I woke up laughing this morning. One of the last things I read last night before going to bed was that Southwest Airlines has terminated the captain of that Boeing 737 that landed nose-first at LaGuardia Airport in New York City back in July of 2013. Apparently the copilot was making the approach, but the captain took over when the aircraft was only 400 feet in the air. SWA says it was a violation of its policy for the captain to do something like that.
Well I woke up thinking about that crash, and my thoughts drifted to the Asiana Airlines Boeing 777 that crash-landed at the San Francisco International Airport also in July of last year.
You remember the Asiana crash: It was the one in which the local San Francisco TV station KTVU erroneously and hilariously put out the names of the flight crew as: Captain Sum Ting Wong along with crewmembers, Wi Tu Lo, Ho Lee Fuk and Bang Ding Ow. The KTVU female newscaster read them with the gravitas you’d expect of a professional delivering a tragic news story. She said that the names came directly from the NTSB. If you’d like to see and hear it again, click HERE.
The NTSB quickly issued a correction, giving the somewhat weak excuse that they were put out by a “summer intern.”
Regardless of how the names were generated and released, it says much about the current state of television news that the station had to rush them on the air. Nobody, from the assistant who called the NTSB to the line producer to the person who typed them into the teleprompter to the air personality herself had the sense to read them and go, “Uhhhhh…this doesn’t sound right - let’s double-check this.” In fact, the station later apologized and gave an even weaker excuse than the NTSB’s: They admitted that no one actually read the names out loud. Really? Are they trying to make us believe that no one could have read those names and not realized that they were bogus? Come on…
Alright, all of this is old news. What struck me as funny this morning was that *if* the NTSB’s story is true, then the “intern” who purportedly perpetrated this hoax must still be laughing about it as well. I’ll bet he wakes up every morning laughing his ass off. For he not only manipulated a television station, but he created a minor international incident, as the Koreans were highly and understandably insulted.
What was the pedal-to-the-metal rush to release the names of the crew? It’s not hard to imagine a news producer at a TV station yelling at his staff to get as much information on an event as possible and get it on the air, NOW!...before the competition can get it out, of course. But could not somebody have said, “Whoa- hang on a tick!” Nope! Not in this day and age. Which is why I have such disdain for the media…all media.
Ho lee fuk, there is sum ting wong with TV news, all right! Every time they do something like this I just laugh and laugh.
Who Am I?
- Bob Barbanes:
- A nobody; a nitwit; a pilot; a motorcyclist; a raconteur; a lover...of life - who loves to laugh, who tries to not take myself (or anything) too seriously...just a normal guy who knows his place in the universe by being in touch with my spiritual side. What more is there?
26 January 2014
21 January 2014
The Diet
A while back I wrote about my “diet” in a post titled, "The Fat Guy." I don’t like calling it a diet because, well, it’s not – at least not in a formalized way. Diets are great, but people who announce they’ve started one sometimes have to admit later than it didn’t work and they gained the weight back. Me, I just decided that I needed to lose weight.
When I got home from Washington at Thanksgiving my weight was 202 pounds. But I felt heavier than that. I felt awful- no energy and no stamina. Worse, I looked like a lard-ass. I’ve been wearing pants with a 34” waist for a while, but up in Washington this past summer I had to buy new ones with a 36” waist. And even they were tight. Yikes.
So I decided to do something about it. I cut out sodas and alcohol and junk food, and kept my daily caloric intake to less than 1,500. And I started exercising. Instead of draconian cuts in food types, I just tried to use some common sense on portion size, and being more careful about combining foods that don’t play well together. (Have the steak and vegetable, but lose the baked potato with butter and sour cream.) I have not completely cut out coffee…leave me one vice, willya? And I still allow myself an occasional glass of wine or beer, although the days of “going out drinking every weekend” are over. As they should be for an old guy with an old guy’s metabolism.
I don't walk around hungry, which is strange, because I thought I would. However this new lifestyle takes some discipline. With a pocket full of dollar bills, if I pass by a vending machine it’s awfully hard to not impulsively grab something yummy. But then I think about last summer and how we all just sat around drinking Pepsi and eating Twinkies…and I know that I never want to return to those days. So I walk away. I think…I hope…that I’ve changed my eating habits permanently.
I have not been weighing myself every day. For one thing, I don’t want to obsess about it, and I know that weight fluctuates up and down to a degree. No need freaking myself out if I gain a pound instead of lose one. What I was looking for was a trend.
And I’m happy to see that my weight is finally down in the 180’s…the upper 180’s to be sure, but solidly enough in the 180’s that I can report it with confidence. That’s a loss of fifteen pounds since Thanksgiving. The initial target is to get down into the 170’s. That’d be great. Beyond that, I’m not sure…not sure I’ll ever get down to 150 again…or even if I could. That might take a real diet.
I still don't look any different...at least I can't see any difference in the mirror yet. But I’m back in my 34” waist pants! And even they are loose enough that I need a belt with them. Is 32” a possibility? Maybe so! Hopefully the downward trend will continue.
When I got home from Washington at Thanksgiving my weight was 202 pounds. But I felt heavier than that. I felt awful- no energy and no stamina. Worse, I looked like a lard-ass. I’ve been wearing pants with a 34” waist for a while, but up in Washington this past summer I had to buy new ones with a 36” waist. And even they were tight. Yikes.
So I decided to do something about it. I cut out sodas and alcohol and junk food, and kept my daily caloric intake to less than 1,500. And I started exercising. Instead of draconian cuts in food types, I just tried to use some common sense on portion size, and being more careful about combining foods that don’t play well together. (Have the steak and vegetable, but lose the baked potato with butter and sour cream.) I have not completely cut out coffee…leave me one vice, willya? And I still allow myself an occasional glass of wine or beer, although the days of “going out drinking every weekend” are over. As they should be for an old guy with an old guy’s metabolism.
