A Pilot's "Dinner speech"

A friend sent this piece to me yesterday. Over the course of living a pretty full life, I've encountered two groups who thoroughly loved their work...cops and pilots. The pilot who authored these words summed up a pilot's love affair with his work as well as any I've seen before:

Change Of Command Dinner speech by CDR "Beef" Wellington, former USNR VFA-203 "Blue Dolphins" C.O.

"Two days ago I closed out my career as a Naval Aviator. The realization is just now starting to hit me, as I'm sure it will the rest of you someday. What follows are my remarks at my farewell dinner. Several of the guys in my squadron had asked me for a copy of what I had written and because it had been jotted down on the back of a cocktail napkin in my weird-assed hand writing and because these things came from my heart, I debated for a while whether or not to write it down, but the response from all the guys and their wives was so humbling and overwhelming, I thought... why not.

Being an F/A-18 pilot and an airline pilot at the same time gives you an interesting and different perspective. Unlike others, at my airline (NWA) they do not have a history of hiring Single Seat Naval Aviators and as such we are definitely in the minority. On every trip when you first sit down next to a guy, the first volley of questions in getting to know each other always includes "What is your background?" Based on 3 years in the airline industry, I have recently decided to flat out lie and stop telling guys that I am a Naval Aviator and an F/A-18 pilot. You might be asking yourself, why would anyone do that?

There are 3 reasons.

One - Because everything that the uninformed population knows about Naval Aviation they got from the movie Top Gun: a credible and reliable source of information if there ever was one.

Two - Because when I tell guys that I am an F/A-18 pilot, the machismo and bravado that immediately comes from the left side of the cockpit becomes somewhat intolerable and I am forced to sit and listen to stories for the next 4 days that go something like, "Mike, did I tell you about the time when I landed my C-5 on a 15,000 foot runway with only 30,000 pounds of fuel in the tanks, with the weather at minus, and oh, oh yeah, did I say it was at night." You gotta be $hi **** n' me!

Three - Because, in their state of curiosity, invariably questions get asked about what flying the F/A-18 is like and what this business of Naval Aviation is all about. It is in my futile attempts to answer these questions that I have finally decided that it is impossible to do so. How can anyone possibly explain Naval Aviation?

How do you explain what it has been like to have seen the entire world through the canopy of an F/A-18 like a living IMAX film?

How do you explain what is like to fly an engineering marvel that responds to your every whim of airborne imagination?

How do you explain the satisfaction that comes from seeing a target under the diamond disappear at the flick of your thumb?

How do you explain catapult shots - especially the night ones?

How do explain the exhilaration of the day trap?

How do you possibly explain finding yourself at 3/4 mile [on final], at night, weather down, deck moving, hyperventilating into your mask, knowing that it will take everything you have to get aboard without killing yourself?

How do you explain moons so bright and nights so dark that they defy logic?

How do you explain sunrises and sunsets so glorious that you knew in your heart that God had created that exact moment in time just for you?

How do you explain the fellowship of the ready room where no slack is given and none is taken?

How do you explain an environment where the content of a man's character can be summed up into two simple 4-word phrases - "He's a good Sh**" or "He's a F---in' idiot."

How do you explain the heart of maintenance professionals whose only enjoyment comes from taking care of our young sailors and providing us with "up" jets to execute our craft?

How do you explain the dedication of our young troops who we burden with the responsibilities of our lives and then pay them peanuts to do so?

How do you explain the type of women who are crazy enough to marry into Naval Aviation, who endure long working hours and long periods of separation and who are painfully and quietly forced to accept the realization that they are second to the job?

The simple fact is that you can't explain it; none of it.

It is something that only a very select few of us will ever know. We are bonded for life by our proprietary knowledge and it excludes all others from our fraternity. As I will, no matter where you go or what do, you should cherish that knowledge for the rest of your life. For when I am 90 years old sitting on my porch in my rocking chair and someone asks me what I have done with my life, I will damn sure not tell them I was an airline pilot, but rather I will reach into my pocket, pull out my Blue Dolphin money clip and tell them I was a Naval Aviator, I worked with the finest people on the planet, and that I was the Commanding Officer of the Blue Dolphins."

