The Results

Well, I missed it again, for the 12th year. I shot a 41, and needed a 43 to qualify for expert; so damn close. This year we had to shoot an additional 10 rounds of ammo while wearing the gas mask. If you've ever worn the MCU-2 gas mask, you know how difficult it can be to perform certain tasks, and it seems that shooting would be another difficult task. But actually, I shot just as well if not better wearing the mask. Your breathing is slowed down which steadies you. On top of that, you have to pull your weapon up so hard to your masked head just to look down the sites that everything gets sturdy; the gun goes on a slight canter, but once you can see down the sites, your head doesn't move without the weapon going with it. Solid.
So we needed to hit 35 targets with 40 rounds last year, and 43 out of 50 this year with the mask, glove inserts and gloves. The targets are the size of a person ranging from 50 to 300 meters away.
This was my last chance to "shoot expert", in my opinion. I've given up. I'm way past my prime and on the down hill slide; if I didn't get it by now, it ain't gonna happen. So I save money by not updating my ribbon rack. My predictions were wrong. I'm still on leave, so I've got that going for me!

Handling my Gun

Shooting M-16 today. Could there be a Marksman ribbon in my future? Every year the answer's no. What's different this year? nothing.

This cracks me up

What can you say?

I mean, really, what can you say?

MIT Weblog Survey

Quick and easy survey to study Blogger-type-beings

Upload Pictures Directly?

Well, after searching high and low for a free image hosting website that didn't suck, blogger.com finally got off their asses and lets us upload pictures directly. It's about time. Here's the news:

We've just launched Blogger Images. So now you can include photos and images in your posts. Just click the new picture icon and you can upload an image from your computer or from the web. Try it out!
– Biz [6/24/2005 12:07:00 PM]

So I'm gonna try out this new capability with...

A Demotivator of course.

It's definitely less of a pain in the butt to get a picture on here. Time to redo all my pictures and test the limits of capacity.

about Slim's Family

I thought I'd make a post about some of my American family. I updated my profile and threw a line in about my Uncle Herbie. It got me thinking about him and some others of my family. Plus, with the new Herbie movie coming out, maybe Google will find my blog? Uncle Herbie couldn't drink milk and eat hot dogs, it made his eyes swell. Herbie was Peepahs brother-in-law. Who's Peepah? Read on, McDuff.

The crappy thing about my American family is the fact that my cousins were all older than me, by alot! My family was all so old!! Three of my cousins, Chick, Tony and Mike Venerra were the sons of my Uncle Prospero Venerra, my Peepah. Peepah was a tennis coach for years; he used to call me his little Pasta Fazul.

Chick became an actor and played the lead character, Joe Mondragon, in "The Milagro Beanfield War", directed by Robert Redford, did a spot on Different Strokes and a bunch of other shit.

Tony became a painter, not of houses, but of pictures. My friend’s dad, Jake, has a couple of his pieces I guess. I googled him, but I guess he only got those two paintings out to Jake and quit.

Mike had Polio; he limped and had a sweet ass car. His son liked to be called Moe instead of Mike Jr. He acted like a spoiled bitch, that kid.

Aren't you glad you bothered to read today?

Getting Ready

I've got 18 days before the movers come for my stuff. I made a practice list of what I'm going to have shipped, what I will carry in my luggage, and what I will mail to Korea. What a nerd.
I'm going to be on leave from 27 June till 22 July. It's gonna be sweet. That'll give me time to finish the basement fiasco and hang out with the fam. I have some out-proccessing appointments during my leave, but I've got 17.5 days use or lose leave, so I'm using it. The paperwork to take 18 days around appointments is a pain in the ass.
I shoot M-16 on Tuesday next week. I've changed my ribbon rack 3 times in the last year, so my prediction is I shoot expert this year. That way I can change my ribbon rack again before I get the two new ribbons from the short tour in Korea. Changing ribbon racks is fun, and a cool way to waste money. I'll post my scores after.

