This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: Zero Ponsdorf

  • Chow… Just a Saturday (Geezer) Silly

    Many here have traveled the world in uniform.  This post is/was prompted by an exchange on FB with a young sailor just back in CONUS after a stint in Brussels.

    He opined that one of the things he liked about returning was the variety of food he found.  It took some time for me to get the neurons firing. At first I was a food fuddy-duddy then I remembered  nuoc mam on anything and 33 beer, and Balut. Even after some reflection I am still a bit surprised that he couldn’t find variety in Europe, but that’s just me.

    I’ve snacked from street venders in Olongapo and DaNang.

    So… what is the strangest thing you’ve eaten? C-RATS and/or MRE’s don’t count.

    Caveat: This may well not be the first time I’ve asked. If so….

  • Stormin Norman Laid to Rest

    Some of the Army guys here seem to have missed this:

    Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf Buried at West Point

    Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, the no-nonsense Desert Storm commander famously nicknamed “Stormin’ Norman,” graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, soaking up its values: “Duty, Honor, Country.”

    He married here. He taught here. And on Thursday he was buried here.

    I’ll leave it at that.

  • If It Is Sunday It MUST be a Silly???

    It has been said that “Laughter Is the Best Medicine.”  Using that old saw as a standard I’ve tried to find humor in the absurd, but in my apparent dotage it is getting harder to do so…

    Anyway,  it seems Clint Eastwood has been Swatted

    Add another celebrity to the list of people that have been swatted. “Dirty Harry” himself, Clint Eastwood, is the latest in a long line of celebrity victims. According to TMZ, police rushed to Eastwood’s Los Angeles home this week, after a 911 call stated that men with assault weapons were inside the actor’s house, and people had been shot.

    Linking Eastwood with Bieber (see the link) is funny, but all it takes is a phony 911 call. Any one of us could annoy someone and have a well meaning SWAT team come a-knocking.

    I suspect that defining “absurd” is where I fail. Someone has changed the definition when I wasn’t looking.

    How ’bout this one: Karzai has ordered all U.S. Special Forces out of two key provinces within two weeks.

    Afghan President Hamid Karzai has ordered all U.S. Special Forces out of two key provinces within two weeks, accusing Afghan units under their jurisdiction of being responsible for the torture, abuse, and disappearance of Afghan civilians.

    My first thought was that he must finally have amassed enough cash AND have a jet on the runway all warmed up.  If we didn’t have “boots on the ground” there the absurdity would be worth mentioning. How DID he become Prez in the first place?

    Must note Jonn’s take – it just fits.

    Hmmm… I found myself getting so tangled up in definitions I almost trashed this post. Then I realized that my confusion may reflect some of you TAH readers so I’ll leave it to you.

     

  • The Threats Get REAL

    Defense department set to announce furlough plan Wednesday

    The Defense Department intends to notify Congress on Wednesday of a plan to furlough nearly 800,000 civilian employees one day each week beginning in April, a defense official said Tuesday.

    Federal law requires the Pentagon to warn Congress of furloughs at least 45 days in advance, and other regulations require direct notification of employees at least 30 days in advance.

    Sorry folks. Reality sucks.  If them damn Republicans would just increase taxes our military won’t be short-changed like this.

    Kinda tired of this dance. This is the most frightening thing in our future?

  • The Snake is 80

    A MOH recipient is still with us.

    Bruce Crandall

    Thanks Hondo for reminding me.  I honesty figured the MOH was enough but I was way wrong.

    TAH has told the story.

  • The Cold War

    Not gonna even attempt a formal dissertation on that subject. Many here served, and will have their own perspective. Indeed, tomes have been written on the subject that I won’t attempt to compete with.

    As far as I am concerned the “Cold Warriors” won the only battle that mattered so you can skip that part of my characterization.

    My interest is only in the concept. I reckon I would like to re-define the label.

    Taking our guns with no shots fired?

    Opening our borders while dismissing the laws that clearly apply?

    Perhaps it IS time to dredge up The Colonel:

    “Most of the people in our society are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident.” This is true. Remember, the murder rate is six per 100,000 per year, and the aggravated assault rate is four per 1,000 per year. What this means is that the vast majority of Americans are not inclined to hurt one another. Some estimates say that two million Americans are victims of violent crimes every year, a tragic, staggering number, perhaps an all-time record rate of violent crime. But there are almost 300 million Americans, which means that the odds of being a victim of violent crime is considerably less than one in a hundred on any given year. Furthermore, since many violent crimes are committed by repeat offenders, the actual number of violent citizens is considerably less than two million.

    His data IS dated, but …

    Will we win the NEXT cold war? YMMV So I’m just curious about you.

  • A Sunday Silly on a Friday? Or is it?

    By now you’ve all seen or heard about the meteorite strike near the Ural Mountains.

    If not:

    Here’s a different view on the event:

    Russian nationalist lawmaker Vladimir Zhirinovsky, long known for his flamboyance and outrageous remarks, said Friday that meteorite fragments had not rained down on Russia in the morning, but that the light flashes and tremors in several of the country’s regions resulted from US weapons tests.

    Secretary of State John Kerry attempted to warn the the Russians it seems:

    He also said US Secretary of State John Kerry had wanted to warn Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov about the “provocation” on Monday, but couldn’t reach him – a reference to US State Department comments earlier this week that Kerry had spent several days trying to speak to Lavrov by phone to discuss North Korea and Syria.

    I think it was aliens testing us, however, the voices in my head tell me to share this version.

    And I gotta wonder if the US SecState can’t reach the Russian Foreign Minister about this sort of thing, what good is he?

    Aside: We here all know what Kerry is good for, but…

  • What IF…

    The whole gun control argument got a giant dose of reality the other day.

    Okay so this was a hoax/prank/hack (or something), but for a fleeting moment some television watchers in Montana were likely doing a mental inventory of their guns and ammo; while some few others, it is Montana, after all, were reconsidering their anti-gun stance.

    TV hack attack warns of Montana zombie apocalypse

    Viewers in Montana who were no doubt already on the edge of their seats waiting for the results of “teen cheaters take lie detectors” were suddenly confronted with a bigger calamity on Monday. The CW station of KRTV was interrupted by an emergency alert for a zombie apocalypse. Viewers were told that “the bodies of the dead are rising from their graves and attacking the living” in several Montana counties. KRTV confirmed someone had hacked into their emergency alert system and “there is no emergency.” Phew, back to those dirty adolescent cheats then.

    Reckon it’ll take a REAL Zombie Apocalypse to change some minds about the evil guns, but…