Some people need to be kicked in nads

The Lt. Gov. of Maine, for example, needs to be kicked in the nads (but she doesn't have any...) for this crass display of politics.

Recognize the tune?

I was watching Australian Rules Football on TV today, and checked the website of the Adelaide Crows. I clicked on their Club Song (right bar, near the bottom) and immediately recognized the tune. It's an amusing use for a melody that most people here in the US know.

Great Interview

Read this interview with Ian McEwan, a British author that wrote a novel about terrorist attack. His comments on Islam are interesting...and the West's reaction to current events.

Remember the Eastland!

On July 24, 1915, the SS Eastland capsized in the Chicago River, taking over 800 lives. In terms of passenger deaths, it's one of the worst shipping disasters (many of the casualties on the Titanic were crew). The Eastland Disaster Society has more info.

Surf Dawgs game report

Went to see the San Diego Surf Dawgs, the minor league baseball team that plays here in San Diego (they play at "Tony Gwynn Stadium" on the SDSU campus) on Tuesday (they played the Yuma Scorpions) Mike, Luci and their kids came along, too. My seat was in the front row and they lucked out and got seats right behind me. Rickey Henderson, the soon-to-be Hall-of-Famer plays for the Surf Dawgs and Terry Kennedy, catcher for the '84 San Diego Padres (they won the World Series that year) is the manager. The stadium is a good stadium for minor leagues/college ball. Beers were relatively cheap ($5) and food wasn't ridculous, either. The game was lots of fun, the Surf Dawgs hit around in the 1st inning, getting 4 runs and Rickey stole a base. They won the game, 9-5.
The guy that sat next to me bantered with the 3rd base coach (and all of the Dawgs players that came by) - how often do you get to talk to a guy like Rickey Henderson? I took the pic of Henderson at the bat because there was a guy who was about to blow a gasket - his son was the pitcher for Yuma and Rickey was the dad's favorite player. So, I snapped a bunch of pics and will email them to the dad when he sends his email to me.
Overall, the game was cool, the Surf Dawgs aren't awful (neither was Yuma), and at $10 for tix, I can definitely do this again. There were probably 750 people in the stands (stadium holds 3000).

Pic of Ricky Henderson at bat at the Surf Dawgs game on Tuesday 

The United States a "Christian" Nation?

HAHAHAHAHA!
Our founding fathers sure as heck weren't Christians. Read some quotes from them. I read a killer book on this subject a few months ago.

Worst Naval Disaster of All Time

Titanic? Lusitania? Nope.
How about 4000 ships of the Kubilia Khan going down with 70,000 men? Great story and links on Samizdata.

Yesterday's desert run

6 shooters. 20 guns. At least 1000 rounds fired. Lots of fruit destroyed (oranges, grapefruit, baby watermelon, etc.) We even shot up 2 computers, an old Compaq server (roughly the size of a microwave) and an old Mac Quadra. I smacked myself with another guy's scoped rifle; it'd been a long time since I've fired a scoped rifle and I had my eye too close. I got whacked good and my orbital bone (over my eye, where the eyebrow is) still is a bit sore. But, it was a good time overall, and it was bloody hot when we finished around 11AM, 102F in the desert near Jacumba.

Here are the pics and videos.

Descriptions of the pics:
Les with my M1 Carbine
Me with my SKS
Scott(?) firing an H&K .45 ACP
Les firing a bolt-action rifle
The shot-up Macintosh
A guy shooting my M1 carbine
Dave firing a Walther P22 (.22) pistol, John working on his 8mm Hakim rifle
A guy shooting a .22 pistol
A closeup of the shot-up mac
Me again
Les and the bolt again

Your not so humble reporter firing his SKS in the desert on Saturday. Note the shell casing flying off at the top right of the picture. 

2005 and history

Today, I was flipping thru the channels and stopped on History and they were showing a bit on Rommel. They were showing a Nazi propaganda video with Rommel giving a medal to "Gunther Rahm" a 19 year old gunner in Afrika Korps. Then they had an interview with Gunther, probably 50 years later. It's very cool to hear the stories from the guys on the "other side". History also runs a show called "Sink the Bismark" that has interviews with sailors from the Bismark.

