Monday, April 30, 2018

Musings

Kith and Kin Everywhere on this Monday, April 30, 2018.

Watch out!  Unless it's a ruse, which it more than likely is, the Crazy Fat Kid With The Bad Haircut just may be eradicated by his entrenched and ancient generals -- poisoned, of course, so his demise could be attributed to ill health.  Due to overeating.

Those wizened olpharts with Cracker Jack medals covering their emaciated chests clear to their knees like chain mail armor of eld ain't about to give up their nuclear toys.  Un needs to hire a taster IF, I say again, IF he really is sincere about peaceful reunification.  NoKo has begged to be turned into a glass parking lot since 1953, but few are alive today to recognize that Ike really screwed the pooch with his failed negotiations at Panmunjom. 

Watched too many minutes of that 32-year-old SYT from Hershey, PA, as she clumsily tried to emulate the pregnant pause used so effectively by the renowned Jack Benny.  Her nasty and lewd comments at the WH Correspondents' Dinner went over like a concrete cloud -- unless you are a swamp creature yourself who applaud stabs at the non-politician President.  BTW, the "comedienne" has a voice that reminds one of a scraping of nails on a chalkboard, according to my hearing aids.

And the Progressives, like a broken record (whatever that is/was) keeps harking that the Russians are coming, the Russians are coming.  The Russians already came thanks to the Evil Witch of the East.  They bought with bags of money her very own supply of uranium -- oh, was that America's, not hers?

No, the Russians came and went home with tons of uranium to produce more nukes.  Then, thanks to Bill, George W. and Barak, the Chinamen are not coming; they are here. There. Everywhere.  
Image result for dragon spider pictures
The Spider Dragon is casting its web very rapidly throughout Central Asia, the Middle East, Eastern & Western Europe, Asia Minor and Africa.  New seaports, new rail lines are already spreading rapidly.

Uncle Sam, the Federal bureaucracy, apparently, is too caught up in Trump bashing to pay attention.

Hotelier Trump, you can bet, is well aware of the web, however, as his site location scouting geographers must be on top of the American-based hotel chains a-building apace with the advance of the Sino-railroad building spree. 

America, which makes relatively little of consumer merchandise, is being reduced to a shell of its once magnificence.  Communist Chinese Capitalism is poised to force America to wither on the vine.

The joke may be on the "refugees" pouring across our southern border when Yanks will be forced to mow their own lawns and make their own beds as the USA economy will dry up.  Unless the freaking idiots at the helm in Congress open their less than brilliant eyes, we Americans are hide-bound for Third World status.  No longer able to produce profits to purchase Chinese-made goods, our progeny simply will have to do without.

Log on to The New Silk Road, OBOR or BRI to read, understand and observe Trader Uncle Sam have to file for bankruptcy.  We already owe almost $21,000,000,000 for heaven's sake, $1.17-Trillion of it to Communist China.

While I'm picking on the Lazy Laughable Loons in Congress, who universally begin every paragraph spoken with "Well, first of all, XXXX."  Have you reached your limit?  How about the Millennials who must begin every sentence with a preceding, "So, XXX."

As I found out during my first year in college, the English profs spend so much of their time brainwashing students with their Progressive political agenda that they don't have time to teach English, written or spoken.  Some of you older friends may recall that I set out to be an English major until finding that my unabashed American patriotism would result in the murder of the whole English Department of Comm-Sympathizers -- Progressives!  I changed to American History, Geography and Cultural Anthropology in order to remain in the Navy and out of prison.

So, went my rambling rampage for today.  So, I would like for you to click on "make a comment" and, so, inform me that you read it.  So, that about wraps up this harangue.
So, what do you think about my various subjects wrapped in one long discourse?

So, It's been a long, hard day of yard work.  So, I might as well put this one in the NSA record book.

Good night, all.

massacheepjack






Sunday, April 29, 2018

Snippet of 4/29/18

Well, now, Kith and Kin everywhere or someone who might happen upon this Sunday evening, April 29, 2018, blog:

Today turned out to be a balmy 89° here in Arizona's Mohave Desert, although yours truly didn't venture any farther outside than the back patio today.  And that was to feed Babe and Hardee, our two resident roadrunners. who are sitting on a nest somewhere across the wash behind our house.  They both come to beg for the high fat hamburger balls they seem to love.

They both have their own character, too, Babe prefers to take meatballs from my fingers while Hardee likes to eat from a platter at my feet while coo-ing repeatedly his appreciation for the handout.  Babe is the silent one.

Natural food; insects and reptiles have become pretty scarce with our continued drought.  If memory serves me right, there have been only two rainstorms during the past 8 months.  We had some rain in August of '17 and a light rain in January of '18 and little else.  Maybe that's why it's called a desert.  We are wondering if the summer monsoon rains will resume after they went AWOL last year?

Of course, of even more importance is that snowfall in the high mountains that feed the Colorado River has been in a more than decade-long drought.  Our paper today speculated on the consequences should the drought continue.  Tucson, Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Diego depend on the Colorado, too.

