Baltimore bridge. One group that's gonna get screwed is probably

the working stiff longshoremen in the port.

Because Dundalk terminal is now shut down the guys are probably not getting paid for the next couple of months.

Of course the lawsuits will go on for years and everyone and their cousin will jump on the bandwagon and send their legal attack dogs to collect compensation for them.

It's a lead pipe cinch that the terminal people will sue but when they get the settlement money I'd bet that the guys at the bottom don't see a dime of it.

I may be wrong, though because maybe the longshoreman's union will send in their attack dogs and grab a piece of the pie but still if the union gets money I wonder if any of it will get to the rank and file working stiffs. 

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History repeats itself.

Back in the day when I drove $50 crap cans as daily drivers I had a women back into me and dented my right rear passengers door.

She went into a dither and carried on about insurance companies and notifying the police and accident reports and so on and so forth. It's the last thing a young driver wants to hear and I imaging she thought the damage would cost hundreds to repair.

I looked at it and told the frantic woman that the entire car cost me $50 and a Saturday afternoon's work and was treated to an "I don't understand."

So I explained to her that I never pay more than $50 for a car and just fix them up myself and that everything would be OK and she should just go away because her car wasn't hurt at all.

She asked who would fix my car and to get her off my back I said that I would even though I wasn't going to bother. Finally out of oncoming desperation just to get rid of her I said, "Tell you what. I've got to go into the church hall for about an hour. If you want just grab a six-pack of PBR and throw it into the back seat. I'll leave it unlocked."

She grew wide-eyed and asked me how old I was and I told her I was 19 and she said, "But that's illegal."

"Well then don't worry about it. I'll just call my dad to pick me up one on his way home from work. None of this is any big thing. I'll fix it myself and we can skip the paperwork. I gotta get in there before I'm late."

With that I walked off. 

About an hour later I returned to my car and saw the coat I had left in the back seat was covering something. It wasn't a 6-pack. It was a case of PBR. I laughed and tried to picture the woman sneaking up to the car carrying a case of beer, looking around for the police and rapidly tossing in back, covering it with my coat and driving off scared out of her wits.

Fifty years later, Homeless Depot parking lot. 

Some lady brushed against my pickup ever so slightly while parking. I was still in the pickup getting ready to leave. I was answering a text before I fired up to go home. I actually never felt it and out of the corner of my eye saw her get out and look at my rear fender and came and was practically in tears as she reported to me she had hit my fender.

I got out and inspected the mark. It was a big, fat nothing burger complete with bacon, lettuce and tomato. I scratched the little chip of her paint off or it and told her not to worry about it but she was still upset.

"Don't worry about it," I said. "When I get home I'll grab a can of rubbing compound and make it disappear in about two minutes. You'll never know it happened."

She was dubious as hell and clearly had it blown out of proportion in her head. She was clearly upset and I tried to console her just to get her to go away. It was someone making a mountain out of a molehill.

"Look," I said. "If you really feel you have to do something about this to make your guilt go away then the next time you're at a convenience store or supermarket then pick up a simple four pack of Guinness and put it on my porch. You don't have to and I don't expect it but if you truly feel you have to do something than go ahead. It's no big thing. I don't care." With that I gave her my street address.

I got home a couple of hours later and found an entire case of Guinness on my porch. I shook my head.

Go figure.

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Maybe Biden has a point on gas.

Back when Trump was president my gas tank would only hold about $40 worth of gas.

Under Biden it holds almost $100 worth of gas!

Pretty cool, huh?

If we drill and become energy self-sufficient we will go back to my truck only being able to hold about $40 worth of gas.

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When it rains it pours.

It seems like every time I try and cut spending a whole bunch of crap happens that needs to be tended to.

Wham! Out of nowhere comes an unexpected necessary expense for $60 which in itself isn't too bad, followed by another whatever for $110, followed by whatever. Problem is they add up fast.

On the other hand I paid my 2023 taxes and it looks to me like I overestimated the amount to set aside for taxes by 100% which means I actually have more money in my pocket on a monthly basis than I thought I had and that is always a good thing.

=================================================

Daily phone maintenance.

1. Settings: turn off any background apps running

2. Run cleaning cycle

3.Reboot.

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It's the Netherlands now, you know.

said someone to me when I called the place 'Holland' which is what I called it for about the first 50 years of my life. The name's changed but the people are the same. It's one of the fairly few places in Europe where they like Americans. They tend American war graves to this day.

In my mind the place is 'Holland' and the people there are 'Dutch' and they grow beautiful tulips and when you hear a clop clop clop you know it's a Dutch jogger because they wear wooden shoes as they jog past windmills. When they get home they have a bottle of excellent beer. All in all it sounds pretty good to me.

Now get off my case. I like those people.

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One of the things middle management used to forget about old hands

is that it's pretty likely old hands know a lot of people that they don't.

There are two incidents that come to mind over the years. Both times my shipmate and I were warned that we had to give the people we were going to meet a good impression and yada yadda yada , so on and so forth.

Anyway, as the person in question walked in after an hour long lecture on how important it was to out on a good impression I heard my shipmate say, "Quequeeg! How ya doing? Last I heard you were going to visit the folks in Vanuatu! Did they throw a missionary in the stewpot for you when you got there?"

The port captain looked in horror.

"Nah, we got McDonalds now," he replied. The port captain didn't know what to think, say or do until my shipmate made introductions.

"This is Piccolo and that's some port captain."

The port captain lamely said, "I guess you guys know each other." and left shaking his head. Needless to say, we got the contract.

