Happy Hour

"IF A LIFETIME CAN BE LIKENED TO A DAY, THEN THIS IS HAPPY HOUR!"
BUCK PENNINGTON

Mother, Mother Ocean

Mother, Mother Ocean, I've heard you call
Wanted to sail upon your waters since I was three feet tall
You've seen it all, you've seen it all
Watched the men who rode you, switch from sails to steam
In your belly you hold the treasures, few have ever seen
Most of 'em dream, most of 'em dream
Yes, I am a pirate, two hundred year's too late
The cannons don't thunder, there's nothin' to plunder
I'm an over-forty victim of fate
Arriving too late, arriving too late

Yoda

"Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? Hmm. And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is."
―Yoda, to Luke Skywalker

Counted the Stars

Counted the stars on the 4th of July
Wishing we were rockets bursting in the sky
Talking about redemption and leaving things behind
I have these pictures and I keep these photographs
To remind me of a time
These pictures and these photographs
Let me know I'm doin' fine
We used to be so happy once upon a time
Once upon a time
But the sun sank west of the Mendocino County Line
And the sun sank west of the Mendocino County Line


""SOME SEE A GLASS AS HALF FULL, SOME SEE IT AS HALF EMPTY, I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHO’S DRINKING MY RUM."
Rumbear

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Disabled My Ass

http://snigs1spot.wordpress.com/

Greatest Tank Ever

Ingenious if I may say so..................
Time to lay in a supply...............................that anniversary requiring a toast is approaching..............

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

On Perspective

This was on Google Plus this morning. Thought I would share it here....................
Pretty much nails it...................................................

Sunday, January 26, 2014

More Pictures From The Central Coast

Cambria, Cayucos and one from Pismo Beach.































A Picture from The Central Coast

The Missus and I went over to Cambria, Morro Bay, Cayucos and Pismo Beach Saturday.
This is of the pier at Cayucos, taken on my Droid. We went to see the surf as there was a high surf warning.
I have a ton of pics on my Nikon D3000 and those will be posted after I upload at some later date and time.................

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Time for a rant courtesy of PIGazette, The Free State of PIG.

Begin Rant
From the Pigazette
Here we go again, getting ready to harangue you about things you already know. It won't hurt you to refresh your memory on some Reality 101 tidbits. Who knows, you might stumble upon something you didn't know...or be reminded of something you knew, but forgot.

If this isn't meant for you, know-it-all Sparky, who is the intended target of this rant? Who indeed.

Idiots with self esteem who matriculated to the celebrated low information voter status need to know these reality bytes.

Low information Elected Tormentors like Hank Johnson - the man who worries that the island of Guam will capsize, if Uncle Sam increases the number of troops deployed there - REALLY needs to know these reality bytes.

Anyone whose only source of 'just the facts' is the MSM needs to know these reality bytes.

Anyone who drinks the Kool-Aid served by the two major political parties needs to know these reality bytes.

The politically-motivated, whopper spewing, MSM bitches and bastards who think we were born yesterday need to be hammered with these reality bytes.

The activists who tweak reality to promote their particular agenda need to know these reality bytes.

Let's face it, everyone needs to know these reality bytes, especially rational adults who are in mortal danger of drowning in an unrelenting blizzard of bullshit.

Fundamental elements of objective reality don't change, but they do fall out of favor and are relegated to inconvenient truth status. Put another way, A is, always was, always will be A. BUT, depending on the prevailing political environment, asshats will promote their A is B brain fart with compelling conviction.

When it comes to reality bytes, they've been with us for a while. For example, here in what's left of America, this reality byte rocked the whole world in 1776:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.--We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,--That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. [Declaration of Independence]

In 1916, an American religious leader and influential public speaker, William John Henry Boetcker, served up a memorable reality byte in a pamphlet named 'The Ten Cannots':

The Ten Cannots

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.

You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.

You cannot help little men by tearing down big men.

You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.

You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.

You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.

You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.

You cannot build character and courage by destroying men's initiative and independence.

And you cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

News Nitwits/media Meatheads

• Thespians are NOT smarter than the average bear. They're the dishwasher at your local eatery who caught a break. You'll probably get more meaningful insights from the dude who is still washing those dinner plates in the back room.