I don't walk around hungry, which is strange, because I thought I would. However this new lifestyle takes some discipline. With a pocket full of dollar bills, if I pass by a vending machine it’s awfully hard to not impulsively grab something yummy. But then I think about last summer and how we all just sat around drinking Pepsi and eating Twinkies…and I know that I never want to return to those days. So I walk away. I think…I hope…that I’ve changed my eating habits permanently.
I have not been weighing myself every day. For one thing, I don’t want to obsess about it, and I know that weight fluctuates up and down to a degree. No need freaking myself out if I gain a pound instead of lose one. What I was looking for was a trend.
And I’m happy to see that my weight is finally down in the 180’s…the upper 180’s to be sure, but solidly enough in the 180’s that I can report it with confidence. That’s a loss of fifteen pounds since Thanksgiving. The initial target is to get down into the 170’s. That’d be great. Beyond that, I’m not sure…not sure I’ll ever get down to 150 again…or even if I could. That might take a real diet.
I still don't look any different...at least I can't see any difference in the mirror yet. But I’m back in my 34” waist pants! And even they are loose enough that I need a belt with them. Is 32” a possibility? Maybe so! Hopefully the downward trend will continue.
15 January 2014
Motorcyclist? Nope, Motorcycle-less!
I sold the Sportster. I know, I know…my pride and joy. And I really did like that bike. But it was not the Sportster for me. So I will get another one: The one I really want.
The Harley Davidson Sportster model was introduced in 1957. Since then the bike has stayed pretty much the same, although it has undergone evolutionary changes and improvements. In other words, it still has a V-twin engine, and general overall look of the bike has stayed fairly consistent. Below are some photos of Sportsters. The first is a 1958 model (a fairly ratty '58 at that). The second one is a pretty nice 1968 model. The third one is my red 1986. God, I loved that bike. Finally, it's my blue 2005. You'll see that they all retain the same design elements: bare-bones motorcycle with the staggered-dual exhaust pipes, and a small "peanut" gas tank. (I replaced my front fender with a chrome one, and dear Lord, I wish I had spoke wheels! Next time...next time...)
Over the years, Harley changed the cylinders from cast iron to aluminum alloy. They also added another gear to the four-speed transmission. And they substituted a belt for the final drive chain. That’s about it. At some point they made the gas tank bigger, keeping the same iconic shape but increasing the capacity from 2.2 gallons to 3.3. However over the years the bike has gotten heavier. My 2005 model weighs about 50 pounds more than my 1986. And yes, the rider can tell.
The basic V-twin configuration of the engine doesn’t just lend itself to vibration, it guarantees it! It’s complicated to explain, but it has to do with how it’s difficult to get an even firing order from an engine with two cylinders spaced 45 degrees apart. (Ninety or 180 degrees would be better.) Thus, Sportsters have always vibrated a lot, especially on the highway.
Newer ones (from 2004-on) have engines that are rubber-mounted which quells the vibrations to a degree. But there’s only so much you can do; on the Interstate the thing still pounds like a jackhammer. I’ve taken both of my Sportsters on long trips. Even I’ll admit that Interstate travel is not their forte.
But let’s be fair – the Sportster was designed before the Interstate Highway System was built. On curvy back-roads and secondary roads at 60 mph, all Sportsters are sweet-running machines. You have a lot of highway riding to do? There are bigger, better bikes for that. For me, the Sportster is the best all-around motorcycle.
Although I loved my 2005 Sportster, I actually wanted one of the earlier models – one of the lighter ones. So I decided to sell this one. It was a tough decision, but I’ve found that I’m not riding it as much as I’d like. So I put it on eBay and Craigslist. The response was immediate.
The first person to come look at it was a woman about my age. She’d been a rider a long time ago and was looking to get back into it. But she was a short, skinny little thing, and had trouble putting both feet on the ground while sitting on it. (Harley does make a model they call the Sportster “Low” which is designed for shorter people.) In talking with her, I got the impression that my bike was not the one for her. Although she tried to give me a deposit, I declined to take it. Honestly I just did not want to sell it to her. I told her to go home, think about it overnight and call me the next day.
But the next day I had another appointment scheduled. This guy used to ride as well. On the phone he told me that he would buy it, period. He came to the house on a Thursday with cash, took one look at it and bought it. He didn’t have a trailer, so I volunteered to deliver it to his house.
In his 40’s, this guy had a full disability from the Army. He said he didn’t think he’d ever be able to walk again, much less ride. But now he could, and he wanted a Sportster! I didn’t ask about the particulars. To be honest, he seemed a little PTSD to me (which he eventually sort of admitted to). But hey, maybe the motorcycle was therapy for him? Who knows. He gave me what I was asking for the bike, and I agreed to deliver it on Saturday.
The day was perfect for a ride: One of those crystal clear NW Florida days…just cool enough for the leather jacket and full-face helmet (hey, it is January here). The bike ran flawlessly. It took about forty-five minutes to get to his house, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting the chance to take it for one last spin. I’d like to say I was overcome with remorse at selling the bike…but I wasn’t. It’s not that I disliked the bike – oh no! But it just wasn’t the “perfect” Sportster for me. And that’s the beauty of owning a motorcycle that they’ve been making since the 1950’s: You can find the exact model you want.
Footnote: Oh, and I'm not exactly motorcycle-less. I still have two Kawasaki Z-1's in the garage which I promise to get around to restoring...soon. Here is a picture of a *much* younger me (on the right, with the Z-1R I still have) and my friend Mark Leuthner when we took a trip through the Smokey Mountains back in...could it be?...1990 or so.
Here's a better shot of it...