The other time there was a supervisor and a port captain in the room when the person in question arrived. He was halfway down the stairs and I looked up and heard, "Piccolo! What brings you to the west coast?" Long time, no see!"

"Hey, Ceesco Keed! When they send you out here?" I asked.

"Two years ago. What's the relief crew like?"

"They're OK," I said.

The supervisor's face lit up relaxed but the port captain looked incensed because he had been upstaged.

The customer looked at the pair of them. "These guys are squared away. I'll tell Tom to ink the contract IF these two are running the show."

Then the bull$hit of what we had been doing since we saw each other last started. The port captain looked pouty because he was left out while the supervisor was tickled pink we had managed to get the contract.

 

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The Kingdom of Eswatini is the new name for Swaziland.

When I heard that a while back the first thing I asked myself is 'why? Did all the Swazis move out or something?'

The next thing I wondered is if I have to work it again to keep it in my DXCC log. (I don't.)

=============================

In other gnus my cell phone wants to update its software and will do do on its own if I do nothing. WTF just get it out of the way.

More junk that means shorter battery life between charges is the likely outcome. I keep deleting junk and they keep adding to it. 

One thing I do have down to a fine art, though is that every morning I run a cleaner and then reboot the whole damned thing. 

=============================

I see where someplace in Minnesota is blaming the auto industry for making cars that Black people like to steal.

Oh.

I can't help but think what would happen to me if I happened to own one and installed an alarm in it that would enable me to catch the thief. Who would go to jail?

The guy trying to steal it?

Or maybe I'd be charged with hunting over bait.

It's all so tiresome.

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I just worked a wonderful woman on 20 meters. You never know who you are going to run into.

What a kind voice she had. It was a joy to talk to her!

She was running her rig from Austria where apparently she lives now and I instantly opened her QRZ page and checked her out. She had a link to her personal website and I found out she is a Saudi Sheikh's daughter! She's kind, educated and very well traveled and studied mathematics in the States and earned her Master's in Vienna. In addition to that she speaks three languages I know of, Arabic, German and her English is perfect, unaccented American English.

For a while she worked with special needs children in Riyadh and that takes a special kind of patience. She's a talented, attractive, special kind of woman.

Of course as an old man that watched a lot of old rerun movies as a kid the fact that she's the daughter of  a Sheikh that rang a bell. Off to the Official Hollywood Guide to Old Movie Characters.

Let's see, here. S...S...S...SH..S H E....here it is. Sheikh...Sheikh... Sheikh's Aunt...No. Here it is. Sheik's daughters. Two kinds. Let's see here...Oh, yeah. Beautiful and ugly. Oh yeah, The ugly one is the daughter the Sheikh tries to force the hero to marry. The hero usually grabs a sword about two minutes before the wedding ceremony and fights his way out and joins the Foreign Legion at Fort Zindenauf and is awarded the Legion of Honor for shooting 38 of his pursuers off of the back of a camel. (Of course Hollywood never explains how they got 38 people on the back of the camel)

Here we go....Sheikh's beautiful daughter...This is the one I'm looking for. Let's see. What's her appropriate story line? Oh, yeah.

She and the hero meet and fall in love at first sight. The Sheikh finds out and has someone haul the hero out into the desert and drop him off in the middle of nowhere 100 miles from food or water to leave him to die of thirst and starvation. 

In the next scene it's after dark and the hero miraculously shows up outside the Sheikh's fort wall, fit as a fiddle and rested leaving the audience to wonder how he survived. He's freshly shaven and has a meticulously groomed pencil thin moustache. His clothes have come straight out of the cleaners.

He's clad in a pair of those baggy pants, the pointy shoes that have a little bell on the tip, a white V-necked big, baggy sleeved dueling shirt a bandana on his head and a dagger in his teeth and just happened to have found a coil of rope next to the wall enabling him to lasso an abutment and scale the wall.

 Sneaking past 5 or 6 lazy, sleepy guards he finds his way to her room. They embrace and decide to run away. Stealing the Sheikh's favorite horse, the gallop out the gate as the alarm is sounded and from out of nowhere 1000 shouting, sword swinging men on camels are seen pouring out the gate in hot pursuit.  (I guess he kept his army hidden in a giant underground bunker of some sort because they appear out of nowhere.)

After about 6 or 8 pretty good fight scenes and several close calls they escape to Chicago or Detroit and live happily ever after.

Actually Hollywood stereotypes certainly doesn't hold true only for Sheikh's daughters. It often holds true for Americans. One of the greatest exports America has is the western movie. 

Because of this one thing that is not a good idea to do is to try and clear French customs while wearing American western clothing. Don't do that and DON'T ask me how I know. 

The customs inspector will take one look at you and in his mind will decide That man is an American cowboy! Cowboys carry revolvers! Where is he hiding his six-gun?  He will then proceed to tear through every bit of your luggage in an effort to find one. When he doesn't he will look at you with suspicion trying to figure out where you are hiding it.

I wondered about what he was thinking. Did he think I was going to pull out an illegal pistol, fire a few shots into the air and stampede a herd of cattle through the streets of Paris? 

(Personally I don't need a six-gun. I have the US Cavalry on speed dial so if I had a problem in Paris a quick call would have a bugle blaring and thundering horses charging down the streets of Paris, rescuing me in the nick of time. Never in the history of the motion picture industry has the US Cavalry been too late.)