M5 and I have been "trapped in irons," as the old days of sail called it -- ain't been doin' much.  Oh, yes, getting caught up on much reading with the mornings taken up with cooking.  I made a Brussel's sprout and chicken dish today following an actual recipe.  Wow!  Complicated that I could reproduce much more quickly.  The lady who wrote the recipe earned a "D" from me in her writing, but an "A" in taste.

We are scheduled to get a new heat pump on May 8.  Our A/C units here have an average life span of 15 years.  Ours of 20 years and showing instrumentation of being on the downhill side.  Rather than having it crap out in July with a backlog of installers, we decided to replace it while it's still functioning.  We hit 126° last June, to give you the idea.

Another big expense will be reroofing our rental next door.  The 1979-built house had a new asphalt-shingle roof put on about 15 years ago as we remember.  This time we are looking into a permanent lightweight tile of some kind that doesn't involve reinforcing the roof.  A roofer scheduled an inspection, but never showed up for the appointment.  Eh, manana time!

M5 and I will be going to the range this coming week to exercise her 9mm Ruger and I need to break-in my .380 Sig.  We keep putting it off for no really good reason!  I'm supposed to run a couple of hundred rounds through the Sig to ensure flawlessness.  And, we both need more gym time to built up stamina.  I can always drum up a reason not to go and must stop that.  My 93rd birthday is less than 2 months away!!!!  We have an annual membership, too, that's wasting away!  "No excuse, Sir!"

Make a comment of what's happening at your castle.

Neanderthal Jack











Wednesday, April 25, 2018

The Alpha and Omega of My Navy Career



THE ALPHA AND OMEGA OF MY NAVY EXPERIENCE

Jack Duncan


Upon enlisting in the Navy in Bakersfield at the Recruiting Office in the basement of the old Post Office, finally when Chief Boatswain's Mate Frank B. Wilson got through with my lengthy preliminary paperwork, he put me on a bus for L.A. on August 14, 1942.    Frank had been recalled to active duty after retiring from 30 years on active duty beginning with Teddy Roosevelt's Great White Fleet 'Round the World Cruise.  I had seen a photo of him riding a camel at the Great Pyramid in Egypt.  The exact memories of a 17-year-old are long-erased, but somehow I got from wherever the bus took me to the Naval Reserve Center at Chavez Ravine.

Miles away from the coast, in a narrow canyon near what is now Dodger Stadium, generations of navy and marine reservists were trained to fight a war at sea. The Navy and Marine Reserve Center, located in Chavez Ravine near Echo Park, opened just before World War II with a radio tower, basement pool and a football sized “drill deck” equipped with a torpedo sight, 5-inch cannon and  a 40mm anti-aircraft gun that reservists would find on a battleship. Decades after the last military reservists received training, the former armory, still equipped with cannon and anti-aircraft gun, has been nominated to become a city cultural historic landmark.
Why would  a Navy armory and reserve center be built so far from the sea?  Because it would be “inconspicuously nestled in the hills where raiding bombers in a possible attack by enemy air forces will be least likely to damage it,” a Navy official was quoted as  saying.

Omigosh, typing my paperwork with me sitting right alongside him was a real movie star.  He was a yeoman (clerk-typist) and a petty officer.  I was aghast as the beginning of a long Navy career was to start with such a flair!  Richard Denning himself.

Denning was born as Louis Albert Heindrich Denninger, Jr., in Poughkeepsie, New York. He became an actor, best known for his recurring starring roles in various science fiction and horror films of the 1950s. In later life, he had a recurring role as the fictitious governor of Hawaii, Paul Jameson, in the CBS television crime drama series, Hawaii Five-O (1968–1980), starring Jack Lord.   According to Denning, his military service during World War II in the United States Navy, effectively disrupted his acting career, and after his discharge from military service it would be another year and a half before Paramount Pictures offered Denning any more acting work. During that time period, Denning and his family lived in a mobile home that he alternately parked at Malibu and Palm Springs. His period of unemployment ended when he was hired to star on the radio opposite Lucille Ball in My Favorite Husband.[3] Denning later appeared in several 'B' crime drama films before starring in a number of science fiction and horror films. In 1957, he began the first of what would become a steady series of television appearances, usually as a supporting character, though he did star briefly in two television dramas, The Flying Doctor (1959), and Michael Shayne (1960–61).
With such an auspicious start, what was possibly the omega of things Navy almost had to be "over the top."  And it was with the cutting my 90th birthday cake assisted by the Commander, U.S. 3rd Fleet and the Secretary of the Navy aboard the guided missile cruiser, USS Chosin.  June 5, 2015.

Arranged as a surprise by the all-volunteer crew of the PT658 during Fleet Week of the June 2015 Portland Rose Festival and Vice Admiral Kenny Floyd whom I'd met the year before, the whole thing totally surprised and shocked me no end.

http://www.savetheptboatinc.com/

My Marvelous Marlene had been in on the surprise for weeks without giving me a hint.  I believed that the crowning glory was that the crew had pulled strings just to get us an invitation to the Admiral's Reception.  I had kept many of my Navy assignments secret from her and she did a superb job on this one keeping it from me!