Zoom

Barney Fife Lives....in Georgia ! & Iowa, & TX, & MA, & WI, & CA

I feel so much more secure knowing that officer Kelly is on the job...don't you? This is why Barney got only one bullet and he had to keep it in his shirt pocket.

Sept. 2013 update:

Hadn't had a look at this piece since putting it up a couple of years ago, I thought it might be interesting to see what became of officer Kelly.  Didn't find much about her, but there have been some substantial writers and publications weighing in since then.

FORBES 2011:  "The Inexplicable War on Lemonade Stands"

American Thinker 2012:   "Lemonade Freedom Day"


A lot of folks believe this issue is trending much larger than some kids' stands.


Adios

Nabisco Round Saltine Crackers

It’s an oxymoron, isn’t it?  Noticed about a week ago that my life-long saltine cracker maker, NABISCO, had changed its package…nothing new there—see my earlier rants in the blog about the toilet paper makers jerking around with their packaging.  This ongoing jiggering with packaging, flavors, and weights irritates me on other levels, but this one is a direct attack on one of our fundamental, life-long preferences.

Of course, one of the principal reasons for the change is to confuse consumers so they will pay more for less product…a quasi-clever way to raise prices—significantly.  That’s going on across the board with all manufacturers and is made ever simpler since the advent of EXCEL spreadsheet programs.  The problem with those programs is that they are only good at if-then-else calculations, and utterly clueless with regard to whether a considered change will enrage their customers, or not.  I suppose it's the marketing department’s job to make that calculus, and you know what I generally think about unbridled marketing.  But then, I’m just a Dilbert-type technical guy.  I suspect there are a few of my kind muttering quietly to themselves somewhere back in the dark, hot, and greasy parts of some NABISCO plants.

In a world where airlines that once ran their operations without much drama, we now observe those operations run by today’s current crop of managers having serious problems figuring out how to get passengers off a stranded airplane at the gate…for 7-hours!  And now we have the Giant Kraft Foods, owner of NABISCO since about 2000, under the leadership of the ladies shown above, apparently seeing no problem trashing an American standard we have known all our lives.

Time will tell how this works out for them, but for now the house brand saltines at half the price are just fine by me.  One thing those spreadsheet programs cannot calculate is the effect of my dropping OREOs, Maxwell House, and pretty much anything “NABISCO” from my shopping rotation.  With the problems today’s “enlightened” management teams" seem to be having running their “core” businesses, I doubt they will ever figure out what went wrong and why.  But then again, few of them stick around long enough to care much about that anyway.

I may address flavored salt next.

Dec. 2012 Update:  Apparently our dissatisfaction with this ham-fisted maneuver has had some effect.  I've got a much larger selection of my old standards back on the shelf.  But take notice my NABISCO friends, those "house" brand saltines are just as good as yours and at half the price.  Now you've got to get to work and re-sell your product to me.  And I've generally dropped most of your products from my shopping list.  This particular move on your part was disgusting in my mind....or, maybe just dumb !

BTW, this article is one of the most heavily visited pages in this blog.

Adios 

Abandon Ship!

Friday, three days ago, the Italian cruise ship, Costa Concordia, struck rocks near a Tuscan island off Italy's Mediterranean coast.  Aboard were over 4200 people and to date the losses appear to be fairly minimal.  However, the pictures of such a large ship on its side are striking.

Almost immediately, reports were in circulation of the ship’s captain behaving in a cowardly manner as the ship was foundering.  Tuesday, this morning, recordings of radio transmissions between his company’s dispatcher and the captain began to broadcast over news media.  The recordings appear to support the earlier reports…the captain had abandoned his ship among some of the first of those subsequently recovered by rescuers.