Another thing is that during my (real) career as a seaman I surprised a few people when I let them know that most Americans were not millionaires and that I live in a modest home in a quiet neighborhood that I had mortgaged. (Now I am an old retiree living on a somewhat limited income)

Anyway, this woman apparently has radio in her blood. He father had the first callsign issued in Saudi Arabia, HZ1HZ, and she wrote that she used to sit and listen to her father communicate with people all over the world in English. I'll bet her father has JY1's call sign in his log. (JY1 was the late King of Jordan and was on the air regularly.)

When her father passed somehow she got his Saudi callsign issued to her. Her father was Deputy Minister of Communications in Saudi Arabia and she was the first woman to he issued a license in her province.

One thing Hollywood got right about this YL is she's a raven haired beauty straight out of central casting. She's a very attractive woman. One thing that Hollywood seems to gloss over is she was not born in North Africa where all of these old adventure movies seem to have taken place. She was born in an entirely different continent. Saudi Arabia is a part of Asia. Good old Hollywood. Never let the truth get in the way of a thrilling adventure story.

I think that one of the best parts of ham radio is that you never know who you are going to meet or get to listen to on the airwaves.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Later that night I was talking to my nephew and he asked me if I had run into anyone interesting on the air. 

"Yeah, as a matter of fact I just worked an interesting woman. She's a Saudi Sheikh's daughter. Wonderful woman. Spoke perfect unaccented American English, she was working out of Austria," I said.  

"Oh, yeah? Cool. You know, those people take their education and travel seriously. I'll bet she learned her English in the States," he replied. 

"I think she did. She studied math here. Now tell me, when I said 'Sheikh's daughter' what was the first thing that you thought of?"

I could tell by his voice he felt kind of sheepish.

"You know, Hollywood really gives us a really lousy picture of reality..." he hedged.

"Out with it! First thing you thought of." I interrupted.

He laughed. "A beautiful dark haired exotic women that runs off with a handsome stranger out in the desert somewhere."

Hollywood. Never let the truth get in the way of a thrilling adventure movie.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Speaking of Hollywood, I had a cab driver that was born in Casablanca driving me from an airport in New York once. 

When he said he was from Casablanca my smart-ass nature ran away with me.

"Casablanca, huh? Is Rick's Place still there?"

He turned and gave me the look one gives to a wise guy like I was being at the time.

"Nah. He sold it right after Elsa and Lazlo left for Lisbon and stowed away on a ship that had a stop in England where he got off. Elsa and Lazlo were already there and Lazlo was busy helping out DeGaulle organize the Free French so Elsa ran off with him and they headed to the States together settling in Chicago where they got married and had a couple of kids. Later Rick got involved with some redhead and Elsa divorced him and took him to the cleaners and when the redhead found out he was broke she dumped him. Rick spent the rest of his life a drunk living under a bridge in Cicero."

Needless to say I laughed myself silly and realized three things. First we were kindred spirits and that he had a pretty good education from somewhere and that he had seen the movie.

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I don't know who Steve Garvey is and I don't care.

I see where he is running for office and one of his online ads brags about his baseball career.

I don't give a damn about his baseball career. 

And it might surprise people to find out I don't listen to Cher, either just because she's a singer.

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Everything these days is SO important

that we have to endanger the rest of the world by answering texts while we drive in heavy traffic at 60 mph.

It's IMPORTANT that we find out who is wearing what to the big party. It's IMPORTANT we find out instantly what time the game is going to start two weeks from now. It's IMPORTANT we find out who is buried in Grant's tomb right NOW! It can't wait! Gotta happen NOW!

Years ago when cell phones took hold and I finally got one I got called to the home office which was a little over 2 hours away.

I fired up my pickup and started in that direction and instantly after I got on the Interstate my phone rang. A glance told me it was the office. We had a 'no phone use while driving' rule in place so I pulled into the breakdown lane and answered it to be greeted with a breathless ''Where are you now?"

To which I replied, "I am sitting in the breakdown lane on the Interstate."

"OMG! What happened? Did you break down or get into an accident?" 

"No. We have a no drive and talk on phone policy so I pulled over to answer you," I said.

"Well, get going! We need you now!" he shouted.

That entire conversation repeated itself five more times during my drive and when I arrived the big boss asked me if I had been caught in traffic.

I said I had not but I had to pull over to answer the phone six times because someone kept calling me to see how far along I was.

THAT raised his eyebrows and I knew my caller was in for an ass chewing and a math lesson.

As for why I had been called? There was a question regarding a delivery I had been in charge of and the customer had a couple of questions that could have easily been answered over the phone but his boss had told him to talk to me face to face.

Needless to say this was IMPORTANT.

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Download the free app!

and add more useless crap to your phone and slow it down even more.

"Hey, I just got the free app from a truck stop outside on Minot, ND! Pretty cool, huh? I'll get 20 cents off of a gallon of gas every time I stop in!"

Of course the idiot has never been there and isn't likely to go there in the foreseeable future but if he ever does he'll be able to save $2.50 on a fill-up. Either that or the place will have changed hands or gone belly up and the app will be no good by the time he gets to use it.

I've been fighting a battle with my phone since Day One. 

Everyone wants to fill my phone full of crap, I want to delete it. It's a never ending battle.

One other thing, the more crap you have running the faster the battery runs down.

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One of the rights I give up when CCW

is the right to be a smartass. I can't start anything whatsoever and probably with good reason. I have to stay lily white because if I start something and it escalates then I no longer have a right to defend myself.

The right to self-defense can be easily lost by starting trouble of some sort. 

I say this to clarify that I am NOT running around packing heat and looking for trouble.

In fact I damned seldom run around the neighborhood armed and generally speaking, if I do it means I am headed somewhere where it might be prudent to.

Occasionally my wife would ask me to carry because she knew it would make me behave myself.