Then to have the Admiral call me front and center to introduce me to the assembled crowd of 200 to 300 VIPs and to SecNav Ray Mabus was beyond belief.  When SecNav slipped me a challenge coin during the introductory handshake, came another shock for an old knuckle-draggin' Cannon Cocker. 

Totally as aghast as at the movie star who did my paperwork when I was fresh out of Miss Mary Virginia Owen's East Bakersfield High School homeroom, I was ushered by the Admiral and Secretary into the hangar deck where a large cake sat. 

Mary Virginia finally married George DeArmond and their kids became successes, I'll add parenthetically.  But that's another story.

Admiral Floyd handed me the sword, asked me not to cut him with it and the duo thankfully guided my trembling hand as we ceremoniously sliced the cake to the accolades of the multitude.

Handshakes were offered by hordes of people with stars on their shoulder boards or eagles on their collars.  The wife of a Canadian Navy ship's captain even planted a kiss on my left cheek.  I know it's hard for non-veterans to grasp, but it's even tougher for the veterans to realize that it would ever happen to a mere enlisted man.  Thanks to digital cameras, there's proof.

My own chin was bruised for a week afterwards due to my jaw hitting the deck so many times as event after event unfolded.

Now, with 18 years in grade as a Master Chief, I had had many adventures with the "brass" while serving Navy Captains and even "raising" young JGs up to become two-star Admirals, but after being retired for 30 years to receive this recognition -- might I express a not-too-subdued WOW?  This was beyond belief.

When Annapolis grads, nicknamed "Ring Knockers," might knock their class rings, I could knock my own Fresno State graduation class ring as not being too much of lower caste member of the Goat Locker.  Yet, Ray Mabus was the first SecNav upon whom I'd ever laid eyes, let alone receive a challenge coin as well as an assist with cutting a cake!

My retirement had been underwhelming.  I was a Reservist, serving in a Pacific Fleet billet on active duty.  The Navy Reserve didn't know me; I didn't belong to the active unit, either, so I had just "left the building" after 43 years, took off my blue suit in exchange for mufti and gone to work as a Department of the Navy instructor at Fleet Training Center, San Diego.  Maybe there might have been a handshake or two; that's it.

Much later, I did receive an honor along with a flag by an NJROTC unit that was much appreciated. 

And while a lot of this is repetitious, you've seen it before, this is a summation and the beginning of another of The Many Mini Tales of an Old Dry Frog that make up the story of my life -- so far.

Three Sons


THREE SONS
Three sons of neighbors; a contrast:

              Marlene’s son Mike thrashed around during high school, went on to become a Journeyman Carpenter after a four-year apprenticeship.  Bored by the rote of the occupation and apprehensive of losing fingers or falling from scaffolding, he became an Engineering Aide with the city government of his hometown.  This was after simultaneously obtaining a two-year degree from his local community college. 
              His mother, Marlene, her graduate work in Geography, was variously a teacher, a welfare worker and finally a mid-level administrator for a large County.  His late-father was a civil engineer with his own company.
              After several years, Mike’s city position was outsourced.  He then was hired by a contractor and trained to become a fiber-optics technician at the Navy Air Warfare Center at China Lake, CA, where he works with testing exotic weaponry.  Involved in civic work, he is a long-term Treasurer with the Eagles in Ridgecrest, CA.
               A champion bowler, his hobby morphed from competition Smallbore Rifle to that indoor sport.  His several finger-rings he has earned attest to his prowess.
His job is helping keep America safe by working with weapons to eradicate the enemies of our nation.  Or, as his proud step-father proclaims, he is employed at helping kill the bad guys of the world.
Not an easy task there in the brutal climate of the Mojave Desert; he works outside in weather alternating from snowy wintry storms on high mountains to the stifling intense summer heat of dry lakes on the desert floor.  Skin cancers from exposure to the sun’s deadly rays are one result.
              Jack’s son Jeff bluffed his way through high school, plowed his way through the University of Tennessee all the way to a PhD in Ecology. He was determined to save the world from self-destruction.  Interning with the National Park Service, his work was outstanding enough and his experience wide enough to be hired onto the Park Service staff. 
              Jack was just a Navy enlisted man albeit possessing an education.
His son had wandered through the fringes of academia from living on a raft in the Everglades while doing research to teaching classes in the Amazon at the University of Manaus in Brazil and scuba-diving to study the coral reefs of the Florida coast.  Jeff serves as an Adjunct Professor from time-to-time at the U of TN-Chattanooga.  His expertise in fisheries, riverine and limnology sciences is so vast that he has been detached by the U.S. National Park Service to aid with the amelioration of the Mekong River halieutics that are being disturbed by Chinese dam-building upstream.
First, Cambodia asked for his assistance.  Next, Vietnam sent for him to help their plight.  Both nations fear for the diminishment of a vital protein source to feed their millions.  Vietnam, especially, fears for a dearth of river water to flood the rice fields.  Millions more throughout Asia depend on Vietnam’s exports of rice grown in the Mekong Delta.  Reducing that flow might result in famine.
Linda’s son Bryan chose a different route while in high school.  He decided to be one of the gang addicted to some of the various forms of narcotics.  Showing that he was one of “the gang,” he spent a majority of his adulthood to date in Florence, AZ.  Now, in case the reader doesn’t know, Florence is noted for its several Arizona State Prison complexes. 
Bryan, not educated enough to make any other type of living, had become so “institutionalized” that he was unable to survive in adulthood outside of the drug trade.  Ignorance, lack of education, also made it easy to make many mistakes repeatedly leading him from idyllic Lake Havasu back to Florence and incarceration.
Now, 38 years old and once more living at home with Linda, he returned to his addictive behavior and began dealing dope from mom’s garage – at night.  “Under the cover of darkness,” stupidly, is just when authorities expect these drogues on society to engage in their nefarious activities.  Bingo!
Again, he was apprehended and Linda’s house subjected to a SWAT team night time search complete with a phalanx of heavily armed agents.  There were flashing red and blue lights, hailers ordering occupants to exit with their hands up as well as the employment of a “flash-bang.”  The entire peaceful neighborhood was disturbed by a miscreant unable to ever be a productive member of society.
Bryan’s mother, apparently still feeling she could never become a viable member of the amicable neighborhood, ostracized herself.  Her son never contributed to society; quite the opposite, his dealing of drugs mired others into the cesspool of the drug culture.
Life is funny that way.  Some “do.”  Some “don’t.”  Some contribute; some rip asunder.  Marlene and I thank God that our two sons both became contributing citizens.
--end--




Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Snippet of 4/19/18

Kin and Kin on this April 24, 2018,

Summer in the desert has been elusive this year with the temps yo-yoing between the 70s and the 90s and windstorms seemingly every other day.  Today the Weather Wonks predict our first triple digit day!!!!  The one we've been awaiting.

The Snowbirds have been flocking on their northward journey right into stormy conditions.  Ha!  That will teach them to stop the nomadic life and settle down here in our wonderful desert.

We've been on borrowed time with our heat pump.  In these torrid conditions, a life span for A/C is about 15 years and ours is 20.  So, before it goes down, we called Samons A/C and ordered a new 4-ton heat pump.  We didn't want to wait until it quit completely in the middle of a 120° week and then be put on a waiting list.

$6,000 in case you're curious.  Ouch; the price of living in the warm desert.

Last week we had lunch at Jersey's Grill.  Excellent food downtown.  We'd never tried it before.  Pretty funky place for olpharts, but as MacArthur said, "I shall return."  Well, WE shall return.

Last week we stopped by London Bridge Arms and picked up two extra magazines for my Sig P238WTP carry gun.  Now, I can get into a prolonged gun fight when really, only one round is needed right 'twixt the eyes of a raghead or bad guy.

I spent most of one morning making another pound of hamburger meatballs.  We're feeding two roadrunners that are nesting somewhere down in Whaler Wash.  We soon shall have babies, we're sure.  Hardee gives me coos as I put meatballs in his dish between my feet while Babe, the quiet one, prefers to eat out of my hand while standing on the patio wall.  How much fun can you have???

Then on Friday we left for Tucson.  Quick trip, down and back on Sunday.  A project of Tucson's University HS was a veterans heritage book presentation and signing.  Inasmuch as the book led off with a brief of my WW2 service, we just had to go to honor the kids and their project.  Thanks to Vivien and Henry for suggesting to Matthew that he pen the brief of yours truly.  Martina and Ken treated us to a Mexican dinner after the book signing.  A great family including Ken's dad, Dave.

Yes, Marlene drove and we did stop a couple of times for her to get out and walk a bit.

Traffic was safe and sane until the home stretch on AZ-72 from Vicksburg to Parker.  Marlene was holding the speed about 73 mph along that 55 mph speed limit two-lane road.  At various times we were passed by black pickups and black cars, 2 of each, doing close to or above 100 mph!  They weren't together, but four separate incidents.  You must understand that the road is rough with dips and Marlene's 73 was pushing it.  Wow!  Idiots are still among us and eastbound traffic returning from the river was heavy.  Methinks the drug alcohol might have been fueling the drivers.

Babe was waiting for us, begging for meatballs and eating both from mine and Marlene's hands.  No sign of Hardee.

Yes, yes, the 600 mile round trip was hard on both of us.  We learned a couple of years ago that about 350 miles a day is her limit.  300 miles on Friday, 300 miles on Sunday with a hectic Saturday just about enough for a weekend.  We crashed on Monday, lazing around the house -- except Marlene's new laptop needed to be tweaked at the Whiz Kidz shop.

Nothing planned until son Jeff's proposed brief visit from Tennessee on May 19 & 20.

Then comes our trip to Portland and the PT658 at Fleet Week the first week in June with son Mike doing the driving.

All is well in the desert.

Jack&Marlene







Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Part II of "If I Were to Write a Novel ..."

IF I WERE TO WRITE A NOVEL . . .
PART II
Scroll down to read Part I first

Peter Tare, his rave, rants and harangues regarding President Xi and China's New Silk Road, quashed by No Such Agency and cancelled by gmail, was stifled only briefly when he found a charming, cutie from Nebraska's farmlands who knew a way to work around the roadblock.

