I've a tendency to flare my right thumb in anticipation to lay it on top of my left thumb. In warm weather this is no problem, but with the above mentioned poofy jacket, there were a couple of times when my left hand would rise up to support... not a damn thing, as my right hand's thumb was caught up in the right pocket of my jacket. Whoops.

Empty the mags, ready to shoot for score. Doin' the ICE qualification, feeling like ice, this morning...

First round, at 3 ft from target, bent-elbow shooting, from the holster.

Slow is smooth, smooth is fast...

"Shooters ready?... The Shooters are ready.."

There's the target... draw... *Boom!* scan... tuck & re-holster... target turns again... draw & crap,snaggedonthefriggin'pocket-therewego,extendand... *click* whatthe-taprack*Boom!*... *click* sonofamother-taprack *Boom*!

... and it went pretty much downhill from there. I took a moment to clear and break down the weapon, nothing major out of place, slide-release worked fine, nothing blatantly out of whack. I suspected I was limp-wristing it, but was leaning more towards blaming the gun, the weather, the sun in my eyes... or heck, global warming.

I am, after all, a self-declared master combat super tactical expert pistol sniper...

For the record, I must've shot two bullets perfectly into one hole at the 15 yd line- uh, again. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

At least I can say that I got some great immediate-action drill practice in this morning. Darn near from every shooting line, to boot.

Transitioning from standing to kneeling was fun, lemme tell 'ya. Nothing like slamming yer knee onto a frozen rock while trying to not whimper from running those stairs the other day like I was friggin' Rocky, or something.

25 yards, shooting from cover... two standing shots, two kneeling (greeeaat), reload and prep for shooting on the other side of the cover, again two standing, two kneeling...

"Shooters ready? The Shooters are ready, standby...

The targets turned, my draw was good, extension was ok, first four shots were fine. Kneeling down again *groan*, I took my first shot from the kneeling on the left side of the barricade. I was so dialed in on the front sight post that barely registered the gun-light flying off the frame.

Figures... heck, I should be happy it's only happened once!

End result? Pretty good (considering), but not great. Heck, a bad day at the range is still a good day, right?

Naturally, runing through the course of fire again and for the heck of it resulted in no problems. None, zip, zero, nada.

Murphy's Criminal Friendly Neighborhood Tips...

2008-12-03T09:52:00.004-06:00

BWAhahaha!

*brrrring.... brrrring*

Hey, brain donor, it's the clue phone! It's for you!

1. Home invasion (in Texas) is a risky 'business'.

2. I don't really understand those that abandon their vehicles in an attempt to out-run the cops... in their squad vehicles... all with radios, and granted I've never been in a running away situation so mebbe I'm not the best to offer advice here, but a friggin' golf cart is probably not gonna be much better of a choice.

3. Kinda hard to cry 'Poor me!' when you have a stolen car in your garage...

Kudos to the boys in blue for commandeering their own cart to give chase. I'd love to see that tape!

Book Memery

2008-12-02T07:34:00.000-06:00

Via Xtine.

1. English wasn't Dad's first language, but one he learned quite well, eventually. As the story goes, he had a good grasp of the basics but a heckofa strong accent when he first came to the states.

He was quite keen on the kiddos learning, early and well.

I think perhaps it was too much stressed too soon, but I distinctly remember dreading Sunday mornings because I knew that the weekly grilling over words in the comics section was coming. It caught on eventually, and instead of getting grief over not learning words quickly enough, I'd get grief for getting into the Sunday paper and pretty much destroying it in my search for the comics.

2. There were some lean times, financially, in my family. We always had food on the table and clothes on out butts, but there were times when the money just wasn't there. The library became a regular weekly fixture. Mom would load up the kiddos and take us over. There weren't any rules as far as what to pick out, and I would load up on all kinds of books.

3. This is where I mention that I've always read quite a bit, and pretty fast, but from what I've read of other bloggers, that really isn't random or weird, just par for the course. Besides, as fast as I did read, Little Brother read about twice as fast... booger.

4. I got some grief in some of my high school english classes for reading other books than what was assigned in class. The problem was that I'd have already read and sometimes re-read the assigned material, and spending quality reading time in class reading it over again wasn't something that I was terribly keen on doing.

5. My favorite classes in College were the Medieval lit classes. Good stuff, once you got the hang of middle english spelling. The stories were pretty gruesome, too, so that was kind of cool.

6. When I had some free time in Iraq, I was usually reading. I was pleasantly surprised with the number of 'lit' books we got in care packages, but I was honestly just as happy reading the usual page turners like King, Morrell, Koontz, etc.

7. I'm on my 4th copy of Steven Pressfield's Gates of Fire. Great book. Two times I've loaned it out only to get it back pretty worn out. One book I re-read, dog-eared, spilled food on, and basically took with me everywhere for a couple of days (I was taking my time on the third readthrough of that book, m'kay?), and I eventually had to replace it.

Christmas Movies

2008-12-01T16:42:00.000-06:00

Somehow, someway, some folks out there in bloggyland have gotten the impression that I'm not a huge fan of Christmas.

Go figure.