The Harley Davidson Sportster model was introduced in 1957. Since then the bike has stayed pretty much the same, although it has undergone evolutionary changes and improvements. In other words, it still has a V-twin engine, and general overall look of the bike has stayed fairly consistent. Below are some photos of Sportsters. The first is a 1958 model (a fairly ratty '58 at that). The second one is a pretty nice 1968 model. The third one is my red 1986. God, I loved that bike. Finally, it's my blue 2005. You'll see that they all retain the same design elements: bare-bones motorcycle with the staggered-dual exhaust pipes, and a small "peanut" gas tank. (I replaced my front fender with a chrome one, and dear Lord, I wish I had spoke wheels! Next time...next time...)
Over the years, Harley changed the cylinders from cast iron to aluminum alloy. They also added another gear to the four-speed transmission. And they substituted a belt for the final drive chain. That’s about it. At some point they made the gas tank bigger, keeping the same iconic shape but increasing the capacity from 2.2 gallons to 3.3. However over the years the bike has gotten heavier. My 2005 model weighs about 50 pounds more than my 1986. And yes, the rider can tell.
The basic V-twin configuration of the engine doesn’t just lend itself to vibration, it guarantees it! It’s complicated to explain, but it has to do with how it’s difficult to get an even firing order from an engine with two cylinders spaced 45 degrees apart. (Ninety or 180 degrees would be better.) Thus, Sportsters have always vibrated a lot, especially on the highway.
Newer ones (from 2004-on) have engines that are rubber-mounted which quells the vibrations to a degree. But there’s only so much you can do; on the Interstate the thing still pounds like a jackhammer. I’ve taken both of my Sportsters on long trips. Even I’ll admit that Interstate travel is not their forte.
But let’s be fair – the Sportster was designed before the Interstate Highway System was built. On curvy back-roads and secondary roads at 60 mph, all Sportsters are sweet-running machines. You have a lot of highway riding to do? There are bigger, better bikes for that. For me, the Sportster is the best all-around motorcycle.
Although I loved my 2005 Sportster, I actually wanted one of the earlier models – one of the lighter ones. So I decided to sell this one. It was a tough decision, but I’ve found that I’m not riding it as much as I’d like. So I put it on eBay and Craigslist. The response was immediate.
The first person to come look at it was a woman about my age. She’d been a rider a long time ago and was looking to get back into it. But she was a short, skinny little thing, and had trouble putting both feet on the ground while sitting on it. (Harley does make a model they call the Sportster “Low” which is designed for shorter people.) In talking with her, I got the impression that my bike was not the one for her. Although she tried to give me a deposit, I declined to take it. Honestly I just did not want to sell it to her. I told her to go home, think about it overnight and call me the next day.
But the next day I had another appointment scheduled. This guy used to ride as well. On the phone he told me that he would buy it, period. He came to the house on a Thursday with cash, took one look at it and bought it. He didn’t have a trailer, so I volunteered to deliver it to his house.
In his 40’s, this guy had a full disability from the Army. He said he didn’t think he’d ever be able to walk again, much less ride. But now he could, and he wanted a Sportster! I didn’t ask about the particulars. To be honest, he seemed a little PTSD to me (which he eventually sort of admitted to). But hey, maybe the motorcycle was therapy for him? Who knows. He gave me what I was asking for the bike, and I agreed to deliver it on Saturday.
The day was perfect for a ride: One of those crystal clear NW Florida days…just cool enough for the leather jacket and full-face helmet (hey, it is January here). The bike ran flawlessly. It took about forty-five minutes to get to his house, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting the chance to take it for one last spin. I’d like to say I was overcome with remorse at selling the bike…but I wasn’t. It’s not that I disliked the bike – oh no! But it just wasn’t the “perfect” Sportster for me. And that’s the beauty of owning a motorcycle that they’ve been making since the 1950’s: You can find the exact model you want.
Footnote: Oh, and I'm not exactly motorcycle-less. I still have two Kawasaki Z-1's in the garage which I promise to get around to restoring...soon. Here is a picture of a *much* younger me (on the right, with the Z-1R I still have) and my friend Mark Leuthner when we took a trip through the Smokey Mountains back in...could it be?...1990 or so.
Here's a better shot of it...
08 January 2014
Mysterious Ways
I was at the motorcycle dealership yesterday buying some parts for the bike. Sometimes the Harley employees have a condescending attitude toward the diminutive Sportster. It’s just not manly enough for them. They call it a "girl's bike." They don’t consider it a “real” Harley, blah blah blah. For that you have to ride one of their “Big Twins.” Mostly we Sportster owners just grin and bear it, and vow to never buy anything but the absolute essentials from the "stealership" (as they are often called by Harley riders).
But John, the guy at the H-D parts counter yesterday was a Sportster fan like me. He owns two of them: one new and one older model. He also owns other bikes as well, as do I. Needless to say we got into a long conversation. Ironically, it was not primarily about motorcycles.
I told John that I do a lot of traveling on my bike. He mentioned a long trip he’d done at the beginning of last summer.
There is a famous road for motorcyclists in Deals Gap, North Carolina. Officially it is Highway 129, but everyone calls it the “Tail of the Dragon.” If you can envision how curvy such a road might be you’ll understand why motorcyclists love it so. Unfortunately, YouTube has more than a few videos of instances in which over-exuberant riders miscalculated their riding ability. It is a fact of life that every guy believes he is the best driver/rider/pilot on the face of the earth. The well-chronicled crashes have convinced me to stay well away from the road, even though it's sort of mandatory for all motorcyclists to ride it eventually.
John told me that this past summer he and his wife went to Deals Gap. Along with them was their 19 year-old daughter who also rides and was on her own bike. John was in the lead. As they came around one curve, John felt and heard a bang. When he looked in his mirror he did not see his daughter anymore. Pulling over, he discovered that she had hit another motorcyclist head-on. While her (and the other rider’s) injuries were serious, both lived. Both bikes were totaled.
