Despre Toamna, partea a patra (About Autumn, part four)

The Autumn melancholy is not present, or at least not as bad so far this year.

I wrote that a couple weeks ago, and never finished it. For the most part, it has remained true this year. There have been moments, but nothing enduring, this season.

Until today...and still, it is mild comparatively. It came on in full force this morning for some reason....maybe because it was overcast and cold.  I went out and ran a couple errands and then stopped over at the local Coffee Bean, as I used to do, and bought a Peppermint Mocha latte but all I could think of was how much rather I would be sitting and drinking it in Centrul Vechi Bucuresti, Old Town Bucharest. I'm sure that anyone reading this knows about that adventure, but if by chance you don't, it's here. 

It's raining, hard, now....and I'm feeling a little better which strikes me as odd. 

If you haven't followed this blog and have no idea what I am referring to as the Autumn melancholy, the previous posts are here.

Buna seara, prieteni.

I split lanes.

Originally posted on Facebook April 1, 2016:

"Where many drivers get it wrong is that they see lane splitting as "queue jumping" that will cause each car to go one further spot back in the queue. In truth, a filtering bike disappears from the queue altogether, the only time a motorcycle holds a car up is when it sits in traffic and acts like another car.
Filtering bikes work their way to the front of stopped traffic at red lights, and accelerate away much quicker than the cars around them. When they reach the next stoppage, they disappear again between the lanes and no car is held up."
Hi, I'm Steve, and I'm a lane-splitter. It's legal here in California, and this article explains it as well, if not better, than any other I've seen. I follow the "rules"... I only do it when traffic is stopped, or moving at a snail's pace...I only go 5-10 mph faster than the traffic I am "splitting"... I give a courteous wave to anyone that intentionally moves over to give me room.
Why? Not to get in front of you. There are a few reasons: ....read more...

A piece of my mind

Today my Facebook timeline has been inundated with posts regarding President Obama's speech at Hiroshima. I've seen it called "repulsive" and "absolutely vile". I've seen "click bait" websites with headlines that say that POTUS said that America is "Evil" and that he apologized to the Japanese people. I've read the entire transcript of the speech, four times, trying to find these things...and I can't. The word "evil" appears exactly once...in this line:

"We may not be able to eliminate man’s capacity to do evil, so nations and the alliances that we form must possess the means to defend ourselves."

I can't find anything that, to me, is an apology unless you want to extrapolate lines such as:

"Why do we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder a terrible force unleashed in a not-so-distant past. We come to mourn the dead, including over 100,000 Japanese men, women and children, thousands of Koreans, a dozen Americans held prisoner.

Their souls speak to us. They ask us to look inward, to take stock of who we are and what we might become."

...as an apology. I can't make that leap. Even if I could find an apology in the text, my response would be "So what?"

I've seen comments the likes of (this is not an exact quote, it is an amalgamation of comments I've read. I use quotes for style here only) "dropping the bomb wasn't evil, it ended the war", "it had to be done", etc, etc.

So, even if POTUS did apologize, so what? Even if I give up the point that bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki was necessary, what what would be wrong with an apology 71 years later for the act? Have you never done something that you felt was necessary, and even though it accomplished the desired effect, you had some tinge of regret after the fact? Over 100,000 humans died. What the hell would be wrong with "Sorry"? Sorry we had to commit an act such as this to achieve the desired effect? But again, I didn't see an apology in there anywhere. Please feel free to quote the portion of the text that you feel is an apology.

No, I've never served in the military, but I lost two uncles in that war. My brother served in Vietnam and although he returned, he never really did. Over 35 years ago, I took an oath to defend the constitution, and I have renewed that oath twice since then, and I believe that, to the best of my ability, I have done so. I'm as much a patriot as the next guy. Some folks love to sling the term "liberal" at me like it it's the scarlet letter. If liberal means that I care about other human beings no matter where they are or come from, I'll wear it.

If I was in a life or death struggle, and had to kill someone to end it, I hope that I would feel some small tinge of regret after the fact for the act.

I'm not a fan, supporter, or apologist for President Obama. What I am is a person who looks at the facts and draws my own conclusion rather than let the tide carry me to a different viewpoint. I certainly don't agree with everything POTUS has done or said, but I can find nothing in his speech that I think is vaguely "vile" or "repulsive".

