Something a little different this week: A
tumbler of Woodford Reserve , based upon the kind
recommendation of Bryan, who drops in from time to time while trying to stay
awake while being up half the night on call. Even more generous than his
recommendation (and I am exceptionally pleased with the thing itself) was the
fact that he made quite a generous donation to more than pay for
it.
For which I thank him kindly.
(And the honor is mine, sir.)
So. What shall we talk about? It's been a
while...
Well - let me tell you about
dinner last night then: The Biscuit graced us with her presence, and in fact
brought home a bevy of young ladies. Although I use the term guardedly. Anyway:
This combination virtually assured us of a visitation from all the local
teenaged boys, and we were not at all disappointed in that regard, in their
wife-beating muscle shirts and bloom of arrogant youth and good health. We
shooed them off eventually, in order to make a reasonable repast - although the
act of doing so nearly broke the Hobbit's heart, so fond is she of feeding the
unwashed neighborhood rabble, mere beasts that they are, and up to no good. But
there is little on earth that can compare to a teenage boy when it comes to your
essential ravenous gluttony, and we were sadly (some of us) unprepared for
serving both the girls
and
the boys.
This was no choice at all.
For me. Off you go then, boys. Come back in a decade or
so.
We held hands around the table,
and bowed our heads and gave thanks, as is our custom. One of our guests thought
to make a bit of sport of that, and we smiled politely in return, not rising to
the bait. 'Tis a free country, after all, and allowing oneself to get wrought up
by 14 year olds is analogous to picking fights with DU'ers (It's in the
comments, really - starting at the beginning. H/T to Glenn again.) The Biscuit
seemed a bit embarrassed for her friend, which gratified me for some strange
reason.
At one point in the meal,
somehow the talk turned to childhood diseases, etc. about which we no longer
worry. This brought up smallpox, for one - like most kids of my generation, I
got a smallpox vaccination way back in the day. I guess we declared victory and
left the field not long thereafter, because kids joining the service today, and
many who are in fact in their early 30's never did so. The import of this was
that in the ramp up for OIF, along with all the anthrax shots we got, those of
us in theater were required to get smallpox vaccinations. Because of the threat
of biological weapons, or WMD as you might say. Which we all secretly knew was a
ruse, because we knew that there weren't any WMD, and never had been, and that
all those Kurdish folks in Halaba had really, really bad diets and when
they claimed to have been subject to gas attacks, we all jumped to the wrong
conclusion. It might have been a translation
error.
So no. No WMD. But here's the
thing: We really, really wanted to go to war for some reason or another. Which
none of us can remember now, but it had nothing to do with WMD, and it was a
really good reason, you'll just have to trust me on that. So we all graciously
acceded to the anthrax and smallpox vaccinations as a way of furthering the
ruse. My
God,
but we're clever.
So. Smallpox
vaccinations. If you'd never had one before, it was a simple matter of three or
so scratches with the needle, a bandage and a grotesquely suppurating sore for a
week or so. We were warned: Don't touch it, for heaven's sake. And if you do,
don't touch any mucous membranes, exposed skin, clothing items, door knobs,
hatch handles, dining implements or
bulkheads.
What could be simpler, on
a vessel a thousand feet long and carrying 5,000 souls? All of whom had
suppurating sores on their shoulders? Nothing at all to worry about. Move
along.
But the really unfortunate
thing was that, for those of us who had once been inoculated, our resistance was
assumed to be higher. So we didn't get the three pricks of the needle assigned
to the callow youth, but rather closer to twelve or fifteen. Which is a lot more
than three. A lot. It's so much more in fact, that the average fighter pilot
wants to 1) pull his shoulder back away from the medical corpsman after about
six or seven hits with the needle, and 2) use that same shoulder to deliver a
punch right to his nose after about ten hits. Neither of which courses of action
is deemed entirely appropriate. He was just doing his job, after all. The
bastard.
So,
in telling this story to our assembled crowd of 14 year old females, I pushed my
shirt up over me left shoulder to show the vaccination scar. I've been paying my
dues lately at the gym, and was felt absurdly rewarded when the Biscuit said
aloud, "I never realized you were so muscular." At which point, another 14 year
old girl commanded, "Flex," which of course I did, unthinkingly. Immediately
feeling more than a little foolish. Because deep inside, no matter how old we
get, we never lose that part of us that's a 14 year old boy, wearing a muscle
shirt in arrogant good health, and hoping desperately to be noticed by the girl
before the girl's dad kicks us the hell out of the
house.
----------
Charmaine
sends along a link to a wonderful story about the USS
Bonefish -
a submarine lost in combat in World War II,
and to which Charmaine has a personal connection. It's a lovely tribute, and you
ought to give it a read.
As
well as a
link to a great deal more plane p0rn, for those so disposed - He also
links to an amazing story about a partial ejection in an
A-6 that I mentioned obliquely here . Thanks
Joe!
Speaking of photography, I got a
nice note from Jordan in Poland. Jordan is an occasional visitor I gather, but a
tremendous visual artist - his oeuvre can be found here (when he
gets back within bandwidth limits). Beautiful
work.
------------
Well.
I've got a long, serious, Important Post that I've been mulling over since, oh -
two miles into my four miler this morning. That's the lovely thing about a run,
the way it clears your head. But it doesn't really belong here, with pictures of
legacy fighters and smallpox scars. So I'll save it for later, and offer all of
you my best hopes for a lovely weekend, full of every pleasure you could
desire.
But not so much as you might
get used to it
:-)
Cheers!
Posted @
06:45 PM
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Posted in
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Sendit
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Credo
"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." - John Paul Jones
"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Ceasar and Cleopatra"
"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friederich Nietzsche
