Rantings Diversified

There is a boy who just wants a glass of red wine
some good conversation
a nice smile to gaze upon
a friendly face
maybe some Zydeco music

would be nice

he’s been there
He’s standing on a corner
talking to her
Bachet, Trane, hell, even Bird is gone
Paint the statue in KISS face
Uriah Heep, Black Oak Arkansas no body drives a Studabaker anymore

Open the trunk Have a beer let the party carry on
we sang about what’s so funny….
we didn’t really mean it
Johnny R was right
despite the hype

She was tall
actually shorter than she looked
she loved his
scared of moving too fast
scared of……SHIT!!!
they loved good together
They did the best they could while they were stuck in this place

would be nice

I finally found a politician I can believe in.  Sam Rohrer is a Pennsylvania State Congressman who is running for the U.S. Senate.  He has a record of standing for small, non-intrusive government and the truth.  I first heard of him years ago when he first ran for the PA House of Representatives.  Below you can see his announcement that he is running for the U.S. Senate.

My beloved Phillies lost in game 5 of the NLDS.  The series was tied at 2 apiece.  The whole season was hanging on this one game and they lost one to nothing.  Neo-diety Roy Halliday sucked in the first inning and allowed what became the winning run.  The Phillies bats were silent all game long.  Where as the Cards were hitting.  The Phils defense was good enough to keep the Cards in check but again their bats were silent.  DAMN it’s hard being a Phillies fan!  The best record of any team in baseball this year.  102 wins during the regular season and they blow it in the first round of postseason play.  I was convinced that they would be playing the Brewers for the NL pennant.  Well now it’s the Cardinals who will play the Brewers for the pennant.  I’m tired of getting my heart broken in the post season every year.  Unfortunately I’m a Phillies fan and next year will be excited about their chances in March and I’ll follow them all summer long and be excited for the postseason all over again.  What can I say?  It’s a hard thing to be.  I’m a Phillies fan.

Well it all started with an earthquake on my birthday.  It was only a 5.8 magnatude and centered in southern Virginia but the building I live in was swaying.  I had just layed down on my couch to take a nap and all of a sudden my building started swaying like it was a tree in the wind.  Then the couch I was on started shaking and the pictures I have hanging on the walls started rattling.  I smiled and said to myself, “Damn this is an earthquake”.  It lasted quite a long time.  30 seconds or more.  I had the TV turned on and was watching a 24 hour news channel and about 5 minutes after it stopped they broke into their programming and announced that Washington DC just expierenced an earthquake.  Ha!  I was right!
Then we had hurricane Irene blow through about two weeks ago.  The winds and rain were epic but it only lasted a day.  After the rains stopped the winds hung around and knocked trees down all over the area.  Something like 50,000 people had their electricity knocked out.  The electric companies have just finished restoring power.
Then last Sunday the remnants of Hurricane Lee made its way north from the Gulf of Mexico.  It gave us heavy rain from Sunday until yesterday.  The rain came out of the south and drove straight north inundating all of central PA.  All the rivers and creeks and streams swelled way beyond their borders.  The Swatara creek reached historically high levels.  The Yellow Breeches creek has over run its banks higher than ever before.  The interesting thing is that the Susquehanna river did not reach historically high levels.  Oh it flooded alright and it flooded alot of folks out of their houses but it crested 7 feet below the record high of 32.5 feet.  It reached 25.2 feet with the flood stage being 17 feet.  As bad as the flooding is we have seen much worse around here.
Welcome to Pennsylvania!

I think I may have just invented the greatest cat toy ever invented.  Necessity being the mother of invention, I was sick and tired of Captain Willie attacking my feet and thinking it was funny to do so.  I need something to distract him from scratching my feet.  I took a piece of paper and balled it up really tightly and threw it on the floor.  Well needless to say he freaked out and has been playing with it almost non-stop.  When he’s not playing with it he carries it around and sits on it.  The greatest cat toy ever invented! Below you’ll find a picture of this great invention.  Remember you can click on the pics to embiggialize them.