Margo put his computer on blogspot so that he could no longer have to address all of Peter's Pack, but his Pack could, at their leisure, open up their browser to his blogspot to find the latest Snippet or poke at the Establishment Swamp Creatures.  Of course, those ESC, the slime infesting the swamp called government, knew that Peter was on to their nefarious game, but calculated that he now was isolated and could spread his alarm world wide. The Delvers of No Such assured themselves that his blog was receiving just a few to zero comments.  That indicated few were reading it and those who were had no clue on how to spread the alarm.

The ESC's agenda, of course, was proceeding on target and on schedule.  Uncle Sam's USA, the America of the Founding Fathers, was doomed as OBOR, the New Silk Road's web grew wider.  The Progressive Party, camouflaged as the Democrats, were proceeding apace with Communist world domination -- Chinese-style Communism, of course, was doing the guiding, but few Progressives were aware of the orchestration.

OBOR's initial web thrown across southern Asia was a twin route casting, one by sea, one by land.  The high-speed rail line through Khorgos, Khazakstan, thence Iran and on into Turkey was backed up by a line from Khorgos into Moscow and on into Belgium.

The sea routes from China's east coast ports through the South China Sea and the Malacca Straits were reinforced by the enhanced truck routes through Pakistan and Afghanistan to Gwadar, thence by sea to Adriatic Sea ports and Port Sudan in Africa.  The nearby Iranian/Indian seaport at Chabahar somehow may figure into the Sino-planning of the future.

Chinese high-speed train lines spread like a Black Widow's web engulfing all of Europe, Eurasia, Africa, Asia and South America, all tied back to China through sea lanes.  America's Navy shrank as the U.S. Treasury was robbed by the welfare state to feed the immigrant masses as well as the citizens left adrift in a sea of Chinese goods they no longer could afford.  California's idiot governor, Flaky Brown, was leading the open border policy.

Chinese trade (did anyone mention eventual hegemony?) then in time could dominate the Eurasian landmass as well as the continent of Africa leading to economic captivity.  At this point, Peter must remind the reader to stop thinking in Western Civilization timelines and think in Chinese time; not in 4 or 5 years or even a decade but the inexorable creeping in scores of years or even a century or two.

Then, the American Progressive will have been thrown under their New Brave World bus and China will control global economics.  What's left of the USA will wither on the vine and crumble into a disaster such as Venezuela is today.

Added to the speed of America's decline will be the additional burden of the uneducated, unskilled masses of illegal immigrants pouring into the welfare state's socialistic countryside to take advantage of the largess.  As the Treasury dries up, the illegal aliens and the jihadist Muslims jointly will hurry up the process of the disintegration of the Founding Fathers' great experiment in freedom.

Peter saw his beloved USA slither into a morass of chaos as anarchy, food riots and mayhem lay upon the land.  Armed Americans began to add to the anarchy as they rose up in revolt, shooting the rioters without regard to laws -- and law enforcement officers joined them.  The North American continent was aflame as Little Brother Canada, too, was in flames.  

Mexico was under the boot heel of the military as it fruitlessly sought status quo antebellum.  Executions drastically reduced Mexico's long-smoldering problem of over-population as well as the mass exodus northward.  

The remainder of Meso-America was occupied with Chinese-allied troops from China's major base in Panama. 

Peter, his computer long-since confiscated by Federal agents, simply retired into a sort of somnambulism state and spent his remaining time whittling walking sticks at his desert home awaiting the knock on the door by Progressive Bureau of Investigation troopers.  It was recorded that he kept murmuring, "I tried to warn them, but no one would read my blogspot." 

That's the novel I would write if I were to write a novel.  No one would read it.  But you might leave a comment should you happen to think of it.
THE END



Sunday, April 15, 2018

A NUDE SUMMER AT THE LAKE

It was a beautiful late summer day when Bonnie wanted to increase her tan before the rains of fall splattered upon the land.  The sun was delightfully hot as she slipped off her bikini top and lay on a tatami mat in the sand by the lake, alone with her reveries.

Nearby was an apple tree.  The golden apple that Bonnie had espied while walking past was just about ripe for the picking.  

But, the apple had hosted an ugly beetle had visited it weeks earlier in the spring and had stung it with its ovapositor.  Inside the apple, a worm named Motor had hatched to begin gnawing away at the pulp to grow into another ugly beetle, just like its mother.

Bonnie, seeing no one close by, decided to totally sun bathe as the rays soothed her golden skin.  She slipped off her bikini bottom to take full advantage of the sun.  As she drowsed, inside the golden apple, Motor was gnawing away, unseen, unheard, growing ever larger.

Nude and golden-skinned, Bonnie drifted off into sleep, lying there on her tatami under the soothing rays of the golden sun.  She was gorgeous, her flat tummy between her pert, small breasts and long slender, shapely legs -- all growing even more charmingly golden.

Meanwhile, Motor was tunneling, tunneling, tunneling.