I've seen "evil", "vile" and "repulsive" comments though, and I've also noticed an alarming trend among those comments and the people that voice them. Alarming to me, at least. But not surprising. I'll leave the revelation of that trend to your own interpretation.

"We’re not bound by genetic code to repeat the mistakes of the past. We can learn. We can choose. We can tell our children a different story, one that describes a common humanity, one that makes war less likely and cruelty less easily accepted."

That's the world I'm looking for.

Here's a link to the full text of the speech:  Text of President Obama’s Speech in Hiroshima, Japan

Quote of the day - Wisdom from Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!

"When great love is rejected, Rosalee, something inside a man dies. So all he can do is run away, where he can meet the girl he'll love second most."

Add this to the Bucket List

Passo San Boldo - San Boldo Pass, Veneto Italy

Why They Leave When They Still Love You

Why They Leave When They Still Love You

Quote of the day

Someone can be madly in love with you and still not be ready. They can love you in a way you have never been loved and still not join you on the bridge. And whatever their reasons you must leave. Because you never ever have to inspire anyone to meet you on the bridge. You never ever have to convince someone to do the work to be ready. There is more extraordinary love, more love that you have never seen, out here in this wide and wild universe. And there is the love that will be ready. 

— Nayyirah Waheed

Because this needs to be saved....

Best Iconic LA Dive Bars

Quote of the day

"Sometimes, despite what one may want, the door just has too many locks."

Wisdom from "Once Upon A Time"

"If you want a lad to fight, give him something to fight for."  - Merida

Meme of the day

Pieces of my mind....

When I was a kid, I couldn't wait for the Sears "Wish Book" to come out every year. I'd go through it and mark the pages with everything I wanted. This is my wish book now. :-)

Quote of the day - Wisdom from Criminal Minds

"Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity, nothing exceeds the criticisms made of the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well-warmed, and well-fed."
- Herman Melville

Remembering Operation Tidal Wave

72 years ago today Operation Tidal Wave was launched against Nazi oilfields in Ploesti, Romania.

According to Wikipedia it was one of the costliest operations in Europe with 53 aircraft and 660 aircrewmen lost. I have a couple books on the subject, but I'll use those numbers for illustration.

One of my favorite quotes is this:

"He was convinced most of the planes would go down and there would be enough wandering Americans in Romania 'to call a general election, vote the Germans out, and make peace with the allies'"

from Ploesti: The Great Ground-Air Battle of 1 August 1943 by James Dugan and Carroll Stewart

M. Gerald Kennedy

My uncle, M. Gerald Kennedy was one of the "lucky" ones to survive that day...oddly enough in a plane named "Lucky"...only to go MIA/KIA 3 months later over Bremen, Germany

This is how the story goes:

The "Lucky" and part of her crew before Operation Tidal Wave. 

"Some of the Libs [B-24 Liberators] landed in Turkey - some of them even got down okay in Romania - some landed in Malta - some even went on and found freshly conquered fields in Sicily to land on. Capt. Harold Kendall, from Charlton, Iowa, was one of the joes who landed in Sicily.
     They found a half-finished fighter field. The crew was still standing by inside the "Lucky" with ears cocked for the bail-out gong when Kendall landed, with all the red lights showing on the last drops of gas in the tanks. "Lucky" hit the end of the landing strip, plowed into a flock of P-40's dispersed beyond the runway, and came to a stop, literally leaning against the sides of a hill. The crew piled out and kissed the ground, and waited to be congratulated by the ground crews on their magnificent emergency landing. Top-turret gunner Jim Goodgion, from Ruston, Lousiana, described a very different welcome from what they expected:

"Them grease monkeys, instead of giving us a glad hand, damn near blew their tops. They had just taken seven cracked-up P-40's and made two good ones out of them and here we come along and mash the hell out of the whole seven of them all over again." "

citation: I don't have it in front of me, but if you want it, I can find it.

All that being said, I have been unable to actually identify my uncle in any of the crew photos associated with the "Lucky" or Harold "Hap" Kendall's crew. My information comes from various sources identifying him as the navigator of that crew.

