Well, between January and March of 2020, the pandemic caused most things at Fort Gordon to go on standby. It was difficult to maintain fitness will all the gyms closed, me being off mission for weeks at a time, and a curfew that kept me from taking my habitual late-night walks. And with all the boredom and free time, my drinking increased. I invented a drink which I called the quarantini and another called the Typhoid Mary. There was nothing special about them; I just like puns.
I had to switch to the day shift for a while and overslept several times. Not sure why it’s so hard for the Army to keep people on consistent sleep cycle, especially when they’re not deployed in a combat zone. I was able to switch to the night shift again for a while later, but it did not last long. In August, after realizing my alcohol consumption was out of control, I did my best to quit and was booze free for about 20 days. About the same time, I was doing paperwork so two of my subordinates could go to BLC. My platoon sergeant yelled at me for not doing the equipment layout with them, to which I replied I didn’t see the point of making sure they packed the stuff they don’t need for the class that shouldn’t exist which they’re not actually going to because of Covid. He did not take that well and wrote me a negative counseling.
Near the end of that month, I got in an argument with my platoon sergeant over, you guessed it, a counseling. After spending several hours been shown examples of counselings from other sergeants, I got annoyed and asked him ‘how many words do you want me to put on this form?’ He got angry, yelled 5,000, and when I pressed him, he threatened to convene a board to demote me. So I went home and wrote a 5,000-word rant over the next four hours. I called it the Bible of Harty and it was mostly a list of gripes of all the dumb things the Army bureaucracy had inflicted on me despite my best efforts to be a good soldier in a job few are smart or motivated enough to do.
There were some tense moments at meetings, but my First Sergeant, who has a heart of gold, smoothed things out. A few days later, I was awakened in the middle of the night with an urgent request to print some rosters for a training event. It seemed odd. Our headquarters has printers and there would have been plenty of time to print them in the morning. I suspected it was some kind of under the radar punishment but shrugged it off. A few days later, it was Friday at I was preparing to enjoy some Oktoberfest beer to celebrate my self-control in the prior month. Oktoberfest beers are among my favorite, though generally speaking, if it’s wet, I’ll drink it.
Alas cruel fate, I was informed that if I didn’t do a bunch of online classes that night, I’d have to come in to headquarters at 4 AM the next day to finish them. I did my best to finish the classes, but only got a few done. All the while, I drank 13 beers while steadily growing angrier. I had done these same classes three times already in previous years and would have done them on time this year had my usual workstation been open instead of partially closed because of the pandemic. Well, 4 AM rolled around and I got a call asking why I had not come yet. I responded that I needed to finish my last beer. I then took the last four beer I had in a cardboard carrier and took to my car.
I figured I was a little drunk but under the legal limit given that more than 12 hours had passed since I started drinking. I drove 25 MPH on a straight, flat road for about 2 miles at 4 AM on an Army base on a Saturday. I was the only car on that stretch of road. Well, I showed up, plopped down the beer carrier and said something like ‘OK, I’m here. Let’s have a cert party!’ Another sergeant gave me a breathalyzer and I blew 0.18, three times the legal limit in Georgia. The sergeant was flabbergasted and couldn’t understand why a guy like me would do something so dumb. Why indeed.
My company commander and First Sergeant came in and I went to their office. I told them that if I’m being punished anyway, I might as well deserve it. They replied that there had been some DUIs in the battalion recently and demand was growing for a crackdown. My commander took the beer, had me fill out a statement where I confessed to my misdeed, took the beer I brought, and had another soldier drive me home. A few days later, it was decided that since I had been a good soldier otherwise, there would be no punishment, but that I would have to stop drinking and enroll in a treatment program. It was nice to get a lenient punishment, though I was taken off mission and sent to shuffle paper.
At the same time, I was desperate to lose weight again, so I bought an exercise bike and rode it 1,200 miles over the next 3 months. I lost about 20 pounds, and my personal best was riding over 100 miles in a single day. Alas, in late October and more than 50 days of sobriety under my belt, I was hit with another crisis, my new squad leader.
I had a bad feeling from the beginning. In our first phone called, he insisted on reading every single word of a long-winded counseling to me. Later, when I woke up late again, he said if it happened again, he’d write me a negative counseling. He also said that once when he was at Fort Meade, he went to the home of a soldier who failed to call in only to find him dead on the floor apparently by suicide.
Good evening, professor.
The same to you, good sir.
This will do as theme music for tonight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foG8zLMWJ_Y
A fine theme. You know, I was going to call GlibFlick “Crapsterpiece Theatre” at first?
[opera applause]
all the dumb things the Army bureaucracy had inflicted on me
Catch-22 is my favorite book, but not because of it’s plot or characters, or setting. Rather, it predicts a backwardness that will overtake America as everything aglomerates into blobs, notion incorporate.
The military is like the government, school boards, HOA, churches, political parties: there is just something about how these wholes manage to be stupider that the sum of their parts. Heller knew it was all going to shit, one reg and one mission at a time.
I was hit with another crisis, my new squad leader.
Scheisskopf is the training commander for Yossarian and Clevinger, and he takes a particular dislike to Clevinger. Even though Clevinger is just as serious for parades as Scheisskopf, and his ideas help the squadron win multiple parades, Scheisskopf still considers him a wise guy, and someone that needs to be brought down a peg or two. Eventually Clevinger is tried for stumbling while marching at an Action Board, and he has the “book thrown at him.” The bloated Colonel chairs the Board where also present are Major Metcalf, Scheisskopf (as a judge, prosecutor, and as the officer defending Clevinger) and note taker…………….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scheisskopf
Last I heard, my nemesis, a SSG with 14 years of time in service, was relieved of leadership duties (which peaked at 6 subordinates, 3 of whom were also NCOs) and made voting assistance officer, which is just about the most do-nothing job in the Army. For comparison, another NCO in my company with only 3 years of time in service was in charge of a squad of 12.
So I suspect that the leadership of my company and battalion were well aware of the guy’s serious flaws, but gave him a token squad anyway to pacify him. He was a Pashto linguist, and it must have irked him that the two Pashto linguists in our company with 10 years time in service both outranked (SFC vs SSG) him.
A SSG with 14 years is getting close to mandatory separation, no?
“That Sceisskopf is a real shithead.”
A Despair.com poster, from memory
title: TEAMWORK
pic: several hands reaching toward each other
caption: None of us is as dumb as all of us.
Working on entertainment projects at home drinking on the job is a-ok and encouraged by my boss, me. At my day job if alcohol is even seen in my vehicle it’s a suspension.
I made a dumb decision out of frustration and anger, and it snowballed, as we shall see in coming installments. At the time, I had fresh memories of being fired from the plastic bag factory by an overbearing boss. I decided that if I was going down, I wanted it to end with a bang rather than a whimper.
What followed was a hell of a bang, and it kept going.
Some people have a spirit animal. I have a spirit plant.
This Crazy Tree Grows 40 Kinds of Fruit | National Geographic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik3l4U_17bI
***
Sam Van Aken, an artist and professor at Syracuse University, uses “chip grafting” to create trees that each bear 40 different varieties of stone fruits, or fruits with pits. The grafting process involves slicing a bit of a branch with a bud from a tree of one of the varieties and inserting it into a slit in a branch on the “working tree,” then wrapping the wound with tape until it heals and the bud starts to grow into a new branch. Over several years he adds slices of branches from other varieties to the working tree. In the spring the “Tree of 40 Fruit” has blossoms in many hues of pink and purple, and in the summer it begins to bear the fruits in sequence
***
My oldest sister planted a ‘Fruit Salad’ tree at my house, it was supposed to grow like 4 types of fruit. It did not acclimate well, out of it’s zone I think.
Can I ask advice from…any Glib?