Bonnie awoke, feeling hungry, and she recalled that tempting golden apple on the tree beside the lake.  Still naked and golden, she arose, plucked the apple from the tree and was ready to take a bite when -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-

-
-
-
-
OUTBOARD MOTOR
THE END






Friday, April 13, 2018

Snippet for Triskadekaphobia Day

Kith and Kin Everywhere,

So it's Friday, the 13th in April, 2018, and we've moved from the rim of summer's blast of furnace heat back to chilly spring weather.  The two of us love our blistering summer here in the Arizona desert, even when the mercury surpasses the 120° mark.  Of course, we then can escape at our will into our air conditioned abode, car or store.  Some may recall that we recorded an unofficial 126° last summer.

It's only 71° with 28 mph winds blasting out of the north right now.  How strange after the mercury already has been in the high 90°s and flirting with triple digits.  But it is spring and this is the desert.

The ripe lemons are being blown off our tree that is confused.  There are blossoms, green lemons and ripe ones all at the same time.  Kumquats?  All picked, dried and in Mason jars, except for one new tree.  The fruit is nice and orange, but just not quite ripened as yet, with some green still showing.

Roadrunners!  Babe, the newest one, will come down on the patio to get our attention through the glass doors, but doesn't like to stay there, surrounded by rock walls.  He/She/It would rather stay atop the wall where he will actually take a meatball from my fingers.  He is the first one of several generations who will do that.  Evolution at work?  Kidding.  Hardee, the Elder, shows up only occasionally, now.  We do believe that they are tending to a nest.

Plans are all made for our June trip to Portland for Fleet Week where we hope to see some of our readers joining us to pay a visit to the only fully-operational WW2 PT boat in the world.  About 750 vessels of the "plywood Navy" were built and I had given up on her when I first espied her years ago.  She was a derelict scrap, then The Twelve, my title for a dozen motor torpedo boat veterans living in the Northwest, became dedicated to her restoration and went to work. 

They attracted a mass of newer generation men and women who put her back into full operational mode.  She is now original down to the electronics and even the toaster and binoculars -- an amazing feat by an amazing crew of volunteers.  All this was accomplished without a major sponsor.

Current generations give a blank look when we mention PT (Patrol Torpedo) boats.  I usually just simplify an explanation that most of the Navy's iron-ships were sunk at Pearl Harbor so Uncle Sam built 3/4s of a thousand wooden, 80-foot boats, armed them with guns and torpedoes and we sailors went hunting for the Imperial Japanese Navy as well as the German Kriegsmarine. 

This seems to satisfy most of the post-WW2 generations.

Anyway, M5 and I will be in Portland during the first full week in June with son Mike doing the driving up and back.  That trip starts a flurry of travel for us through June of 2019 and the 75th Anniversary of D-Day in Normandy.

If you can't join us in Portland, just send money -- for a boat is a hole in the water into which disappears money, you may recall.

Over and out.


Saturday, April 7, 2018

Pity Poor Me

Kith and Kin Everywhere, April 7, 2018,

Every 3 months, the eye doc has to check my eyesight, my having a hint of
macular degeneration, albeit with still 20/20 vision.  

As you may note, I simply hate the process when the fetching -- no, knockout! -- Shannon, the Eye Tech Girl, will grab the hat off my head, don it, sit on my lap and snap a 'selfie.'

You can tell that I simply detest the fantastic adventure.
See that scowl as she wraps those lovely arms around me?

No, no, my 'nurse,' My Marvelous Marlene, always accompanies me and approves as I suffer the pangs of such painful behavior.
Things are that tough, here in the desert; don't feel sorry for me, though, as I'm able to suffer through it.



As some of Jack's Pack may have noticed, we never eat fast food, although we do dine out often.  Well, the newspaper had an Arby's ad for gyros and we both love Greek food, so we bought two to take home after our gym workout.

Now we know why we don't patronize such places.  The clientele seemed in need of a shower, a visit to a dentist and a laundromat.

O-o-o-e-es they were!  

And the gyros may have had some sort of sauce, but it wasn't tzatziki and the meat lacked the zing of oregano and lamb that makes Greco cuisine so zestful.  Yep, should have gone to Niko's!  At least the diners are clean there and most have a full set of teeth -- where did those scumbags come from?  

Shades of the Grapes of Wrath!  Well, it is 97° and sunny here while the folks back East are suffering from precipitation in one form or another.  That does attract visitors to our city.

And now we'll return to our pondering about the web of railroads that China is weaving throughout Central Asia, Africa and Europe -- One Belt, One Road, they call it -- or the New Silk Road.  We think it serves also as a noose around Uncle Sam's neck.

How do you view it?  Click on "No Comment" to comment -- I don't understand why, but just do it.

PT Jack, the Neanderthal




Friday, April 6, 2018

China Strikes Again

Kith and Kin Everywhere this April 6, 2018,

Allow me to expound on events that the MSM as well as the "Free Press" are keeping out of the news:

China is ripping us a new one, hence Trump's playing with tariffs, perhaps.  As a hotelier, I'm sure his empire's staff is keeping him apprised of world events even as the government bureaucrats might not.  His empire must have geographers employed to keep tab on happenings by the Chi-Coms.

Let's tuck away in some recesses of our personal RAM that China is Communist.  It may be well underway to become the world's supplier of capitalistic merchandise, but it remains dominated, ruled, by a Communist oligarchy under a very strong president.

