I'll take unforgettable phrases for $100, Alex.

So imagine my surprise when I find that this news story passed me by for the past couple days:

EPA Memo To Employees: Please Stop Pooping In The Hallway

Wow.  Just...wow.  You're telling me this is the same caliber of person you want running America's health care?  I mean, it doesn't help that the VA is actively killing veterans, but we now have the EPA going all naturalist +11.  What, do we need to paradrop a heavily armed Jane Goodall in there to teach them some class?  Not only that, but they can't comment on it?  Aren't everything they do supposed to be public domain?  So much for that whole transparency thing, eh?

In other less scarring, yet almost as wrong news, I was goofing off looking at aviation photos the other day and I saw another aviation photographer's work that he titled "Aero-rotica."  Just about spit my drink out right at that moment.

two for one deal

So, last weekend I saw two movies I haven't' seen before X Men: Days of Future Past, and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.

The new X Men movie is all about tying the new(ish) prequel in with the old X Men movies and cast, and it succeeds very well, along with delivering a very entertaining movie chock full of what-if history and great action.  Worth every penny.

The latest installment of the Mission Impossible franchise on the other hand, is a pretty disappointing watch, which is sad, because I really wanted to like this movie.  It even had some elements and scenes that I really loved, but the story and most of the action was so bland and predictable that is was nigh unbearable at certain parts.  Why can't Hollywood just let spy thrillers be spy thrillers instead of trying(and failing) at turning it into another bland action movie?  Oh well, at least we still have the one good installment in the series, (the first one) which I had to re-watch because this movie just didn't cut it. 

going to the other fun show

Well, I'm excited, as this weekend will bring with it the big airshow over at Hill AFB.  What are they calling it this year?  Warriors over the Wasatch?  Supposedly the name won't be changing again for the next one. Whatever.  I bet they'll manage to justify another name change next year.
 

I am pretty exited for this little event, and I mean it when I say the word 'little'.  The list of events/performers is not only small, but relatively lackluster compared to most of the airshows I've been to.  Heck, even compared to the Parowan airshow, it seems a little sparse.  They have the usual items, like the Golden Knights (those guys are everywhere), an F-16 demo, a P-51 demo, along with the Thunderbirds, and a handful of specialty built aerobatic craft, along with the obligatory jet car nonsense.  But they do have a couple of things I'm interested in seeing, like a T-33 performance; I've never seen one fly before, let alone do a whole demonstration.  That'll be cool.

The most sultry of pictures

Amazing Blue Angels photo.

Found a new tool in looking up awesome official photos of military aircraft, at this site here.  The National Archives is so far the best repository of modern military jet photos ever.  I am especially impressed with the quality of blue angels photos there.  Man, I can't wait until I get to see those guys perform again.

Best Tomcat pic ever!  Exploding target seen in the right side of the frame.

Conversations at work

Being the nerd I am, most conversations will drift towards movies at some point. Don't know how the movie The Notebook came up though, but I guess it's inevitable when talking to the female variety.

I posed the assumption, "So, being a woman, I'm sure you've seen The Notebook."
"Actually, no.  I haven-" (interrupted by me giving the hard stare) "Okay, so I have.  She looks at her feet and mumbles "Multiple times."
"Yeah, you can't tell me you haven't.  I can call that bull about 50nmi away."
"It's a good movie."
"No, it's a terrible movie.  Any man who says they like it has something wrong with them."
"I like it"
"Well of course you like it, you're the target demographic.  But if you're with a guy that says he likes it, they are one of three things: a liar, a psycho nutcase that may murder you in your sleep, or gay.  All of the above being a red flag if you're interested in this guy."
"Really?  You really think that no man can like The Notebook?"
"Please, at the end of that movie when they were old and dying, I was cheering on the disease that killed them like I was betting on a horse race."
"Holy crap, you really are the world's worst person."
"Well they did kill Osama a while back, so that bumped me up on the list."

Proof is in the pudding, darlin'

tunes from where?

Cause everybody loves Cowboys from Hell:

Cowboys from Hell - by the real school of rock

Wow, they DO exist!

Remember that rant I had not too long ago about bad cops and such?  Well, guess what I just found?  A good cop that's also a good man and decent human being for wising up.

We need more like you, good sir.  Much more like you.

slow moving action

back when I was planning for my brother to come up, I had all sorts of cool ides of things to do and places we could go, but that was back when I had time and money.  So, now it appears we are spending our weekdays watching all the best of the Bond flicks, and the weekend is simply a re-hash of a Swayze gone crazy special.

Though if I can manage to coax the boy out of bed not long after zero dark thirty, perhaps we can leave in time to go hunting for an A-12 crash site.  there aint much there these days, but I think it would still be a fun trip to take.

Looking forward though, I'm gonna have to do a bit more brainstorming on places we can go on subsequent weekends.

