On This Day...

 I have decided to reflect on a more pleasant memory.

Mrs. Drang's birthday.

I am always astonished when I reflect that we have been together for 31 years now, and married for 29.

I don't know how she does it...

Juneteenth

This is Juneteenth.

I had long known that on June 19th, 1865 -- Juneteenth -- the Emancipation Proclamation was announced in Texas.

That's the short version, of course, the "I learned it in elementary school" version. (Actually, I think it was in junior high.)

What I did not realize was that the man doing the announcing was General Gordon Granger. General Granger had been my great great grandfather's corps commander at the Battle of Chickamauga.

I'm not claiming any deep personal connection. It's unlikely General Granger had a clue who some random rifleman in Company K of the 22nd Michigan was, and G'G'Grandfather was still convalescing in a hospital in Detroit a year and a half after the battle, so he probably never saw Texas.

I think what impresses me more than the (tenuous) connection is the fact that, this morning, I actually learned something from a Pubic Service Announcement on TV.

Merry Christmas

Hoping you enjoy the day with loved ones.  Please think of those who can't.

Breakfast, and then I'm off to work.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Me, I'm off to work. Working tomorrow, too, but probably just half a day.

In the meantime, based on my inbox, it looks like Friday comes on Thursday this week, so I'll go ahead and post tomorrow's meme today.

(For anyone who doesn't get that,see last year's post "Darmok".)

02/14/2019 Earworms

Note to Everybody

Inspired by Tam's post Copypasta from my Bookface wall...

Go ahead and unfriend me.

The only way I am going back to Facebook is if they change their rules to let one post using a pseudonym with your "legal ID" not publicly available, and not searchable, without a warrant.

I'd even be willing to pay a double sawbuck (that's a Jackson for you kids, AKA an Irony Note, until Harriet replaces Andy, at which time it will be a Freedom Note, I guess) per annum for the service.

Facebook can be a useful way to stay in touch with family and friends; people evacuating from Hurricane Harvey only need a couple of minutes to post to their wall "Safe in Dallas, more later" and everyone will know they made it out OK.

Google+ could do that much, too, and anyone who has an Android phone has a Google+ account by virtue of having an Android, AKA GMail, AKA Google, account. And Google+ does not demand you post your legal ID anywhere. (Ask me how I know...)

But Zuckerberg et. al. are more interested in making piles of money and in manipulating society than in providing a simple service that people would actually like.

So feel no guilt at all about trimming your friends list by one there.

BTW, I'm still on Twitter, as of this week. Not real active, compared to some, but posting a link to the blog posts will (or used to) cross-post to Facebook, and occasionally some SJW does or says something stupid...

Odds and ends

So, over the last few weeks I've alluded to a friend who was going through a rough patch, most recently in Earworm, 06/14/2017.

Basically, her son went from a 5% chance of surviving, to full consciousness, coherent speech, and walking unassisted.

Apparently, it is possible for certain organs which have shut down to regenerate.

Somewhere in there, I wondered if this was going to turn into a Lifetime movie, or even in to a Hallmark Special.*

Then she told me that certain other aspects of her life were turning around, and now I suspect even Hallmark would turn the script down as too unrealistic...

***

...In the meantime, my wife has been listening to me obsess about the problems of a woman shes never met, and all she says is "What's the news? Is she  doing OK? She probably needs a break, why don't you see if we can take her to lunch or dinner?"

So, yeah, I think even Hallmark would say it was too hokey. 

Also, I love my incredible wife.

***

Also in the meantime, the NRA has relented on it's ban on 1911s and revolvers in the Carry Guard self-defensive shooting classes.  (Dear NRA: WTF is wrong with you?!)

I heard a lot of rationales why this rule made sense, but frankly, IMnsHO none of them stood scrutiny. If someone is paying $850 for a three day class, you should be a little more lenient about what gat they bring.

If Mas can design the shooting courses of MAG40 to accommodate single-stack pistols and 6 shooters, than by Friar Schwartz' ghost so can the NRA.

***

*Okay, so I have this theory that women's lives can be divided into one of three categories:

1. Hallmark Channel movies
2. Lifetime Channel movies
3. Oxygen Channel movies

depending on how horrible the tragedy is, how sordid the scandal is, and/or how many people die and/or go to prison.

There may be other categories, the woman I first developed this theory around turned out to need one of those pay-per-view channels, if you know what I mean, and I think you do...

(Edited to add that I was only "involved" wih this woman as a co-worker.)

I haven't yet heard a proposed equivalent for men's lives, although I suspect my life story will star Bruce Campbell...

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

Also Happy Birthday (in a few days.)

Wherever you are.*









*(No, really, they're on vacation, and I'm not sure where they are, other than "no phone or internet".)

Now it can be told!

Yesterday evening we returned from a Hawaiian Cruise celebrating our 25^th anniversary.

No, I don't know how she does it.

My parents joined us; other family members were either not able to change plans, or, in the case of many of Mrs. Drang's family, have bad memories of previous cruises, which typically involved 14 hour days of chipping paint and "hot-bunking" with some guy from Alabama...