Into those mental recesses, also stuff in the fact that the Chinese thinking/planning is so very different from ours in Western Civilization.  The Chinese plan in decades and scores of decades, then proceed with the plan and sub-plans with sloth-like speed making sure to cover all exigencies with substitute plans/routes. 

But, China more than a year ago sent its first train from Urumqi to London -- did you know that?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/02/china-launches-freight-train-britain/

It was news in the UK, but who ever saw a whisper in the USA press?  Oh, perhaps in economic journals that none of us Joe Sixpacks read, but certainly not in our mass media.  America is being sucker-punched as China builds/finances more rail lines in Croatia, Austria and even Iran and Africa, for cripe's sake!  With American money, I might add, as almost every consumer good we are able to purchase comes with a "Made in China" label, other than food, of course.  Unless you're buying at the 99¢ Store chain with its canned goods from China.

Then there's tilapia, "the fish to save the world from hunger."  Marlene and I spotted huge fish farms in Shanghai that resembled cesspools.  We stopped buying or eating tilapia!

The point being is that the more we Westerners buy from China, the more capital that President Xi Jinping has to finance America's own demise.  Yet, thanks mostly to the administrations of Clinton, the Bushes and Obama, the USA has caused most of American factories to now be called "The Rust Belt."

Meanwhile, trade from China across Central Asia is bustling:

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/Economy/Kazakhstan-dry-port-key-hub-for-China-s-Belt-and-Road-scheme

Of course, you never heard of it -- America is being murdered in our sleep as we text each other about unimportant and inane things.  

It's time to awaken from our juvenile somnambulism and begin to spread the word far and wide to ALL of our friends that a Deep State, the Progressives, are killing our nation.  They are all in George Soro's camp of One World.  The present leader is China under the guise of commerce and it is working.  Global Dominance by Communist China is a force underway.

Stop looking up porn and jokes and begin to search the Web for happenings in that part of the world of which we know but little and understand less -- Central Asia and the New Silk Road.  Your grandchildren will rue your every purchase of goods made in China for it is that fact that is paying for the New Silk Road!!!!

All the while, we and our kids have been immersed in subtle, gradual, Communism of a style we for which our educational system did NOT prepare us to understand or to battle.  In fact, John Dewey's Progressive Education set the stage for America to accept Gramsci Marxism lock, stock and barrel.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2007/02/cultural_marxism.html

Now, the question begs; are we howling at the moon or are we opening doors of understanding to our readers?  Or have we become left-wing-nuts?
--end--




Thursday, April 5, 2018

Snippet

Kith and Kin Everywhere on this April X, 2018,

Quite a day here in the Arizona desert.  I got up to a blood sugar of 116, indicating that I should skip breakfast.  No idea of the cause.  Showered and My Marvelous Marlene drove me down to #1 Nails to get a pedicure.  I gave up driving several years back while keeping my drivers license "in case."

Too large a belly and 92 years somehow prevent me from grooming my own toenails  -- and Marlene refuses to do so for which I don't blame her.  They're tough as -- well -- toenails and grow prodigiously.  Medicare provides for a nail cut every 60 days, but I require one every 30, so we skip Medicare and seek out professional nail artists at our expense.   You're welcome, taxpayer!

The podiatrist who cared for our feet retired and the remaining ones in our small and remote town are booked solid, so we rely on the Vietnamese gals at #1 Nails.

While we're on the subject of our small town (55,000 permanent), our block "do be a-changin'."  The house directly across our one-block-long street is occupied for 3 or 4 months a year by a couple from Iowa, Tom and Carol, who prefer the humidity, the rain, the snow, the insects of Iowa over Havasu's heat.  The paper this morning says 95° today, so they fled eastward.

Next door to them down toward the lake, a couple named Liz and Frank moved in some stuff after buying the house.  Several months later and they still haven't taken up residence from Burbank, CA.  Evidently, they will be retiring a little later.

Uphill from Tom and Carol, toward the mountains, is a house that went up for sale yesterday when 86-year-old Betty from Corona, CA, decided to sell.  They never really moved in and her husband passed away shortly after they purchased it. 

Anybody want to be our neighbor?  A lightly-lived-in 3 bdrm w/3 car garage and great neighbors; Art and Carolyn on one side, seldom-seen-Iowans on the other and us across the street.  We are in need of more Lunies on Lunar Drive!  Three houses in a row unoccupied.

Yes, our roadrunners are still around, patrolling the neighborhood for snakes and lizards.  At 0630 this morning, Babe, a young-un, was peering in through the all-glass door begging for a meatball.  Each has its own character.  Hardee will eat at my feet while cooing his greeting; but Babe prefers no conversation and to eat atop the wall surrounding our rear patio.  Babe comes with inches of my face to accomplish that.

We are beginning to see a pattern in the fourth or fifth generation of roadrunners in that the adults apparently leave the easy pickin's of our meatballs to the kids while they seek out new territory.  Isn't that strange?  You'd think they'd kick the kids down the block to keep the meatballs coming to them.

Jim in PA and Laura in Upstate NY may still be getting snow, but we are luxuriating in our 90° + and anxiously awaiting triple digits.  I've been slowly constructing some walking sticks and hiking poles at the same time I'm cleaning out my workshop side of the garage.