• Learn to read between the lines: Just because you heard it on the radio, saw something on TV or the internet, doesn't make it true. News Nitwits and Media Meatheads always put their own warped, maligned and sensationalized sense of self-important spin on any given subject. Media Meatheads and News Nitwits are ratings and revenue driven. Why do you think they tease the hottest story throughout the broadcast only to show you a 10 second clip at the tail end of the broadcast? To keep fools like us glued to our idiotic electronic opiate box.

• If you hear, read or see something that offends you, it's YOUR problem, Sparky.

Big Brother & Big Sister Are Watching You, Too!

• The Nanny State only gets money from two places. The can print it, making the money in your pocket worth less. Or, they can steal it from some hard working fool - like you, Sparky - and give it to those chronically-needy parasite.

• If you think for a nano-second the Nanny State gives a rip about you - or the children - by enforcing seat belt, motorcycle helmet, smoking and transfat laws, think again. Big Brother/Big Sister are way too busy rewriting the Constitution, catering to special interests and lobbyists, on top of conspiring to separate you from your money and freedom.

• Korrectniks are, by their very nature, humor-challenged asshats who use the Nanny State's monopoly on the use of force to coerce the 'proper' behavior from you. You are not allowed to say things that offend them. You are not allowed to write things that offend them. You are not allowed to create images, or artwork that offends them. Their message is clear and inescapable: shut up, sit down, die in a fire you (pick your poison: racist, sexist, homophobe).

• Crime Pays: Ask any cop, correction officer, judge, criminal defense lawyer, parole officer or dope dealer. Without petty laws to keep courts and prisons filled, these occupations would be rendered obsolete.

Race Card

• Al Sharpton and Je$$e Jackson got rich and powerful by hunting down and exposing that racist hiding in the woodpile. When America began to shed its racist past, these Ethnocrats worried about an untimely end to their race card waving enrichment.

Al and Je$$e want, need, rampant racism to stay in business and they've shown a willingness to create some, when none exists. The lesson here is obvious: we need to persuade these Ethnocrats surrender their race cards, close shop and get a real job for a change. Repeat after me, gentlemen, "Do you want fries with that?"

Enabling

• If you tolerate an evil, it gets stronger. This was driven home, with telling clarity when rational adults laughed off political correctness as an insignificant Ivory Tower phenomenon and, decades later, it has embedded itself in every aspect of American life.

• A critical mass of rational adults - many of them in the top echelons of political power - turned a blind eye to the real enemy in our war on Jihadikazes. This is not, as W - and Barry - claim a war against some fringe wingnuts who 'hijacked a great religion'. We are at war with Islam itself, a belief system whose endgame involves world domination - forcible adherence to their supernaturalism - by any means necessary. In this battle for our very survival, tolerating this evil is not an option.

• When you reward undesirable behavior, you get more of it. We did that in 1986 by giving 4 million border jumping scumbags amnesty and we got 20 million more.

• Rewarding pachyderm punk Elected Tormentors who spend like The One on a stimulus binge, encourages them to spend even more and goads them into running up bigger deficits.

• Rewarding parasites with Nanny State freebies generated an explosive growth of the parasite horde.

If you think it has all been said and done, get over it.

• Under our Constitution, the Founding Fathers created a nation where a small, island of government is surrounded by an ocean of inalienable individual rights. Over the intervening years Elected Tormentors pulled the big switcheroo, leaving a small, shrinking island of individual rights surrounded by an ocean of government.

• If you were paying attention during Bush 43, you know that putting the beltway (establishment) pachyderm punks in charge isn't necessarily the fast track to a smaller, properly constitutional government. Too many of them like big government, too. The only real difference is how fast they want to get there.

• The political atmosphere in D.C. is TOXIC. Prolonged exposure, invariably turns the most rational Elected Tormentor into a McCain or a Schumer.

• If you hate the gender you were assigned at birth, that's your personal problem. You can pin any label you want on yourself, but it doesn't change biological fact. Your imaginary gender is irrelevant. If you've got a hole - original equipment or a tribute to modern medicine - you do your business in hole city - the women/ladies/girls facilities. If you've got a pole - original equipment or a tribute to modern medicine - you do your business in pole city - the men/boys facilities. If you cut to the chase, you are what you're packing: a pole, or a hole. Why make it more complicated, when it's as easy as that?

