tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post115126179140540497..comments2024-03-26T16:03:42.608-06:00Comments on Flares into Darkness: Khobar Towersambisinistralhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03836786826294202405noreply@blogger.comBlogger50125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151385830912775962006-06-26T23:23:00.000-06:002006-06-26T23:23:00.000-06:00My middle daughter is there now, on her graduation...My middle daughter is there now, on her graduation trip with a friend from Ukraine she met @ the UTexas Russian Dept. They've done Florence, Venice, Rome, and Barcelona, and are due in Paris any day now. Hope she's having fun, I'm boiling old shoes for supper.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151368664282182942006-06-26T18:37:00.000-06:002006-06-26T18:37:00.000-06:00buddy—I think a decade later, but then I'm thinkin...buddy—<BR/><BR/>I think a decade later, but then I'm thinking the people I know were talking about the Musée du Jeu de Paume and that some of the paintings were transferred from the Musée du Luxembourg to that museum sometime after Maugham's time. Funny, I never noticed the discrepancy. Everyone just referred to the Impressionist Museum. Time to see for myself. Anyway, the state collections post-1848 were brought together in the new Musée d'Orsay in 1986 and both of the other museums now house temporary exhibitions. <BR/><BR/>Best.lonerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13329414340481290010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151350644905198792006-06-26T13:37:00.000-06:002006-06-26T13:37:00.000-06:001986 was the opening of Pompidue Center? With the ...1986 was the opening of Pompidue Center? With the glass pyramid out front?buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151334964628469952006-06-26T09:16:00.000-06:002006-06-26T09:16:00.000-06:00In the afternoon Philip thought he would go to the...<I>In the afternoon Philip thought he would go to the Luxembourg to see the pictures...</I><BR/><BR/><I>They walked towards the gallery. Caillebotte's collection had lately been placed on view, and the student for the first time had the opportunity to examine at his ease the works of the impressionists.... Miss Price led Philip straight up to Manet's </I>Olympia<I>. He looked at it in astonished silence.</I><BR/><BR/><I>'Do you like it?' asked Miss Price.</I><BR/><BR/><I>'I don't know,' he answered helplessly.</I><BR/><BR/><I>'You can take it from me that it's the best thing in the gallery except perhaps Whistler's portrait of his mother.'</I><BR/><BR/>That's from my favorite part of the novel. I still have hopes of one day visiting the Musée du Luxembourg though, of course, things haven't been quite the same since 1986. No one I know who was there before 1986 hasn't claimed it, without prompting, as one of the highlights of their time in Paris.<BR/><BR/>Enthralling!lonerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13329414340481290010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151320018719177412006-06-26T05:06:00.000-06:002006-06-26T05:06:00.000-06:00loner:Of Human bondage was his best.It was about t...loner:<BR/><BR/>Of Human bondage was his best.<BR/><BR/>It was about the prisons we make for ourselves.terryehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16609746018265953069noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151300394655486242006-06-25T23:39:00.000-06:002006-06-25T23:39:00.000-06:00A note on sickness as it applies to certain things...A note on sickness as it applies to certain things brought to mind by this thread...<BR/><BR/>I just finished watching the latest installment in the great HBO series, <I>Deadwood</I>. It appears that the outcome will mirror history, but who knows. During the first season my wife invariably retired during the opening credits. The astonishing amount of profanity was enough to cause her to do so and my assurances that it was great storytelling did nothing to change her mind. <BR/><BR/>She was suffering from a certain type of sickness when prior to the beginning of the second season the network showed all the first season during the course of a week.<BR/><BR/>This illness caused her to lack the requisite energy to leave her place of repose when I began my three hour descent into the pleasures of great writing and by the third night she got it. Ever since we've had an hour of enjoyment together wholly related to a program on television.