In the Navy

Well, I'm sitting here waiting for my phone to arrive - it wasn't supposed to be here until Wednesday but then yesterday afternoon I got an email telling me it had been upgraded to "3 day shipping," so I called work and told them I'd be late.  However, if I wait too long, I'm going to call off completely.  I've got the time on the books.
A few years ago, because I was in the Navy, on an air craft carrier (USS Constellation), and in Vietnam, I joined something on Facebook called The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club.  This is where other sailors with the same history as I post pics from those days long gone by.  This morning one my 'shipmates' posted a pic looking out into the hanger bay towards the aft end of the ship and I thought I'd post it here since most people have absolutely no idea just how big an air craft carrier is (so huge it would make the Idiot's head spin).

That's right, there's a van parked in the hanger bay - it was used by the Shore Patrol when we were in Subic Bay.  And, of course, you can see planes there because that's where the Airdales performed maintenance.  On the left hand side, about half way back, you can see a fire wall.  A long, long time ago, I lost a hard contact lens just forward of that fire wall, never to be found again.

And this is what it looked like when they were taking aircraft from the hanger bay up to the flight deck.  The above picture is from the USS Ticonderoga, which was rather small compared to the USS Constellation, which was the largest, non-nuclear air craft carrier ever built.

This is my ship pulling into San Diego after a 10 month tour of WestPac.

Now ain't that grand!  Can you see me up on the flight deck in my dress whites waving?

Las Vegas Fail

Now and then I will complete online surveys just for the fun of it.  Monday I did one which was supposed to be a lot of fun relating to the our new marriage equality.  The first question was "Now that the gay and lesbian community has marriage equality, if you were to get married, where would you want to spend your honeymoon?"  There were 2 blank spaces which I filled in with the cities 'Paris' and 'Rome."  Wrong answer.  The next question listed 5 American cities, including San Francisco, New York, Palm Springs and Las Vegas to choose from and I chose San Francisco.  Wrong answer.  The survey then zeroed in on Las Vegas.  In fact the rest of the questions were all related to Las Vegas which for me is a fail.
I have absolutely no interest in going to Las Vegas.  I'm a non gambling person.  I can think of better things to waste my money on, like video games, or dinner and a movie.  Being surrounded by thousands and thousands of tourists is not my idea of fun.  Seeing aging pop stars warble their greatest hits in a show is not how I want to spend my time.  In spite of all of the 'extras' Vegas offers with a wink, that city's main purpose for existence is gambling.  And as I said, I'm a non gambling person.

I realized this a long, long time ago.  Back when I was in the Navy and stationed in San Diego, I had a buddy who was from Vegas and as a result got to go there 3 or 4 times.  It got to water ski on Lake Mead, that was fun.  But mostly what we did was wonder around casinos watching people lose money.  This was a lesson in the pointlessness of gambling. So a survey attempting to extol the wonders of Vegas is a failure as far as I am concerned.  

Weiner / Filner Jackasses coast to coast

I haven't really been following the Weiner scandal but evidently a lot of other people have, mostly, I suppose, to stretch things out as long as they can, until some other sexting shit hits the fan... Oh, wait, it has out in San Diego, of course they have a bit more, like head-locks, and groping, and forced kissing.  I did the Wikipedia thing on both Anthony Weiner and Bob Filner to educate myself.  First thing I noticed is that Weiner is tall, I mean really tall, six feet five inches tall, in case you didn't know, he is a big guy.  If they have their dates correct, he is 40 and about to do a swan dive into his mid-life crisis, in fact I'm quite surprised he didn't use that as his excuse.  Dealing with slowly dwindling testosterone in addition to the realization you life, for most purposes, is half over, is enough to send any tall, geeky guy around the bend.  Can you blame him for trying to immortalize himself?  So what if the medium he's chosen is a little... risqué?

6' 5" mans big hands, big feet, big.....

And then there is Bob Filner from San Diego, originally from Pittsburgh, where they drank Iron City Beer and made American Steel.  The first thing I discovered about him is that he's old, a lot older then he looks.  He will be seventy-one this coming September.  He's been divorced twice and at the time of winning they Mayoral race was engaged.  However, that relationship ended because, according to his ex, because of his verbal abuse and constant sexting.  Did I tell you this guy is going to be 71 in September?  He is doing everything he can to prove to himself he isn't nearly that old.   Of course at his age he doesn't really have a lot of time to just court and spark, hence, I suppose, the neck lock.  It's a good thing he didn't grow up on a dude ranch, otherwise things might be a low worse for him

There's no fool like an old fool

 

 

Besides the fact that both of these men are jackasses and one is on the East Coast and other on the West Coast, what else can I say?  How about one is an exhibitionist and the other a control freak?  How about that both are in denial about some very serious issues?  I suspect Bob Filner has been acting the same way most of his life, it's just that he can't get away with it anymore.  As for Anthony Weiner?  I suspect he's desperate for something and in the end it may just boil down to a need for attention.