Our Hutterites

Ok, if you know anything about Tokyo Slim, you know my admiration for the Hutterites. In a word: Efficient. When I was a kid in New York, we had the Amish around. Nice people, but they wasted so much time without electricity and gas-powered engines. It drove me nuts to think about it.
Then you got your Hutterites. They got the gas powered engines, the electricity. “They play the guitars on the MTV.” Okay, not really, but compared to the Amish, they rock! They appeared to be the high-tech, blasphemous Amish.
The bad Amish got kicked outta New York, so they ran West to Ohio. The bad ones there got kicked out again and ran to Montana and changed their name to the Hutterites. That was my 3 minute theory.
Then I began to study them… When they go to Walmart, it's all "in, grab it, pay for it, out." I was impressed. And I told people," Those Hutterites are efficient, man."
Then I had the chance to check out the digs at the Hutterite Colony near Ulm, Montana. I saw the organization of their place; nice. They had housing areas set up better than a military base, all lined up, symmetrical and organized. Neat, tidy, not flashy, efficient.
Wow, they have uniforms, barracks-type family unit housing, non-whimsical/non-meandering shopping methods, organized work-place and family-unit housing area, well structured schooling, a daily schedule you could set the atomic clock to… These Sons-of-Guns are Efficient!

Here's a picture of some Hutterite Boys in front of the housing.

Here's a picture of a row of housing. It's all the same, so tell the Johnson's to kiss yer ass, the competition's over.

Then I saw this picture, what the hell?:

The Alcohol, the DVD's for those boring stake-outs, The CIA Operative in the background reporting back to Big-Brother. You know that metallic tubing on the right is tied to Roswell!
I'm starting to think we've all been duped. Was it all just a hoax? Were all the Hutterites just a front for a bigger Operation? Were the Hutterites monitoring us at Walmart? Seeing what we buy, what we waste our time on? Did they see me at the Five-Dollar-DVD-Bin for more than a minute? Were there cameras hidden in the beards and bonnets of our silent societal co-habitants?
My suspicion is raised, as well as my guard.

Ahoy, mateys!

Well, I'm a boat owner, and she's a fine vessel! I called probably 30 different places in Helena; boat shops, fishing shops, outdoor sporting goods, regular sporting goods, department stores. Nobody had pedal boats or knew where to buy one.

So we drove to Holter Lake to rent a boat or canoe, just to whet our appetite. The only thing we could find to rent was a party barge. We decided to drive the rest of the way to Helena. We took the kids to the Carousel and stopped in a few stores, then came home, boat-less. We decided to go with the one at Big Bear.

We bought it Sunday and took it to Broadwater Bay. It was a little tough to fight the current, but we kept it close to shore and chugged up-stream quite a ways. Then, we jettisoned over to a pile of rocks on the shore, grabbed one and tied to our rope and made a half-assed anchor. It didn’t hold us completely, but it slowed us down a lot, as we gently made our way back to the dock.

Ah yes, her maiden voyage went well. We were gonna christen it with a half empty bottle of Iced Tea, but people don’t like broken glass by the boat launch. Wussies.

Gotta head to work, more later.

Lewis and Clarke Read This Blog

Lewis and Clarke. Clarke and Lewis. Whoopdie-Freakin-Dooo. Two guys went left for awhile. If yer not from here, be thankful you don't get Lewis and Freakin' Clarke crammed down yer throat. I am so sick of them. I've had to listen to Lewis and Clarke get posthumously sucked off since the day I got here. Now's the big Bi-centennial.
Here's an idiot who covers this breaking news just in time to ease the poor Lewis Family's suffering:
Was Lewis murdered? Forensics professor presents findings:
By KIM SKORNOGOSKI
From what I understand, John Walsh is enticed... Stay tuned to AMW.

Pretty Bad Pedal Boat Predicament

So, the plan was to hit Sam's Club today with Matay to pick up the pedal boat. I decided to call and make sure they still had one in stock. They said they were sold out and were no longer going to carry it. They even sold the display. There's 4 left at Big Bear Sports, but they don't have the canopy and seat cushions, which I think we can live without.

So, that does it for Great Falls, we're headed to Helena tomorrow in search of another pedal boat. Hopefully, we either find something better, or Big Bear doesn't sell out before we get back.

No whammies, no whammies, no whammies

After the Hotwash; In light of my failure...

Upon further investigation, I have determined Slim's Basement Project to be a total failure. In order to defend myself in regards to effort, I leave you with this Demotivator...