I inquired about German language qualifications at one of my two employers. They sent me a link to the test! I estimate I’m about at the beginning B1 level in German. The test is reading only, multiple choice. I can currently read and mostly understand short stories in German at an A2 level. I have a month to take the test. Since I don’t need to write, listen, or speak, and I know the basic grammar well, what do yinz think of my cramming vocabulary for a month and taking a shot at the thing? It’s “German Reading Test ILR 2+/3+ ALTA 8 /10”. Could I figure it out well enough to pass? DANKE
If you are unsure the most likely answer on a multiple choice test is “C”
Statistically, it is rarely “A.”
I filled out a multiple choice chemistry test in high school using the Genesis Method, I got a B-. At least 2 grades higher than I would have done had I tried.
For those like me who had trouble untangling this reference, there was a band called Genesis with an album called Abacab. I presume the method involves filling out a multiple-choice test using a, b, a, c, a, b over and over.
We now return to our regularly scheduled program.
It also helps to do the synthesizer part under your breath – “bump baaa bah bump baa bump bah bah bump baa bah bump bah bump bump- bump bump bump bump bump bump bump”- air guitar “Look up on the Wall”
You should give the album a listen, it’s not great but it’s not too shabby.
It’s better than Duran Duran at least.
C or the longest answer. It took me a decade to finish college, but at least I learned that much.
Don’t those making the test know that too and correct?
Teachers and professors are those not smart enough to make it in their field, they just follow the herd. And the herd makes c or the longest answer the correct answer. It’s #science
Here you go: https://langmedia.fivecolleges.edu/lbc-topics/40/97
Listen to the audio while reading the transcript in German. Then re-listen while reading the transcript in English. Then read the transcript out loud in German.
Trust me, it works.
Thanks bruh
“Mein Bleistift ist rot.”
Listen to Derpy.
My German has rotted, but I’d say go for it. Especially since it is reading only.
There’s a lot of cognates between German and English, so you’ll probably understand more than you think.
+1 Der Tiger ist wild.
“And for God’s sake, don’t forget to kill Hitler!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cW73KL1xres
Never kill Hitler
With anything like this, first, ask yourself “what do I have to gain?” and then, ask yourself “what do I have to lose?” If the first is greater than the second, take the damn test.
I am a maroon, I’ve had a ice cube mold for making clear large cubes to make my drinks look cool for at least two years, and since there’s no lip I always manage to spill a little water (or a lot depending on my sobriety) moving it from the sink to the freezer. Took me until five minutes ago to realize that I could leave it a little low and top it off with a cup of water after it’s in the freezer.
Or buy a watering can.
I read an interesting piece about making totally clear ice. Apparently you should rip the top off an ice chest, fill it and put it in the freezer to slow freeze. Once you have the brick, saw off all the white ice and you are left with clear squares. Seems like a lot of work.
Yeah, I did that a few times, cutting the ice block into cubes is a pain in the ass , easier to just buy on of these.
Interesting. I added that to my list. I tried a similar product and it made foggy, crackly ice.
The ice from mine is pretty clear, the crackling happens if you go to fast from freezer to adding booze, let the ice sit out for a minute and it won’t crack if that kind of thing is important to you, me I just want my Old Fashioned and I want it now, cracked Ice be damned.
Same. I just get cubes from the automatic ice dispenser, like a sleazebag.
Automatic Ice dispenser? Get a load of Rockefeller over here, probably has one of them fancy sinks with the built in blender.
Strangely, yes. I do.
Leave it a little low, and know that water will expand on freezing.
Science, Bitches!
I was waiting for someone to say this.
Perhaps if The Hyperbole had paid attention in his high school chemistry class, he would have learned that.
Pull my finger. I’ll teach you a lesson in thermal gaseous expansion AND Brownian motion!
One would think that, but because these things are designed to force the water to freeze from the top down ( leaving the impurities in the unfrozen part and giving one clear ice) it doesn’t work that way, if I fill it to the top when I remove it the after the ‘right’ amount of time in the freezer (when the upper cubes are solid and the lower part is still unfrozen) the cubes are about an eighth on on inch lower than the top of the mold. Somehow (I am not a physicist) this set up causes the water to be ‘pushed’ down. If I leave the mold to long in the freezer the bottom part of he mold does bulge as the expanding water to ice happens there. It’s why you need to time the freeze properly to make getting the cubes out of the mold easier.
Firsts don’t freeze.
Do they suck balls? I think I heard that they suck balls.
In the time of Firstment you will be Firsted harshly.
Have you tried putting the water through a filter first? Or using distilled water? Ice is a crystal, and the purer the water, the clearer the ice will be.
In my first engineering job, my company made large crystals of artificial sapphire (aluminum oxide). Bubbles and cracks in the initial crystal meant fewer wafers and the end and less profit.
It might also help to freeze the water more gradually. I don’t know if variable temperature freezers are available. It could also help to freeze, melt, then refreeze. In the process of making specialty hardened steel, this is called annealing.
There are tons of articles on this, e.g.
https://www.foodnetwork.com/how-to/packages/food-network-essentials/how-to-make-clear-ice
His directional-freezing mold looks to give the best results.
I never cared one way or the other. My instinct would be to boil the water first, driving out all of the dissolved gases before freezing. Pour it in the mold hot.
Hey Q. Find some of these
That is a strange set of videos.
Barbie gets headshots
try it again
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/POwncb1HzPQ
A Star Trek TNG episode that spoke to Vietnam veterans:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43Y_N33NzNA
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Roga_Danar
I knew what it was without clicking the link. *buffs Enterprise model*
Today, it ZWAK news, lathe is finished, and enough stuff is put away in the shop as to be safe to use it. So, first project was to drill out the barrel weight for a Daisy 599 competition air gun to be mounted on my Webley Tracker (variant) so as to allow the use of competition sights, and not rely on a scope. Worked a charm, only thing is that I need to go through and sharpen all my MT drill bits. Too much moving around over the years has taken its toll.
Which lathe?
The proper grammar is who lathe.
Whom.
South Bend 9c from ’47.
My client, who has been making a TV show since 1997, still can’t grasp that a video that plays poorly over a slow internet connection does not mean there is something wrong with video file, there is a problem with the connection. Ok Boomer.
If she hadn’t had covid, then a stroke, then her husband die I’d just walk away; but no I have to be the heartless libertarian and keep working with her so she doesn’t have a breakdown.
Oh, my. Is she the doyenne of local TV with her own daytime talk show (if not on a broadcast channel then on public access a la Wayne’s World?)
Talk amongst yourselves
I’m old enough to remember when SNL was funny.
Who would have thought all these years later, Roseanne Barr would be far better looking than Madonna?
I’m not at liberty to say.
You’re a mensch CPRM.
Seems like the army isn’t the place for someone who chafes under arbitrary authority.
Get up and get yourself a fastnacht!
🌄🍩👍
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7zEm-U1hC7E
🎶🎶
Counterpoint
Valid rebuttal.
We have some snow action. Maybe I’ll get to use the snow ❄ button today.
Snow’s going further south than originally expected. I’ll take that. 🙂
Snow’s going to miss me entirely.
Good morning, Sean & Ted’S.!
We were supposed to get some of that snow last night, I think. As far as I can tell, not a trace.
Morning.
Good morning! How are you today?
I completely messed up my sleep schedule, and have been up since yesterday.
Oh, dear. And it’s only Tuesday.
I have a feeling it’s going to be a long week for you, but at least there’s a three-day weekend at the end of it.
Fetterlump gets a favorable article at Zerohedge penned by the Epoch Times:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/john-fetterman-not-progressive-politician-everyone-thought-he-was
It’s a crazy world.
Huh. Wonder who was on the other side of the machine.
Or maybe the drugs just wore off.
Mornin’, reprobates!
Plenty of snow here. #1 son is shoveling the driveway. I love that boy.
suh’ fam
whats goody