Veterans Day

As you know, I have written quite a bit about Veterans Day and Veterans in general.  Today I sit here thinking about how lucky I am to be an American and how thankful I am to those who made that possible.  There are currently about 25 million living Veterans, not all active duty but still kicking and I am proud to include myself in that group.  Just as a comparative there are only about 48million who have served in our military since 1776.  As you can deduce with simple math, over half of the folks who have ever served – since 1776 – are still alive.  As I sit and think about that and what it means I wonder, where we will be as a nation be in another 50 years.  The one thing I do know, we will have brave young Men and Women who are willing to server to protect our Great Nation. 

I was reminded of a poem I heard a long time ago by Courtney Tanabe called “Because of you, Unknown Soldier”.   Usually when we think or hear the words “Unknown Soldier” we think of Arlington National Cemetery and the proud marines protecting the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  I am not sure but I suspect Courtney might have been inspired by the site there at Arlington.  Maybe she put together the pieces of the puzzle that explain the importance of 21 in the military.  21 gun salutes, the 21 steps that Marine takes or the 21 seconds he pauses before the next 21 steps at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, who knows.  As I read it today I wonder if maybe she wasn’t thinking about the fact that we do not really know our soldiers. (The word Soldier is used generically to describe anyone who serves).  Here is her ode.

 Because of you, I am here

Because of you, I am able to live freely

Yet I do not know you

And I have not done anything for you

But there you stand, ready to fight

And there you are prepared to die

For me

You've fought before

And you'll fight again

For someone you don't know

So thank you Unknown Soldier

Fighting for me

I'm here because of you

And I owe my future to you

 

Regardless of what she was thinking when she wrote it, it is a beautiful tribute. 

Maybe that is part of our problem, our Soldiers are unknown to us and their work is even more unknown to us. We like to picture Hero’s in our head and the Military has no lack of Hero’s. But along with those Heroes are young scared kids who may not understand the geo political ramifications of the actions they are taking.  Maybe, and this is a maybe, we just don’t care about things as much anymore.  Other than the things that are revolving in our own insulated cocoon of life.  That sounds like a harsh reality but that is what it seems.  With so much instantaneous and overwhelming communication we have insulated ourselves.  We listen to news stations that cater to our views, we hang out with likeminded folks who hold the same views.  We rarely get outside our bubble, our cone of safety if you will.  This may be part of our National problem, we live in a world where we have so many places to get information from that are very targeted to exactly what we want.  Is that good, I think not.

For example I will pick two things and explain, social media and riding in your car in traffic.  I have to ask; don’t we feel emboldened when we sit in our 5000 pound protective cocoon?  Don’t we scream things at people that we would NEVER say to them in person, even in a joking way.   Don’t we feel powerful when we can sit in our underwear pecking away at a keyboard spewing hateful bile, in all caps no less?  We never have to see the persons face or care about their reaction.  Most people and things outside our bubble are “Unknown” to us.  How many of your own neighbors can you name, how many have been in your house, how many do you just wave at to appear the tiniest bit friendly?  I was not sure where this would go when I started pecking on the keyboard, I never do but here I am.              

I want to let everyone who has served or is serving to that I am indebted to you, I owe my freedoms to you and I will never take the sacrifices you have made for granted.   I started two years ago posting a tribute to every Military member who died in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, those posts have reached 838 as of today who have died in the last two years defending our freedoms, or so they tell us.  I am so glad that we are out of Iraq and soon to be out of Afghanistan so I no longer have to perform that honor, not because I don’t want to, but because I should not have to. 

I will leave you with another poem or two

Remember

by Brittany Vigoreaux

American soldiers sacrifice so much,

All for the freedom of our country.

Leaving their families and heading off to war,

Not knowing what the future holds.

Working day and night

Determined to stay strong.

Watching friends be killed every day

Letters from home inspiring them to keep fighting

So little is given to them

Although there is little to do,

For those who have died in war

We can still remember

Remember all the men who have died.

Remember all the battles fought

Remember all the tears families cried

Remember it was freedom the soldiers brought

To this very day soldiers are under-appreciated

Veterans Day is the day

For the dead, living, and fighting soldiers

To be remembered

 

Sometimes the World Seems

by Larissa Myschuk

Sometimes the world seems like it's

Upside-down

Inside out

Torn down the middle

In need of arrangement

Desperate for guidance

Wanting direction

Lacking leadership

Losing patience

Turning and flipping

Backwards and sideways

Speeding endlessly forward

On a path of self-destruction

And the only thing to stop it,

The only thing to calm it,

Is the lives of the men that

Fight passionately

Fall readily and

Die willingly.