Having served, in the distant past, as a member of a blue water ocean-going crew, I have some modest knowledge of those who go down to the sea in ships.  There’s about 60,000 miles of modest sea-going knowledge sitting somewhere in my ROM.

This old salt’s quick thoughts are: (1) it’s dumb to be that close to a shore unless leaving or entering a port; (2) current day super size cruise ships look awfully top heavy—they fail my stability eye-ball test; (3) the captain, age 52, is a card-carrying member of the Italian chapter of the FBG; (4) there are no mitigating circumstances in this event; (5) how big is that lumbering beast?

The Costa Concordia and the USS Reagan are about the same size, nominally 114,000-tons.  Each is nominally about 1000-ft long; the Reagan is incrementally larger in both dimensions.  Center of gravity and moment arm, two fundamental concepts taught to every Freshman future engineer, determine a floating vessel’s stability.  It would be desirable to have the CG located underwater on the keel.  However, that is not possible.  The next best design would place the CG as low as possible and would preclude stacking too much weight high above the waterline. 

Although this current event appears to be a matter of stupidity and not a CG issue, I think the CG issue is worth planting near these dramatic images, as it’s a question that has long dogged my acceptance of fun in the sun cruising.  It has always seemed to me that a large, top-heavy cruise ship would be inherently unstable in a heavy sea-state--stabilizers and such notwithstanding. 

Add in the presence of captains like this current character who are legally the absolute “authority” aboard that ship while it’s in International waters, frequent main propulsion failures, frequent food poisoning, frequent missing passengers presumably gone overboard, foreign non-English speaking crews, and a few other troubling conditions…nope, I’m content here onshore. 

Before a Navy ship is deployed to foreign waters it always undergoes strenuous sea trials to prove the integrity of its systems and structures.  Some of the most dramatic trials are the high-speed runs with throttles full open, the props thrown into full reverse while at full speed, and high speed turns as the Reagan is doing below.  Note both the list and the demonstration of the vessel’s stability.  It’s probably making in excess of 35-knots…I think the rudder is thrown to its full travel in that direction, so it’s bearing the full force of all that water pushed against it by a quickly moving 114,000 ton vessel…that’s a lot of stress on the rudder and its support structures.

Draught is another stability contributor.  The more the better; however, the more you have, the fewer the ports that can handle the ship.  The Reagan has a 37-ft. draught; the Costa Concordia, 24-ft.

The pictures coming in from this event are fascinating…I’ve never seen anything this dramatic before, nor thankfully did I ever see a ship sink.  Images of a sinking ship have always struck me as a spooky scene, and these show some remarkably clear views of the underside of those top-heavy vessels that trouble me so.  I would like to see more mass hanging under the water line.

Settlement Offers:

No. 1:  Refund cruise fare plus 30% discount on all future cruises!
No. 2:  $14,000  (28 Jan 2012).

Previous Recent Events:

Underway !

Occupy Flint. . . seriously!

. . . interesting juxtaposition . . .

Adios

Dilbert - Outsourcing

Comment withheld.

Adios

Why the Blog?

Well, to tell the truth, it’s not because I have a deep, life-long affinity for any of my old classmates or the school….I don’t. I left EH somewhat unsettled and a little irritated although I had a pretty good trip through the place. You know, I’m finding from the way a number of you have expressed yourselves or dodged me, that a number of us left dear old EH in that condition…a little unsettled.

Nevertheless, many of us seem to have a lingering warm spot in our hearts for the place and for some of those there during our matriculation. We spent an awful lot of time together and had the opportunity to make both some good and bad decisions while there. I envy the Class of 1960 who seem to have maintained close associations with one another over the span of 50-years; some of us did that, but it appears that there were not many.

This blog started in 2006 more as a curiosity about the technology. Blogging was relatively new then and it had the, “buzz” within the techie community. Now, the “buzz” has moved to Twitter and Facebook, but I think neither of them provide the solid foundation for something like this like a blog does. I do participate in the Facebook community, but I don’t tweet.