Dunno if it's fond memories or improved technology, but I must admit the Christmas movies do seem to be getting better and better every year...

No trickery or nuthin' *snert*, but there's (technically) no vulgar language in the clip. Feel free to turn it way up.

2008-12-01T08:44:00.000-06:00

Been doing a lot of thinking lately, and I thought I'd take a moment to let y'all know what kind of stuff goes running through my 'mind' the past few days.

What a difference a year makes...

Remember the '15 min prior' rule? That's the one that runs along the line of a Battalion Commanding Officer talking to his Executive Officer. He tells his XO that he wants to hold a formation at 1800. The word travels down the chain of command, from Officer to Occifer, Senior Staff NCOs to Staff, around and about to everyone that has something to say about it. By the time it gets down to my level, I'm standing tall in formation with my guys at 0745 that morning, wondering why the Battalion formation is running late...

Preparing for large family gatherings around say... Thanksgiving, for example - is kind of like that. Timelines are more of general suggestions and/or loosely held guidelines, especially with select members of the family.

Know what isn't a general suggestion?

Heh.

One of the only things that's more fun than the 15 min. prior rule is the to-my-knowledge unnamed rule that deals with visits by a General. Before a General arrives, you better believe there is a massive 15 minute rule applied, but even more so than that is the advanced preparation. The guy could be planning to not even go anywhere near your shop/office/barracks/heads/whatever - but the cleanup... *Oy, vey!* Floors will be buffed to panty-viewing perfection, weapons will be lick-dried if necessary, and grass will be cut, by hand and by individual grass blade, if possible. All this and the Man is only going to visit the other side of the base... again. Yeah, we kind of had that goin' on this weekend. I almost expected My Love to tell me that she wanted the Virgin Mary herself to be proud to come over to take a- well, you know.

The next time I tell myself that I'm gonna go on a good run on Thanksgiving morning and not eat so much that night... I'm actually going to do it... hopefully. I'm lucky if I can get up enough steam for a good waddle, right now.

On a related note, in my life I've gathered up quite a few skills that, while not necessary enjoyable, in the moment make life a bit easier. Lamaze breathing and relaxation techniques on the throne is a good example of one of those skills.

I figure I've still got a few days before I get tired of turkey sandwiches, turkey pot pies, turkey stew, turkey a la mode, turkey jerky, turkey subs, fried turkey, turkey gravy, turkey jello, etc, etc, and etc...

Eric, I have no idea who you are, but you're on my list, buddy, and it ain't my Christmas list...

I love watching some good football games on a full belly - but I try to avoid thinking too much about it. If I did, I'd get pissed all over again about the way things are run and the way that certain players act. When I become king of the word I'm going to institute a single elimination tournament system. To make it interesting, elimination will be done with axes. Should make for some good times.

Speaking of interesting times, what the heck is going on with the players (again)? If I was making that kind of money to play a game, the only time I'd leave the house would be to do charity work, feed the homeless, and help the nuns at the orphanages. Sheesh.

Thanks, ABWF...

2008-11-21T02:39:00.000-06:00

... the check's in the mail.

link.

2008-11-21T00:37:00.000-06:00

You know that deal that you do when walking in say, a hallway, down a sidewalk or wherever when you just about run into someone? Yeah, the ole, half-shuffle to the left, lean right, grin/nod, juke left & turn right, say, "thank you for the dance" and mosey on your way- all movements, of course, mirror-imaged by the other person?

I about did that while running this morning, with a van... sort of.

So there I was, running at my usual easy pace of a five minute mile, only a 20lb pack on my back, invigorated by the fresh air and exercise, breezing along for the adoring ladies- aw heck, who'm I kidding...

I was gamely trying for the wheezy-shuffle that would only somewhat disgust my sense of pt proprietary while praying for a stroke, compound fracture in a non-painful area, or good-sized meteor that would give me a reasonable excuse to slow down, stop, pass-out, or die - when I noticed the van. I was 'running' on the pavement towards the occasional oncoming traffic of my subdivision, the van was parked on my side of the road and would have been facing me had I not been looking down the ground wondering how bad it really would hurt to take a swan dive from a standing elevation. Ok, not so much concerned with pain (already had that, I was 'running'), but whether or not it would knock my ass out...

As the community is still fairly new, there's quite a few houses that are always being built at any time. Lots of electrician vans, cable-co. vehicles, workers in their personal trucks, flat-beds, and whatnot. The van facing me pulled away from the curb. Now, instead of doing the sensible thing and say, taking two steps to the left and getting my butt up on the curb (too high, what the hell, obstacle course), I did the whole crazy-assed lurch to the right / *pant* / lean left while moving even more right / *wheeze* / realize you're getting close to center-of-the-road-with-no-idea-who's-behind-you (Bad Idea) / all while continuing my 'run'. Finally, I more or less resigned / celebrated the idea of getting squished by the van and came to a stop, in the dead center of the road.

Turns out the driver of the cable-van was an old Marine buddy of mine.

We both paused for the 'squint, tilt-head, slight point, and mutter an expletive' thing...