 

Broken Hearted I write this Blog!

Now I have never had a title like that, but it is exactly how I feel.  As I wrote about earlier, I have written quite a number of posts about military deaths in the wars.  What I have never mentioned is the word “suicide.”  We use code words to designate a suicide.  It seems sad that we have to use code words; actually I feel it is a shame we have to use them.  I suppose we use them to protect the families of the victims. I am sure they are devastated enough at the loss of their loved ones and to heap on the stigma of suicide in the press releases would just be too much. 

So how did I get back to Military deaths so soon you might be asking.  Well, several things over the last week really kind of drove it all home.  The first I suppose happened when I was in Boston last week.  That evening I stayed up late watching WGBH, who some consider the flagship PBS stations.  I was at their facility earlier in the day so I wanted to watch their product.  It was late when the Charlie Rose show started and during the lead-in he mentioned he was going to talk about the military suicide rate.  I was beat so I called Bride and asked her to record it for me, which she did.  It was an informative piece and well presented -- Charlie Rose is the best at the oak table.  Here is a link to that interview.  It is about a 16-minute piece but I implore you to please take a few moments and watch it. 

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/12463  I was stunned at the rate of suicides and more shocked by the rate of increase in them.

After that I wrote about the 6500, now already up to 6510, lost Military members in the wars we are fighting. It is hard to write about them all, as I feel a small piece of my soul is being eroded with each one.  I wonder what has happened to our country, why have we spent so many resources on this sand box fight.  What is the driving force and why do we just stand by and do nothing while our people are dying -- their people are dying and for what?  A piece of shit little corner of the world that is good for nothing but growing poppies.  Sorry, I did not want get off on that but I just do not see the value of the fight in that location. 

So, this morning I was looking at my Facebook and my friend who works down at WOSU FM in Columbus, OH, posted a story about a Court Martial that began For Ohio Soldier Accused of Racial Hazing.  Well after I read the story I realized that it was about 8 Army folks who hazed a young Army Private Danny Chen so badly that he committed suicide. 

Here is a link to that story http://beta.wosu.org/news/2012/07/24/court-martial-begins-for-ohio-soldier-accused-of-racial-hazing

It angers me that ANYONE is hazed to the point of the victim committing suicide.  It also angers me that no one stepped in to stop it.  Be the bigger man, be the one who protects those who might be weaker and the one who stands up for those who cannot stand up for themselves.  Don’t assume to know the burdens others may carry as we all carrying our own internal burdens.   

So I looked up Private Danny Chen, this death was listed as unspecified causes, here is his post. 

I just find it hard to stomach!  I do not even know what the answer is, or the cause.  I suspect, like Charlie indicated, it is the rate of return to combat.  During WWII nearly 8% of Americans were serving, now it is less than one percent of the population so they are going back to fight over and over and over and over again.  He had experts talking about the why and how but they were not sure how to fix it.  All the while I am yelling at the TV “stop sending them over there to fight.”  The answer seems so simple to me:  Remove the troops and then any issues related to the troops being there, automatically fixes itself.  Seems simple to me anyway, but I suppose I am not smart enough to know why that won’t work.     

So anyway, I get home from work today and I take a look to see if there were any losses of Military life today and up pops Army Staff Sgt. Brandon R. Pepper.  He died July 21, 2012, serving in Operation Enduring Freedom.  Brandon was 31 years old and form York, Pa, and at 31, I do not suspect he was hazed.  Brandon was assigned to 4th Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group, Fort Bragg, NC.  He was in Ghazni province in the middle of nowhere Afghanistan when he died from “unspecified causes”.  Which is what we all know now is code for he killed himself, for whatever reason he is gone.  These self-inflicted deaths touch me more than others, I am not sure why.  Such a senseless waste.  I wish one of Brandon’s buddies could have seen the signs, if there were even any present. 

Our young men and women serving overseas are being damaged.  We can see the folks who come home without legs or arms, but the ones who are hurting inside – how do we know?  How do we know what to ask, how do we know or even learn some of the signs.  I have lost 2 friends to suicide and I know there are no answers to any of these questions but the knowing has not assuaged my pain.  Maybe I think about Grady and David, my two friends, when I read or think about these Military suicides.  Not that they compare, only that there are always a million questions that can never have answers, and I find that frustrating.  I am just a dumb hillbilly from small town Ohio but the problem seems to have an easy answer – STOP SENDING Our TROOPS OVER THERE!!     

I ask that we all send up a few extra prayers tonight, to keep everyone safe and sound and to bring them home.