The focus on EH was chosen because it seemed to be an old topic that might find some interest, but not so much as to be overwhelming. It also seemed to be a topic where some meaningful information sharing could take place and perhaps a better understanding of how or why a lot of us left…a little unsettled.

I’ll poke at some people either here or through Facebook to encourage their participation. They tend to be people I knew fairly well, thought well of, and who I know can probably answer questions I pose to them. Their responses, or lack thereof, tell me something about them as they are today.

It’s pretty clear that a lot of us are techie neophytes and exceedingly wary about interacting with someone we don’t “know” online. My anonymous approach is somewhat off-putting to them and I understand that…we’ve been conditioned by the scare stories.

It has never been my intention to settle any old scores here, although it is troublingly easy to do those kinds of things in this space. Frankly, I don’t have any unsettled old scores. However, I do have one unrequited love and a couple of administration piss-offs I would enjoy understanding better as a means to clear out some old occupied space in an otherwise uncluttered mind. And the amazing thing about this technology is that such things are possible.

Adios

Dilbert - Post Graduate Education

Got it?

Dilbert - Pointy Haired Boss on a Tear

A whole week of the boss on a tear. And below, remember this boss from the past?

Adios

Better Than Typical

Andy Rooney, 92, perhaps our nation’s favorite curmudgeon, passed away Friday night. Nearly anything you would want to learn about him can be readily found elsewhere online, so I wanted to share something about him that you may not too easily find online.

During WWII, Private Rooney was a London-based writer for Stars and Stripes, the Army newspaper. In that role he lived a safe and comfortable life, but was forever affected by his observations of American soldiers, particularly the Army Air Force airmen. His contemporary writing and post-WWII reminisces involving those aviators were, in my opinion, some of the most insightful words on the subject ever crafted.

Over the years he expressed similar thoughts in a number of published pieces. I particularly liked the chapter in his 1995 memoir, “My War,” in which he told his heartfelt story of the young airmen he had known in WWII England well enough to bring tears. While that chapter is too long to post here, the following introduction Mr. Rooney wrote for a 1981 book entitled, “One Last Look,” is a fine example of his masterful wordsmithing.

MEMORIES
By Andy Rooney

London—There’s just so much sentimental baggage you can carry through life. I’m not much for reunions. Anyone who has reached the age of 60 could easily spend the rest of his days just sitting around, remembering.

I’m here at this old U.S. 8th Air Force Base near Bedford, England, though, because members of the 306th Bomb Group are having a reunion and I flew with them on the first U.S. bombing raid on Nazi Germany in February 1943. It’s sentimental baggage I carry easily and with great pride.

It’s been 40-years now since these men flew their four-engined Flying Fortresses out of here. They’re the kind of men Americans like to think are typical Americans, but they’re better than typical. They’re special. A lot of World War II Air Force men are.

It was a terrible war for them although during this reunion they’re managing to recall a lot of the good things about it. It would be too sad if they didn’t. It was terrible because so many of them were killed. One evening they’d be sitting around their huts talking, worrying, playing cards and writing letters home. The next evening, if there had been a bombing mission that day, the bed next to theirs or the one next to that—and maybe both—might be empty, its former occupant, their pal, dead. Perhaps he had gone down in a parachute that caught fire. “Who burned Bailey?” MacKinley Kantor wrote. “Was it you?”

It was a great and terrible war for me because, as a young reporter for the Army newspaper, The Stars and Stripes, I was in a strange position. I came to this base often when the bombers went out, and when they returned—if they returned—I talked to the crews about what had happened. Then I’d return to London and write my story. I often felt ashamed of myself for not being one of them. I was having the time of my life as a newspaperman and they were fighting and dying. That’s how I came to fly with them just that once to Wilhelmshaven. It made me feel better about myself.