I winced as I listened to the story. Like pilots, motorcyclists don’t like hearing descriptions of bad crashes – it’s not the way I wanted to start my day. I told John that I hoped his daughter recovered and would ride again. That’s when the story took a strange turn.
“She had been in college studying the ‘hospitality industry,’ because it was easy,” John said, and the look on his face said that he abided with it but perhaps felt she wasn’t living up to her potential. “But after the accident she realized that she was tougher than she thought. She changed colleges and majors and is now studying engineering, which was always her dream.”
Now that’s good news! We love hearing about life-changing events that work out for the better. But there was more.
John went on, “She had planned on a trip to El Salvador this past summer…a missionary trip with our church. But I had a very bad feeling about it…very bad. I wanted to stop her…but…what can you do? I prayed and prayed about it, but I just knew that if she went something bad was going to happen to her. Then the accident happened and she couldn’t go.” He told that last part with a curious look on his face…a look of wry bemusement.
I saw where he was going. “So…maybe the accident wasn’t such a bad thing in the long run?” I offered. “Do you think that, as bad as it was, it might have prevented something even more horrible from happening to her?”
“Exactly.”
Hmm. For sure, seeing your daughter involved in a motorcycle accident has got to be horrible for any parent to experience. But I can think of worse things.
The daughter healed, the bike has been replaced. Life goes on. Was there some sort of divine intervention going on with the daughter? It cannot be proven, but you couldn’t tell John otherwise.
I know it’s a trite expression, but the Lord really does work in mysterious ways.
But John, the guy at the H-D parts counter yesterday was a Sportster fan like me. He owns two of them: one new and one older model. He also owns other bikes as well, as do I. Needless to say we got into a long conversation. Ironically, it was not primarily about motorcycles.
I told John that I do a lot of traveling on my bike. He mentioned a long trip he’d done at the beginning of last summer.
There is a famous road for motorcyclists in Deals Gap, North Carolina. Officially it is Highway 129, but everyone calls it the “Tail of the Dragon.” If you can envision how curvy such a road might be you’ll understand why motorcyclists love it so. Unfortunately, YouTube has more than a few videos of instances in which over-exuberant riders miscalculated their riding ability. It is a fact of life that every guy believes he is the best driver/rider/pilot on the face of the earth. The well-chronicled crashes have convinced me to stay well away from the road, even though it's sort of mandatory for all motorcyclists to ride it eventually.
John told me that this past summer he and his wife went to Deals Gap. Along with them was their 19 year-old daughter who also rides and was on her own bike. John was in the lead. As they came around one curve, John felt and heard a bang. When he looked in his mirror he did not see his daughter anymore. Pulling over, he discovered that she had hit another motorcyclist head-on. While her (and the other rider’s) injuries were serious, both lived. Both bikes were totaled.
I winced as I listened to the story. Like pilots, motorcyclists don’t like hearing descriptions of bad crashes – it’s not the way I wanted to start my day. I told John that I hoped his daughter recovered and would ride again. That’s when the story took a strange turn.
“She had been in college studying the ‘hospitality industry,’ because it was easy,” John said, and the look on his face said that he abided with it but perhaps felt she wasn’t living up to her potential. “But after the accident she realized that she was tougher than she thought. She changed colleges and majors and is now studying engineering, which was always her dream.”
Now that’s good news! We love hearing about life-changing events that work out for the better. But there was more.
John went on, “She had planned on a trip to El Salvador this past summer…a missionary trip with our church. But I had a very bad feeling about it…very bad. I wanted to stop her…but…what can you do? I prayed and prayed about it, but I just knew that if she went something bad was going to happen to her. Then the accident happened and she couldn’t go.” He told that last part with a curious look on his face…a look of wry bemusement.
I saw where he was going. “So…maybe the accident wasn’t such a bad thing in the long run?” I offered. “Do you think that, as bad as it was, it might have prevented something even more horrible from happening to her?”
“Exactly.”
Hmm. For sure, seeing your daughter involved in a motorcycle accident has got to be horrible for any parent to experience. But I can think of worse things.
The daughter healed, the bike has been replaced. Life goes on. Was there some sort of divine intervention going on with the daughter? It cannot be proven, but you couldn’t tell John otherwise.
I know it’s a trite expression, but the Lord really does work in mysterious ways.
03 January 2014
New Year's Eve 2013
I hadn't even planned on going out on NYE; I didn't feel like partying, plus it being amateur night and all. But my friend Matt was in town, and the three glasses of wine that I had during dinner at the Bonefish Grill put me in a better mood (great chain - never had a bad meal there). So what the hey. Matt's wife, Alisha wisely decided not to join us and stayed in after eating.
First we went to a club in downtown Pensacola called Vinyl, which usually books fairly good acts. Usually. But there was one of those electronic banner signs inside above the bar and the scrolling message read: "Coming Soon - Queensryche!" Oh boy! I wondered which band they might have lined-up after that, Ratt? The Scorpions?
No Queensryche tonight though. The place was strangely empty. On stage was an '80s cover-band (Motley Crue, Poison, etc.) that wasn't half-bad. But they weren't half-good either. The lead singer had that high, screechy Vince Neil-type of voice that brought me right back to the 1980's and reminded me why I don't want to be there anymore.
They were soon replaced by a band of Guns N' Roses impersonators. Only, the lead singer seemed to be channeling the later "Fat Axl" Rose and not the skinny-druggie-just-starting-out Axl. And we are absolutely certain that the drummer was wearing a wig.
Why does it seem that up close, guys in these cover-bands always look so...flabby? Ick. Hey, we want our rock stars to be lean...and angry...and young. Instead, we get paunchy guys in their late-20's who've been trying to make a living singing other people's songs and eating way too much McDonalds instead of spending their time being strung out on cocaine and writing songs like, "Welcome To The Jungle."
The crowd was pathetically small. At one point during the faux-GNR set I counted a mere 25 people in the place. Twenty of them (mostly girls) were lined up at the stage, acting if they were seeing the real Guns N' Roses.
Matt met up with two of his friends. Both were guys in their 30's who were recently divorced. I talked with one of them: a big, tall dude named Jamie. He said that after twelve years of marriage and two kids, his wife decided one day that their marriage was over. Boom-done, just like that. No warning. That was less than a year ago. It threw him for quite a loop. Privately, I wondered how he could not have seen it coming? But guys can be pretty obtuse and clueless. And I guess this guy was too. In any event, he still seemed pretty adrift and I felt badly for him.
So our little New Year's Eve party wasn't exactly the rollicking, fun-fest we might have imagined. It certainly wasn't Times Square in New York City. Then again, having grown up in NYC I've been to Times Square on New Year's Eve, standing right smack-dab in the middle of that big crowd. And I had to pee. So I don't mind dinky Pensacola, Florida.
Then we met up with another guy, George, who was a childhood friend of Matt's who'd also come in from out of town. Both Matt and he are originally from Pensacola, and they'd met through their church. This guy, George, had sort of "fallen away" from the church as he'd gotten older, but his father was still big into it. George suggested that we depart and go say hi to his brother who was a bartender at a nearby club called Cabaret. I asked, "Is he gay?" because that's the kind of club the Cabaret is. George assured me that his brother was most definitely not. "He's an ex-Marine!" Well we get to the club and...ummm...hey, you can't be absolutely sure of anything...but...I'd say there are some issues in that family that aren't being talked about. None of my business, of course...
Afterward we wandered around some more, hitting some of the other clubs. It was a blur - by that time I was pretty drunk. Luckily I wasn't driving. On the other hand, Matt was driving and all night long he'd been matching me drink for drink. By the time we called it quits, it was nearly three a.m. - and we still had to drive the Jamie home. (If you held a gun to my head I could not tell you where he lived.) While we all had a good time, the night reminded me of a couple of things - mostly why I don't do stuff like that anymore. I remember thinking, "Gee, I used to be a part of this scene. Now I feel apart from this scene - like some alien observer."
So...I hope your New Year's Eve was fun...and pain-free. Ours was. But do it again soon? Ehhhh, I don't know. I think I'm good for another year...at least.
First we went to a club in downtown Pensacola called Vinyl, which usually books fairly good acts. Usually. But there was one of those electronic banner signs inside above the bar and the scrolling message read: "Coming Soon - Queensryche!" Oh boy! I wondered which band they might have lined-up after that, Ratt? The Scorpions?
No Queensryche tonight though. The place was strangely empty. On stage was an '80s cover-band (Motley Crue, Poison, etc.) that wasn't half-bad. But they weren't half-good either. The lead singer had that high, screechy Vince Neil-type of voice that brought me right back to the 1980's and reminded me why I don't want to be there anymore.
They were soon replaced by a band of Guns N' Roses impersonators. Only, the lead singer seemed to be channeling the later "Fat Axl" Rose and not the skinny-druggie-just-starting-out Axl. And we are absolutely certain that the drummer was wearing a wig.
Why does it seem that up close, guys in these cover-bands always look so...flabby? Ick. Hey, we want our rock stars to be lean...and angry...and young. Instead, we get paunchy guys in their late-20's who've been trying to make a living singing other people's songs and eating way too much McDonalds instead of spending their time being strung out on cocaine and writing songs like, "Welcome To The Jungle."
The crowd was pathetically small. At one point during the faux-GNR set I counted a mere 25 people in the place. Twenty of them (mostly girls) were lined up at the stage, acting if they were seeing the real Guns N' Roses.
Matt met up with two of his friends. Both were guys in their 30's who were recently divorced. I talked with one of them: a big, tall dude named Jamie. He said that after twelve years of marriage and two kids, his wife decided one day that their marriage was over. Boom-done, just like that. No warning. That was less than a year ago. It threw him for quite a loop. Privately, I wondered how he could not have seen it coming? But guys can be pretty obtuse and clueless. And I guess this guy was too. In any event, he still seemed pretty adrift and I felt badly for him.
So our little New Year's Eve party wasn't exactly the rollicking, fun-fest we might have imagined. It certainly wasn't Times Square in New York City. Then again, having grown up in NYC I've been to Times Square on New Year's Eve, standing right smack-dab in the middle of that big crowd. And I had to pee. So I don't mind dinky Pensacola, Florida.
Then we met up with another guy, George, who was a childhood friend of Matt's who'd also come in from out of town. Both Matt and he are originally from Pensacola, and they'd met through their church. This guy, George, had sort of "fallen away" from the church as he'd gotten older, but his father was still big into it. George suggested that we depart and go say hi to his brother who was a bartender at a nearby club called Cabaret. I asked, "Is he gay?" because that's the kind of club the Cabaret is. George assured me that his brother was most definitely not. "He's an ex-Marine!" Well we get to the club and...ummm...hey, you can't be absolutely sure of anything...but...I'd say there are some issues in that family that aren't being talked about. None of my business, of course...
Afterward we wandered around some more, hitting some of the other clubs. It was a blur - by that time I was pretty drunk. Luckily I wasn't driving. On the other hand, Matt was driving and all night long he'd been matching me drink for drink. By the time we called it quits, it was nearly three a.m. - and we still had to drive the Jamie home. (If you held a gun to my head I could not tell you where he lived.) While we all had a good time, the night reminded me of a couple of things - mostly why I don't do stuff like that anymore. I remember thinking, "Gee, I used to be a part of this scene. Now I feel apart from this scene - like some alien observer."
So...I hope your New Year's Eve was fun...and pain-free. Ours was. But do it again soon? Ehhhh, I don't know. I think I'm good for another year...at least.
15 December 2013
Keeping Track Of Us.
We are in a time when our privacy (and the expectation of it) is dwindling. If you have a computer or cell phone there are a lot of people who can know a lot about you whether you want them to or not.
I find it more than slightly creepy that if I search for something on Google, ads for that very thing will appear on my Facebook or eBay pages. But I guess that’s the “connected” world we live in now: What you do on the internet in one place is monitored by various other entities. Some of is fairly benign – in that marketers want to be able to better target their audience. But some of it is nefarious – as in government snooping which, come on, we know they do. We’ve all heard about the snooping into private lives that the NSA is doing.
On the local level, there was an article in our Pensacola newspaper recently about some new technology the police have and which they’d rather you not know about. Police can do what they call a “tower dump.” This lets them know the identities of all cellphones that have used a certain tower (or number of towers) in a given time period. And if the police know which phone was used, then they also know the number that phone called. And vice-versa. The article did not say, and perhaps cleverly omitted any admission by the police that they can actually monitor cellphone conversations.
But why could/would they not? Cellphones broadcast over public airwaves. As such, the police say that they are legally able to listen in. You don’t have the same right to privacy as you would using your regular old home phone landline; therefore no warrants are necessary. Civil rights organizations obviously do not agree.
Another device that police have is called a “Stingray.” This thing is the size of a suitcase and can emulate a cellphone tower. It tricks all cellphones in reception range to connect to it. (Your cellphone is always “looking” for a cell tower unless you put it in “Airplane” mode.) All the cops need to do is put the Stingray in the trunk of a car and drive into a neighborhood. They will know what the “bad guys” are doing…who they’re calling…and who’s calling them. And they’re probably listening in.
Details of the Stingray and how it works are understandably sketchy. The manufacturer says nothing…refers all inquiries to the law enforcement agencies that operate the device…the same law enforcement agencies that had to sign a confidentiality agreement just to purchase it.
Of course, the police have long had the ability to track you through the GPS feature of your cellphone. As long as it’s in your possession the government can know your whereabouts. It is still unclear whether “they” can track you even if the cellphone is turned off. Also, one federal agent I spoke with said “they” had the ability to turn your cellphone on and off at will. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know.
This technology and these abilities trickle down from the federal government, who use and implement them to fight “The War On Terror!” And of course, when fighting TERROR! anything goes. Remember, the American people willingly, gleefully give up their rights when the government says it’s doing something in the interest of their safety and security. …What was it Ben Franklin said about that?
There are probably no practical solutions to the increasing invasion of our privacy. If you use the internet or own a cellphone you are being tracked in some way. You could, I suppose, never get on a computer and not ever keep a cellphone in your possession…but seriously, how could you get anything done in today’s world?
However, more and more things we carry casually and without thinking…credit cards and passports for instance…have chips in them that allow their use to be tracked – they’re called “RFID” or radio frequency identification chips. Mostly these are only readable at close ranges – for now. More and more cars have “transponders” in them that allow vehicle tracking. Some of these devices you’ll know about (e.g. Onstar services and the like)…and some you won’t.
I don’t want to sound like a paranoid, tin-foil hat-wearing conspiracy theorist, but the implications of this capability to track an individual are equally scary and disturbing. I know that the excuse always is, “Hey, if you’re not doing anything wrong then you have nothing to fear.” But I don’t buy that. We always have something to fear when our government is involved; I think they’ve proven to us at this point that they cannot be trusted.
With no small amount of irony I saw that in the same newspaper, on the facing page to the one with the article on police cellphone snooping there was a full-page ad touting free cellphones for senior citizens. It was designed to look not so much like an ad, but a regular news page. And on it was one of those fake news articles with the headline: “U.S. Gov’t urges citizens to carry cellphones.”
Yeah, I’ll bet they do. The better to keep track of all of us.
Wall Street Journal Article on the Stingray
New York Times Article on Cellphone Tracking
I find it more than slightly creepy that if I search for something on Google, ads for that very thing will appear on my Facebook or eBay pages. But I guess that’s the “connected” world we live in now: What you do on the internet in one place is monitored by various other entities. Some of is fairly benign – in that marketers want to be able to better target their audience. But some of it is nefarious – as in government snooping which, come on, we know they do. We’ve all heard about the snooping into private lives that the NSA is doing.
On the local level, there was an article in our Pensacola newspaper recently about some new technology the police have and which they’d rather you not know about. Police can do what they call a “tower dump.” This lets them know the identities of all cellphones that have used a certain tower (or number of towers) in a given time period. And if the police know which phone was used, then they also know the number that phone called. And vice-versa. The article did not say, and perhaps cleverly omitted any admission by the police that they can actually monitor cellphone conversations.
But why could/would they not? Cellphones broadcast over public airwaves. As such, the police say that they are legally able to listen in. You don’t have the same right to privacy as you would using your regular old home phone landline; therefore no warrants are necessary. Civil rights organizations obviously do not agree.
Another device that police have is called a “Stingray.” This thing is the size of a suitcase and can emulate a cellphone tower. It tricks all cellphones in reception range to connect to it. (Your cellphone is always “looking” for a cell tower unless you put it in “Airplane” mode.) All the cops need to do is put the Stingray in the trunk of a car and drive into a neighborhood. They will know what the “bad guys” are doing…who they’re calling…and who’s calling them. And they’re probably listening in.
Details of the Stingray and how it works are understandably sketchy. The manufacturer says nothing…refers all inquiries to the law enforcement agencies that operate the device…the same law enforcement agencies that had to sign a confidentiality agreement just to purchase it.