Thinking today of the heroes of that day, those that survived and those that were lost, and of the good people of Romania who, by most accounts, were hospitable and helpful to our downed airmen.

Five years ago...

Five years ago today I posted this on my Facebook:

"I never get tired of this....Wonderful voice, classical guitar, desert evening, and hot brunettes...what's to get tired of?"

Still true.

Questions that bother me so....

If you don't know where I get the reference, it is here:



...but more on that later perhaps. On to the questions:

1) Why are so many people all fired up about a lion being killed in Africa, and so few people fired up about Planned Parenthood selling baby parts?

2) Why do we listen to the men who are making millions of dollars a year complain about how raising the minimum wage is "outrageous"?

3) Why do people want to believe that the "automation" being found at McDonald's is a direct response to raising the minimum wage?

4) Why do people believe everything they read on Facebook, and take it as gospel?

I'm sure there are more, but those are at the top of my list today, and each is probably fodder for it's own blog post. I think that in lieu of that I will pour another whiskey, grab a book, and sit on the balcony.

Some if it's magic, and some of it's tragic, but I've had a good life all the way.

I don't know....

Ok...let's see...today is Saturday, right? I worked day shift Thursday....slept for 8 hours...ran errands and did housework for a while and slept (kind of) for 4 hours...then to the House of Mouse for an 8 hour graveyard. Came home and slept (kind of) for 3 hours until the damn phone woke me up (reminder to self: when you're working graves, turn the phone to silent).  Now I've been up for 3 hours, and in about an hour and a half I need to lie back down in the heat of the day and put my sleep mask back on and try to rest for a few hours before I go back to the House of Mouse for another 8 hours from 2200 today until 0600 tomorrow....then I will probably sleep for another 3 hours so that I don't lose my whole Sunday..then graves back to back Monday and Tuesday night....

Wtf.

A "series of events" led me to search my old blog posts for a particular post. While I did not find it, I did find this one, written almost five years go: Musing on an empty nest. 

Not much has changed, and in an already melancholy mood, that is just damn depressing. Sarah is now 23, and still lives with me, so the "empty nest" has not happened, but the feeling is much the same most of the time. She has her work, her friends, her life....and that doesn't include me for the most part...as it should be at this point. 

To make matters "worse", I retired from my full-time job, of over 30 years, three years ago. I am not complaining. It's just that I never saw this coming....I thought that retirement would be great....not having to get up every day and go to work. Not great. At least not from my point of view. As I said in the earlier post, "I don't know how to do alone". Well, it seems at this point that I don't know how to do "not working" either. You see, there's no one to spend the days with, and since I am an apartment dweller, there's no home upkeep or yard work to do. You can only clean an apartment, polish a motorcycle, do laundry so much before there's nothing to do.

I know this is true...I did one thing for over 30 years, since I was 18 years old....through lots of other stuff in life, I did one thing five days a week, fifty or so weeks a year, and I was good at it. And for 18 or so of those I had a second thing, Dad, that I was at least competent, if not "good", at. They were my "raison d'être", according to Webster, my "reason or justification for existence."

They are gone. While I am still Dad, and my usefulness as such still comes in to play now and then, it is not the same. And I still work part-time at that same 30+ year job, but it is sporadic, and not the same.

I have lost my train of thought. I don't know what to do, and that's the problem.

I just want you to understand....

We don't think we're "better" than you. The few that tarnish the badge, the uniform, don't represent the thousands of us on the streets, all over the United States, and the world, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, in the rain, in the snow, in the heat....there when you call us....just as soon as we can be.

Yes, there are few that tarnish the uniform or the badge....we despise them. We do NOT stand with them....no matter what mainstream media tells you.

Yes, we do violent things sometimes. Things you do not understand. Things we walk the streets so you do not HAVE to understand.

We wear the badge, the emblem, the uniform, proudly. To paraphrase Lt. Col Dave Grossman, the badge, the shield, the patch, is a direct, intentional reference to the Knights of Old that carried their shield in their left hand to protect their hearts.

We are ready to do violence on your behalf, so you don't have to suffer. Please understand that.

#uniform #badge #knight #understand

There are no words

If this doesn't at least give you goose bumps, let alone bring a tear to your eye, you're dead inside.