I've run into buddies on different bases here in the States, a couple of guys in Iraq, one on the strip in Vegas, and one in a hotel lobby in Austin. It was pretty cool, catching up on who was still in, who where & doing what. Trips me out to hear about crazy Lance Criminals that are not the senior Sergeants running the show.

Best part about it? Got to stop and chat w/o totally killing the runner's high I had going on...

Christmas, Shmistmas

2008-11-18T09:10:00.000-06:00

That's right, I said it!

Snot even Thanksgiving yet, and I'm already getting this stuff in my inbox. Might as well have some fun with it...

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Coal dust.

2. Real tree or Artificial? Charlie Brown's Christmas Tree.

3. When do you put up the tree? As late as possible, after much hints, suggestions, requests, nagging, demands, and threats.

4. When do you take the tree down? See above.

5. Do you like eggnog? I love it mixed with whiskey, hold the eggnog. Make it a double.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? World Peace.

7. Hardest person to buy for? Baby Cheeses?

8. Easiest person to buy for? Moi. All I want for Christmas is Salma Hayek.

9. Do you have a nativity scene? Huh?

10. Mail or email Christmas cards? We gotta do that nowadays?

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? AK-47 bullets.

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Scrooged, Bad Santa, and... uh, Mrs. Claus and the North Pole.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Eh, for this year or last?

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Ah, there is such thing as a stupid question!

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? See answer to question # 5. Bring me two.

16. Lights on the tree? Lights? Dang, next thing I know, you'll want something shiny on top...

17. Favorite Christmas song? The indisputable classic, Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer.

18. Travel at Christmas or stay at home? Travel to the fridge, couch, and bed. Repeat as necessary.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer's? Let's see, there's Jerky, Medium-Rare, Venison, Fajita Fixins, Tenderloin (?)... aw shucks, guess not.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Gah!

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? My extended family has toddlers and small cats & dogs. We're lucky if we can piece together the remnants.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? Crowds and bills... and realizing you don't have enough ammo to deal with both.

23. What theme or color are you using? Bah Humbug Blood-Red.

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner- See answer #5 Get the good stuff!

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? See answer #5. Just leave me the bottle.

What the heck was he thinking?

2008-11-13T12:37:00.000-06:00

So a buddy and I were talking about the current political situation and related news about a week back.

Inevitably, the conversation turned to our President-elect.

He's a wee bit more pro-O. than I, but neither of us begrudge the other for our differing views, too much, at least...

I was kind of surprised when, after about 10 minutes or so he made a comment in the vein of, "...it doesn't really matter how much I like to see the first Black President, 'cause someone's bound to try and take the brotha down n' out, ya know?"

[scratching record sound here]

"Really, you think so?"

He answered in the affirmative.

I might be pessimistic in some ways, but I'm not nearly that pessimistic..

I tried countering that by emphasizing the value of the Secret Service. I spoke about the group as being for the most part well trained, thoroughly vetted, highly motivated and dedicated outfit true to their mission. I told him that with their level of training, standard OCD level of anxiety in every aspect of what they do- hell, it'd almost be worth it (in an academic training sense) to see some turd begin to try something. Of course anything can happen at any time, but I'd be willing to wager that there's a fairly good chance that they'd perform exceedingly well, succeeding at their mission, letting nothing get in their way of accomplishing their tasks, no disctractions whatsoever, driving straight on through...

*sigh*

Figures....

Down Time, Clips, and a Doh!

2008-11-13T10:45:00.000-06:00

I was cruising through the MC Times the other day, when I read this.

Pretty nifty, huh.

Especially nice when they talk about service members and loved ones being able to communicate about babies first steps, birthday parties, and the like.

Obviously, this memory isn't about such wholesome and family friendly things. Heck no, this one's about what they don't allow on the family friendly channel...

I might've mentioned before that some of the guys would take digital video and pictures out on patrol. I don't remember this ever being something that was officially sanctioned, but the fact was that it was eventually commonly accepted as part of the information gathering process. For the most part, all knew when it was appropriate to have a camera out and when it wasn't. Also, it was much, much easier to pass over a memory card at the debrief rather than try to describe familiar tattoos on bodies or suspicious drawings and arabic writings. We'd much rather take personally owned equipment rather than take what would have been the military issued, gen 1, 25 pound, rarely functioning, often assed-up, Camera: Picture, Polaroid, 1.

Heh, '... for the most part...'

I remember one stop we made to the guys up north. If I remember correctly, we were delivering misdirected mail and dropping off a repaired hummer. We pulled into the staging area, got all the vehicles topped off, and I sent the guys to grab some chow while I checked in with the CO. After a fairly uneventful debrief and a little chewing of the fat with some of the staff, I grabbed a bite and wandered the area looking for some buddies I hadn't seen in awhile. I poked my head into one of the squad rooms.

"Hey, anybody know where y'alls squad leader is?"

Their eyes were rooted to the tv show they were watching. One guy pointed vaguely 'upstairs', another grunted something sounding like 'farther back down this hallway', and one guy farted.

Good times.

As it turned out, they weren't really watching a tv show, but an episode of Combat's Funniest Videos. Not familiar with that program? Lemme 'splain...

