Two things happened over the past few days that have me puzzled, puzzled. And all I'm wondering, as my Trini friends would say, how it go look?
First, I read that Government was looking to compulsorily acquire the former Sam Lord's Castle for "a mixed development of housing for low and middle income earners, recreational facilitites and tourism development".
While I normally wouldn't mind the ordinary Barbadian having a chance to own (relatively) beach front property, this story has me wondering if there isn't more in the mortar than the pestle. Here's why:
1. I don't see Government using prime beach front property to house locals, no matter how people-centred that Government may be. Least of all Sam Lord's Castle, that has long been a tourism site here.
2. CLICO currently owns Sam Lord's Castle. In my mind, if Government buys the property it lets CLICO off the hook from having to develop it. Many people feel that if CLICO can come up with the millions necessary to develop the site that would prove the company isn't in financial difficulties, as its head Leroy Parris has said repeatedly.
3. CLICO head Leroy Parris and Prime Minister David Thompson are longtime friends. It's the PM's right and privilege to be friends with whomever he wants, but my question is, how it go look?
The other thing which occrred is the leaking of the names of the 18 calypsonians who have made the semi-finals of the Pic-O-De-Crop competition. The leak is only half of this puzzle; what troubles me is the fact that the list of names was leaked BEFORE all the tents were judged! Wuhloss. How it go look?
I'm not surprised that an injunction is being brought against the National Cultural Foundation over this.
Just when I thought the festival would come to an end without any controversy....
You may have seen a couple of news stories about today being the 40th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.
There has been enough coverage that I don't feel like I have much to add. I covered Apollo 11 a couple of years ago. I talked about getting to attend the 20th Anniversary celebration at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, my close encounter with Armstrong and Aldrin, and Alexei Leonov.
You can read all about it if you want.
What I thought I'd do is regale you with some of my favorite stories from the early days of the space program as gleaned from years of research.
WERNER VON BRAUN
The guy who really got us to the moon was the Mexican Immigrant and German rocket scientist who went to great lengths to make sure he wound up as an American prisoner at the end of WWII, Werner von Braun. He took his basic design of the Nazi V-2 rocket and upscaled it to a ridonkulous degree to become the Saturn V moon rocket.
In the late 50's and early 60's, the Soviet Union was kicking our ass and calling us Shirley. They were scoring first after first in the space race with their heavy rocket boosters. Mainly because their nukes were less sophisticated than ours and required larger rockets, but I digress.
Meanwhile, our shit was blowing up like the most expensive fireworks display ever mounted! This was around the same time that President Kennedy decided, based on Alan Shepards 15 minute sub-orbital flight, to stick his thumb up the Communist's ass and declare "Fuck it. We're going to the moon! Catch us if you can you Godless Commie bastards!" (not an exact quote).
A reporter cornered Werner von Braun shortly after the announcement and asked him "Dr. von Braun, when we get to the moon, what do you think we will find there?"
Werner replied "At this rate...empty vodka bottles."
URINATION IN SPACE
Tom Wolfe told this story in "The Right Stuff". In order to pee in zero gravity, you needed to put on a condom with a tube at the end that led to a reservoir where the urine was stored until it could be ejected from the spacecraft using a special connection designed for that purpose. The entire system was referred to as the Waste Management System.
Taking a shit in space involved taping a baggie to your ass in an area about the same size as a Volkswaogon Beetle with two of your buddies sitting elbow to elbow. But I'm not even going there. I'm, sticking with the Urine Collection system.
In order for the Urine Collection system to work, the condom had to fit properly. The Urine Collection devices came in 3 sizes...Small, Medium and Large.
Well, no self-respecting Test Pilot turned Star Voyager was going to walk into the nerdy Flight Surgeon's office and declare he needed a SMALL Urine Collection Device.
So the Astronauts renamed the sizes. They became "Large, EXTRA Large, and UNBELIEVABLE!"
Shortly after docking with the Agena target vehicle, the mated spacecraft began spinning rapidly. After fighting the problem and burning precious attitude control fuel trying to bring the bucking bronco under control, Armstrong made the decision do release the Agena. Unknown to him at the time, the problem was a stuck thruster on his own Gemini craft which started tumbling even faster.
Armstrong and Scott were quickly approaching blackouts from centrifugal forces. Armstrong, havng difficulty seeing clearly and having trouble communicating with Houston, broke all the rules and manually disabbled the Orbital Attitude Manuevering System, activated the Re-entry Control System, manually stabilized the craft, initiated re-entry manuevers via hand controllers, and brought the spacecraft to a splashdown within 3 miles of the recovery Aircraft Carrier.
Amazing cool.
There are other stories regarding the LLRV and the actual lunar landing that had less than 10 seconds of fuel left in the tanks.
It is an epic tale of exploration that concludes here.
You cannot begin to imagine the impact that this had on a 13 year old technophile.
If I believe that we can solve any problem through science and technology, this is why. We have and we can.
Can't name a single problem we have overcome or goal we have achieved through faith & prayer.
For the first time in over 3 years of blogging, I've had to put in place a restriction on comments.
