Friday, March 27, 2009

Skippy's list of things he may no longer do.

Skippy’s List: The 213 things Skippy is no longer allowed to do in the U.S. Army


A quick note from Skippy:
I don’t mind if you want to quote a few items from my list of your site. But please do not copy the list in it’s entirety.

Explanations of these events:
a) I did myself, and either got in trouble or commended. (I had a Major shake my hand for the piss bottle thing, for instance.)
b) I witnessed another soldier do it. (Like the Sergeant we had, that basically went insane, and crucified some dead mice.)
c) Was spontaneously informed I was not allowed to do. (Like start a porn studio.)
d) Was the result of a clarification of the above. (“What about especially patriotic porn?”)
e) I was just minding my own business, when something happened. (“Schwarz…what is *that*?” said the Sgt, as he pointed to the back of my car? “Um….a rubber sheep…I can explain why that’s there….”)

To explain how I’ve stayed out of jail/alive/not beaten up too badly….. I’m funny, so they let me live.

So there you go....drop into http://skippyslist.com/list/ and see the rest of them.....this is only a brief sample. Hope you don't wet yourself laughing....




28. Don’t take the batteries out of the other soldiers alarm clocks (Even if they do hit snooze about forty times).

29. The Irish MPs are not after “Me frosted lucky charms”.

30. Not allowed to wake an Non-Commissioned Officer by repeatedly banging on the head with a bag of trash.

31. Not allowed to let sock puppets take responsibility for any of my actions.

32. Not allowed to let sock puppets take command of my post.

33. Not allowed to chew gum at formation, unless I brought enough for everybody.

34. (Next day) Not allowed to chew gum at formation even if I *did* bring enough for everybody.

35. Not allowed to sing “High Speed Dirt” by Megadeth during airborne operations. (“See the earth below/Soon to make a crater/Blue sky, black death, I’m off to meet my maker”)

36. Can’t have flashbacks to wars I was not in. (The Spanish-American War isn’t over).

37. Our medic is called “Sgt Larwasa”, not “Dr. Feelgood”.

38. Our supply Sgt is “Sgt Watkins” not “Sugar Daddy”.

39. Not allowed to ask for the day off due to religious purposes, on the basis that the world is going to end, more than once.



As I said, drop into skippy's web site for the rest.....

http://skippyslist.com/list/

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Tee shirt sayings.

BEST T-SHIRT SAYINGS

"Filthy Stinking Rich... Well, Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad"

"I Used Up All My Sick Days... So I Called In Dead"

"Happiness Is Seeing Your Mother-in-Law on a Milk Carton"

"Just Give Me Chocolate and Nobody Gets Hurt"

"Learn from Your Parents’ Mistakes... Use Birth Control"

"If God Had Wanted Me to Touch My Toes, He Would Have Put Them on My Knees"

"If You Can Read This...Kiss A Teecher"

"Wrinkled Was Not One of the Things I Wanted to Be When I Grew Up"

"If You Remember the ’60s, You Weren’t Really There"

"Procrastinate Now"

"Rehab Is for Quitters"

(Across a drawing of a skeleton) "Waiting for the Perfect Man"

"My Husband and I Married for Better or Worse...
.... He Couldn’t do Better and I Couldn’t Do Worse"

"The More I Learn About Women, the More I Love My Harley"

"I married Mr. Right. But did his first name HAVE to be "Always"?

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Skeptics....

They tell me that there is a US state which is called "The Show Me" state, and they even put that on their licence plates. I wonder...when did sceptisim go out of fashion?
Of course, as anybody that knows me has noticed, I have a remarkable level of sceptisism in my day to day life. I mean, we all know that the kid at MacDonalds really doesn't care if you "have a nice day", and that perhaps Ford really doesn't HAVE a better idea. And that guy on TV, the spokesman for the auto company who is saying "everybody talks about quality cars". As if "quality" has any meaning....a true sceptic fills in the missing words..."everybody talks about the HIGH quality of their cars (does anybody have a LOW quality car? I thought not.) And the luxury, best in its class. (there are classes?...you mean surfeit of luxury don't you? Or did you mean to say LACK of luxury? Neither "quality" or "luxury" have any existance without qualifiers.)
Make no doubt about it...if they had a greater quality than the other guy, or a a softer, cozier, better luxury than the other guy, they would have said it.

Now we have the great global warming debate. Is it a debate still? Well, anything which the world's government has spent (get this) 50 Billion dollars on had better be a topic for debate. The debate is not, of course whether global warming is happening. Of course it is happening. The money is all being spent on how to stop, alter, or live with it. Good work if you can get it. There is a "green" movement which is attracting a lot of money.

So shortly after our eyes glazed over from the Bob Dole movie and shortly before the economic meltdown, we came up with a way to develop carbon credits. This happened in something called the "Kyoto Accord", a conference which has pretty much been ignored, possibly unfairly. I usually say when people ask me about it that "Tell ya what, you bring out your scientists and I'll bring out MY scientists and see if we can agree on anything.

Turns out we all agree on global warming. What we don't agree about is what is causing it? And we REALLY don't agree how to reverse it.