I gave Captain Willie this paper ball this morning at about 7am and he played with it non-stop for about an hour.  Here is a pic of him after he was done playing.

Well I did it. I went to the HumaneSociety today and got a roommate.  You see they were adopting cats for $10 today only.  So Maggie and I met at Starbucks at 9am and ventured over to the shelter only to wait in line until they opened at 11am.  There were about 10 people in front of us and by the time it opened there were 75 people behind us.
Last Thursday Mags and I went and found a few kittens we liked so we already knew who we were looking to adopt.  Well both of our choices were right up front by the main desk in the lobby.  I asked to see a black and white kitten I had fallen for last Thursday and as soon as I was holding him I knew he was bound to be my roommate.  His name is Captain Willie or Willie for short.  His name comes from a Little Feat song named “Crazy Captain Gunboat Willie”.  Capt. Willie is a special needs kitten.  You see he only has one eye.  When he was young he got into a fight with one of his siblings and lost an eye.  He is so friendly and full of energy and I was afraid that nobody would adopt him so I did.  We got home today and there was very little transition time.  He ran around the apartment checking things out for about an hour and is now happily sleeping on my lap as I write this on my laptop.
Maggie got a beautiful all black kitten.  I’ll have to check with her and find out what she named her.  (Update: Maggie named her kitten Klipper so now she has Kashi and Klipper)
Below is a picture of Capt. Willie and remember you can click on it to embiggialize it.

Below you’ll find a photo of the most recent eggs to show up. There are now three but I have an idea that the original bird was kicked out. The whole time she was there I never saw babies but my neighbor just under me said she found a dead baby bird and disposed of it. So I think the original bird had her chick and somehow it got knocked out of the nest and now I have a brand new robin with three eggs. I’m not sure but the new momma-bird sure makes a racket and yells at me every time I go out on the balcony. Hey, I don’t have to feed it or clean up after it and anyways everybody walking by loves checking it out and keeping track of how the new bird is doing. I’ll post again after some of the chicks are born. Remember you can click on the photo to embiggialize it.

Governor Corbett signed HB 40 into law yesterday.
House Bill 40: The bill, known as the “Castle Doctrine” bill, amends 18 Pa.C.S. (Crimes and Offenses) and 42 Pa.C.S. (Judiciary and Judicial Procedure) to expand and further define an individual’s right to use deadly force inside or outside of the individual’s dwelling, residence, or occupied vehicle. It eliminates an individual’s
duty to retreat before using deadly force if the person is in a place the person has a right to be and believes that deadly force is necessary to protect himself against death, serious bodily injury, kidnapping, or sexual intercourse compelled by force or threat.
What this means is that you no longer have a “Duty to retreat” outside of the home. If you feel you are being threatened with death, serious bodily injury, etc. you have the right to use deadly force. This bill also limits certain civil liabilities for people who act within the guidelines of the bill. In other words you can’t be sued for using deadly force outside of your home.
This is a good day for the honest citizens of Pennsylvania and a bad day for criminals

So my bud Maggie and I drive all the way to the Lancaster Humane League just to find out that they are out of kittens.  We both are looking to get a kitten.  Another one for Maggie and my first.  Last weekend the Lancaster shelter advertised free kitten adoption because they had so many.  Today they had none.  So we drive back home and went to check out the Harrisburg Humane Society to see whatever kittens they might have for adoption.  Well of course they were closed!  What kinda’ sense does that make, being closed on a Sunday?  Harumph!
A hat tip to culch.ie for this…

Camp Perry Wind Chart

For those of you planning to attend the Nationals at Camp Perry, particularly any “first timers”, this wind chart is offered to better help you gauge the speed of the rather infamous Camp Perry winds.
More experienced Camp Perry shooters will recognize some of the more subtle nuances of this chart.