It is the least restrictive method that Blogger offers...one of those word verification things to prove you are a human and not a robot.
I've recently been getting a lot of spammy comments. I'm not knowledgeable enough to to determine where they are coming from, I just know that A) I can't read them. They appear to be Asian. And B) Some of my domestic readers have received similar spam from the same source and I blame myself.
If they were just annoying comments on my posts, I could live with that. But when they become an annoyance to my fellow bloggers, it's time to shut them down.
I apologize to my readers if this change inconveniences them. That is not my intent. I just don't want to be a nexus of nuisance for others.
Feel free to leave me comments expressing your feedback.
"Panetta briefed lawmakers on June 24 on an unspecified counterterrorism program, according to a letter from seven House Democrats to Panetta made public Wednesday. The June 26 letter characterized Panetta as testifying that the CIA "concealed significant actions from all members of Congress, and misled members for a number of years from 2001 to this week."
It does not surprise me at all that Dick Cheney would order the CIA to conduct illegal, covert, surveillance on American citizens and then order them to not disclose it to the congressional oversight committees whose job it is to make sure the CIA is operating within the law.
Just to make this crystal clear, this means that Dick Cheney committed criminal acts while in office and ordered others to commit criminal acts.
I hope Eric Holder has the balls to prosecute him. Dick Cheney spent 8 years shitting all over the concept of co-equal branches of government, pissing all over the idea of checks and balances, and wiping his ass with the constitution.
WASHINGTON — Pentagon health experts are urging Defense Secretary Robert Gates to ban the use of tobacco by troops and end its sale on military property, a change that could dramatically alter a culture intertwined with smoking.
Jack Smith, head of the Pentagon's office of clinical and program policy, says he will recommend that Gates adopt proposals by a federal study that cites rising tobacco use and higher costs for the Pentagon and Department of Veterans Affairs as reasons for the ban."
You have GOT to be fucking kidding me! We make up bullshit reasons to go to war with Iraq and send our soldiers into a meat grinder, we get over 4,000 of them killed dead, tens of thousands of others maimed and wounded and these fucktards want to take their cigarettes away from them?
These soldiers, regardless of why they were sent into harms way, are risking their fucking lives 24/7, being ripped away from their families, being forced to stay in the military past the end of their enlistment, being re-deployed over and over again and we're going to take that as an opportunity to help them quit smoking? Really?
That's beyond shenanigans and bullshit. That's just fucking stupid and it's spitting in the faces of our troops.
Look, I quit smoking almost 3 years ago. In fact, on July 31st it will be exactly 3 years. I'm glad I did it. Smartest thing I ever did and I've never had the urge to start smoking again. But unlike some folks, I did not become a born-again anti-smoking Nazi. I don't give a flying fuck at a rolling donut whether other people smoke or not. I'm not a smoke free zealot and I think businesses should be able to choose whether they want to allow smoking or not. I let my smoking friends smoke in my house. I even keep an ash tray around for them. Because I'm a tolerant person and a good host.
But I'll tell you what. If you were to pick me up, strap 90 pounds of armor and equipment on me, send me into a live firefight in 110 degree heat with bullets whizzing by me, explosions going off, people around me being ripped apart and killed, after it was over and I realized I was still alive, I bet a cigarette would taste pretty fucking good! After a couple of good smokes I'd worry about shovelling the shit out of my pants and puking up everything I'd eaten in the past 12 years.
Taking cigarettes away from fighting soldiers is the sort of thing that could only be conceived of by fat-assed academics sitting in air conditioned offices who think they are being protected by the 70 year old security guard at the front desk of their building.
"One in three service members use tobacco, the report says, compared with one in five adult Americans. The heaviest smokers are soldiers and Marines, who have done most of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, the study says. About 37% of soldiers use tobacco and 36% of Marines. Combat veterans are 50% more likely to use tobacco than troops who haven't seen combat."
GEE! Ya fucking think? Who saw that coming? Jesus Fucking Christ, people.
"The military complicates attempts to curb tobacco use by subsidizing tobacco products for troops who buy them at base exchanges and commissaries, says Kenneth Kizer, a committee member and architect of California's anti-tobacco program.
Seventy percent of profits from tobacco sales — $88 million in 2005 — pays for recreation and family support programs, the study stays."
So by banning tobacco, not only are we depriving the fighting soldiers who are protecting OUR FREEDOM of one of the extremely few ways they have to deal with the stress we thrust them into, but we are also harming their families back home by cutting funding for their support.
You know what? Not only should tobacco NOT be banned, not only should the military continue to subsidize tobacco products at the BX/PXs, but any soldier who chooses to smoke should receive gift wrapped cartons at regular intervals with a card hand-signed by the president.
Anytime a soldier pulls out a cigarette, their commanding officer (or the nearest U.S. citizen) should rush to their side like a tip-hungry bartender, whip out a solid gold lighter and light that soldiers cigarette while reminding them that the American people appreciate their sacrifice.
If our soldiers want to smoke, let them smoke. I think they've earned the right to do as they please.