Looking out at the crumbling remains of the old runways at this airfield, I’m haunted by flashes of memory. Often the bombers came back badly damaged and with crew members dead or dying. In April 1943, I was here when they came back from a raid deep in Germany and one of the pilots radioed in that he was going to have to make an emergency landing. He had only two engines left and his hydraulic system was gone. He couldn’t let the wheels down and there was something even worse. The ball turret gunner was trapped in the plastic bubble that hung beneath the belly of the bomber.

Later I talked with the crewmen who survived that landing. Their friend in the ball turret had been calm, they said. They had talked to him. He knew what they had to do. He understood. The B-17 slammed down on its belly…and on the ball turret with their comrade inside it.

 
There are funny stories, too. Everyone here remembers the eccentric gunner Snuffy Smith. Sgt. Maynard Smith. He was an oddball kind of guy, but he did his job well in the air. The Air force loved to give medals and they had good reason in Snuffy Smith’s case. On one occasion, Henry Stimson, then called secretary of war, came to England, and officials, thinking this would be good time for publicity for the Air Force and the secretary, arranged to give Snuffy Smith the Medal of Honor. The whole entourage came to this base with the secretary and a dozen generals, but the hero was nowhere to be found. It turned out he was in the kitchen washing dishes. He was on KP, being disciplined for some minor infraction of the base rules.

This reunion is a bittersweet experience. Last evening I had a drink at the bar where there was a gathering, and a strong-looking weather-beaten man came over and quietly said he’d like to buy me a drink. He’s a Nebraska farmer now. He had been the tail gunner on the Banshee, the B-17 I flew in over Wilhelmshaven. We’d been hit that day and it was a terrifying trip, but it made a good story for me. We laughed and talked together and he paid for the drink. As we lifted our glasses in a mutual toast, I noticed that two fingers on his right hand were missing. It often happened to crewmen who stuck by their guns while their hands froze.

And he was buying me a drink.

Headlight - A Real "Game Changer"

Regular readers may recall that I don’t like to use clichés and that their overuse in popular media tends to make my skin crawl. This or that thing being proclaimed a “game changer” by some breathless, young TV talking head…well, you get the point. However, let me take a moment to share something I really do view as a “game changer.”

Had the heating tech out yesterday and ushered him into the bowels of the house where the heating beast resides…not much light in there. I was ready with a long power cord and bright work light, but the guy never asked for it!

When I checked in on him, I saw he was wearing the most amazing “game changer” I had seen in a long time. It was a small headband with a very bright LED light array attached to the center of his forehead. He was quietly and effectively working away with BOTH of his hands, a bright light shining wherever he looked, and absolutely oblivious to the fact that he was in our black hole of Calcutta.

This topic doesn’t need many words…if you work with your hands doing anything, you will immediately see the benefit. Cost: about $12 to $20 at your local home repair warehouse, uses 3 triple A batteries, life is about 15-hours or more, mine weighs just under 3 oz with batteries—hardly noticeable, light element section rotates downward so you can see what you are doing while sitting.

Caution: The added benefit of it throwing light where you are looking will also blind an innocent bystander, should you turn to look at them. On the other hand, most “innocent bystanders” are usually offering unsolicited advice about the job YOU are doing, so maybe the retina boiling beam will discourage those irritations, too.

Maybe these lights have been around for a long time and the rest of the world has long known of them, but then again, I haven’t spent much time browsing the fix ‘em up emporiums in recent years. Go get yourself one of these, or maybe 2 or 3….you will be pleased.

Adios

Dilbert - Apps & Creativity

Adios

Computers & Fords

I don’t normally forward email jokes etc. around, but this one sent to me by a friend, is worth sharing.  For all of us who feel only the deepest love and affection for the way computers have enhanced our lives, read on.

At a recent computer expo (COMDEX), Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated,

'If Ford had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon.'

In response to Bill Gates's comments, Ford issued a press release, stating:

'If Ford had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics (and I just love this part):

1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash......... twice a day.