<BR/><BR/>Sometime a month ago I became sick in a way in which I'd not been in at least fifteen years and the duration of the illness was eleven or so days. I dropped eleven pounds during this time (everything I ingested tasted terrible for five days) and reached a weight I hadn't seen since my early thirties. So far I'm keeping it off.<BR/><BR/>I'm finishing up W. Somerset Maugham's 1927 novel <I>Ashenden, or The British Agent</I> tonight. I had it with me during over-long stays on an airplane both to and from PA and while spending many hours one evening in an emergency room while my wife waited, at the insistance of her relations and her insurer, to be examined because of a problem that might not be resolved before the year ends. I finally started reading consistantly after the hour and a half delay on the runway in Philly was over.<BR/><BR/>Late in the novel which Maugham based on his World War I experiences as a British agent, Ashenden has to make a decision.<BR/><BR/><I>"Have you ever read Balzac's </I>Pere Goriot<I>? asked Ashenden suddenly.</I><BR/><BR/><I>"Twenty years ago, when I was a student."</I><BR/><BR/><I>"Do you remember that conversation between Rastignac and Vautrin where they discuss the question whether, were you able by a nod to affect the death of a mandarin in China and so bring yourself a collossal fortune, would you give the nod? It was a notion of Rousseau's."</I><BR/><BR/><I>Herbartus's large face coiled itself in a slow, large smile.</I><BR/><BR/><I>"It has nothing to do with the case. You are uneasy at giving an order that will cause the death of a considerable number of people. Is it for your own profit? When a general orders an advance he knows that so many men will be killed. It's war."</I><BR/><BR/><I>"What a stupid war!"</I><BR/><BR/><I>It will give my country freedom.</I><BR/><BR/><I>"What will your country do with it when it gets it?"</I><BR/><BR/><I>Herbartus did not answer. He shrugged his shoulders.</I><BR/><BR/>They end up flipping a coin.<BR/><BR/>...and so it goes.lonerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13329414340481290010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151295769639429452006-06-25T22:22:00.000-06:002006-06-25T22:22:00.000-06:00It IS weird--it's entirely possible to be alive to...It IS weird--it's entirely possible to be alive today, and have a parent who was alive at the time of the Battle of the Little Bighorn, before anyone had even dreamed of cars and airplanes, and Sitting Bull still had dreams of the Sioux & Cheyenne running the Great Plains from Mexico to Canada.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151294810028140222006-06-25T22:06:00.000-06:002006-06-25T22:06:00.000-06:00BuddyThe more things change. Heh. In an inside-out...Buddy<BR/><BR/>The more things change. Heh. In an inside-out kinda way.<BR/><BR/>That article made me feel REALLY old. He speaks of his great-great-grandfather living in South Dakota.<BR/><BR/>My grandfather was 26 and living in North Dakota.<BR/><BR/>I've conversed with people born in three different centuries. (If you can call talking to a five-year-old conversing.)Sylhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03069871911665125873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151292855769183432006-06-25T21:34:00.000-06:002006-06-25T21:34:00.000-06:00Syl, re your thought--what goes around comes aroun...Syl, re your thought--<A HREF="http://instapundit.com/archives/031082.php" REL="nofollow">what goes around comes around</A>. DC and the northeast seaboard needs to take care it doesn't start looking alien to the rest of the nation.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151288327914298132006-06-25T20:18:00.000-06:002006-06-25T20:18:00.000-06:00I've got it!America's elites are imperialists colo...I've got it!<BR/><BR/>America's elites are imperialists colonizing red state America.<BR/><BR/>I'm not being facetious. I'm serious!<BR/><BR/>Their behavior and attitudes are exactly what they criticize about the colonial powers!Sylhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03069871911665125873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151287699618840982006-06-25T20:08:00.000-06:002006-06-25T20:08:00.000-06:00They're grifters first and foremost - figure out h...They're grifters first and foremost - figure out how they were paid and the answer will become clear.