Military Medals

 

Some Generals need an extra chest so they can wear all their medals.

You can bet your booties that the Chinese military is not worried about political correctness.

                                                           

                                               Amazon Books on Chinese Military

Coffee and Sugar

When I was 18, for Lent I gave up sugar in my tea. Later on, in the Air Force, I drank coffee without sugar. Just think. Sixty years without sugar. I must have had a major effect on sugar prices. That must have been felt down through the whole food train. 
Someone gave me a coffee one day with sugar. Couldn't drink it. In my house we only use sugar for baking. So there is no big rush to buy sugar when it is on sale. 
I've read this, "Even if someone tells you the truth, who will listen?" That goes very well with what is going on now. Some listen, some don't. Possibly we only listen to what we want to hear. All leaders assume they are right and want to pull us into their sphere. Right or wrong, we suffer the results.
Alright, confession. I never read that sentence, I wrote it.

Choices

Life is all about choices. What we decide now will impact the rest of our lives. Have you ever wondered what your life would have been like if you had made different choices? One different choice that could have changed your whole world? Take that job or not? Join the military or not? Marry that girl or a different one? Decisions can be be or small but all might lead to different experiences. Choices not only affect you but also your friends and family with good or bad results. It could change your way of life but also theirs. Have you made wrong choices? Will my future choices change who I am now?

The Canadian Armed Forces now believes that since the women on Startrek have ponytails, it should be O.K. for our military ladies.

Dreams

      I had a dream the other night that I clearly remembered. Most times I remember them for about 10 seconds and then nothing else. Funny how that works. In this dream, I was back in the military, and someone told me to put on a clean shirt. This I did, and a little while later they asked me why I had on two shirts. I said that I was ordered to put on another shirt. Then they said they didn't think I was supposed to put on one shirt over the other. So I told them I wasn't ordered to remove the first shirt. And that was it.
      If I were going to my Chinese doctor for traditional medicine, she would tell me what the dream meant. It's one of the things they do to get a grip on things. Before anytime visiting her, I have to keep track of my dreams. She is great for aches and pains, but I wouldn't go for a life threatening situation.
      It could be that I see myself in an alternate universe. In that case, I must be some dumb not to know enough to remove my shirt or, I follow orders to a tee. Wouldn't want to get stuck in the universe.

Vacation Day Deserved

Sunday morning with forecast for same weather as yesterday. This afternoon, my wife and daughter go away for a week. They go to our friends house in Eastern Passage. The house is right on the ocean. Lots of family so there is always a bunch of people around. We call it our daughter's vacation. So she is all excited. It's the week for the parade and fireworks. They drag my daughter in the wheelchair all over the place. A difficult thing to do. If God let you pick your own relatives, life would be pretty good.

A friend of mine made a comment on one of my rants.
If you haven't read a book called "The Peter Principle", see if you can locate a copy...... it has an explanation for some of the promotions you refer to......   "
I'm sure everyone knows what that means but if not here is the short version.
The Peter Principle is the principle that "in a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence".
This brings up the question that if you first join an organization and are found out to be incompentant, where do you go? You go into the sideways shift. Well known in the military. They keep sending you from job to job, until they find you a job where you can cause the least damage.

What brought this to mind was an article I read the other day. It concerns a WW2 german prison guard. They said he was responsible for 422,000 deaths. So I had to look at that. He must be something else to be responsible for so many. I learn that he marched people, locked doors etc. They said he did all the guard duty type jobs in the camp. So you can guess my thoughts on that. They shifted him from job to job because he couldn't do anything right. After two years, he lost that posting. Went back home to his village and stayed there till now at 88 years of age.

He was nabbed by the Simon Wiesenthal Org. which is in some respects is like an organization funded by donations. You have to keep the money rolling in. The number of war criminals is starting to thin out, so then what. All such organizations face the same dilemma. People to be paid. The org. is in place, all you need is a new disease. I'll give you an example. The War Amps. Started for WW2  amputees and when that started to dry up, they switched to children. Of course I agree that was I good idea. Sadly to say, that won't dry up. What if they find a cure for cancer. Many and massive organizations. Doesn't a cancer cure seem to be taking a long time?

"Black Eyed Peas," "Black Eyed Peas." I'm sick of reading about them. They did a show on Gay Pride Day and there has been an article about them in the newspaper every day. I think the articles should have been put in the week before, not after. It's like they never heard of them and they are trying to make up. Anyway, I don't like black eyed peas and I don't like green beans either.

Facebook entry for today is: "Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder."

Where Has My Promotion Gone?

Storm on the way. That's what they say. In that case, I'll just do inside stuff.

I was watching a tv show the other day called, "Crash $ Burn." It's about an insurance company. So there is a promotion coming up and one guy asks if he is going to get it? His boss says to him,"What! You're the best Adjuster we have. You save us millions of dollars a year. I woud be crazy to promote you and lose all that." And there in lies the truth. I suppose that you believe in the old adage, study, work hard and you will get ahead. That sounds good but that's not the way it works in the real world. The more useless you are, the more likely you'll get promoted. I bet you see that around your workplace. The hard working, smartest and best employees are the foundation that hold up the company. Can't promote them. Who would do the work. If you are getting a little older, maybe you are starting to clue into that now.

Does the military operate that way? You bet your combat boots they do. We had a saying in the military. Card players promote card players and drunks promote drunks. Of course, hard workers promote hard workers, but they are few and far between. This reminds me of something else. In the military they are always sending people on courses to keep up with the new stuff. So you can assume that they would send the best people, so they can keep up with the new stuff. No,no, no! Are you crazy. If they did that, who would do all the work? You have to send the person who is the most useless. Now what happens after that? Promotion time. "Look at this guy. Really gung-ho. Always going on courses. Up to date on everything. This is the guy we have to promote. Besides that, he's the Generals nephew.

Saw something the other day that flu vaccines are free this year. Also protects against H1N1. It is always free for a certain segment of the population. That would be me. When they were in panic mode last year, it was free to everyone. So maybe they are saying it's free for those who don't need it. So what are my thoughts on this?  First of all, they have too much vaccine left over. If they give it out, the doctors can charge the health insurance $20. a shot. During the panic last year, I didn't get any shots. Once I found out that the upper crust wasn't getting the same as the rest of us, I was wary. I also took into consideration the financial crisis, where thet were trying to get money into circulation by any means. Everyone associated with getting the vaccine to people had to be paid. Another way of getting money into the economy. Didn't hurt the drug companies either.

Time to bash the Water Commision now. My wife's friend told me yesterday that she had a call from them asking if they should come out and change the meter? They said that the water bill was down and they wondered if they had changed the consumption or if the meter was broken. She told them that her husband was in the hospital for the last two months and he used to water the lawn like crazy. So they were happy with that.  I guess this begs the question that if the bill had doubled, would she still get a phone call about the condition of the meter?

My facebook note today is. "Aaah! I'm the victim of rapid ageing. I'm sure I was 19 yesterday."

Squatters To Be Shot

Awhile back I wrote about Canada Geese. The next day there was a half page article on the subject. It seems that when they fly south and stop for bed and board, some decide that they like the area, close to schools, shopping malls and especially parks, they decide to stay. They have five chicks a year for twenty years. So the squatter slums start getting larger. Not unlike humans, would you say? We don't know what to do with the humans but the Geese can be shot. In Canada the hunting season is 5 days, which they have just extended to 11 days. But just like the army, there are rules of engagement. The hunting season is prior to the peak travel season. We don't want to shoot vacationers going south. You can shoot them in a farmers field, but you have to get permission. Never said anything about dressing up as a Scarecrow. If you are one for a Christmas Goose, you need to have a freezer.

Speaking of "Rules of Engagement." I guess it's not shoot first, ask questions later. Looks like you have to call Headquarters first and get permission. The Capt. didn't do that and look what crapola he got in.

Military Culture

Breakfast finished, Obituary column finished, TV guide finished before I started. The Obituary column upset me. Too many people dying young. Does that mean they have started running out of old people? I am going to petition God to let people live longer. At least long enough to collect all the pension they have paid in. Maybe this is a Government conspiracry. After all they get to keep all the money.

Read this article yesterday and it pretains to military culture in Canada. It has to do with training manuals. And the use of sexual cartoons in these manuals. It appears now that the troops need pictures to understand. When I was in the Air Force, no pictures, all writing. The cartoons are no different than I get in emails. And I can understand why they did it. A sexual cartoon is much easier to remember than a paragraph. Ok, your wrist has ben slapped.

What I don't like about the article is this woman in Calgary, sitting behind a desk, presuming to know about military culture. Basic military culture, you have to learn how to kill people and people will definately try to kill you. Now I never agreed with the idea of women in combat. But women libbers had to have their way. So now women are equally able to get shot in the head. If captured, they won't be given a little BO Peep dress and sent back home. For them, getting killed would be the good part. This reporter need to see the mini-series "Pacific", war at its worse. Too naive to write about the military. There, you have been spanked. Oh crap! Did I say that out loud?

Saw this morning about a female member of parliament. She said that there was a move afoot to change the law concerning Honor Killings. That's where those dumb asses kill their daughter for going to the movies. My first thought was, "Hold on Trigger." Murder is murder. But with reading a few extra lines, the light bulb went on and all was clear. "In her statement, Ambrose said honour killings have no place in Canadian society and urged women’s groups to submit project proposals for government funding to prevent future violence." So the cat is out of the bag there. The Americans would call that pork. Up here, we call it fishy.

I see that in the gulf states, they are not too forthcoming with giving up any of that 20 billion to the fisherman. As they put it, not enough paperwork. I think that if you made $40,000. and paid your taxes you should have enough paperwork. But hey, the big guys have to get their cut first, so how much will be left?