The Sixty Five Hundred

Kind of an odd name for a blog huh?  What is the significance of 6500, 5772 and 728?  Where does the 713th engineering company hail from and what do they do?  Who is Sergio E Perez Jr.  and Javier Ortiz-Rivera and how are they associated with these numbers? And how in the Hell is Orville Redenbacher involved?  Well I am going to link all those things together with this blog. 

I think I will start with five thousand, seven hundred and seventy two.  That number is directly tied to Javier Ortiz-Rivera.  He was the first Military member I commemorated on Facebook, which was on November 18th of 2010.  On Veterans Day, I had decided to post on my wall every one of the deaths that were happening in the wars we were fighting.  Javier was the five thousand seven hundredth and seventy-second US Military casualty since the United States of America started invading Sovereign nations.    

Here is a story that I found today titled, “Family mourns death of Marine” about Javier written by Jeffrey Blackwell of the Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat & Chronicle. 

The family of a Marine is mourning the loss of Staff Sgt. Javier Ortiz-Rivera, who was killed Nov. 16 by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.

On the dining room table of her small, neat First Street home, Ortiz-Rivera’s mother placed photographs of her son in his Marine uniform, with his wife, Veronica, and with their three young children, and another with his sister Glory Ortiz, brother Orlando and father Orlando Ortiz.  “There are just no words,” said Gloria Rivera, mother of the 26-year-old Marine.

Four days before his death, Ortiz-Rivera called his family in Rochester and talked about the bad phone connection and the excitement of his tour of duty in Afghanistan. Days later, sister Glory and her family found out the crushing news of Javier’s death from an improvised explosive device. “He was not just my brother,” said Glory Ortiz, 22. “He was everybody’s brother.”

Ortiz-Rivera was raised in Rochester and is a graduate of the School of Imaging and Information Technology at Edison. He joined the Marines right out of high school in 2002. His first of three tours of duty was in Iraq in 2003. He was deployed to Afghanistan in 2005 and again in September. He was due to return home in August.

According to the Defense Department, Ortiz-Rivera was killed while conducting combat operations in Helmand province of Afghanistan. He was assigned to 1st Battalion, 8th Marines, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.

“He was dedicated to his Marines and was proud of them,” said wife, Veronica Ortiz. “He told me he was extremely blessed to be out there with the guys he was out there with. He started a Bible study with his guys, and his faith was stronger than ever.”

Ortiz-Rivera lived with his wife and three children, Alyssa Jade, 8, Andrew Joshua, 5, and Anthony Javier, 3, in married housing at Camp Lejeune. Veronica said in an e-mail that her husband was a wonderful father. “Javier was the absolute best father any kid could ever hope for,” she wrote. “His kids were his pride and joy and of all the jobs he had, being a father was what he did best.”

Funeral arrangements are pending. Glory said her brother wanted to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, outside Washington. She said his death is pulling the family even closer together. “The last time we talked to him, the call just kept dropping off until we just gave up,” said Glory. “He loved his family and he was a great father and a great brother to everybody.”

It seems like a lifetime ago that I reported that first one.  Now 728 posts and 20 months later we arrive at 6500 United States Military members who have made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of our Country.  Today I write about Sergio E. Perez, Jr., who served in the 713th Engineering Company, a National Guard unit out of Valparaiso, Indiana.  I wonder if he had ANY idea where, or even knew such a place existed before he was killed in the Wali Kot district in Afghanistan.  A farm boy from Indiana - I doubt it!!

I wonder how prepared this Lake Central High School graduate was for the work he was doing?  Was he trained well enough, was he mentally prepared to do the work?  I am NOT AT ALL knocking the National Guard, but I wonder if he got enough of the right kind of training.  He did go to Army boot camp and then 12b training, which is Army code for a Combat Engineer.  He also received some follow-up training, a course called Route/Reconnaissance Clearance Operations.  When I looked that up I found that their expertise is in areas such as mobility, counter mobility, survivability and general engineering.  The Army’s site showed it like a civilian might see a job description.  Here is a link to it.  http://www.goarmy.com/careers-and-jobs/browse-career-and-job-categories/construction-engineering/combat-engineer.html

I read where the Governor of Indiana said, "Every such loss is a heartbreak."  He went on to say "We are hit with special severity here because of the casualties this heroic unit has already endured.  No Guard unit in my memory has been assigned to a more dangerous mission than the 713th, and here again we see the incredible risks these citizen-Soldiers volunteer to run for the rest of us."  Maj. Gen. R. Martin Umbarger in a release said, "My heart is heavy today as I consider the soldiers of the 713th Engineer Company who, for the second time in their combat tour, have experienced the multiple loss of their team mates.  I am so fiercely proud of the service and sacrifice of these Fallen Heroes and so very grateful for their families who loved and supported them."