• Since it doesn't produce anything, the government doesn't participate in the marketplace. So where does it get the money it throws around? It steals it from the individual who earned it, via taxes. OR, it prints it, making all the money in your various investments and savings accounts worth less.

• If you get more money back from the government than it stole from you, it is NOT a refund. It's welfare, laundered through the IRS.

• If you oppose some, or all, of The One's policies, it doesn't make you a racist, no matter how vociferously the Obamunists brandish the race card.

• Everything the Nanny State spews about the U.S. Constitution is bullshit. Contrary to what they told you, the United States Constitution delineates, with considerable specificity, the limits under which our government operates. It does not include an exhaustive list of inalienable individual rights.

• They're also full of crap about the Bill of Rights. If an item is included in the Bill of Rights, that does not mean that the government ever had a Constitutional mandate to restrict it in the first place. Finally, kindly remembere that according to the Ninth Amendment, individuals have countless rights that are not listed in the prior amendments, rights that the government must respect. Don't hold your breath waiting for the Nanny State to admit THAT.

• The MSM lies about EVERYTHING. Their reporting isn't informing you. It indoctrinates you. They're promoting neo-Marxism in general and Barack Obama in particular.

Are you paying attention, mind full of mush Sparky? Are you getting the big picture? Are you ready to take your brain out of neutral? I hope so, because time is running out and we need your help to start turning things around.

What, if anything, does all this table pounding prose mean? It means, among other things, that I'm a lot crankier than usual. It also means that We the People are running out of time, if we want to leave future generations a better, stronger, more prosperous, and freer American than the one we were born into.

Rant Complete

Saturday, January 18, 2014

Just Because

Funny for a Saturday...................

Some Aviation Sayings

Blatantly stolen from The Lexicans, that place for all of us.
There are some classics in this one!
The personal favorites are as follows:
5.  The man who flies an airplane … must believe in the unseen. ~ Richard Bach
9.  Flying is like sex —I’ve never had all I wanted but occasionally I’ve had all I could stand. ~ Stephen Coonts
11.  Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it  is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect.
18. I fly because it releases my mind from the tyranny of petty things.  ~ Antoine de St-Exupéry
20. When asked by someone how much money flying takes: Why, all of it!  ~ Gordon Baxter
The rest are at the following link..............................................Some Aviation Sayings-Literary Plane Pr0n

Thursday, January 16, 2014

The Aviationist: French Rafale fighter jets operate from U.S. aircraft carrier

This does not happen very often.
When I was serving aboard USS Independence CV62, we conducted two cross deck exercises with HMS Ark Royal. That was in the mid Seventies.
As an aside, I am impressed with the Rafale.
140113-N-XL102-125
French Rafale fighter jets operate from U.S. aircraft carrier

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Kings Acquire Third Round Pick From Oilers For Scrivens; Jones Recalled

The kid did good on his first call up to the Kings. I was wondering when it was going to happen.
http://kings.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=700789

http://kings.nhl.com/club/player.htm?id=8474889

I am sorry that Ben Scrivens was traded as he did well also when Jonathan Quick was out injured. Now to get the offense in gear!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Weekend In Las Vegas

I took Missus ORPO to Las Vegas this past weekend to see Paul Revere And The Raiders at South Point Hotel and Casino. We of course stayed at the very nice Nellis Inn on Nellis AFB. One must take advantage of the things one has earned.
Friday was just to have a splendid dinner at Landry's Seafood House on Sahara just off of I-15. Most excellent it was!
The show was Saturday Night and it was great as always. Paul Revere just turned 76 and is still a blast.






















A former member of The Raiders, known as Fang was there and The Missus has an album from his band...........He autographed it for her with a big smile.

I will not go down and tell my children I didn't have the courage, the conviction, the commitment or the character to fight for this country...Don't go home and let your children down~~ LTC Allen West

Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus

‎"Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum.("Therefore, he who desires peace, let him prepare for war")" from "Epitoma Rei Militaris," by Vegetius (Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus)