Burnt popcorn is a horrible odor. And wasted popcorn!
oh yeah, and I've never heard of The Slip or Victorious.
Burnt popcorn is a horrible odor. And wasted popcorn!
oh yeah, and I've never heard of The Slip or Victorious.
Was in a club yesterday, not really my kind of club, but a friend had stag party. At the end one of the security guys came to my brother and asked him to go out. I followed them, we wanted to check our stuff back out and the security guy was still arguing when he came really close to my brother. I told him to keep distance then he pushed my out of nothing so hard that I fell over backwards. He then pushed my brother too and we went out. I would sue the damn bastard but I don't have prove or witnesses.
"Wer Visionen hat, sollte zum Arzt gehen." - Helmut Schmidt
My Creative X-Fi Gamer soundcard seems to be dieing. Lasted a good point longer than I expected considering its a Creative product, but now I have to find a new one. TO make matters worse Creative seems to have redesigned how they make their cards, so I have no idea what I need to be looking for.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
Anyone heard of any serious internet problems? I lost my connection to Guildwars and I also can't get facebook to come up, twitter was failing for a while, even those but.ly URLS weren't working. Once I got twitter to load I saw some people complaining abotu the same thing.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
Nope.Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer
But I did have a creepy dream just the other night, where everyone was coming out of their houses and apartments, because on-line life had hit a glitch. Smart phones weren't working. GPS in cars stopped working. Folks in grocery stores and banks were confused when the computers stalled and no credit or debit card worked. People at gas pumps were going inside to complain to the cashier that gas was only moving one cent per minute, like molasses.
But nobody had a clue what was going on. Everyone just stood around looking perplexed. Very patiently but almost like zombies. The gas station cashier dude had tattoos covering his forearms, and I was [supposed] to figure out their message. But I couldn't. Then there were some guys outside riding bikes in the dark street, without any lights or reflective vests. I almost ran into one biker with my car, until I saw his ass crack (lol, mooning light?) It got even weirder after that, culminating with morning birds chirping (tweeting) and more zombie-esque people walking around....
So my neighbour who is a so-so cook, got a new cookbook. And said he was going to make something from it today! So that sounded good to me. Except first of all, he did not check the preparation time. If you only half a bit more than half an hour, taking something that requires more than half an hour in preparation and then 45 minutes in the oven is not a good idea. So me and the other guy eating there are already getting a bit moody, but hey, it's finally finished, and looks damn tasty. Except he did not realise apparently that chicken with sauce and some vegetables on itself is not a meal, and didn't think about adding anything like potatoes, pasta, or rice.
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
Who uses Creative these days anyway?Asus Xonar DX is a great card. I got an Asus Xonar Essence STX for the best headphones and 2.0 speakers experience, and am mighty satisfied. Reviews agree wholeheartedly with me. The alternative is Auzentech, but imo Asus is the way to go.
Tomorrow is like an empty canvas that extends endlessly, what should I sketch on it?
While doing some literature research, the university website went offline, including the library website and all redirects to restricted journal websites etc.
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
Let me know if you need someone else with a university account to find you something.
Hope is the denial of reality
ThanksBut we managed with other sources and by now it's back online.
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
Hope is the denial of reality
Deadliest day for the US special ops community since WWII, by the way.
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
-- Thomas Jefferson: American Founding Father, clairvoyant and seditious traitor.
Any idea what kind of special ops? I would imagine losing this many will have a significant affect on our capabilities in that province.
Edit: Navy Seals. Ouch.
Last edited by Loki; 08-06-2011 at 07:12 PM.
Hope is the denial of reality
For what it's worth, it's highly improbable that 31 SEALs died, as originally reported. SEALs almost always operate in 4 man teams, so it's probably 6 teams + 7 Afghan commandos = 31 KIA.
I miss the days when journalism involved investigating and/or fact checking.
Still, this has to say something about the wisdom of these daytime helo insertions of Navy personnel. The last time this happened, it was 4 SEAL teams KIA before the boots hit the ground. First of all, elite troops own the night, and secondly, why have airborne troops at all, if not for the exact purpose of insertions from the air?
Who do we have calling these plays anyway? A 13 year old FPS gamer? Such a senseless misappropriation of elite resources, and a waste of life to boot.
Last edited by CitizenCain; 08-06-2011 at 10:43 PM. Reason: tpyos; smartphone has no browser spellchecking, the bastardliness.
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
-- Thomas Jefferson: American Founding Father, clairvoyant and seditious traitor.
The way I understand it, they were searching for something after a long fire-fight (i.e. they came in toward the end). Also, this took place at either 11 PM or 1 AM.
Wiki says a Navy Seals platoon is 12-16 men. Unlikely that they'd all be on the same helicopter?
Edit: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/dozens-die-...120744697.html Double ouch.
Last edited by Loki; 08-06-2011 at 08:52 PM.
Hope is the denial of reality
Sure, a platoon being composed of 3-4 SEAL teams.
Platoons, in general (in Western militaries, at least) are composed of 2-4 "squads," with the squad being the most basic unit. How big your squad (or team) is depends on a lot of highly variable factors. Regular infantry squads are generally bigger, between 8 and 12 men, vehicle squads are smaller, consisting of 1 or 2 vehicles (depending), and your special ops squads are generally somewhere in the middle. Too few men, and it's hard to be combat-effective, too many, and you can't pull off the level of coordination and "fluidity" needed for commandos to fight efficiently. And of course, that's just on paper... once you hit the realities of combat, things get even more variable still. (Squads can/generally are also be broken into two fire teams, but that's below the level of official management that you'll see - it's up to each squad leader to determine how to best get the job done, and it so happens that with two teams, you can do the whole "fire and maneuver" thing. You could well get an awful squad leader who wants to split a combat squad into 6 teams, to ensure that there are too many moving parts to manage effectively, and any team will be immediately combat ineffective upon enemy contact... but I guess that's another tale of woe altogether.)
But, yeah, the platoon is basically the smallest size unit that the brass deals with, and in the US military, that means it's the smallest unit size an officer (Lt.) will get tasked with commanding... which incidentally, is the reason it's the smallest unit size the brass gets involved with, because smaller units (squads/teams) don't generally have officers.
No, not at all. You wouldn't want to cram that many onto a Blackhawk, but you could certainly do it on a Chinook. The primary concern would be whether or not they're tasked with a combat insertion/extraction, and if they are, you'd want to use a different chopper type (Chinooks aren't designed for, nor are they effective at rapid loading or unloading of troops), use more choppers (1 per 4 man-team, ideally) and divide your troop load up among them so that each chopper (and team) spends the minimum amount of time extracting from or inserting into the vehicle, while taking fire. Either get them out of harm's way as fast as possible, or get them on the ground, and ready to leverage their combat abilities as fast as possible.
But as it sounds like this was an after action extraction gone horribly wrong, there's no reason you wouldn't load up a whole spec ops platoon, plus whoever else you have room for, onto the same bird.
Well, that makes more sense. Guess I was giving journalists too much credit for reporting the time at the location of the firefight, rather than in some unrelated, arbitrary point on the globe, such as D.C.
And the fact that it's not just SEALs explains the number thing too.
*<sigh>* $100 RPG >> ~$35 million (+) in materiel and ~$31 million (+++) in personnel.
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
-- Thomas Jefferson: American Founding Father, clairvoyant and seditious traitor.
My condolences.
Was it pure coincidence that they targeted a helicopter with basically the US' best soldiers?
Tomorrow is like an empty canvas that extends endlessly, what should I sketch on it?
Everything I've read thus far points to a lucky hit.
Hope is the denial of reality
Yah, my best guess says that one of the insurgents probably escaped or snuck out while the teams were securing the area and grabbing the insurgent leader, hid nearby with an RPG and waited for a chance to shoot down a chopper. Wouldn't be the first time... and it's what I'd do in their place. Probably just shear dumb luck that the chopper he shot down was loaded up with special ops guys, instead of other more "standard" combat troops... although, the special ops guys do tend to leave first, while the marines and army combat specialties tend to stay around longer after the shooting stops, so that's gotta skew the odds in favor of downing a special ops transport helo somewhat.
It's frankly rather outrageous just how easy it is to shoot down a $35 million dollar vehicle (that could actually be loaded with billions of dollars of equipment and personnel), and how cheaply it can be done for. Especially when you consider that we've had very public examples of this exact same problem going back two decades now. Contrast with a politician getting grazed by a schizophrenic's bullet, and the sweeping, unconstitutional legislation that prompted almost immediately.For that matter, Airforce One has automated defense systems to handle incoming AA fire, plus an escort of fighter jets, and it never goes into combat zones (not to mention, I'd much rather see it get shot down than lose a bunch of operators). But yes, the safety of an incompetent, unpopular, utter despicable waste-of-skin politician on [above] friendly soil is far more important than the safety of our elite soldiers in hostile territory. <sigh> As they say, war is far too important to be left to the politicians... but it is anyway.