When I mentioned that most guys knew when to have the camera in their hands and when to have a rifle, well, that was correct. See, after all the hoopla has passed is the time to bust out the cameras for the record. Angles of approach, maps, id, uniforms, weapons, vehicles, anything and everything that can possibly help the intel weenies should be noted, and in detail. When the enemy is attacking well, let's just say not the best time to record, unless...

Apparently one of the guys in the squad I visited had hit on an idea. He had a fairly lightweight camera and a number of spare batteries. He was a Lance Corporal, so he managed to 'acquire' an extra helmet cover and a bunch of zip ties. He trimmed some helmet cover material with his bayonet and used his sewing kit to fashion cammo covers for his camera. He then affixed his camera to his helmet. Other than taking a little extra care getting into and out of his vehicle, he was good to go. No hands necessary after pushing the record button.

What resulted was a little bit documentary, a bit of COPS, and a whole lotta funny.

There was a passable Aussie accent when recording a pair of mutts going at it, some shaky footage of a Marine taking a deuce, and a short while later, the ambush. It was pretty standard as far as ambushes went back then, a bunch of amateurs with beat-to-hell weapons and questionable tactics, but his voice during the attack was what made it memorable. While narrating the video, he was grinning and chuckling as well and trying to explain his thoughts during his hasty nose dive out of the vehicle (not tripped, 'hasty vehicular dismount'). His running commentary of, 'ohshitohshitohshitohshit' as he ran to a building (talking to himself whilst trying to keep attempting to gain personnel accountability, not freaking out), and his high-pitched "Aiiiieeee" was a rallying cry/way cry (and most definitely NOT a 9-year old girl shriek).

It was a 9 year-old little girl shriek - trust me, I kno... - er, I'm pretty sure...

Hey! Who's laughing in the Back? Rambo? Well, ok then... the rest of y'all, tell me how you do the first time downrange!

Anyways, fast forwarding to a half-dozen months in the future, and I was sitting in my parents living room, my assorted bags scattered around, and my mom's toy poodle humping my leg.

Ah, the good old days...

Dad was really keen on getting ahold of all of the pictures and clips that I had collected on my all expenses paid trip to fun in the sun for his collection and for distribution to family. I don't think I had yet confessed that the one collection of pictures I had sent of a hummer hit in an IED attack was actually my hummer, but it was coming, I'm sure. Anyways, we were both on the couch, his laptop on his lap, and mine on mine. I was pulling discs from the pouch, inserting them into my laptop, getting a rough idea what was on it, and handing it over to him for copying. My part of the process was quicker than his, so he had a nice pile of discs waiting to be copied. He still noted when I subtly slipped a few discs back into the pouch. "What're those discs?" "What discs?" "The ones you just put back." "Oh, those. Those're nothing, just some ah,... recreational stuff." "Recrea... sure...."

Eventually, I got kind of lazy and began relying on the label details of what was on one of the discs. During the deployment I had eventually gotten detailed about what was on the discs, dates, names, and all of that. The last two discs weren't actually even anything I had taken, but some discs that other Battalions had handed out. Our Battalion had approached the end of our tour at the same time as some others, and during the inevitable down time that always happened back in the rear, we managed to trade a number of discs back and forth. Gave each other a rough idea of what else was going on in the greater AO while we were each in town.

I asked Dad if he wanted 'em, he said 'sure', and I handed 'em over.

It was only a couple of hours later that I remembered what one of those discs contained. The Battalion Disc in question had compiled a bunch of video sources together on one disc, voted on by popularity by its Marines. There were the standard combat ops, down time funny stuff, and some miscellaneous stuff towards the end. There was no question in why one clip at the end was hugely popular; apparently, one lonely soldier (female type) had decided to make a clip of herself... er, dancing around to Marvin Gaye's 'Lets Get It On', I seem to remember. I guess it was pretty warm in the can, 'cause she was pretty scantily clad at the end of the clip, you could say.

Very nice.

Wonder if Dad ever got that far in the disc...?

Did You Really Think I Wouldn't Notice?

2008-11-12T10:26:00.002-06:00

Hmmm, how to phrase this...

Links.

If you take a gander over to the left, you'll see a bunch of really neat blogs, some interesting reading material, and my archives (if you're really a glutton for punishment).

The only link that I think is somewhat close to an advertisement is for a charity. I've got nothing against other folks posting links for profit - their blog, their rules. As for my blog well, I never say never, but not at this time...

I've been kind of freewheeling with my other links, 'cause that's what it appears to me that most other folks do - see something cool, link to 'em and write about it.

For the record, anybody out there that doesn't really want me linking to them in my posts or on my front page- no problem, drop me a line and I'll respect your wishes.

I'll comment on the occasional post - not nearly as many as I should, I know, but my blog feeder is getting out of control - so I suppose that technically, there's a link from some of my comments back to this site. What I don't do is comment on other folks' blogs with my comment consisting of nothing more than an advertisement for my little blog.

I got a comment / request recently, asking me to post a link to an on-line DVD shop. This didn't bother me much - someone asked a question, and I answered. Hell, I was somewhat flattered that someone out there thought that my stuff might actually toss them enough traffic to make a difference- but I declined.