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Why the names have been changed to protect the innocent/guilty.

Some bonehead busybody I know once asked me why I don't just say the hell with it and name names, places and times.

"Yeah, maybe I ought to," I said. "Your mother was the best piece of a$$ I ever had. She had a Japanese love swing and what happened in the back seat of my '63 Ford I still have show up in my dreams. Want me to start there or does that hit a little too close to home?"

It was funny watching him turn beet red and what made it funnier was he knew we lived 700 miles apart. It was just the thought that made him turn purple.

How about giving people a bit of privacy? A lot of those that are still alive have kids and grandkids they are trying to raise. A lot of them were single when much of this $hit was happening and they don't need the embarrassment.

"Oh yeah? Piccolo got drunk with you and two stole a police car? I never heard about that one!" That's the last thing some poor bastard raising a kid needs to hear his kid repeat to his father.

On the other hand, my unindicted co-conspirators and I can certainly share a few laughs out of earshot of the nosy ones.

 

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I had the PRC 320 in a local park earlier today.

and was trying to check in on the YL net.

Someone casually asked me what I was doing and I cheerfully explained that I was a ham radio operator trying to check in on a net and told them they could listen in if  they wanted to.

It took a couple of tries but I got my call on their log via an assistant net control out of Broken Arrow, OK with a 5x5 signal report. 

Then it was off to try my luck elsewhere.

Along came someone else that demanded to know what I was doing. I told him I was reporting in to the Moose and Squirrel net reporting that Boris Badenov and/or Natasha Fetale or Fearless Leader had not been seen in the area.

He gave me a really angry and dirty look.

"Take out your phone," I said. "Say 'OK Google, take me to Moose and Squirrel net' and open the link.

He did and went through it and got even more annoyed.

I turned to him and said, "I hope your grateful toward all of the other members of the net that work hard to protect Rocky and Bullwinkle so they can protect us from world communism."

He gave me a pissed off look and walked away. Hopefully he was feeling pretty stupid.

Here's a pretty good picture of one identical to mine.

 

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One of the things I know that probably would have made me a good father

is that I remember how it was for me back in the day. If you can think back fairly clearly and look at the  problems your parents had with you it becomes easier to raise a kid.

The other thing I know is that we're all different. I hear parents of three kids surprised that all three of their kids are entirely different. I don't think that's surprising at all.

The other thing you should get used to is that maybe one or more kids don't share your interests. Don't think that automatically your son is going to be your hunting/fishing buddy. He very well may but then again me very well may not. Don't pressure him either way, offer to take him and leave it at that.

If you are having kids to take over the family business, don't bother.  

Offer the same thing to your daughter and she may very well surprise you...or she may not. It's all somewhat of a crap shoot. A daughter might just be a girly-girl or a real tomboy. There's no telling.

What does matter is the end result and that you raise them to be decent, well adjusted people. 

In my case I am a product of both a parent that had a path they expected of me and another that was wise enough to let nature run its course.

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About 25 years after I left my hometown and returned for a visit

I think I'll keep this one for myself...

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Junior prom.

Christ! What a joke that was.

Not only was I the oldest son of the family, I was the oldest son of the entire generation and the pressures were unfair. When my Junior Prom came around Mom asked be who I was going to go with and I told her I was not going.

"You HAVE to go to your prom!"

"Where does it say I HAVE to take part in ANY school activities?" I shot back. 

"You're going to the prom," she practically screeched.

The carrying on was close to epic and I knew Dad would be dragged into it and I cringed. While I knew he'd back me when push came to shove.

"Okay," I said. "I'll figure something out."

Off to the next town over where I generally hung out. I asked around and found out that Lisa Lorenzo didn't want to go to her prom, either. So I went looking for Lisa.

When I found her I told her that I didn't want to go to my prom and that I was looking for someone not to go to either prom with. She laughed like hell and agreed not to go to my prom with me if I wouldn't go to her prom with her. She said that when she told her parents she didn't want to go her mother was disappointed.

"So we both don't go to our proms together." I said. "It's a non-date."

"Okay," she laughed. "It's a non date."

The following afternoon I got a call from Lisa. She said her father wanted to meet the guy that wasn't taking her to the prom. "Don't worry. You'll like him."

I showed up that evening, having bicycled to her place. Al Lorenzo proved to be a real character. 

"I just wanted to meet the young man that isn't taking my daughter to her prom that she's not going to," he deadpanned. We chatted a while and finally he told me he would be delighted to have me not to take his daughter to the prom. We both laughed. Then he asked me how I figured that Lisa and I were not going to different proms together.

"Yogi Berra was asked how he knew someone and he replied "We went to different schools together." It makes sense to me."

He chuckled.

Then he asked me what I was going to do instead of going to the prom.

"Probably going fishing at Damon's Point," I answered. He said he wished he could join me. I told him to drop by.

The next day was Saturday and that afternoon Mom asked me who I was going to the prom with. I announced that a girl named Lisa Lorenzo and I were not going to our proms together.

We went round and round over that for a few minutes and Mom demanded the Lorenzo's phone number and said she was going to call the parents to find out what kind of funny business was going on. I gave her the phone number. As she was dialing it my father walked in.

My mother introduced herself and asked what was going on between Lisa and I. The next thing I heard her say, "What do you mean they're not going to their proms together?" and I knew Al had answered the phone. I pointed at Dad and then to the phone.

Dad stepped in and in about a minute it became clear that he and Al understood each other.

"I can do that...Bring him? Sure he's right here...Give us about 25 minutes... See you then..." He turned to my mother. "We're meeting him at the Harbor." He turned to me. That means you, too."