I still wonder what it is we are trying to accomplish in that far away land.  I know some have a very clear definition of that and strongly believe we are doing the right thing by being there, slowly and agonizingly having our Military folks killed off.  I know people who have been there and I know folks who are still there and I get both sides - some of them are for it and understand what we are doing and others just don’t get it. I have asked hundreds of time in lots of places without ever getting an answer that makes sense – what was the goal going into Afghanistan and what is the goal in Afghanistan now?  I do think it has morphed since we started, in an attempt by our Government to save face - I believe.  Nothing I can say will change any of it but I will continue to say what I think and how I feel.  Do you not wonder -  did Sergio understand and believe in our mission and goals there?  Did he join the Guard just to get out of small town Indiana?  Did he go in to take advantage of the GI bill?  What was his motivation?  I will raise up some prayers to whichever God you worshipped.  Sergio, Thank you for making the sacrifice for me!      

Oh and by the way, Orville Redenbacher grew up in the same small town in Indiana that Javier did.

A Titty Tax????

So it is a tax, some are acting as if the Government taxing our asses to death is something new – IT IS NOT, and when you die, you broke ass will pay some more taxes!  That is how the Government works folks, they collect revenue from the citizenry and then spend it on things they think are important.  This is not a new concept, seems I remember something about a tea party (not the recent one) having some issues about taxation without representation.  Since all (every F’ing one of them) of our elected officials are not representing us anymore it makes any tax unrepresented – in my opinion.   The fact we have a new one should not surprise anyone.

Most probably don’t even realize that every state in the union except Alaska pays a gas tax that ranges from about 18 cents to over 50 cents PER GALLON, PER GALLON!!  For those will mobile phones, you are paying a 911 tax, for those in Kansas, you are taxed on your Bingo winnings and if you live in Illinois, you pay a higher tax for candy than other food products.  In Tennessee they have the “Crack Tax” which is a tax on illegal drugs.  Yep, under a law passed by the Tennessee General Assembly, in January, 2005, drug dealers are required to pay anonymously at the state revenue office, where they receive a stamp to prove their payment.  This tax applies to illegal substances, including cocaine, marijuana and moonshine.  In Arkansas there is an extra tax when you get a tattoo, California, extra tax if you buy fruit from a vending machine.  Maine produces about 99% of the countries wild blueberries and guess what – those who grow, purchase, sell, handle, or processes blueberries are hit with additional taxes.  Hell a person can’t even eat a bagel in New York without paying an additional tax.  And in Utah there is the Sex Tax, freaking Mormons have decided that if you run an establishment where naked woman work, there is a 10% tax on all things paid for in that establishment – I wonder if those uptight Mormons call that the Titty tax?

We like to sit around and pontificate on the other political parties inability to get anything done.  Well, let me tell ya, both parties are incompetent and worthless.  Each election cycle the party not in power talks about all the things they are going to do and change.  And we lap it up as if we are dunderheaded and don’t remember a damn thing from high school civics class.  It is like we have forgotten that the President is not the one who gets to make the rules, it is the 535 dipshits down the street that pass bills into law.  It is them who pass the budget onto to the president to sign, it is them who exempt themselves from the laws they impose upon the rest of us and it is them who have the real power in Washington.  He (or she) who holds the checkbook and the rule book win, it is just that simple!!

There has been a lot of talk about the national debt lately, well I pulled some numbers and under Jimmy Carter our debt increased a little over 211 billion, about 10.6% annually.  Under Reagan it was a 23.6% annual increase and 1.6 trillion added to the tally.  Under Bush #1 1.2 trillion or about 13.9% annually and Clinton was at 4.4% annually or 1.1 trillion.  Bush #2 blew it up at 4.7 trillion added, an increase of 11.1% annually and under the current president it jumped another 2.8 Trillion or 13.8% annually.  Now as a percent of GDP (gross domestic product) through all of these presidents  it has ranged from 2.7% under President Bush#2 and President Obama  to 4.8% under President Bush #1.  So what does that mean, damn if I know and ya know what - I wish more people would admit they don’t know because ya know what – they freaking don’t! 