Now, maybe I'm being a little sensitive here, long(ish)-term readers might understand the significance of the end of this month, so when I got a comment notification on a post for almost a year ago, I was most definitely not pleased to see a friggin' comment / link / advertisement.

I had comment notification.

I will now try to figure out how to do comment moderation to hopefully prevent this sort of... thing in the future.

In the event the posters of the above mentioned comments can't catch a clue if I crammed it up their rear - sideways, and sans dinner, drinks, or lube -, any of my blog savvy readers out there know how to delete undesirable comments? There's gotta be a way...

I do very much appreciate most all other mails and comments- funny, punny, questioning commiserating, hell- even the odd 'hey, dumbass...' ones.

Happy Birthday

2008-11-10T00:01:00.000-06:00

Semper Fidelis.

Just Another Day In Paradise, Pt1

2008-11-07T07:57:00.001-06:00

Finally.

All the vehicles were in more or less a decent position for the terrain, overwatches set, and no (major) issues to deal with. I still wasn't exactly sure what was going on, just that higher had sent word to stop the patrol and hold position for further developments. We had diverted from patrolling the MSR (Main Supply Route) and basically set up camp in the middle of nowhere to wait... and wait... and for some more variety, wait some more. In between monitoring the radios, some of my guys were talking about their fondly remembered conquests. Business as usual. At least they weren't acting out these heroic adventures or taking, uh... matters in their own hands... er, that I knew of, at least. The sun was setting (again), so nothing was for sure, of course.

I rolled over to the convoy net to see if there was something going on there that I needed to know about, like a particularly large convoy or anyone that had found an IED in our area...

Nada.

I keyed my squad radio.

"All victors go to 50%, driver primary, VCs (Vehicle Commanders) to my victor." After my guys showed up we had a short talk about the situation (standby to standby), the patrol (loooong hours, and counting), and the fact that I at least wanted my drivers to catch a few zzzs so they didn't almost kill anybody, again. None of the VCs had anything for me, so they went to their vehicles to wait for the word. I started rummaging in my vehicle for my etool and my personal Roll of Life (toilet paper - ain't no way I was gonna use the MRE-supplied 'paper', nuh-uh).

One wise-ass asked, "Gonna take a dump, Sergeant?"

I glanced down at my tp and shovel. "Nope, gonna make a surrender flag and call it a night, Einstein."

He chuckled and returned to his story, this time with girlie voices and sound effects.

Dang, his chick voice is starting to sound pretty good... it's definitely been a long deployment.

Ask any Marine about what's the quickest way to interrupt a perfectly good period of boredom and they'll tell you;

1) Light up a smokey treat.

or

2) Pop a squat (in pitch-black darkness, no less).

I was about half-way through #2 (ha!) when, of course, we got the word to move.

ME: Comeon!, ya bastard...

RADIO: [stage whisper] Hey, Sergeant, we got the word from higher, gotta go! Sergent! You over there?

ME: [groan/whimper]

RADIO: [chuckling] You ok, Sergeant? What's the hold up?

ME: Jale... peno... [pant,pant]... chee... ese.

Gingerly climbing back into my hummer and easing into my seat, I asked what the word was. My radio man rogered up and told me that we were to return to the FOB for an escort of Psycho.

Sweetness.

Back at the FOB, the new XO introduced me to the Sergeant First Class in charge of the Psychological Operations (Psycho) team. The good Sergeant nodded his head and said, "Bob", as introduction. I shook his hand, grinned, and introduced myself, "Sergeant". First name basis completed, he informed me that he needed us to escort him to a general location, east of the city that regularly lobbed little forget-me-nots over to our FOB. In response to my general inquiry as to what generally they'd be doing at said general location, he smiled and said "Psychological operations".

Touché.

We spit-balled a few ideas for the escort, a somewhat more specific location for the op, and set a departure time in just under an hour. XO added the standard stuff, the good Sergeant had rank, but I was responsible for his ass to and fro the objective. At the party he was the man, and I was to help out wherever I could. No stickyfingered Marines near the soldiers' hummer, for security and common decency reasons. There was still more than enough time to pass the word, for my guys to raid the chow room for midrats (midnight rations), and still leave us all enough time to transit to our position to arrive on schedule at zero dark thirty.

"On the road again..."

Exiting the FOB again, this time with the Psycho vehicle in our train, we meandered on a somewhat scenic route to our destination. As it was about 0300 hrs and we were driving sans lights there really wasn't too much scenery to be had, but it was definitely not the straightest route, that's for sure.

Our route to approach the city included taking the hardball for the last few miles to our objective. As we crossed the last of the dunes and began our approach to the road, I started to pick out where I wanted to get on in the green blur of my NVGs. This was pretty important, because it would really ruin my day to get blown up before we even got the job done, you know. I directed my driver to the area I wanted, hopped out of the hummer, and walked up to the road. Not seeing anything particularly suspicious in the shoulder of the road, I marked where I wanted my vehicles to get on the road and started jogging in the direction of the city. One by one, my vehicles and that of Psycho climbed the berm of the road and turned after me.