<BR/><BR/>OFF grew under their gaze and the payoffs looped through Russia, France and Germany, all of whom carried the scent of rose to the Clinton's noses.Rick Ballardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11082425215912372067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151287486620703522006-06-25T20:04:00.000-06:002006-06-25T20:04:00.000-06:00Terrye's Wild west thread got me thinking about La...Terrye's Wild west thread got me thinking about Langtry County in west Texas, population near zero. <BR/><BR/>Back in the Wild West days, the so-called Hangin' Judge, Roy Bean, had been assigned to the town of Langtry (which was the old Camp Vinegar in the Territory). <BR/><BR/>Back east British stage actress Lily Langtry was famous as "The Jersey Girl", and was somehow the great unrequited love of Judge Roy Bean, tho the two had never met as far as anyone can tell. <BR/><BR/>Roy Bean can't be now thought of except as Paul Newman, who played him in some long-forgot obscure 70s or 80s movie the name of which I forget. <BR/><BR/>Langtry had zero to do with Lily prior to the arrival of Bean. <BR/><BR/>It was Camp Vinegar, being called Langtry because an itinerant railroad repairman named George Langtry had some years before worked out of there. <BR/><BR/>Bean's use of her name and his love for her promoted the new saloon he opened in Langtry, "The Jersey Girl Saloon".<BR/><BR/>When Lily herself finally did make it to the states (the "Jersey" was her English Channel Isle birthplace), it wasn't to Langtry, Texas, but to the Napa Valley where she made wine for some years. <BR/><BR/>If you go to Langtry today, Paul Newman is thought to have been a judge there before he went Hollywood, and is a sort of Cargo Cult icon for having put the town on the tourist map, which has gained the town upwards of dozens of new visitors in the decades since the movie was released, visitors who've bought probably hundreds of dollars worth of movie bric-a-brac and posters of Lily Langtry, "The Jersey Girl", courtesan to Victorian noblemen who to a man lived far from Langtry, Texas.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151286382018185852006-06-25T19:46:00.000-06:002006-06-25T19:46:00.000-06:00Nice thread guy's and gal's.My only contribution w...Nice thread guy's and gal's.<BR/><BR/>My only contribution would be to say too Rick;<BR/><BR/>I once did a four-way, it taxed me. But it worked!! Come to think of it, it was a hell of a lot easier than remembering the rules for to and too! Call me stupid.Lutherhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08901441364329385474noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151285949856761252006-06-25T19:39:00.000-06:002006-06-25T19:39:00.000-06:00But to what strategic end?Perhaps a state visit an...<I>But to what strategic end?</I><BR/><BR/>Perhaps a state visit and a handshake in the Rose Garden? Great photo op and a toast to the summer of love. And we could have followed it up by flooding Iran with copies of the Yellow Submarine.chuckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15164145672293455823noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151285007033926802006-06-25T19:23:00.000-06:002006-06-25T19:23:00.000-06:00Skook:I agree. Readiness to ascribe base motives t...Skook:<BR/><BR/>I agree. Readiness to ascribe base motives to opponents is also important to them if it can accomplish any short-term goal, whether strategically important or not.<BR/><BR/>In short it is not a particularly great way to live a life. It makes peace of mind difficult, and requires constant edginess.<BR/><BR/>Being ready to take offense 24/7 breeds a certain emotional turmoil, doesn't it?<BR/><BR/>The Freeh article is also revealing in the cynicism it describes. But to what strategic end? How did Iran fit in as a potential ally? Was it helping in Kosovo? Was it helping establish a more workable relationship with Russia? <BR/><BR/>Just what was Iran doing for us at the same time it was enabling people who would murder our troops? It really puzzles me what on earth they were thinking. I wonder if there is anyone out there that can shed rational light on the subject.vnjagvethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15904498408683884983noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151284772320162082006-06-25T19:19:00.000-06:002006-06-25T19:19:00.000-06:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.vnjagvethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15904498408683884983noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151284165955269942006-06-25T19:09:00.000-06:002006-06-25T19:09:00.000-06:00Any distortion can last where there's no competiti...Any distortion can last where there's no competition for resources. <BR/><BR/>"Cinderella Man" was great. Hollywood is crazy-making. It assaults with toxic drivel, yet celebrates some of our true heroes, too.