The Pre-Hotwash Evaluation

Slim's Basement Job
Current Day: 3
Days Left in Project: 0
Trips to Dumpster: 2
Percent Completed: 41%
Time Wasted: 20 hours, 35 minutes

It just didn't happen for me today. I woke up and knew, in the back of my mind, that I wasn't gonna do shit today, as far as that basement went. Instead, we went boat shopping.
Because the follow-on assignment is to Misawa AB, Japan, and there's some lakes and stuff there, we plan on taking some kind of water-craft. We're not looking to ski behind something, just something to take out on the water, maybe fish off of. I went to TMO outbound this morning and they said the max length of boat we can ship is 12 feet. Trailered boats are kinda out also, so we said "screw it."
We are buying a pedal boat. It holds four people, you don't have to register it, you can slap on a low HP outboard motor, you can pedal instead of row, you don't need paddles, you can fish off of it, it's way less than 12 feet in length, more stable than a canoe, you can throw the thing on top of a sedan, chicks dig it, ok maybe not that...

Please leave comments if you've had pedal boat despair. Am I just another guy with pedal boat pipe-dreams?

About Day 2

Slim's Basement Job
Current Day: 2
Days Left in Project: 1
Trips to Dumpster: 2
Percent Completed: 41%
Time Wasted: 18 hours, 16 minutes

Well, I was making some good progress. Then, on my last trip to the dumpster, I realized how tall my grass got. I didn't want to get written up for the lawn, so I mowed it, then went inside to hang out with the wife for a bit. Got a phone call to report to work at 1545, in uniform, despite my leave status. Long story short, I decided to put the effort in this year, and it paid off. It's a definite milestone for me, and it comes at a great time. I should have that stripe sewn on maybe in November by my calculations. We'll see. I'm psyched.

The Big TL is back in Philly visiting his Mum. I left a message on his machine here, and he called me all the way from Philly to give Congrats. I missed his call (we ate at Melaque). It really meant alot, that message of his.

Project Update

Slim's Basement Job
Current Day: 1
Days Left in Project: 2
Trips to Dumpster: 0
Percent Completed: 1%
Time Wasted: 11 hours, 47 minutes

I had some other stuff that came up. Had to take Kid-1 to the library; can't stifle education, you know.
Then I had to pick-up a prescription refill; gotta have drugs, you know.
Then I decided to change this blog's appearance; gotta keep it fresh, you know.

I decided to give myself 1% on completion because I made that sweet-ass project log!!
I've pretty much given up on today. Day 1 will be re-evaluated in the Hotwash.

If only Dom were here to help

On Leave

I'm on leave till Friday. The plan is to clean my basement. We'll see...
So far, I've acquired a new image hosting website and checked some email. Basement's untouched.
This picture always makes me laugh.


Here's a tip from the TV Show "Cleen Sweep" on TLC: Keeping one pair of "Skinny" pants is a great way to get inspired to lose weight. Keeping more then that is just cluttering up your closet, you fat ass. Adding the "fat ass" part was my idea. Genius, I know.

Ok, I've gotta start on that basement.

To track my progress, I'll keep a log for everyone to see.

Slim's Basement Job
Current Day: 1
Days Left in Project: 2
Trips to Dumpster: 0
Percent Completed: 0%
Time Wasted: 2 hours, 44 minutes

I'll be in the field until Friday night, no posts until Saturday. Until then, enjoy another Demotivator on adversity.

Predictions

(Thursday, May 26, 2005 Hopefully no one gets stupid (like a DUI) to cut this weekend short.) Unfortunately, my prediction came true. Fortunately, no one got injured and we didn't get recalled early to be lectured on mixing one part vehicle with two parts alcohol and three parts idiocy.

This first paragraph was written and saved as a draft on Friday morning. It is now Monday morning and guess what? Another DUI in the squadron, and this time, we got the recall Sunday morning. Apparently, this idiot had a designated driver drop him off at home after drinking. He then got hungry and drove to Hardees, three blocks away. The drive-thru kid smelled the booze and narc'ed on him. Idiot. I'm sure the whole story involved him pissing off everyone in Hardees and then they decided to call the cops on his drunk ass

So, I gotta get to work now. Hopefully this will be enough to appease Miss Lilly.

Townsend Phase II Area

The Phase II area. It's been raining for a long time, and will not let up anytime soon. It's gonna be MUDDY!!!!