Hopping back into my seat, I told my driver to keep the speed slow, as to allow all of the vehicles to get onto the road without too much space between us. I grabbed the mike and told my trail VC to advise me when they were on the road and ready to step. Meanwhile, my vehicle was proceeding forward at what would be a fast walking pace. My last vehicle finally climbed onto the road and rogered up that they were good to go. I was responding to his information when, from out of the pitch-black darkness, a huge friggin' deamonbeast of a mutt decided to stick his snout in my window and express his displeasure at my presence, loudly, vigorously, and with much snapping of teeth.

To my credit, I avoided shrieking like a girl (much), and even managed to restrain myself from okaying a MK19 expenditure. Thankfully, that was about the extent of excitement on the whole ride over there.

At the objective, well, it got a bit more interesting...

Ah Yes...

2008-11-02T09:57:00.001-06:00

The day has come again when I spend half of the day setting the clocks in my cars' radios, stove, micro, clocks, alarms, watches... and the other half trying to set the VCR (yup, still got one). I usually spend the whole day looking at the time and thinking, 'what time is - oh... hold on, did I set that one, yet?'

What always makes it interesting (aside from periodically discovering various time pieces throughout the next few days n' weeks and the inevitable one in April or May), is finally figuring out that I've reset the time on a few items that have already automatically switched over... again, and that I've set a few clocks twice.

A small price to pay, all in all, for the extra hour of sleep.

That other one, that cold & mean bastard who steals an hour? Well, that's just cruel.

That's funny...

2008-10-31T22:22:00.001-05:00

I don't recall 'Night-Time Bimbo Barbie' being a popular costume for the girls when I was of trick-or-treating age...

also

I understand that Moms might tend to be a little bit more into dressing up to walk their kiddos around and/or hand out candies, but a... uh, 'perky', dolled up, high-heel, mini-skirt & sexy mesh hose wearin' Little Red Riding Hood?

and

It's ok. You've been married for awhile and had a few kiddos - great. If you need oil, deep exhalations and three friends to squeeeeeze you into your old cheerleading uniform, well, it just might be time to hang it up before you kill somebody with a explosively projected uniform patch. And tell your boobies to stop staring at me.

oh yeah

Your little pooch is precious in his/her little outfit... and pooping in my yard. Well, you do have a bag right there in your hands, right?

as well as

Kid, you're almost taller than I am. Time to hang it up, go to a party and hit on the girls, like everyone else your age. Think about it, you'll thank me later.

Amateurs

2008-10-30T22:10:00.000-05:00

A clip, by way of Theo.

Thaaat's gotta suck...

I like this clip for a number of reasons (besides the obvious).

Yes basically, the mortar is a pretty simple weapon... to fire. If you want accuracy with it, well that's another thing, but just getting it to go 'boom' is really pretty simple. Make sure the safeties are removed from the round, drop it in the tube, it falls to the bottom and hits the firing pin and - well, the rest just kind of comes naturally.

Usually.

If you're the type to skip out on aiming stakes & sights and go by the tried and true 'spray and pray' method, well, you're probably also the type to take a pass on cleaning out the bore every now and then.

Mortar barrels have been known to get dirty, just like rifles and definitely not like that floozy showing off too much ankle three hovels down from your own.

When barrels get dirty, rounds can (will) get caught up in the tube. When rounds get caught up in the tube, I'd imagine that more likely than not they're not going to explode in the barrel (the explosion in the barrel comes from the propellants attached to the rear of the round), but all that pressure's got to go somewhere. (This is that same pressure that shoots the round up to the neighborhood of 3000 meters.) If the pressure can't go up, it'll go down and probably either find that faulty and/or loose firing pin or it'll definitely find that barrel failure that you didn't see upon inspection of your weapon. Dumbass.

The fact that the video existed to post up for posterity leads me to belive that the round didn't spew shrapnel all over the place turning the guys into meaty man-chunks (to include the camera man and his camera), but, Inshallah, the failure of the tube was enough to ensure that all in the immediate vicinity had a Very Bad (read: slow & terminal) Day. Further viewing of the clip shows the barrel failure (flash at the bottom), resulting in it getting some air time (lovin' it!), suggesting that the round was almost definitely stuck in the barrel and the ass end of the tube was hopefully embedded in the tender bits of nearby schmucks. If not the bits of the tube in the bits of the guys, I'm sure the sand bags, base plate, rocks and other assorted items were moving fast enough to make things interesting...

2008-10-28T09:40:00.000-05:00

I got one of those letters the other day, letting me know that I was now eligible for a new phone.

Shoot, I'm still getting used to this last one.

I've had exactly four cell phones, kinda sorta. My first phone lasted about two months before going kaput, got it swapped out for another of the same model. I had that phone for about... forever, long enough that I don't remember exactly when I got it, just that it was sometime around '98 or '99. Still have it, and it still works. Looks good too, on account of there's the equivalent of about three years that it wasn't used, packed up in storage or at my folks' house while I was away on deployments.

Heh, I remember when I discovered that it had texting capabilities a couple of years back, when I got a wrong number 'booty text'.

ME: Sweet! Booty text!

