Judge Judy...."This Is What We're Creating"

I couldn't agree with her more!

H/T to Miss Phlegm Fatale.

Shipboard Life

Things I'm remembering about life on a ship......

1) Port is Left, and Starboard is Right

2) The front of the ship is the Bow

3) The back of the ship is the Stern

4) It's not the Floor, it's the Deck

5) It's not a wall, it's a Bulkhead

6) It's not the ceiling, it's the Overhead

7) They're not hallways, they're Passageways

8) ALWAYS pick up your feet when going through a doorway or hatch, or you'll trip on the Frame

9) Self-Closing doors will do so right as you start to go through them

10) NEVER call a Chart a "Map"

11) A ship will Pitch, Roll, Yaw, or Heave just as you're getting ready to take a sip of your coffee

12) Ship's coffee can double as general purpose cleaner and/or paint stripper (Our coffee is actually pretty good!)

13) The "Slop Chest" is not what it sound's like


And a whole lot more!

We The People......

Got this from a friend of mine.
Sure nails things, doesn't it?

Cowboys and Aliens

Just got back from the Art Theater where we saw "Cowboys and Aliens".
I liked it.
My wife liked it.
Good little summer movie, and I recommend it.
No, it's not "Firefly" or "Serenity", but it was fun, and the little place next door has great gelato!

"Castigo Cay" by Matt Bracken

I just finished reading Matt Bracken's latest book, "Castigo Cay".

Matt is the author of the "Enemies" series of books, which are a set of three books dealing with the near future of America. They're excellent thrillers, and I've read them a couple of times, so when I saw he had another book out, I preordered it, and started reading it as soon as I received it.

It's pretty good, but I like his first three books a lot more. "Castigo Cay" seems to drag a bit, and doesn't really "get going" until the last half of the book.

I think it's well-written, but not in the same vein as his first three books, which held my attention from start to finish.

If you liked "Unintended Consequences", and "Molon Labe!", then you'll love his "Enemies" series.

"Castigo Cay", while different, was a worthwhile read, a perfect "little book" for some light summer reading.

Gallows Humor....

Light posting this weekend as I'm working on my Honeydew list, but I thought you'd all get a kick (in the head?) out of this:

Let me get this straight . . . ...
We're going to be "gifted" with a health care
plan we are forced to purchase and
fined if we don't,
Which purportedly covers at least
ten million more people,
without adding a single new doctor ,
but provides for 16,000 new IRS agents,
written by a committee whose chairman
says he doesn't understand it,
passed by a Congress that

didn't read it but
exempted themselves from it,
and signed by a President who smokes,
with funding administered by a treasury chief who
didn't pay his taxes ,
for which we'll be taxed for four years before any
benefits take effect,
by a government which has
already bankrupted Social Security and Medicare,
all to be overseen by a surgeon general
who is obese,
and financed by a country that's broke!!!!!

'What the hell could
possibly go wrong?

Sub Off The Coast

I'm not sure what they were doing out there (backside of Catalina Island), but all day Monday and Tuesday we saw the sub going back and forth, accompanied by some small "patrol" type boats. Tuesday afternoon it looked like one of the small boats made a rendezvous with him, so I'm gonna take a SWAG and say the little guys were U.S. Navy, too.
NOBODY in their right mind would get so close to a sub that they could transfer people unless they were authorized!
I don't know enough about U.S. submarines to tell what class it was, but I know to see one run on the surface for so long is unusual.
Of course out where we were, there aren't too many other ships just hanging around!

For you guys that know far more about this than I do, I added a crop from one of the better pix I took.
Have at it!

Back Home Again

We got in this morning about 10am. Took another hour to get from the Pilot's Station to the pier, and then tied-down.
By this time the Purser (who has our passports) had gone to lunch, so we had to wait for her to show back up.
Then she had to call the Captain to see if it was OK to "release" us!
DUH!
Oh, well, she's new, and it was her first time out, so we all just sighed and cut her some slack.
Wonder how long the floor will continue to move under me now that I'm back on dry land?

Took some interesting pictures, and I'll post some after I finish unpacking.

There was a sub running on the surface the last three days, making rendezvous with some small boats. They never got closer than a few miles, but I thought it was quite interesting to see one running on the surface.

And there was a C-130 circling overhead a lot of the time.

Should have brought my 400mm lens this trip!

See you all sometime next week.....

Headed out for Sea Trials early Saturday morning. Since we don't have the contract for our satellite services provider signed, we'll have no Internet or email access while we're at sea, so I'll be incommunicado for a while.

42 Years Ago

We walked on the Moon.
Now we beg rides from the Russians.

Big Mil Training Op

Catchy title, isn't it?
Over the last couple of days, we've been visited by no less than 12 CH-47 Chinooks. Man, those suckers are LOUD! They'll come in from the ocean, and hover over the lone MARAD ship that's docked at the next pier over from us.
Today, they gave the ship the Full Monte.
At least six came in, and dozens of troops in full battle gear fast-roped down on to the deck. All this time four or five Super Cobras were orbiting the area, backed up by several particularly nasty looking Blackhawks.
While this was going on, two more Chinooks set down in the parking lot next door, and a whole lot of fully armed troops came out and stormed up the stern ramp (it's a RORO Cargo ship) of the ship.
Since the helos were Marine units, I'm guessing they were from Camp Pendleton, which isn't too far down the coast from us. A couple of times a year their LCACs will come into the inner harbor/turning basin, and maneuver around for a while, and they skeedaddle back out and over the horizon.
Pretty interesting, but I don't see any way these guys could sneak up on the bad guys! They shook the building I was working in the last two days when they went overhead, and we could hear them coming a good ten minutes before we could see them.