Looking strictly at the numbers, Jimmy Carter was a God, but for those who lived through those times, you know he was not.   Looking back on the Clinton years, which had the smallest debt growth by percent, I seem to think that his approach was not so bad.  Ya know the expression, there are two things for sure  - death and taxes.  I wish some would un-wad their panties and just move on.  The only way it will change is if ALL the incumbents are voted out, all of them from all the parties.  With new elected officials we may be able to remove some of the insanity they have created – level the rule book for citizen and elected official alike.  We have to change them out, like diapers, and then they have to change the rules back – not likely to happen folks although I remain optimistic that someday that will happen.  Until then, the Washington power brokers will have control of what happens in and to our country – and it does not make a damn bit of difference which dipshit happens to be sitting in his (or her) little oval office located on some prime real-estate.  It is true damn it!!   

The Hatfield's and McCoys - what does it mean in 2012, really!!

So we had noticed that the History Channel put together a three-part, six-hour mini-series about the Hatfields and McCoys.  Funny story, I knew one of the “real” McCoy’s from Kentucky, we served together on my last command – The USS Gettysburg.  Seemed funny that Randall McCoy and Anderson Hatfield’s relationship took the biggest turn during the Civil war, and the USS Gettysburg is named for arguably the most famous of battles during that war.  That was the point that the South went into decline - until their eventual loss.  I feel I have to state a blanket apology for some of my Southern friends who think the south should have won, and in some cases believe they did??

Anyway, I did not, and still do not, know much about what was really driving the feud.  Seems to me it is not very important really.  Seems to me what was driving it was hate, bitterness wrapped around some perverted view of religion and folks’ belief in God.  I have not spent much time looking up how accurate the program was to actual history but I suspect it most likely about 50-50.  Just because it’s touted as  “based on a true story” does not at all mean there are any facts in the program, not sure if that needed clarified or not but there it is.  The hardest part about researching this famous feud revolved around the fact that it was so sensationalistic for the journalists of the time.  Of course, there was no National Inquirer around then but the national media of the day descended upon the little sleepy hollows around the tug fork of the Big Sandy River like ants.  Much like journalist’s today, they wrote whatever they could get, from whomever might be willing to talk to them – facts be damned. 

That fact will keep most of the true reasons for the argument covered in an obscurity that we will not be able to penetrate and will only grow the more the feud is examined in later times.  It’s been 100 years or so now, I wonder what it will be viewed as in another 100 years.  Even his name, Devil Anse, might have been coined by the press.  The series starts with a civil war battle at someplace called Devil something, although they never said, it was implied that maybe he was named after that place.  The folks in the movie were portrayed much like the 1889 book “An American Vendetta” by Mary Murfree – backwoods, murdering barbarians who did nothing but fight with each other.  Truth is, only around 20 folks were killed in the 30+ years there was feuding going on.  Another truth is that old “Devil Anse” was not only a successful businessman in the timber harvesting industry, he also taught school and his children and grandchildren were businessmen, school teachers, farmers, lawyers and doctors - hardly the hillbilly’s portrayed in the show or in the recollections of the day. 

I also learned, I think, that the fued was not over a pig, as the show described, or a fiddle as some have said or even the underhanded attempt to steal timber rights from Anderson Hatfield.  Seems it might have gone as far back as the civil war.  It appears Randall McCoy blamed Anderson Hatfield for the murder of his friend after Anderson deserted.  I suspect this incident laid the groundwork for animosity between the two but the real deal got going when a greedy lawyer cashed in on Randall McCoy's animosity towards "Devil Anse".  Seems lawyers haven’t changed much.   Even the famous 1897 picture of the Hatfield family was staged, some say.  Looks like they were asked to go back inside and bring out some guns.  That would explain why most of the firearms in the portrait tended to be 20 years out of date.  I suspect they were family heirlooms that hung above the fireplace. 

I found it interesting after Bride and I completed watching it that we both kind of felt wow, they did not realize the impact the feud had on them or their families during the time it was going on.  Maybe what this was really, when you strip away the drama and glamour of the story is this – mean spirited hatred based on religious beliefs coupled with ignorance (or blind faith) with regards to the impact on themselves and those around them.  Even in the show there was a point, after Randall’s wife was sent away and he fell into a bottle and after so many had lost their lives, where Devil Anse asked, (paraphrased) who will stop this, Randall can’t, it has to be me.  That was the point that I think he realized, what the hell are we doing here??  I don’t suspect Randall ever “got it” even though in the show at the very end it showed him burning a box that was filled with what looked like newspaper clippings and other written items related to the feud.  I suspect the producer wanted to wrap the story up with a nice clean ending.   Anse went on to be baptized in 1911 and lived out the rest of his life (1921) peacefully in the hills along the Kentucky border where he had spent his whole life. 