ME: Holy crap, this thing has text!

CRICKETS: *sigh*

ME (typing): s-u-r-e... i... b-r-i-n-g... k-y... y-o-u... b-r-i-n-g... w-a-i-t... u-r-e... n-o-t... a... d-u-d-e... ?

Never did get a response, guess it wasn't meant to be...

Anyways, I got a wild hair a couple of years back and got a new phone. One of those fancy ones, with a camera, music ringy thingies, games, and all kinds of stuff. That one lasted about a month before it disappeared.

So, after a short debate about just going back to old faithful, I wound up with another fancy new phone. This phone (the one I'm currently using) has most of the new stuff that comes with phones nowadays, but I realized the other day that about the only thing that I use it for besides calling (gasp!), is keeping a list of Stuff I Gotta Do.

I'm a big fan of lists.

Pretty sure this started in school, writing lists of everything, and it was something that carried over to the Corps. I have my own system, separating things that I have to do, stuff I have to buy, items of interest, and the like. With notes, you don't have to try to remember every little detail, just jot it down and there ya go. I used to have a bunch of note cards, and just grab one as the old one got all items crossed off, or disappeared.

I was always losing those darn things.

I was afraid to keep 'em in my wallet, because with my luck, I'd lose my wallet and all of my personal crap in it. Besides, I had a ton of cards, and if it was important enough to remember, it'd eventually make it back onto another list. That's not to say that it'd get done pronto, just that it had a better chance than before. I was likewise a little leery of putting my lists on a phone, but I figured I had that thing with me even more than my wallet, so mebbe I had a better chance of holding onto it.

As an example, one of those things recently was Find The Holster.

During the work-up to Iraq, I went out and bought my own high-speed low-drag Hollywood-sexy thigh holster. I knew that any crap we'd get issued would be just that -crap- and once I got the impression that higher wouldn't have too many objections to us getting our own stuff as long as it fit some regs, I went ahead and picked one up before they could change their minds. Naturally, as it turned out, there weren't enough m9s to go around, and once I issued them out to guys who needed 'em more than me, I read the writing on the wall and realized that I wasn't even going to get one (sad face), I gave one of my guys the holster to use in Iraq. He remembered to give it back at the end of the deployment, only somewhat worse for the wear, and that was about the last time I saw it, stuffing it down to the bottom of my seabag.

So, down in the garage in my storage space / pile o' military crap, there lies my old seabag. Standing it up and opening the flaps was a trip through memory lane. A faint whiff of stale man stanck, left over Iraqi dust, some uniform items that I doubt I'll ever fit into again, and assorted odds and ends. There was a nifty little map case with a bunch of pockets that I'd long ago forgot about, one of which included a list card. One side had a bunch of Marines' names and where they needed to go (medical, dental, admin, etc), schedules for issued gear turn in, flight schedules, and what looked suspiciously like a list of bars and strip clubs (ah, good times). Flipping it over, I looked at the other side to view my personal list of stuff to buy or do, and had a good chuckle.

ITEM 1 - FIND OLD LIST(S).

ITEM 2 - DON'T LOSE THIS LIST, DUMB-ASS!!!

whoops.

Muahahahah!!!!

2008-10-24T09:32:00.001-05:00

via OLD NFO and Snigs.

Scribbling kind of fits, actually, when you think about my method of blogging. For the overwhelming majority of the time posts just kinda come to me at the keyboard and I bang 'em out as they pop up. My posts are occasionally a bit messy, tending to wander outside of the lines, but hopefully giving you somewhat of a picture of what's going on in my noggin'.

Now, over on the port side there are a whole buncha (technical phrase, 'buncha') good writers. I thought I might use this opportunity to call out a few new (to this blog) good ones. Consider each link as a representation of a violently self-administered headsmack for not linking them earlier.

Bob G.

M.& C. Byrne

Telebush

The Captain

Still thinking 'bout the last one (hey, what do you expect from a blogger that takes the name of Murphy?).

Of course, the rules, originally from here.

Each Superior Scribbler must in turn pass The Award on to 5 most-deserving Bloggy Friends.
Each Superior Scribbler must link to the author & the name of the blog from whom he/she has received The Award.
Each Superior Scribbler must display The Award on his/her blog, and link to This Post, which explains The Award.
Each Blogger who wins The Superior Scribbler Award must visit this post and add his/her name to the Mr. Linky List. That way, we'll be able to keep up-to-date on everyone who receives This Prestigious Honor!
Each Superior Scribbler must post these rules on his/her blog.

My Almost Near (Sorta) Brush With SumDood

2008-10-22T10:03:00.000-05:00

Something that happened a short while back in Murphyland...

*brrrring... brrrrring....*

Big City Emergency Services, what is your name?

Uh... Murphy. (I was expecting the 'PD, Fire, or EMS question'.)

Ok Sir, do you need Police, Fire, or EMS?

(bingo.)

Police, ma'am.

Allrighty Sir, and what do you need to report tonight?

Gun shots down the street at what looks like... the Peaceful Meadows Apartments Complex, ma'am.

Another interesting evening, indeed.