In other random news, the location of my apartment is still making me itch for a digital camera that has a seriously beefy optical zoom.  Getting tired of seeing awesome shots of F-16s without being able to get a close enough shot of 'em.

waiting for their closeup. (official USAF photo)

The squirrel's leftovers

So, catching up on missed episodes of the Squirrel Report, the latest's (no. 107) call in topic was blatantly ripped from an Ace of Spades post.  The post poses a fun question that says you can travel back in time to do one thing: you can either cure or kill any one person in history.  However, the rules are strict; you can't cure and kill someone, you only have the choice to cure OR kill one person (and I believe you can't choose living persons, either).

The comments were really good, but after a while they have kind of veered off to something I think is a bit more fun.  So, I think it would be fun to expand the idea to include what people were doing in the comments.  Same basic concept, choosing people from history, but we change the arbitrary rules to include three people: one you save, one you kill, and one you marry.

I can see this being the ultimate hangout topic.  I've been thinking about it since listening to the episode, and I'm still having a really difficult time trying to narrow down the choices of people down to one for each category.  So far this is is the best list I could come up with.

can we get this guy a "shoot me" t-shirt?

I'd kill Karl Marx and subsequently save hundreds of millions of lives (and intellects)
I'd save Joseph Smith Jr. from being shot (man, that will really open up the possibilities! And piss off a lot of intolerant/ignorant people at the same time!),
and I'd marry Roza Shanina (because what a babe! and classy, too.  I'd sure as hell turn her capitalist.)

Momma always said, "Only marry a girl with confirmed kills!" ...or something like that.  I think.

more missed opportunities

I've been on the lookout for high quality rifles that shoot 7.62x54R because whatever the price of the rifle, I know I can offset by a significantly cheaper ammo budget than most other calibers while still having steel core bullets.  I'll have to put more effort into maintaining them, what with the corrosive ammo and all, but still, I'm dead set on it.

The problem being that most precision rifles in this caliber are either of a dreadfully low quality or are so exquisite that they are beyond any reasonable price point.  Despite the attractively low prices of Mosin Nagants, they do require a bit of work and modification to get them to a point that they can shoot accurately over a distance.  Consequently, that makes the price jump up to the point that they are no longer much cheaper than just getting another rifle with all the features you want built in.

What a beauty.  Now that's a real man's biathlon rifle.

Now getting to the meat of the matter, which is the Finnish Mosin M/28-76.  It was issued in both target and sniper models, a majority of them imported here being of the target variety.  It has everything I'm looking for, nice stock, cool sights, can take an optic after being tapped and racked, still can shoot run of the mill 54R ammo, all for less than $600; that is, when they first appeared.

Now this guy has the dream setup, right here.

But now it seems it's impossible to find one, and when you do, the seller wants twice that much.  Phooey.  Anyone that comes across one of these for sale at that $600 range again, you let me know!

Something striker this way comes

imagine the following conversation with a hipster:

You:  Hey, did you hear about that new hybrid sports car?
Hipster:  Ugh, please, I've had a fuel efficient car since the 70s.
You:  Um, okay.  That's not what I'm talking about.  There's this new hybrid sports car that's really cool, it's breaking all sorts of records.
Hipster:  Sheesh, what a bunch of posers.  They aren't doing anything new!  My college class made an electric car once.
You:  But you can actually drive this one fast, and it'll compete with the fastest of regular cars.
Hipster:  Whatever, my Ford Pinto was more efficient.
You:  I don't think your're getting the point.

This is the kind of reaction H&K had to the rest of the world getting striker fired pistols.  They just love being the hipster that points out that it had a striker fired pistol waaaay before they were cool.  Look buddy, just because you had one in the 70's doesn't mean it's cool or that it was even good.  There was a reason you didn't sell 'em like hotcakes, and it wasn't because it was striker fired.

The ridiculous over the top ambition of the VP70 resulted in nothing but less than stellar reliability coupled with superfluous capabilities.

But, finally getting back into the program nearly 40 years later they've come up with the VP9.  Get it?  'Cause it's just like their old VP70, but better!

I'm honestly surprised it took them so long to suddenly realize they were missing out on a whole market.  I think it was spurned by the fact that LE everywhere are all drinking the Smith and Wesson M&P cool aid, and HK finally realized it was passing up on some sweet deals.  For their sake, I hope they haven't missed the gravy train.  Either way, I can see this thing doing really well on the civilian market. Heck, despite my eager mockery of HK, I'd still be willing to get one, as long as I have the money.

Although this does look like it'll be a solid and good shooting pistol (I mean, it IS HK after all), I'm also puzzled at it's magazine capacity of 15 rounds of 9mm.  I mean, everyone else is sporting 16 to 20 these days and the best they could muster up is 15?  I dunno what they were thinking there.

Update:  Hey, didn't the old VP70 have an 18 round magazine? let's look that up.....yeah, it did.  WTF H und K?  You couldn't use those magazines?  Why do you keep taking two leaps forward and two steps back?  Honestly I feel like I'm ABSuperman here: "They made the gun good, why can't they make the magazine good?"