We went out to the crap can dad drove back and forth to work, a beat up old Ford. He started it up and laughed. "He's a hot $hit," he said. "He told me to meet him at the Grog Shop."

"You'll like him, Dad. You know how parents want to meet their daughter's dates? He had me over so he could meet the guy that's not taking his daughter to the prom she's not going to."

"What!?" he snapped.

"Yeah. He did that. It was a hoot. I went, met him and laughed myself silly. He's funny. You'll get along with him well." I said. Dad shook his head.

We arrived at about the same time and I noticed Dad was carrying two beers and Al had one. Dad parked a beer in front of me. This was back in the day and the rules were different then. Dads could quietly have a beer with their sons and nobody said anything about it.

It took the pair of them about eleven seconds for it to sound like they had known each other for years.

Al said his wife was totally confused over the story that they were not going to different proms together and Dad admitted that Mom didn't understand it, either.

"That's because women don't understand Yogi Berra," he said and they both laughed.

Then Al said something interesting. "I like the way these two young people came up with their story and ran with it. I spoke with Lisa and there's no romantic interest between the two. They just had problems with their parents and figured out a way to deal with it. I really like the way our children educate us and help us grow up."

Al turned to me and said, "IF you need a date sometime and ask my daughter you don't have to worry. You can go out with her anytime. If you don't want to I'll understand."

Dad  looked at me wide eyed and with a lot of pride. "Thank you," I said kind of humbled.

Then the subject was dropped and the bull$hit started. The three of us yakked the time and beers away for a couple of hours. We all laughed a lot. 

Those men were Old School guys of the WW2 generation. They didn't step down to deal with a younger man, they lifted him up to their level and I was a part of the conversation. I've said before I walked on the shoulders of giants.

Al asked me what I was going to do on prom night and I replied, "Probably go fishing at Damon's Point." and he laughed and said he might join me.

After we left Dad said he'd handle things from here on. He also said he liked Al and was surprised I'd met such a good guy and thanked me for creating the meeting.

When we got home with a mild buzz on Mom asked Dad what was going on. He said "Lisa Lorenzo is not going to her prom and your son is not going to his prom and that's that. The matter is closed."

"But they're doing it together," Mom protested.

"Yes," he explained. "At the same time but not in the same place. Lisa is going to do what she wants and  Piccolo is probably going fishing at Damon's Point. The end. Now drop it."

Aftermath. Prom night.

I actually did go fishing prom night and as it was getting dark I was working on my tackle. I caught the motion of a car approaching and turned back to my tackle.

When I was done I saw Al Lorenzo get out of his car carrying a tackle box, a rod and a heavy ammo can that I soon discovered contained about a dozen cans of beer. It was heavily iced to boot.

"Help your self," he said and Al and I fished until about 2300. When he left he left behind a scrounged cardboard box containing two or three beers and a pile of ice. I kept fishing until about 0200ish and brought home a pretty good striper.

Lisa and I remained casual friends. She later went off to college and I lost track of her. From time to time I'd run into Al here and there. I did meet him on a visit home after I got out of the army. He said Lisa had married, had a child and was living in New Hampshire.

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I remember the time some karen threatened some working stiff minimum wage

college student type with getting her husband to settle it with him. 'He's a big guy!"

I stayed out of that one for a change. I wondered what she was thinking.

What I wanted to do was say, "Hey, lady! I'll take the job for only 1/3 of the insurance money. You get him to pick a fight with me, I'll ice him and get off by reason of self-defense and when you collect his life insurance I'll only take a third."

It would have been priceless, she'd have wet her pants but I decided to let that one go. Maybe I just chalked it up to 'You can't fix stupid', maybe I figured water would seek its own level. Whatever. She was her husband's problem. I shined that one on.

Actually I wondered why because I have always gone to bat for the little guy trying to get by or the old woman ringing a register. I must have been tired or hung over that day. Whatever.

What was she thinking? If any woman I had ever been involved with had even thought of dragging me into a fight with a total stranger for stupid stuff she'd have been kicked to the curb.

This isn't to be mistaken for a random attack of some sort on a loved one. If that happened to my wife or family member I'd fight to the death. That's a different story.

What was she thinking? Did she think the two of them would go to the schoolyard and have a nice boxing match following the rules of boxing decreed by the Marquis of Queensbury? Did she think that afterwards when he came home with a black eye she'd comfort him in bed and be proud that he stood up for her 'honor'? That the two combatants would shake hands after it was over?

I wonder what she would say when her husband was found face down in an alley choking in his own blood or with a nice sucking chest wound or even stone dead.

She wants her husband to pick a fight with a total stranger?

Let's look around a bit. In my county alone there are over 150 thousand people licensed to carry concealed firearms. Then you look at the people that are carrying unlicensed. The latter are the people you have to watch out for. Not the licensed people because they took the time and effort to get licensed. It's the people that didn't you have to keep an eye on.

Now lets look at how many killers are out walking the streets.

See that nice guy in his 30s? He killed four people during the fighting in Fallujah, one of them with his bare hands. The old man on the walker killed about 450 people in a single afternoon when he flew lead bombardier back in 1944. The guy over there in his 70s killed four North Vietnamese back in the late 60s. The guy that paid for his education through ROTC was a forward observer for an artillery unit and he sure rang up the numbers. That teenaged gang banger over there has two under his belt over a drug deal gone back. He's probably one to keep an eye on.

I could picture the scene of her threatening the gang banger with sending her husband after her. Actually that would probably be the best thing that could happen to her because the gang banger would probably set her straight fast.