Obviously, the senior guys (Rommel, Monty, etc.) are all long since gone, but the privates and the sailors are still around, and as History, Discovery and TLC all work for material, their stories are being recorded.

Why do they hate us?

A question that gets a lot of hand-wringing type answers, but the truth of the matter is, they hate us because we're unbelievers. One said so himself.

What is the NEA all about?

Read for yourself.

For example, items 3 and 6 are about privitazing social security, item 4 is about political correctness (etc.)

Just read it for yourself. Yup, the NEA has nothing to do with education, it's just a union.

Norman Spurlock

Norman Spurlock, current media darling (celebrating his 15 minutes) after his book/movie "Supersize Me" has a new book out, "Don't Eat This Book." It's filled with so many factual errors and other crap, that Radley Balko (The Agitator), started a separate blog so that he could give the book a proper fisking.

Summation: Spurlock is an idiot.

Who is a reporter?

Just about anyone with a camera cellphone it seems.

Hitchens on the London Bombings

Why say anymore when Christopher Hitchens, writer for a bunch of stuff, including Vanity Fair, does it so well?

"It's comin right for us"

Tropical Storm Dennis is headed right for Noreen.

Japanese Wackiness

The Japanese put all kinds of odd stuff on their pizza (corn, for example, which isn't too bad). But their creativity in ice cream aisu in Japanese leaves much to be desired. Like squid ice cream.

Reason #3 to stay in San Diego

#1: The weather
#2: The weather
#3: The fact that of the Top 50 breweries worldwide 3 of the top 10 are in San Diego. And I'm well acquianted with all 3.

Stuff

I stole the idea for this post from another blogger, Doc a Marine that is now in med school. He was "tagged" to do this by another blogger. (see the link on his post). So, I decided to do one, too....here it is:

10 years ago: My last few weeks in the Navy. Going out with my fiancee.
5 years ago: Not much different than today; working for AT&T
1 year ago: Probably working, since the wifey was in Japan and I was not.
Yesterday: On a conference call about a customer outage

5 Snacks I enjoy

• Clif Energy bars
  
• Quaker "chewy" granola bars
  
• Apples
  
• Bananas
  
• Drumstick icecream
  

5 songs I know all the words to

• Just about all of Rush's songs
  
• Just about all of the English stuff from the "Cowboy Bebop" soundtracks
  
• Folsom Prison Blues
  
• "My Love Will Not Change" by The Del McCoury Band
  
• "Miss U Less, See U More" by Faithless
  

5 things I'd do with $100 million

• Start a foundation to counter the BS put out by the neo-prohibitionist groups MADD and the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation
  
• Buy (and learn to fly) a helicopter
  
• Ride a motorcycle on every continent
  
• Spend some serious time in Japan at the out of the way places
  
• Buy a nice, big spread somewhere (Arizona?) where I can have a nice, big gun locker (and be able to shoot off the back porch) and drive the Hummer I'd buy (and a big enough garage for it)
  

5 places I'd run away to

• Australia (Brisbane or Port Adelaide)
  
• Scotland
  
• Da U.P., eh?
  
• Japan (Sapporo and Aomori)
  
• TBD
  

5 Bad Habits

• I swear like the bastard son of a truck driver and sailor
  
• Procrastination
  
• Loud/blunt/direct
  
• Otherwise, I'm perfect!
  

5 Things I like doing

• Hanging out with the wifey
  
• Smoking cigars
  
• Reading
  
• Shooting
  
• Listening to my tunes
  

5 Things I'd never wear:Heck, I'd wear anything.

5 TV Shows I like

• The Shield
  
• Homicide (bastards cancelled it)
  
• Penn & Teller's Bullshit!
  
• Just about anything on The History Channel
  
• Judge Judy (she cracks me up)
  
• Third Watch (one of the best cop shows on TV). The bastards cancelled this, too.
  

5 Favorite toys

• SIG P220 (.45) pistol
  
• Laptop
  
• Benz C230 coupe (my car)
  
• Mossberg 500 shotgun (modified with folding stock)
  
• My stuffed Domo-kun (since toys on the desk torque off the uber-bosses and I like Domo-kun)
  

Your not so humble reporter in his kilt and Jacobite shirt, ready for the Highland Games this past Saturday.