So, as you think about this story it REALLY could be used to show the insanity of war and fighting with someone over something that grew into something it was not - with the aid and complicity of the news media.  Our lives are bombarded with stories and opinions about this thing or that situation and it seems to do nothing but stir the pot and keep the world at a low boil.   Like back in the McCoy – Hatfield days, we too are anxiously awaiting the next bit of sensationalistic bullshit to come from someone who has a vested interest in keeping the drama high.  Like the good lawyer Perry Cline on the McCoy side, he had a vested interest in the timber rights.  He alone, or at least with the media of the day, drove this feud to what it turned into (my opinion). 

It makes me look around at all the hatred and bitterness in our world (from Presidential politics to outright war in Afghanistan) and wonder – what is keeping the divisiveness alive?  Who is driving to keep it in our faces, and better yet,  why?   And why is the media, in general, complicit in that in your face, dramatic, selective, GREATLY biased and very carefully orchestrated (pick a channel for your particular views) message delivery.  Sometimes what they are saying is complete BULLSHIT and it only takes a few minutes to prove it.  So why do they knowingly disseminate this propaganda.  Like the four minute negative campaign ad against President Obama created by and aired by Fox News - how could they at the same time claim to be unbiased?? It seems crazy but no one is finding the answer to the most important question – why?  Those are the questions we should ask ourselves, just like Randall McCoy and Anderson Hatfield should have asked back in their day!  We should be looking at ourselves (individually and as a Nation) and asking those hard questions, taking the long look.  What is the impact of hatred and bitterness on ourselves, on those around us, on the world and on those we harbor those feelings toward?    

I will say this for the History Channel, when they want to do a topic, they are all in.  For example, leading up to the miniseries, Mike and Frank from American Pickers are in the area and are able to pick some items that belonged to the Hatfield’s.  The Pawn Star guys had some items from the feud in their shop and American Restoration restored some items from the period.  VERY nicely done History Channel in a cross program promotion of the miniseries!!   

My annual pilgrimage to the morally bankrupt, God Awful, ethically lacking shithole in the desert

Two conferences I must attend for work are backed into each other every April about this time.  The first is the PBS technology conference, it is four days long and I thoroughly enjoy it.  Then there is the NAB, National Association of Broadcasters show, which is another 4 days long and I thoroughly enjoy that one as well.  My issue is not with the conferences, it is with the length of the stay in Vegas.  4 days for one, two weekend days and then 4 day for the other one.  That coupled with the time changes (3 hours) each way and if you know me at all you know it do not like when the time changes, not even for daylight savings time.  That many days between time changes allows one’s body to almost get acclimated to the new time, almost.  So I get all screwed up on the trip out and then again on the trip back.  ARGH!!

So the conferences, the PBS TechCon as it is known is very good.  We had over 450 attendees this year from well over 125 PBS stations.  It is a chance to interact with our peers from around the country and listen to what they are doing that is working and what is not.  It also gives us access to the folks at PBS to either complain or praise, which I have done both before in the same year.  There are technology vendors who show up to hock their wares, and pay for the meals, if you have to attend conferences you know what I mean.  I have been coming out here for quite a while now, and I have been on panels and presented to the group as well.  I like hanging out with a bunch of engineers, we all understand – everything.  They are my kind, from the geek with a plastic pocket protector (yes there was a guy there this year with one) to the true leaders of our industry.  I seem to gather more information each year, not sure if I have learned how to gather it or what but each year gets better for me. 

Except that we are in Vegas baby!!  This place is SO loud and SO in your face the only way to get a reprieve is to rent a car and drive out into the desert, which I have done in the past.  I am not a gambler, I am not looking for a hooker and I do not drink, this town has little to offer me.  Once you have dropped a hundred bucks or more to watch a good show a few times, even those hold little interest for me.  This year Bride almost came with me, that would have been nice.  The only issue with that is that these things get started by 7am and usually end around 6-7pm and then there is always a vendor who wants to take you out to dinner.  I have eaten the most expensive meals of my life here, and not paid for a one of them.  One year a vendor took me to a place that is the MGM Grand and for the two of us the dinner bill was over 600 bucks.  Not sure if I were rich I would ever get used to spending that much money on dinner, don’t get me wrong it was NOT the Outback Steakhouse – it was VERY good eats.  I have also eaten a 4 dollar Nathan’s hotdog as well, that was when I had to pay myself.