Dr. David Evans wrote this article in the Australian. He is the scientist I am trotting out in favor of the idea that it is all a big shell game and a money grab by special interest groups.... Dr David Evans was a consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24036736-7583,00.html
So, I kind of like Dr. Evans...he would clearly be a great candidate for a "show me state." He states categorically and in writing, and I quote... " There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming." unquote

I suppose I could, in the interest of balance, bring an article by David Suzuki, but then, Dr. Evans doesn't have a TV show like Dr. Suzuki so maybe it will all balance out.
I am finding that I am applying my "grumpy old man" outlook to more and more things these days.

Anyway, I believe we can all agree on a few things...like perhaps life without smoke in the air would be better, (though the alternative might mean freezing to death) so maybe we may have to agree to a trade off.

I was going to add a paragraph about this latest censorship by the city of Ottawa transit system in which they refused to allow a billboard stating "There is probably no God, so just get on with your life". but I have a hockey game to get to. So TTFN. Stay sceptical....grin!

(I may move this to my "rant blog". But this is not quite as wild a rant as usual...the censorship one will DEFINITELY need to go there though!)

Friday, March 13, 2009

Alien Abduction or something more sinister?

SCOTTSBLUFF, Neb.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

- There's no wheeling or dealing at a car dealership in western Nebraska.
Three top executives are missing and so are about 80 cars. Police in Scottsbluff are investigating the removal of the cars from the Legacy Auto Sales dealership and the disappearance of the owner and two managers.

Dealership employee Miranda Cervantes told the Scottsbluff Star-Herald newspaper that she returned to work Tuesday after a day off and found the lot was virtually empty.
Cervantes said 25 to 30 Fords were loaded on trucks and removed Saturday, and about 50 Toyotas were apparently taken away Monday night.

She said the desks of the owner and the two managers had been cleaned out.

Police Capt. Kevin Spencer said the dealership has had financial difficulties

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Bergen Op Zoom

This is a little exercise in reconciling old pictures with new ones. Trouble is, often my holiday snaps are rarely taken from the same perspectives as the old ones. Case in point, the pic below. Above are the Canadians who visited in October of 1944. Very pretty little town square. The Canadians had been mauled pretty badly on the trip to get here, this was pretty much all that was left of our armour. Needless to say, we had to hold off a bit, and lick our wounds, we took well over 70% casualties within the last month and had nothing to speak of in the way of serviceable armour. The British called it a "side show".
But the side show opened up the port of Antwerp, allowing everybody to re-arm and get ready to march north through Holland to Nimegan. We were not the only ones to take a lickin' though....the German 7th army, the Adolf Hitler Paratroops, and the German LXXXVIII army (thats the famous 88th army) Corps managed to withdraw in fairly good order, and the Hermann Goring Ersatz regiment proved to not be so ersatz at all. They hung onto Holland through the "Winter of Hunger" (as the Dutch call it) Just to put it all into order, this all was going on while the "Bridge Too Far" was tripping over its long feet, and in a month or two, the Germans will pull a lot of the troops out of Holland and hit the Americans some sixty miles to the South in Bastogne, the famous "Battle of the Bulge". But for now, here, everything is peaceful, mostly because nobody has enough energy to stand up, let alone fight.
The top picture was taken from the bell tower, and here is what the bell tower looked like in June of 2007. Those old stones must have seen the ebb and flow of army after army...they date back almost 900 years. In 1944, they saw the 4th, 6th and 10th infantry brigades from Canada, the 49th and 104 divisions from the US, and the 1st Polish Armed Division drop in for a beer.

The Palais de Justice. The statue is of blind justice with a sword and scales.


This coat of arms even LOOKS old. I have no idea how old.
And I believe you can see the same building in the 1944 print above.



Looks pretty in the sun though.

Wednesday, March 04, 2009

Vanity of Vanities, all is Vanity

Playing with the filters. Here is a picture which to my eye looks like Henri Matis was playing with it. When you click to enlarge it, the beard hairs really look good.
This one enhances edges. It gives a real three dimentional effect. The green background looks almost textured.

And this was the original. Brenda took it of me to memorialize the dirty face of a working man. Well, I didn't really HAVE a portrait of me for this year.
I thought it would be kind of fun to try out different "artistic" effects.


Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Winterlude

With the spiral wheels and fully cut out body, it is hard to remember that this pumkin coach is solid ice! I am using this as a wallpaper on the computer.





This is winterlude from the Laurier Street bridge, looking South. There is maybe an inch of snow on this, the world's longest skating rink! This is the frozen Rideau Canal...it goes far far away, almost eight kilometers. The snow allows people in boots to walk, but the skaters just skate right through it. Over on the side, to the left, are the concession stands where you can get hot pastries, hot chocolate, and hot coffee. Trust me, after skating five miles on this canal, you WANT something hot! The big building on the left is National Defence Headquarters, the Canadian equivalent of the US Pentagon, and quite possibly the ugliest building in Ottawa. (though there are lots of contenders!)
Most of our snow has vanished due to a 2 day thaw. Whats left is a couple of feet of solid ice. Oh, it looks like snow....but don't kid yourself! You can walk on it. And if you never actually got around to shoveling out that driveway, well, you can forget about it now! A jackhammer would be useful.