Of course, the police have long had the ability to track you through the GPS feature of your cellphone. As long as it’s in your possession the government can know your whereabouts. It is still unclear whether “they” can track you even if the cellphone is turned off. Also, one federal agent I spoke with said “they” had the ability to turn your cellphone on and off at will. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know.
This technology and these abilities trickle down from the federal government, who use and implement them to fight “The War On Terror!” And of course, when fighting TERROR! anything goes. Remember, the American people willingly, gleefully give up their rights when the government says it’s doing something in the interest of their safety and security. …What was it Ben Franklin said about that?
There are probably no practical solutions to the increasing invasion of our privacy. If you use the internet or own a cellphone you are being tracked in some way. You could, I suppose, never get on a computer and not ever keep a cellphone in your possession…but seriously, how could you get anything done in today’s world?
However, more and more things we carry casually and without thinking…credit cards and passports for instance…have chips in them that allow their use to be tracked – they’re called “RFID” or radio frequency identification chips. Mostly these are only readable at close ranges – for now. More and more cars have “transponders” in them that allow vehicle tracking. Some of these devices you’ll know about (e.g. Onstar services and the like)…and some you won’t.
I don’t want to sound like a paranoid, tin-foil hat-wearing conspiracy theorist, but the implications of this capability to track an individual are equally scary and disturbing. I know that the excuse always is, “Hey, if you’re not doing anything wrong then you have nothing to fear.” But I don’t buy that. We always have something to fear when our government is involved; I think they’ve proven to us at this point that they cannot be trusted.
With no small amount of irony I saw that in the same newspaper, on the facing page to the one with the article on police cellphone snooping there was a full-page ad touting free cellphones for senior citizens. It was designed to look not so much like an ad, but a regular news page. And on it was one of those fake news articles with the headline: “U.S. Gov’t urges citizens to carry cellphones.”
Yeah, I’ll bet they do. The better to keep track of all of us.
Wall Street Journal Article on the Stingray
New York Times Article on Cellphone Tracking
12 December 2013
The Fat Guy
For the last three summers I’ve lead a pretty sedentary life – sitting around waiting for it to rain – or, more accurately waiting for it to rain and then stop raining – so I could go fly. For days on end we’d sit around the hangar drinking Pepsi and eating junk food. Our boss was the instigator. He liked to feed us, both at the airport and at restaurants. Often we’d go out for breakfast (he’d buy) and then we’d cook up a big barbecue feast at the hangar for lunch. Or I'd cook up something in the crew house. Oh God, did we eat! And we drank, which you can do when it’s severe-clear with a zero percent chance of rain and forecast to be that way for the next month. Needless to say, the pounds piled on.
But it didn’t just start when I began the cherry-drying thing. I’ve been a working pilot since 1982 (and I wasn’t in all that great shape back then either). It just doesn’t take much effort to sit in the seat of a helicopter and push those little hydraulically-boosted sticks around. And I was never big on exercise. So over the years my weight steadily increased.
I’m 5’9”, and I weighed under 170 when I started with Petroleum Helicopters in 1987. At the end of the 2013 cherry season I weighed just north of 202 pounds. Twenty-five years and just over 30 pounds. Doesn’t sound so bad when you say it like that, does it? Just a pound a year! But goddam, do they add up!
Up in Washington I felt like a whale. In fact, during the summer a couple of us went swimming at this place we liked to go on the Methow River (it’s pronounced met-how, by the way). It was Brandon (who weighs maybe 140 and is built like a toothpick), Mikey (who’s tall and slim) and Alex (who’s tall and husky-but-not-fat)…and me (the fat guy). Camera-phones were out as usual to document the event for posterity and Facebook. When I saw the pics I was so ashamed of the way I look that I made Brandon promise to not put them up. I mean, seriously, I looked terrible. I’m not People Of Walmart.com-obese, but I’m on the way. In any event, I have no energy or stamina anymore. Climbing up onto the helicopters was a chore, and I did not want to look bad in front of the younger pilots. I don't want them to think of me as "the old guy" who can't keep up.
On another level, I don’t mind being bald. But bald and fat? If I ever want to have sex again in my lifetime (and I do), one of those things is going to have to change. Maybe both.
In a lot of ways I look like my dad - no offense, pop. He always had a “beer-belly” for as long as I can remember (except he never went bald). Hey, we were city people not country folk. The most exercise most of us ever got was the walk from the apartment to the car and back, which usually didn’t even involve any stairs.
So this year I vowed that things would be different. Before I left I told the guys in Washington that when I got back next year they would at first think it was Brandon walking in the door. Which may be a bit unrealistic, since Brandon is 30 years younger than me and much better-looking, but still…
I’ve tried diets; we’ve all tried diets. Mostly they don’t work. Here’s why: They’re so restrictive…unreasonably restrictive, I think. You don't stay on them. One diet plan I looked at specified that between breakfast (half-cup of black coffee and half an orange) and lunch (an unsalted celery stalk), if you were feeling “snacky” you could have “ten sunflower seeds.” I was, like, “Really? Screw that!"
So I knew that a “diet” wasn’t going to work. I just had to change how I ate. And how much. Look, this isn’t rocket science: If you want to lose weight you simply have to take in fewer calories than you’re burning. PLUS, you have got to exercise regularly. It’s got to be a combination of the two.
I decided that when I got back home I’d do a couple of things. You can go online and plug your height, weight and age into these calculator programs that’ll tell you how many calories you “need” in a given day. For me it comes out to about 2100. Okay, so I figure that if I keep my calories down to 1500 or less, I should be able to lose weight. Less than 1500 calories a day is easy. It simply means eating better: No more three-big-meals per day; no sodas, and cut way back on the sugar; no McDonalds or fast-food; no junk food; no snacking. It’s do-able.