We're surrounded by killers if you stop and think about it a minute. Most of these people have certainly not forgotten how although the overwhelming majority would back down. Still, it only takes one to make things interesting. 

People don't realize that the only reason they are alive is because someone doesn't think it's worth the trouble, time and effort to kill them.

===================================

"No more than five to ten people in a hundred who die by gunfire in Los Angeles are any loss to society. These people fight small wars amongst themselves. It would seem a valid social service to keep them well-supplied with ammunition.

Jeff Cooper.

  

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Thin mints time.

which I bought my annual 2 boxes of from the Girl Scouts hanging out at the local stupor market.

Lately I've been grubbing up at Wallyworld which seems to be OK for basics. Sometimes they have some pretty good meat, too.

One thing they do have in the beef department is Carne Pacada or whatever it's called. It's basically beef chopped up not as fine as burger and not as coarse as stew beef. It makes pretty good chili which some people ruin by using top shelf beef.

Today is a day of things I almost did today. I almost won the lottery but picked the wrong number (again). I almost cleaned up the place and I almost worked a DXpedition on Tarawa. Yes that Tarawa.

This DXpedition is being run by Germans which means if they send cards from Germany I will likely have no problem getting them IF they clear the USPS. Germany's postal system is pretty good.

The DXpedition was a little too weak to work but I have a few more days. We'll see what happens.

Grub shopping today was pretty good as far as getting out and doing something interesting. I have to admit that I can get practically everything one stop shopping at Wallyworld because on top of chow I got cat food, canned and kibble, razors and place mats.

Shaving these days kind of sucks because of the 'brand new' bathtub. I generally shave in the shower and had to stop using my beloved WW2 Gillette double edge and now use Bic throwaways in case I drop them. I don't want to put a ding in the porcelain tub and the Gillette will do that.

As for cleaning the place up, it doesn't need a major swamping out so much as it could use a detailing. Maybe I'll put that off a few weeks and do an Old School spring cleaning.

====================================

Good news. Kitty is back to normal now. 

He started overgrooming and licked a spot bare AND stopped eating his wet food. He did continue eating his kibble, though. Off to the vets who looked him over and gave him a shot and almost instantly he stopped grooming and a day later started back on his wet food again. 

He's also gone back to being a royal pain in the ass which is what an orange cat is supposed to do so all is good.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Happy St Patrick's Day.

I always hated that boiled corned beef and cabbage. I always than God for Pete, the Jewish fish buyer in Seattle. He was a character.

We were in Seattle over St. Patrick's Day and he came by the boat the day before and offered to give us corned beef and cabbage at his office. Needless to say, we were saying WTF? Pete's a Jew! This I gotta see!

When we got there around noon Pete handed us a Guinness and a box lunch consisting of a really filling, thick corned beef on rye and a large portion of Cole slaw. 

"Now you Irish bums can tell your mothers you got your corned beef and cabbage," he announced, triumphantly.

We laughed like hell. Pete was a character and always generous and good for a laugh. However, what he didn't know is that I hated the traditional corned beef and cabbage. After that I generally celebrated the holiday with a corned beef on rye and a side of slaw.

I'm doing that to someone later on today. I'm having someone over after he gets off from work and treating him to the same meal I got from Pete.

I'm sure he won't be surprised or disappointed. He expects an occasional surprise from me.

Once I said to my sister who is married to a Jew that the only difference between an Irishman and a Jew is the Irish make better whiskey and beer but the Jews do a better job on corned beef.

There was a brief silence before she answered "You're right!" 

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Mail issues, probably the USPS in action

which is mildly surprising because they have a pretty damned good record as far as I can tell based on personal experience.

This started when I didn't get my ordered cards from 2 QSL managers, one in Italy, the other in Croatia. After almost 3 months I reported to both of these managers I had not gotten their cards and both of them sent them to me again.

The Croatian's card arrived 26 days later which is about right based on the formula according to Piccolo. The formula is you Google how long it should take to get a letter from somewhere and take the larger number in the estimate and multiply by 3 and that's about right.

Example: Google says 7-10 days to arrive from someplace . Take the 10x3=30 so the 26 days is about right. It's in the 21-30 allotted days.

The second card from Italy didn't arrive so after about 45 days I sent both an email and I emailed him telling him I was going to try the Old School method and to expect a yellow envelope containing my card, a pink SAE and 3 USD. He emailed back telling me he would be on the lookout for it. 

Two or three weeks later I got an email telling me he had gotten the envelope and had mailed me my card in the pink SAE.

Needless to say, the second card arrived two days later having taken over 62 days to work its way through the system. FWIW I think the pink envelope will arrive here in record time. Murphy's Law. (I think Murphy was an optimist)

My guess is that the first cards both the Croatian and the Italian sent were either lost in their respective mails or through the international postal system sent to someplace like Tonga or Lhasa, Mongolia but who knows.

So much for that.

Both of these QSL managers mentioned an increase in the return of undeliverable cards to the United States which interested me. I was wondering why as I do work Europe and collect QSL cards. Not all of mine have come home. 

Why?

The tiny handful I have missed I can easily write off as being just plain lost in the mail and/or dishonesty on the part of the ham which is rare. The ham world is small and the dishonest hams get brought to the public. 

QSL managers report an increase in returned to sender cards and I have managed to figure out why. They showed me pictures of a couple of redacted letters showing me the town, country and zip code. The overwhelming bulk of these were people using the standard 5 digit zip codes. Only a couple of them had the full 9 digit zip. ALL of them had USPS return to sender stickers.