CAMP PERRY HIGHPOWER WIND SPEED CHART:

0-1 MPH: Calm-TOO CALM! People get edgy-smoke from cigar smoker next to you goes straight up. You can smell yourself. Target pits are running slow.  Second Relay shooters are frantic to get to the line. Fourth Relay shooters are certain the fix is in.
This is not a common occurrence at Camp Perry.

2-3 MPH: Light air. Leaves on trees don’t move. Cigar smoke rises at a slight angle. Pits are still slow. You can still smell yourself.

4-7 MPH: Light breeze. Leaves on trees move. You can smell the guy next to you, not just his cigar.

8-12 MPH: Gentle breeze Everyone can smell everyone. P.A. system is overwhelmed by wind noise as usual.
Target pits pick up speed erratically.  Rain gear makes flipping noise.

13-18 MPH: Moderate breeze. Wind flags make flipping noise. Shooting mats start to blow off the line.
Score boards begin gyrating, scaring the hell out of experienced pit crew.

19-24 MPH: Fresh breeze. Block Officers make flipping noise. Mats blow all over.  Your brass hits guy two positions over and he yells at you, but you claim you can’t hear him because of all the flipping noise.

25-31 MPH: Strong breeze Difficult to walk. Drunks from previous night’s trip to Nick’s Road House are blown over.
Pages in your score book disappear. Cigar smoke is blowing horizontally, right into your eyes.

32-38 MPH: Moderate gale. Trees move moderately. Elderly Block Officer asks, “Windy enough for you?”. Cheeks flap when he speaks. Shooting stools and scopes are on the move.

39-46 MPH: Fresh gale. Block Officers are blown over. Falling down drunks from previous night’s trip to Cisco & Charlie’s are held upright. Targets blown out of holders. Experienced pit crew bales out.  Embers from cigar ignite your mat, flame blows horizontally.

47-54 MPH: Strong gale. Trees move slowly—across the range. Elderly Block Officer says, “This is nothing! !!! I remember the Nationals back in ’54…!!”
Your shooting hat blows off.

55-64 MPH: Whole gale. Your shooting coat blows off. Range Control Tower tumbles past you.
You can no longer hear Marines arguing with Block Officers.

64-75 MPH: Storm. You regret not using Porta-Johns before they blew away. Elderly Block Officer claims,
“I’ve shot in worse!”,  and is carried away by wind. Your underwear blows off.

OVER 75 MPH: Hurricane. Your underwear blows off, even if you managed to make it indoors.
People from base housing blow past Mess Hall. Your nose hairs whistle even when you aren’t breathing.
You can’t close your eyes, even if you want to.

SPECIAL RANGE RULES:

Due to the frequency of certain weather events, and to speed the progress of the matches, the Match Director has issued these special rules to Competitors.

1). Shooters will be released from the line only when a Category 3 funnel cloud or larger is sighted
and confirmed by Beach Tower, NOAA, U.S. Army Central Command, Canada and the closest airborne AWAC.

2). An alibi will be issued ONLY to those shooters struck by lightning that actually require resuscitation.

3). Holes in target caused by hailstones are NOT to be scored, under HP Rule 14.1., holes in shooters / scorers
caused by hail are not sufficient cause for an alibi or additional time.

4). Shooters in danger of drowning in the prone position due to torrential rains CAN assume a lesser position (sitting/kneeling), but must do so prior to the start of the match and only with the permission of the Range Officer.
Assuming a lesser position after the start of the match is a disqualification, per HP Rule 7.1 and 9.9.
Drowning is NOT an excuse!

5). Debris blowing across range is NOT sufficient cause for an alibi or additional time.

6). A rifle damaged by lightning can be replaced ONLY if it meets the criteria for a “Disabled Rifle”
(see HP Rule 9.5). A barrel bent by the lightning is NOT considered “Disabled” (see HP Rule 9.5).

Thank you for your cooperation, and good shooting!