For exercise, I thought about walking around the block. It’s just under a mile and it’s got a good uphill and downhill to it. Problem is that I don’t like walking. Or jogging. I do like riding a bicycle, so I planned on getting the one in the garage (don't we all have them?) fixed up and road-worthy again.
But when I got back to Pensacola, what should I find in my bedroom but an old-school exercise bike! One of the kids who stayed in my house while I was gone inherited it from his father or something. Instead of selling it or throwing it away he just (ahem) “temporarily” put it in my room, hope you don’t mind. No, I don’t mind! Perfect!
So every day now, I ride the exercise bike and work with my kettlebells. I’m eating better too (and strangely, I don’t miss the Pepsi, which I thought I would). I’m not going to obsessively weigh myself every day – although I know I have lost some weight (down below 200 already). I’m not intending to get “buff” or even skinny. I’m not setting any artificial or target weight…no “before” and “after” pictures. I'm just making a committment to live a healthier lifestyle…to get back down to a good weight…one at which I won’t be huffing and puffing after climbing up on the helicopter…one at which I won’t be so ashamed to have my picture taken with my shirt off on the river or up at Soap Lake. I'm 58 and I don't want to look like this. I don't want to be "the fat guy" anymore.
We’ll see how it goes.
But it didn’t just start when I began the cherry-drying thing. I’ve been a working pilot since 1982 (and I wasn’t in all that great shape back then either). It just doesn’t take much effort to sit in the seat of a helicopter and push those little hydraulically-boosted sticks around. And I was never big on exercise. So over the years my weight steadily increased.
I’m 5’9”, and I weighed under 170 when I started with Petroleum Helicopters in 1987. At the end of the 2013 cherry season I weighed just north of 202 pounds. Twenty-five years and just over 30 pounds. Doesn’t sound so bad when you say it like that, does it? Just a pound a year! But goddam, do they add up!
Up in Washington I felt like a whale. In fact, during the summer a couple of us went swimming at this place we liked to go on the Methow River (it’s pronounced met-how, by the way). It was Brandon (who weighs maybe 140 and is built like a toothpick), Mikey (who’s tall and slim) and Alex (who’s tall and husky-but-not-fat)…and me (the fat guy). Camera-phones were out as usual to document the event for posterity and Facebook. When I saw the pics I was so ashamed of the way I look that I made Brandon promise to not put them up. I mean, seriously, I looked terrible. I’m not People Of Walmart.com-obese, but I’m on the way. In any event, I have no energy or stamina anymore. Climbing up onto the helicopters was a chore, and I did not want to look bad in front of the younger pilots. I don't want them to think of me as "the old guy" who can't keep up.
On another level, I don’t mind being bald. But bald and fat? If I ever want to have sex again in my lifetime (and I do), one of those things is going to have to change. Maybe both.
In a lot of ways I look like my dad - no offense, pop. He always had a “beer-belly” for as long as I can remember (except he never went bald). Hey, we were city people not country folk. The most exercise most of us ever got was the walk from the apartment to the car and back, which usually didn’t even involve any stairs.
So this year I vowed that things would be different. Before I left I told the guys in Washington that when I got back next year they would at first think it was Brandon walking in the door. Which may be a bit unrealistic, since Brandon is 30 years younger than me and much better-looking, but still…
I’ve tried diets; we’ve all tried diets. Mostly they don’t work. Here’s why: They’re so restrictive…unreasonably restrictive, I think. You don't stay on them. One diet plan I looked at specified that between breakfast (half-cup of black coffee and half an orange) and lunch (an unsalted celery stalk), if you were feeling “snacky” you could have “ten sunflower seeds.” I was, like, “Really? Screw that!"
So I knew that a “diet” wasn’t going to work. I just had to change how I ate. And how much. Look, this isn’t rocket science: If you want to lose weight you simply have to take in fewer calories than you’re burning. PLUS, you have got to exercise regularly. It’s got to be a combination of the two.
I decided that when I got back home I’d do a couple of things. You can go online and plug your height, weight and age into these calculator programs that’ll tell you how many calories you “need” in a given day. For me it comes out to about 2100. Okay, so I figure that if I keep my calories down to 1500 or less, I should be able to lose weight. Less than 1500 calories a day is easy. It simply means eating better: No more three-big-meals per day; no sodas, and cut way back on the sugar; no McDonalds or fast-food; no junk food; no snacking. It’s do-able.
For exercise, I thought about walking around the block. It’s just under a mile and it’s got a good uphill and downhill to it. Problem is that I don’t like walking. Or jogging. I do like riding a bicycle, so I planned on getting the one in the garage (don't we all have them?) fixed up and road-worthy again.
But when I got back to Pensacola, what should I find in my bedroom but an old-school exercise bike! One of the kids who stayed in my house while I was gone inherited it from his father or something. Instead of selling it or throwing it away he just (ahem) “temporarily” put it in my room, hope you don’t mind. No, I don’t mind! Perfect!
So every day now, I ride the exercise bike and work with my kettlebells. I’m eating better too (and strangely, I don’t miss the Pepsi, which I thought I would). I’m not going to obsessively weigh myself every day – although I know I have lost some weight (down below 200 already). I’m not intending to get “buff” or even skinny. I’m not setting any artificial or target weight…no “before” and “after” pictures. I'm just making a committment to live a healthier lifestyle…to get back down to a good weight…one at which I won’t be huffing and puffing after climbing up on the helicopter…one at which I won’t be so ashamed to have my picture taken with my shirt off on the river or up at Soap Lake. I'm 58 and I don't want to look like this. I don't want to be "the fat guy" anymore.
We’ll see how it goes.
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