Itinerary:

• Board San Francisco
• Four days at sea
• Hawai'i, AKA "The Big Island"/Hilo
• Oahu/Honolulu
• Maui/Lahaina
• Kauai/Nawiliwili
• Four days at sea
• Ensenada*
• One day at sea
• Disembark San Francisco

*Stop in Ensenada mandated by US Government regulations intended to favor US flag carriers, requiring that non-US flagged passenger vessels make at least one stop in a foreign port on any voyage. Other US Government regulations make it prohibitive to flag cruise ships in the US, so there are none. This makes Seattle an attractive port for cruises, since Vancouver and Victoria are so convenient; Ensenada gets the love from Los Angeles and San Francisco. Alas, Alaska is the only cruise destination convenient to Seattle, and that's not a year-round trip like Hawai'i and Mexico/Central America. (There are rumors of Pacific Rim and round-the-world cruises starting in Seattle Any Year Now...)

Right now the consensus is that a 15 day cruise is at least 3 days too long, maybe 5. (How long a vacation is too long? When you get tired of fine dining and having someone else do your housekeeping...)

Maybe if the consecutive days at sea were fewer, and there were more port calls, we would not have felt this way. I don't know. Maybe we need to look into that 19 day L.A. to Ft. Lauderdale cruise, with Panama Canal transit and a stop in Mexico, Central America, and various Caribbean Islands to say for sure.

Anyway, I'll be posting some pics and videos here, although many of the videos need editing.

Here's a taste:

This is a somewhat crappy cell phone video taken on March 17th off Lahaina, Maui, of a humpback whale doing "pedunkle slaps."

Briefly made us wonder why we paid money for a separate whale watching cruise, if I could watch one from the buffet line...

(It was totally worth it, BTW.)

Memorial Day III

I was thinking this morning about Mrs. Drang's father and his brothers, all of whom served in the Navy in WWII, and all of them on subs for at least a part of the time.

Oh, of course!

Of course the Cartoon Network runs an Archer marathon for Mother's Day!

Don't worry, I didn't turn it on until after I called Mom.

Also, Amazon says the flowers I ordered her are still in transit, but she says she received a bouquet that sounds like what I ordered, the same day.

Life just keeps getting better and better! 

Doncha' Hate It When...

...you're thinking about where you're going for dinner on your anniversary tomorrow when you realize you have the date wrong, and it's today?

The good news is, Mrs. Drang made the same mistake.

I think it was my taking Saturday off to go to the gun show, threw us both off.

Well, so here we are.

Happy 24th, Bearcat!

I ain't'nt ded yet

Just going to be off the air, as it were, for a little while.

Merry Christmas!

For everyone who is deployed now, for everyone who has been deployed over the Christmas Holidays, and for those whose family members are or were ever deployed over the holidays, too.

Also for everyone who is working today...

25 years ago...

On Thanksgiving Day, 1990, the future Mrs. Drang and I sat down to discuss our future and about 5 minutes later we were engaged.

Tomcattin' is hard...

This stool isn't really big enough for Sparrowbane...

Sparrowbane in repose.
Temporarily.
Photo copyright 2015 D.W. Drang & The Cluemeter.

Perspective, gained

It's been a very frustrating week.  Numerous irritations, aggravations, and minor disasters, professional and personal, all seemed to happen more or less at once. Noe of which I am going to blog about directly, but...

Having arranged to take today off to deal with some of the personal disasters, I sat down to eat my lunch with one of my assistants. We started discussing one of the on-the-job pains, and he was telling me about how one of his peers was trying to get another one to swap new assignments with her. After explaining the (already known to me) reasons such a swap would not be approved (all or most of which she knows very well) he added "I have to say that I'm just as glad, since she's going out in a month or so for her... surgery..."

"Told you all about it, huh?"

"Yep."

"Me, too. Wanted to tell her I didn't want to hear about it, but it didn't seem like the right thing to do.  Let her talk it out."

Yes, I know now far more than I ever wanted to about breast reconstructive surgery, how they do it, where they get the tissue...

"Just about everyone in her family has died of cancer, you know.  That's why, when they found the first lump, she went for the radical instead of messing around."

"Didn't know that, but it makes sense."  After a moment, he said "Y'know, there's this guy my wife works with, I want to kick his ass. He's got the same form of cancer she has" (I knew she had been ill, didn't realize it was cancer) and he keeps 'sharing' with her. 'They tried that treatment, it was only in remission for three years.' 'They tried that treatment, it didn't work.' They tried this other treatment, the side effects were horrible.' Every time she sees him he has to 'share'. He may think he's helping, but he's not."

"What an idiot, besides not being supportive, differant people respond to different treatments differently."

And I thought to myself, You know, Self, we have a thousand and one problems, but not a one is likely to kill us or someone we love.

Happy Birthday

Mrs. Drang.

On a day when we all get a little somber, I'd like to thank you for sharing your life with me, and bringing meaning to mine.

I love you.

Overheard, Richard Attenborough Edition

The scene: Drang is standing in the family room, coffee cup in hand, observing Sparrowbane patrolling the back yard perimeter.

Drang: Here we see the mighty tiger, stalking the savanah.
Mrs. Drang: ???
Drang: Nobody told him there are no tigers on the savanah.

Seen in instant messages

(Mrs. Drang's office uses an instant messaging app to communicate instead of yelling across the office or using the phone to call upstairs, so we've used it for years to communicate when I was off or on a different continent.) 

Me: Ran to the mail box.  Starting to rain.

Mrs. Drang: It can't rain, I'm wearing a sun dress!