That tells me that the problem lies with the USPS and it would not surprise me that they are caught at a sorter as they enter the country that rejects them without giving the local PO the opportunity to try and deliver them.

Typical government trying to do things at the highest level. They don't give credit to the local post office or the actual mailmen that have been doing the job for years.

If they send this mail to the local grass roots people I bet a lot of these could easily be delivered with little or no ado.

My advice would be to use all 9 digits when asking for something overseas. 

One other thing, periodically check with the PO for your actual 9 digit zip. Every so often the last four digits change depending if they change the route or not.

As for QSL managers, they should  start insisting on having QSL requests use the entire 9 digits. While I don't think it will eliminate the problem it should minimize it.

One thing all Americans can do to improve their odds on making sure the mail gets to where it has to go is to use their full 9 digit Zip code.

I don't know USPS procedure but my best guess is that when overseas mail first arrives in the States it goes through a sorter of some sort and the sorter spits out what it thinks is undeliverable mail and sends it back to where it came from.

Incidentally the fact that an American return to sender on these letters speak loud. It says the overseas post office has done its job. The error is the fault of the US Postal Service that should be doing a better job.

ETA a word from M0URX, a UK QSL manager.

I can also add a few words to this.   Letters are no longer sorted by humans.  All letters are now sorted by machines.  

So if the address is not formatted correctly or the handwriting is not good then the item is rejected and sent to the returns pile. DIXIE sticks a yellow sticker on the item saying letter cannot be forwarded. 

It is then returned to sender.  So most of the returns are because of automation.  

Our OQRS was designed to format address correctly and since we did that in 2016 we saw a big drop in returns from USA.

There are two UK QSL managers I have ordered confirmation cards from, M0OXC and M0URX and both of them seem to have a far better than average track record of mailing cards to the States. 

-----------------------------------------

Maybe I should explain what a QSL manager is. 

First, a QSL card is a postcard sized certificate that serves as proof of contact. A ham desiring confirmation of contact generally sends the other ham his QSL card made out with the pertinent contact information along with either an SASE (for stateside contacts) or an SAE and return postage. 

A QSL manager is someone hired by a ham to basically do his paperwork. This pretty much means mail out his QSL cards. 

There are a number of reasons for this. The ham overseas may have a mail theft problem at his post office. He may simply have lousy postal service to begin with. In the case of one place it's $11 USD to simply mail a letter which makes a simple QSL cost prohibitive.

The ham may just plain be too busy to keep up with requests which is somewhat common in rare DX areas. The other thing that comes to mind are DXpeditions that make thousands and thousands of  QSOs and are overwhelmed by the total volume.

 

 

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Busy today

I'm trying to work on a project with a couple of overseas hams that are having problems with the USPS.

 

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Looking for an unindicted co-conspirator

because I have worked a couple of countries that will neither accept or receive mail from the States and I want their QSL card.

I would imagine Switzerland would be perfect.

It would work like this:

I send the middleman my card from the States and he would forward the returned card to me.

Not all hams in countries like that have QSL managers. 

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I am now exchanging emails with a Croatian ham QSL manager that was in Samoa when I worked him.

Needless to say, I sent for a QSL card and after 2 months it didn't arrive so I emailed him and he promptly sent me another which arrived about 27 days after he mailed it.

Google says it should have arrived in a week or 10 days but my rule of thumb is to take the 10 days and multiply by 3 and start looking for it about then. 

I have never figured out how New Guinea managed to get me back a card in about 2 weeks but I digress.

Anyway, the QSL manager and I are swapping emails. He says that he's had a few returned to him and all of them were mailed to the States. What's more, is that every single one had an American 'Return to sender' sticker on them. This tells me that the Croatian post office is doing their job. The envelopes obviously got to the States.

Lately I've had problems getting mail from Europe and one Italian QSL manager has tried twice to no avail to get me a card from Iran. 

The process is the Iranian sends his log (almost always electronically) to the Italian who fills out the cards and mails them. The Iranian does this likely because his post office isn't very good coupled with the fact that mailing a letter from Iran costs about $11 US. It cuts costs and in some instances is the only way to QSL.

Any number of Cubans go this route, generally through Spanish QSL managers. I haven't used a Spanish QSL manager in a while but they were excellent in my book.

The problem lies with the USPS.

WTF?! 

The USPS is (supposedly) the gold standard for the planet for getting things to people efficiently. 

Yeah, right.

A Google search says it's number 6.

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As for yesterday's post, I had to go to the bank today

and made another friend of sorts.

She's a young lady and took care of me quickly. I wanted to make sure my credit card could be used for an emergency cash withdrawl but could not be used for cash back at a register. 

Anyway she was not a teller and had an office which I was invited into. She checked and I was good to go.

We chatted and because of yesterday's post I told her to Google the Hash and read yesterday's post which she did.

She did laugh and pointed out that business is based on relationships with individuals and that we're all different. 

The ability to communicate with them on their own terms is an important and very much overlooked skill by upper management. They tend to want to keep things sterile.

I said to her "Then HR comes charging in..." and we both laughed and swapped brief HR horror stories.

That's when I went in for the kill. She had a beautiful complexion.

"They ought to throw you in jail for stealing that beautiful complexion from a 15 year old girl!" I said. She really wasn't a hottie but the did have a really beautiful complexion.

She blushed and told me I made her day and on top of that gave me her card. She's my new go-to person at the bank.

It's about relationships.

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For the past few months I get greeted warmly at a place I regularly do business with.

which I attribute to the woman there that I have a good relationship with and have had for quite a while. She has been kind, considerate and has given me a couple of tips along the way. Two of her tips have been very financially helpful.

When I thanked her she cheerfully replied quietly, "Stick with us old broads, Kiddo. We'll take care of you." which made me laugh like hell. Ya gotta love people like that. Women in professional positions rarely say things like that to customers.  However when they do it means something. For one thing it means they like you and are comfortable with you.

In earlier conversations I had mentioned I worked on the water and she said that years ago she had worked as a fisherman to help fund her education and later when she made the old broad comment, while delighted I was not 100% surprised. She was obviously comfortable with me and my flippent, sarcastic nature. 

Business was usual for the next couple of months and then when I came in her face lit up and she told me she was spending a vacation week on the dragger she worked on in college as a cook for $50/day. The $50 was to keep her on the insurance which had a no passengers clause. I knew she'd have gone for free. Afterwards she probably refused her paycheck or spent it on drinks for the crew.

 She just wanted to get out on the water again. Underneath her professional demeanor was a water girl that needed an occasional fix. She's in her mid to late 50s and still has an adventurous spirit.

"Well," I said, cheerfully in an upbeat voice. "Anything to keep you old broads off the streets and out of the pool halls.  Have fun!" and she laughed like hell. She was tickled pink to get back on the water for a week.

We did business and I turned to leave as the woman behind me snapped, "Hey! You called her an old broad!"

I turned to the woman and put on my 22 year old schoolteacher talking to a recaltricent child voice. "That's because she's a member of the Old Broad's Club which you will never be invited to join. She's been through the mill more than once and come through it every time without losing her sense of kindness, common sense, compassion and sense of humor which is something you don't have to worry about losing because you can't lose what you don't have."

I continued. "I would be honored to take that woman anywhere from a Presidential Inaguaral ball to splitting a sub sandwich with her on the tailgate off a pickup in the rain. On the other hand I wouldn't take you to a dog fight in Greenbush, Masachusetts. Try joining the Karen club because with your mean spirited nosiness they'll greet you with open arms."

As I was turning she started to open her mouth.

"I'm troo wit choo," I said and walked off.

Aftermath.

About a month later I walked in and she wasn't there so instead of shuffling myself around I went to the first available person that looked like a fairly new elementary schoolteacher. When she saw me her face lit up. I think she was the woman that had been in the next booth and had heard everything.

She said the karen had stormed into the manager's office who told her business policy was to get involved in disputes between the customers and the karen left in a huff.

I was mildly concerned and asked her if I was in any trouble. She replied, "Lord, no! That woman is a regular nuisance and everybody was glad to see her get put in place. We're always glad to see you." 

This is an old post I had made a couple of years ago and not posted. I found it while digging through the files. 

The woman that used to take care of me has since been promoted and transferred and I miss her. She made things fun.

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What happened to all the people in a 1962 fifth grade class picture (According to Piccolo)

Something must be wrong with me but I am sitting here with a friend looking at the picture and we are trying to imagine what happened to who even though other than Dennis we cant recognize anyone. Now don't everyone come along and ruin a good story with the facts! Let's see the guy on the right stole a million bucks and ran off with the tomboy that had become a Las Vegas showgirl. The guy on the left married and had 6 kids and 36 grandchildren and is retired with his wife in Florida. The guy on the right joined the French Foreign Legion and stayed in and made it a career. He moved to Polynesia and married a Polynesian girl and has not worn a pair of shoes since he got there. The kid on the upper left is a confirmed bachelor and lives in a cabin in the Cascades. The girl in the left has been married six times and now lives alone with six cats. The guy on the right got cleaned out by his ex wife and has lived under a bridge since. The guy in the green shirt is still on the lam after 48 years for a murder he didn't commit because the kid next to him whacked a drug dealer that ripped him off and pinned the murder on him and the pretty little girl joned the convent and is currently in a home for retired nuns.

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I am looking at some old school pictures on a Facebook page

and see a lot of things from far away and long ago.

This isn't high school stuff, this is grade school stuff and in a way it's funny. Back in the day I thought my first grade teacher was old as in her 60s and just found out that when I had her she was about 23 or 24 years old.

Crazy.

Paul Simon put one in the X-ring when he sang, "When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school, it's a wonder I can think at all..."

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Back in the day I listened in on a bull session between a few senior NCOs

and the subject of the Medal of Honor was brought up.

One of them said "I certainly don't want that mill stone around my neck."

I was a new soldier at the time so I kept quiet and listened for a change.  It was an interesting conversation. The general consensus seemed to be they liked their career as it was and liked being under the radar. A couple of them said that if the medal was forced upon them they'd get out as quickly as they could. Others said they were too close to retiremment to get out and they'd just have to weather it out.

"Can you imagine the pressure put on you to live up to everyone's expectations?" someone asked.

He was answered with a "No $hit!"

The subject went on a bit as an E-7 with the face of an infantryman that had seen too much brought up the subject of a couple of medal awardees that had fared poorly in the civilian world, including a man shot during a robbery he committed. I later found out the E-7 had been a temporary captain during the Vietnam war and had later been reduced to the enlisted ranks. I later asked him about it and he said he only accepted the commission with the provision that if he was RIFed he'd go back to the enlisted grades.

I also later found out his battery commander often asked him for advice. He was an interesting man. He also opined that there should be a decent pension to go along with the medal to keep the awardee to be able to stay out of trouble. (It was $100/month at the time. It's $1489.37 now. Prior to 1961 it was $10)

Of course he medal has served to jump start lagging careers but to consensus of the NCOs discussion is that being awarded it would mean their lives and careers would never be the same.

  

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