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151283258913010292006-06-25T18:54:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:54:00.000-06:00Gang:Has anyone seen Cinderella Man? I caught it ...Gang:<BR/><BR/>Has anyone seen Cinderella Man? I caught it late last night on HBO.<BR/><BR/>Pretty impressive.<BR/><BR/>Braddock's mission in life:<BR/><BR/>Survival.<BR/><BR/>Mode of operation:<BR/><BR/>Hard work and dedication to his family.<BR/><BR/>Concern for appearances:<BR/><BR/>Zero.<BR/><BR/>Result:<BR/><BR/>Goal met.<BR/><BR/>Pretty important lesson in today's society.<BR/><BR/>Then as now, the "elites" thought guys like him were "suckahs".<BR/><BR/>Some lessons are timeless.<BR/><BR/>Skook and MHA have hit on one of the main problems with the boomer generation. It has been ever convinced that "perception" is more important than reality.<BR/><BR/>If you appear to be doing the right thing, you can, avoiding Lincoln's exact words, "fool most of the people most of the time".<BR/><BR/>As we cynically used to say, "good enough for government work".<BR/><BR/>Word Verification "godgumo"<BR/><BR/>Sounds like a new dadgummit type word.vnjagvethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15904498408683884983noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151283152474109072006-06-25T18:52:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:52:00.000-06:00From Clintonian malfeasance to ginger snaps and ga...<I>From Clintonian malfeasance to ginger snaps and gardenburgers in a mere 44 comments.</I><BR/><BR/>Well, Clinton is a man of many appetites.Barry Dauphinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15808109325931309525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151282524276026072006-06-25T18:42:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:42:00.000-06:00Skook,Here are diagrams to look through. The secon...Skook,<BR/><BR/>Here are <A HREF="http://www.wfu.edu/~matthews/courses/p230/switches/3way/variations.html" REL="nofollow">diagrams</A> to look through. The second one is what Chuck and I are describing. Toss in a fan with it's own switch on the same circuit for fun. <BR/><BR/>And rmember - polarity counts!Rick Ballardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11082425215912372067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151282371475687572006-06-25T18:39:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:39:00.000-06:00You can always read the instruction sheet that cam...You can always read the instruction sheet that came with the switch--if you remember to grab your reading glasses as you run from the burning house.buddy larsenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17760847873026506988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151281732065328542006-06-25T18:28:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:28:00.000-06:00Terrye,If it eases the pain, I'm having two garden...Terrye,<BR/><BR/>If it eases the pain, I'm having two gardenburgers for supper. Yum, yum! Only 130 calories!<BR/><BR/>But I did take a 9 mile bike ride today. That helps.MeaninglessHotAirhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11767916621253839341noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151280787998811962006-06-25T18:13:00.000-06:002006-06-25T18:13:00.000-06:00Chuck,You're right - if white is used for one of t...Chuck,<BR/><BR/>You're right - if white is used for one of the travelers it's supposed to be taped black both at the fixture and at the second switch per code.Rick Ballardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11082425215912372067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151279889779427392006-06-25T17:58:00.000-06:002006-06-25T17:58:00.000-06:00OK, so the black wire . . .Is hot, white is neutra...<I>OK, so the black wire . . .</I><BR/><BR/>Is hot, white is neutral. Socket should go to ground when the switch is off. White to socket should be recoded black with a bit of tape, IIRC... it's been a while. I'm sure you know all that anyway ;)chuckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15164145672293455823noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16821859.post-1151278674542279902006-06-25T17:37:00.000-06:002006-06-25T17:37:00.000-06:00Skook,The music reviews sounds good. I used to att...Skook,<BR/><BR/>The music reviews sounds good. I used to attend NG summer training down at Ft. Irwin (before they made it the Desert Warfare Training site). Guys who hadn't been there before thought it was weird to see people putting on gloves at about 10AM in July. Until they touched metal.Rick Ballardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11082425215912372067noreply@blogger.com