So the second part of the conference is the NAB, some say it is the largest one held here, others disagree but it is one of the largest.  For those who have never been the Las Vegas Convention Center sits on 2820 acres, has parking to accommodate over 5000 cars in the parking lot AND has 1.3 million square feet of space under roof, these are NOT small buildings.  That is NOT the only convention center in Vegas either, that is just one of probably hundreds.  Just for the sense of scale, since I can’t understand 1.3 million square feet, that is enough to house 55 professional football fields or almost 100 Olympic sized swimming pools.  That place is completely full during the NAB, it is so bad you get a map, I plot my course for the days I will be staying to minimize covering the same ground, it will wear your ass out!! And if you aren’t friends with Dr. Scholl’s gellin inserts, you dogs are going to be BARKING!!  

It is a very valuable experience though, it is a chance to see all the new offerings the hardware and software makers are selling.  I like to sometimes wander around at some of the smaller booths and see what some of the true innovators are up to.  The big companies are innovators as well but are sometimes limited by the burden of the large company bureaucracy that makes true innovation challenging to get to market.  This year has been challenging for me as we are getting ready to start a large project and most the manufacturers and vendors know that so they are “on me” in a way that does not make me feel comfortable.  I have purposely not accepted any dinner invites from any of them who may become involved in our project, I can’t have any hint of impropriety in this process.  I actually was at the closing ceremonies for TechCon and one vendor who REALLY wants in on this project was telling me that losing a deal like ours could get a sales guy fired, no matter the reason it was lost.  I called him on that immediately, I told him that was a bullshit thing to say to me - he backed off fast with a story about not him but he has seen that happen.  That interaction was noted!

I was able to go out last night a good friend of mine, he brought his son, who is getting into the business and we went to Lowry’s Steak house with another PBS engineer we both know.  We talked and laughed about life, marriage, kids, work and folks we have lost over the years.  We did not talk about work at all and that was very refreshing, the pressure of this project rarely affords me to time to relax and laugh with some of the folks in the system I work with.  I was thankful for the opportunity to hang out with my buddies.

Back to this place, Vegas baby.  There is little here for me, although I did get to spend some time people watching, and there is NO better place than here for that, it is even better than the Walmart parking lot.  There is such a sense of falsehood here, everyone seems to be playing an angle, the kids from wherever looking to get laid and have some fun, the middle aged couple trying to enjoy a vacation, the elderly couple who keep coming looking for what Vegas used to be.  Even the folks who work here, you can tell most of them hate it, it is a service job from hell in a casino for sure.  I will say this, there are shitload of what Bride and I call “the beautiful people”.  The men in 5000 dollar suites with girls wearing dresses with less material than my socks with their big fake boobs hanging out, the per capita on those types of very high here - it is crazy!! 

I am staying in probably the nicest room I have ever stayed in this year.  The PBS conference was at Caesars Palace and that is where I got a room, very nice.  The MGM is a very nice place as well but this place is a notch above that in my opinion.  When our conference was at the MGM Grand I used to stay at a place called the San Remo, a little inexpensive place across from MGM.  I could cross the street at the light, cut through the parking garage and bam, there was the MGM convention center, easy.  Well one year I was booking the hotel and they had changed the name, evidently Hooters purchased the property and it was now the Hooters Hotel.  Well I thought, NO WAY!  First, I was not going to tell Bride I was going to Vegas and I was staying at the Hooters Hotel, that was not happening.  Next I thought of our Bean Counter, receipts from the Hooters Hotel would receive quite a bit of scrutiny by our female CFO, again NO WAY!

Well, I still have a few more days to go before I get to go home, I have all my meetings scheduled, all my meals planned and am just looking forward to the time passing so I can go home.  I miss Bride and sure do wish she could have come with me, next year for sure.

Tires, tires and more about tires!!

This is a story about tires, whodathunkit!  Who would have thought that I could write a blog about tires, what could I have to say about them.  Will it be a good story or a bad one?   The story starts with a car crash that happened in 1982, a 1974 Chevy Vega GT that rolled over a number of times with three passengers inside.  It ends with new $92 a piece tires installed and out the door on a 1997 minivan.  So you have been warned, read on if you must.

 So as most of you probably know, I have an old Jalopy (1958 Ranchero) and Bride has the Girl Jalopy (1963 Galaxie 500).  What you may not know is that we also have a 1997 Chrysler Town and Country minivan.  It has very faded red paint, 165,000 miles and if you were to go by the various lamps on the dash, possessed by some demon of epic proportions.  The wipers will, without warning or reason, occasionally come on, and will not go off with user interaction.  Only when “the van” decides to shut them down do they stop.  It could be day, it could be night, it could be raining or sunny, no meaning to the madness.  It has been doing that since we got it, over 9 years ago.   