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
-- Thomas Jefferson: American Founding Father, clairvoyant and seditious traitor.
"War" has many other connotations, Cain. I've fought wars on varied personal fronts, and they almost always (but not ALWAYS) spelled defeat the moment I thought of them as wars.
Maybe it's the terminology used in wars and battles; some Thing should be won or lost, as if there's a clear and definitive winner or loser in these things. Honor, pride, land, principle, bravery. We do like to consider ourselves as winners, brave, proud, striving for something larger than ourselves. There really isn't any common theme, and nothing is very clear where humans are involved. We are also weak, naive, needy, emotional, and vulnerable. That's partly what makes us Human.
Earlier today, I learned that my ex-father-in-law was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. He cheerfully reported to his second son that his physical went really well, and he "passed all the tests". He's already at stage four, but doesn't really comprehend what that means. His eldest son (my ex husband) is getting married on 9-10-11, a date chosen over a year ago, so Paw Paw could easily remember. We've been following his slow decline for at least three years, but now it's official, and it has a name.
I'm not sure if my ex has fully embraced what this means, but our sons have. They want to know if he's flying alone to the wedding, or with another of his sons. (I don't know the plans made by his family, I'm out of the loop.) They want to stay in the hotel room with him, and "look after" their Paw Paw, help him bathe and dress, iron his pants, make sure he's had breakfast and such, and "escort" him to the wedding. They know he's their last remaining elder, so it's even more poignant.
The whole thing is a battle in my sons' hearts, but also my own. The last time I saw "Paw Paw" was over a year ago, when I picked him up (at his future daughter-in-law's house that will be the wedding site and their marital home) to take him to lunch where his grandson worked. The moment he saw me he began crying, then I started crying, and there we were....hugging and crying each other....at his eldest son's future wife's home. The weirder it got, the tighter we hugged. Then he whispered into my ear, "You'll always be my daughter".
It probably sounds selfish and stupid to say, but I hope his Alzheimer's doesn't make him forget that I'll always be his daughter, even after his son marries another woman.
Illinois state bureaucrats shut down organic ice cream maker... for making organic ice cream.
On the plus side, they note that it's not illegal to use fresh strawberries... just that it's impossible use fresh strawberries, if you want to do things legally.
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
-- Thomas Jefferson: American Founding Father, clairvoyant and seditious traitor.
Ugh, went to the store and got everything, except the first thing on my list..
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
You've been taking shopping lessons from me, haven't you?
We're stuck in a bloody snowglobe.
I've been stalking you and observing your shopping, yes
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
I knew it. Just remember, making a list is the best way to forget things. Never pre-plan.
The US has no place telling other nations how to govern, or how to become democracies that serves its people. We can't manage to meet our own ideals, which we then presume to "teach" to others. When our people call for justice or equality, and elect representatives to be our voice, it's dismissed as populism or even SSSocialism.
That's a two-fer messing with my groove.
Is facing burnout. Don't know how to get over this hump.
Somehow I don't understand I didn't see the connection earlier; earlier this month the Beyoglu municipality all of a sudden started enforcing bylaws against unofficial outside seating at cafe's and restaurants. I will admit that it had gotten out of hand a bit at some places, but in most locations the unofficial teraces had existed for more than a decade. And then all of a sudden it struck me. Beyoglu is extremely irreverent towards the month of Ramadan as a time for fasting. Overhere at midday you will still have to wait for a table at some popular places. Today İ realised that the ban put an end to eating outside (sittimg down at least) during the hours of fasting.
İ really hope this has been the last time AKP has won an election. İ care very little for their theocracy by creep.
Congratulations America
Stop worrying, if you can. Let nothing come between you and you sleep. See what you have to do not as a burden the size of a mountain but as individual tasks you have to tackle. Do not go on a vacation.
Congratulations America
Apparently a tent collapsed at the pukkelpop festival, at least one dead and a lot of wounded. Unclear what exactly happened, possibly a tree fell on it or something. Fuck, I've been there a lot and know a lot of people there, hope they are all okay
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