There's an almost new bandsaw, an engraver, a scroll saw, a bench grinder, a belt/disc sander, a Delta drill press and various other power hand tools out there that maybe our kids might covet -- or might get donated to the schools for a tax write-off.  I've reached the age of tinkering rather than woodworking.  Rifle stock carving is long gone; the old fingers no longer capable of the fine precision required along with the patience required.

As you can deduce from the above, all is well around our place and we hope all is well around yours.

PT Jack, the Neanderthal -- and the Marvelous Marlene




Wednesday, April 4, 2018

Mental Hospitals and Guns

Kith and Kin Everywhere on the April 4, 2018,

Ever wonder why there were almost no shootings/school attacks/rampages back in the Dark Ages when I was growing up -- 1920s/1930s?

Just take a look at what the government did to our nation back during the post-World War II era in regard to "insane asylums" and locking up nut cases.  Politicians quickly bought into the huge mistake in order to save mental hospital costs -- the saving of which that they could usurp for their own pet projects.

https://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/30/science/how-release-of-mental-patients-
began.html

And such misplaced follies has led to school shootings and the insane Iranian woman at the You Tube company opening fire and the list goes on and on.  So the libards blame the gun.  It's a mental issue, not a gun issue.  Let's get back to locking up and giving treatment to those among us who just not right.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/insane-violent-street-article-1.1225716

Some humans simply are irretrievably insane and should remain incarcerated for their own safety as well as society's.  Others might be salvaged and become contributing citizens after some serious psychiatric procedures.  Just turning them loose to prey on the innocent is criminal unto itself and must be looked upon as a failed policy.

PT Jack, the Neanderthal

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Snippet for April 3, 2018

Kith and Kin Everywhere on this April 3, 2018,

We have in our "arsenal" rifles made as long ago as in 1907 or 111 years ago that liberals, using their own ignorance about firearms, would label "assault rifles."

They are detachable magazine-fed, semi-automatics just like the AR-15s, the object of the gun control crowd.  Except!!!!  They shoot a humongous bullet that would knock a deer on its keister.  They are not nearly as light nor as ergonomic to handle as a black AR-15.  Now would the anti-gun crowd call that century-old Winchester an assault rifle?

Marlene has an AR-15 that she had built for an NRA match called "NRA High Power Sporting Rifle."  Folks who get to see it marvel at its beauty with a wooden buttstock, the whole gun being powder-coated in red, white and blue.  Although it has a 30-shot magazine, it was made for a high degree of accuracy.  Indeed, her first 3 shots after breaking in the barrel cut one ragged hole when fired at 100 yards using 69-grain Sierra MatchKing bullets.

Let's knock off this johnny-come-lately label of "assault rifle" to describe the handy, but not pretty to behold, AR-15.  Anyone using one of our 1907-made rifles would not simply wound folks, but seriously would eliminate them, just as they were designed to shoot big varmints like feral hogs and bad guys.  Therefore, don't believe the idiot media folks who bloviate about things they know not.

Instead, you might ask that the old Master Chief Gunner's Mate . . . capisce?

The crew of PT658 up Portland way are working to get Lars Larson to interview me during our trip up there over Fleet Week the first week in June.  The gist of which will be to raise funds to help operate and maintain the boat.  We'll let you know.

And while we were on the subject of guns, the little kids posing as dupes for Progressive ant-gunners are showing their lack of understanding of the NRA and the 2nd Amendments, just as the John Dewey-school of left-wing teachers hoped.

Finally, on March 30, our mercury nestled closer to 90°, the temperature that begins to thaw the frozen muscles of 90+ year olds!  It felt so good!  How we will rejoice when the triple digits arrive -- the kind of weather we both enjoy.

Easter is a special anniversary in our lives, so we were going for Greek cuisine at Niko's to celebrate.  Closed for Easter -- opted for the usual Golden Corral -- ho-hum!  Huge crowd to highlight its popularity in our town.  Steak and shrimp.  Munch!

It was also a special day for son Jeff and family as they scheduled a move into their new home with a barn for all of the cars, a pond and on 4 acres plus.

We cleaned the trees of kumquats as far as the ladder allowed dehydrated them to enjoy all year in salads and casseroles.  While carrying the ladder from the back to the front and into the garage, I spied fornication in progress!!!!  Yes, the roadrunners were creating a new couple of chicks right there in the front yard in front of me.

Allowing him to finish before I walked on, he presented her with a bug of some type as her reward -- or was it payment?  On our way to Easter dinner, she got nailed again right at our mailbox.

Those two birds are providing so much pleasure for us, too.  Hardee will come up between my legs as I feed him meatballs, but Babe prefers hers on the patio wall.  She, too, comes within inches of my face to grab her snack from atop the wall.

So much for April Fool's Day.

And now it's Tuesday, April 3.  Debbie is swiftly cleaning up after us as she does every other Tuesday.  All remains well in the desert.

Our blog is quiet with only one commenting on our Snippets and our ruminations, so I would guess that most of Jack's Pack just can't quite figure out blogspot.com.


JackandMarlene