So back to 1982……  my very first car was a 1974 Chevrolet Vega GT, it was orange and it was a hatchback.  I bought it for 50 bucks and for those who are old enough to remember the Vega you probably realize I paid too much for it at $50.  It needed tires badly, and I had just picked some up, they were in the back of the car.  Tim was sitting in the passenger seat and Don was in the back seat and we were speeding down Zimmerman road, towards Millerstown.  We has just passed Millerstown road, now called CR16 according to Bing Maps. 

We were bearing to the left as the road came around, I was going too fast and the tires were too smooth.  BOOM, the right front tire blows and I go sliding into the ditch on the north side of the road.  We were sliding along sideways when I saw the culvert, a concrete mass hiding in the weeds.  Before I had time to wonder what that meant we hit it broadside and it shot the car up into a roll that ended with us upside down with hot transmission fluid leaking onto me through the floor shifter.  That car was completely destroyed, completely!  The only thing that was left undamaged was the steering wheel, which I sold to someone who put it on a 55 chevy (I think it was a 55).        

So at that point in my life I had a VERY GOOD understanding of the importance of good tires.  The three of us came out with nothing more than scratches so we were very lucky!!  So after that , I have always kept good tires that are properly rotated and maintained at the correct pressure on my cars or trucks and have NEVER had another issue like the one that should have haunted me from my childhood.  Even when I could not really afford them, I got good tires.  The one time I bought retreads, I regretted it.  I was being transferred to Maine and I bought an old Oldsmobile to take up there to save my brand new truck from the snow and salt.  I put retreads on it to save a buck, I was not 100 miles out of Norfolk and two of them had gone out.  I stopped at a Goodyear shop and had a 500 dollar set of tires put on, that was more than I had paid for the car.  I had no problems with the tires on the car for the 12 months I owned it.    

So if we fast forward to the days of Jalopy, which has Cooper Cobra tire on it we can start the story about the van.  I had rebuilt the suspension and steering on Jalopy before I put new tire on.  A few years later we got the Girl Jalopy, which needs the suspension replaced in it as well.  It is not as bad as mine but I am planning that work.  So we were left with the question, what do we do with the Van, sell it, junk it or keep it.  Do two people need three cars??  We decided to keep it, because we owned it and the insurance was only $17 a month.  We decided that we would drive it until the wheels fall off.  That old van will hold (and has held) 4x8 sheets of plywood laying flat so it is a good utilitarian vehicle.  Well, last night on the way to the grocery store the passenger side rear tire literally exploded.  It scared the hell out of both of us.

The old van has needed tires for a while, I have never let a set of tires get so bad, plus there was some age on them so the dry rot was also concern.  We kept praying that it will die, so we could be done with it.  But since it is so cheap to operate and we are car payment adverse we were waiting for the wheels to fall off. 

So I am about 2 blocks from the house when this happens and decide to limp it on home and change the tire once I get there.  In those two blocks of me crawling along at about 2 miles an hour with the hazard lights on - two people driving by stop and ask if I needed help.  Both of them were women, which was a little poke to my ego.  I can and have taken cars completely apart and put them back together again, good as new.  I have even shared pictures in Facebook and the blog of that skill set on Jalopy.  What was it about me that said to these women, that poor boy needs some help.  Don’t get me wrong, it renewed my faith in humanity and folks simply helping other folks when the need assistance but……  it was a flat tire, I have a professional floor jack, impact ratchets and all the tools that a pit crew might use to change a tire.  I am just saying it hurt my pride a bit and made me wish I would have just changed the tire alongside the road.      

So today Bride called around looking for the most economical set of tires we could find.  The prices varied quite a bit.  Anywhere from almost 600 bucks all the way down to 368 dollars.  Because we do not drive this car out of town or on the interstate I decided we did not need expensive tires.   We decided on the $368 offer from Tire Kingdom.  When I dropped the van off, I asked Kaleb, a very young service manager, if they were all four round and black.  He laughed and said, yes they are.  It made me laugh that I had lowered my requirements for tires to “are they round and black” but I knew I did not need much more than that. 

He asked if we wanted to have the free front end alignment check, even though I did not really care it was free so why not I thought.  Go ahead and check it I said.  Not that it would matter, I suspect the van will not make it to the time that these 40,000 mile tires wear out.  Since we drive it only around town and the fact that it did not seem to be wearing out the other tires I am going to take my chances.  He finished up by saying it will ready in 45 minutes, to which I said thank you.  An hour and half later we still had not received a call, so we called back and we were told that they were putting it on the rack for the alignment check.  I thought, of course it needed “aligned”, that is why places offer the check for free – in hopes of getting the work.  I was pleasantly surprised when he told me the alignment was dead on.  I laughed about my misconceptions as we drove off, with probably the least expensive set of tires I have purchased.