Every city has areas that are... well, not the best. Generally, I make it a personal rule to avoid said areas, but on occasion you just can't because, well, they come to you, wherever you happen to be. Before I get too much further, I should mention that no, I wasn't in any immediate danger (hence me taking time to call 911), but gun shots is something that I heard somewhere that law enforcement types might be kind of interested in hearing about.

Conversation went fairly quick after that, I told the lady that there had been gun shots in the apartment complex down the street - no, I wasn't involved, just in the vicinity, minding my own business and - nope, didn't actually see Sumdood fighting or running about, shooting or afterwards, running away. I suppose I coulda offered to help look around, but she probably would've strongly discouraged that and besides, I hear that Sumdood's an elusive and sneaky li'l bugger. She confirmed stuff like safety, names (mine, the roads, and apartment complex) and locations (of same), and promised that the local PD would be along shortly. Po-po, ho!

About 30 seconds after hanging up and re-examining the area, I got an incoming call.

'Iiif you think I'm sexy, aaand you want my-'

'Lo?

(I really should change that ring tone...)

Yeah, I'm calling in regards to the shots fired report. [male voice, PD radio and vehicle engine sounds in background]

Yessir?

Well, I'm en route to your location, and I want to know... where's the gun?

(I really didn't like the sound of this because the thought had occurred to me that technically, I was 'a man with a gun'. Hmm, how do I respond to the Officer... 'the one on my hip or the one that's been shoot-' no, that's like begging for additional rapid orifice creation, and I don't want any of that...)

No idea Sir, I'm just in the area, see and-

You sure it's not just you what been poppin' off a few rounds?

(What the Hell? Visions of some dispatcher fumble-fingering my name into the 'shooter' line instead of 'reporting party' whilst sucking down the last Dr Pepper flavored ice-cube (mmm, delicious) were definitely flying through my brain housing group right about then...)

Uhhh...

Listen buddy, I know you always got a gun, and I-

It was about at this point where he lost control of his 'cop voice' and started to chuckle.

J?

Yeah man *chortle* what's going on? I saw your name when the call dropped so I thought I'd give you a holler and see if'n you were ok and give you some shit... whassup, bro?

Dude... Ok, I admit it, you had me going there, but still, choke on a bacon-flavored donut, m'kay?

*laughter*

Cop buddies, sheesh.

I'm Starting To Like This Endless Political... Stuff

2008-10-20T10:00:00.000-05:00

I just realized something.

The never-ending campaigning, stupid voter tricks, completely unbiased *cough* journalism has taken the usual impact off of something that I find increasingly annoying, year after year.

I have yet to hear any sort of cutsey shopping countdown untill 'Bah Humbug' Day.

That pleases me, very much.

Inter-Office Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures

2008-10-20T09:39:00.003-05:00

This is probably what would happen on day #2 of any Typical Office Job held by Murphy. Probably a good reason why I don't work a Typical Office Job...

Murphy was a Grunt

Word, as in The

Powndouchery

It's Been That Kind Of Day

Pop Quiz

Semper Fi...

Pshaw, Whippersnappers

It Walks, It Talks...

In Response to Already Observed Overly-Enthusiastic Holiday Spirit...

Marvel

Random Internetosity

Whoda thunkit?

WTF, Over.

Feliz cumpleaños, Salma!

I Shouldda Stayed In...

For Those Guys In The Baby Namin' Window

Random Fun

Always Faithful

More on Parties

A Joke and a Party

Signal Flare

Reminders

Wha?

Morons, 1 - Darwin, 0

Blergh.

Coming Back Home

*snorfle*

Well, Looky There!

General Order #4 and Spontaneous Hand and Arm Signals

Something To Think About

Book Pimpin'

Things That Make You Go 'Hmmmm....'

Just Passing A Little Word...

Note To Self: Follow Instructions

Fire In The... Hole?

Good Idears

Highlights

With My Luck...

Now This Makes My Leg Tingle

Sweet, Sweet, Merciful Death...

The Six Things/Habits/Quirks meme

Schweet.

Pucker Up, One Last Time

Here.

Customer Satisfaction...

Blog Pimpin'

Dammit.

Holiday Hangover, pt 1

merry... christmas.

One More Day

Things That Make You Go, 'HHHhmmmm'

Inter-Service Moto

Speaking of Gifts...

Bah. Hum. Bug. (part doh!)

Semper Hooah.

Bah. Hum. Bug.

Mmmm, Holiday Food

Great Googly Moogly!

Things that go boom...

How Silly

WTH?

An Age Old Question & Finding Perfection

I Can Be Such A Li'l Stinker

'It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...'

Somedays, It's Just Better To Stay In Bed

Murphy's Criminal Friendly Neighborhood Tips...

Book Memery

Christmas Movies

Thanks, ABWF...

Christmas, Shmistmas

What the heck was he thinking?

Down Time, Clips, and a Doh!

Did You Really Think I Wouldn't Notice?

Happy Birthday

Just Another Day In Paradise, Pt1

Ah Yes...

That's funny...

Amateurs

Muahahahah!!!!

My Almost Near (Sorta) Brush With SumDood

snorfle