2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.

4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would run on only five percent of the roads.

6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single 'This Car Has Performed An Illegal Operation' warning light.

7. The airbag system would ask 'Are you sure?' before deploying.

8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.

9. Every time a new car was introduced, car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as in the old car.

10. You'd have to press the 'Start' button to turn the engine off.

PS - I 'd like to add that when all else fails, you could call 'customer service' in some foreign country and be instructed in some foreign language how to fix your car yourself!!!!

Adios

Day the Music Died

Steve Jobs died recently and that’s a shame. The shame is that he only got 56-years; the blessing was that they were very good years. Our own Steve has been gone for 6-years now and he got 4-years more than did Steve Jobs. Just pondering….

The purpose of this posting is not to eulogize someone I didn’t know. Except for a project on the other side of the earth where an Apple computer was all that was available, I’ve not used any of his company’s products. The purpose of this posting is to suggest that when the music stops, one’s opportunity to sing along also stops. What does Gus mean?

Gus respectfully suggests that when he asks you to contribute a picture or scan of something for the Highlander blog he thinks you may have, maybe while the music is still playing, you could find a minute or two to send Gus what he requested. We’ve already gotten 11-more years than Steve Jobs got, so who knows how much longer we have? Could be a lot; could be lights out tomorrow.

What do you say? And for those of you who think no response is a legitimate response, let me suggest that it is not. It’s just bad-mannered.


Adios

Dilbert - Servers Down

Scott Adams has nailed it again. When bankers buy a company, they usually have a 5-year horizon to "add value" and improve EBIT "matrices" before they dump their "financially engineered" creation off to another group of moneyed morons. Watch the old Wall Street film, ("greed is good") for a dramatization of what I'm talking about.

Generally, they have little clue about how the companies they purchase do their thing, but do know from the starting balance sheet that they can't screw things up so badly that it implodes before they dump it within their 5-year window.  In the meantime, they install a temporary "management team" of revolving door flunkies to watch over their pillaging of the company and do what they must to keep the bones together during that 5-year window.

Invariably, leaders similar to Dilbert's Pointy-Haired boss are installed at key positions and given the charge to reduce their “headcounts.”  One of the commonalities these pointy-haired leaders share is an almost manic drive to avoid taking responsibility for any of the technology being used by their “headcounts.”  To their underlings…the ones who are often responsible for the success of the enterprise the bankers bought…these new leaders are viewed as empty suits, which they often are.  Adams has captured one small glimpse of this dynamic very well indeed.

Adios

Same Space, Different Time

Sixty years separate these pictures...note the shades descending from Truman's new porch on the left.  The kid has no clue about the significance or history of the place, nor I suspect, do most of those on the right.  However, the 29-year old man on the far left understood the place very well.

Dad had been recalled to the Air Force during the Korean War and the picture was taken during a working trip to the Pentagon.  Six years earlier, he was in the air over occupied Europe flying with the Eighth Air Force bomber streams.  He saw over 40 airplanes go down nearby him, came home, went to college, worked  a couple of years for a power company, and here he was in Washington.  Better than anyone else in the pictures, he understood the history and significance of the place.

Adios

Dilbert - Powerpoint Portal

New wave managers have been spending extraordinary amounts of time--staff time, actually--farting around with these Powerpoint slides. They are used in place of the old chalk boards, overhead projector slides, and flip charts which aren't as pretty, but did get the job done for decades. Staff, who once went home at 5:00, now go home at 10:00; CEOs who once refereed their subordinates' squabbles or played golf, now spend entire days pestering their staff to make minor changes in the Powerpoint slides, as internal warfare rages amongst the subordinates. After all that, Dilbert's strip pretty clearly tells the story.
Adios

Dilbert - Goal Setting

Saw a new CEO come to town once with this bit of nonsense in his mostly empty arsenal and try to graft it to an existing organization of highly experienced old timers. The most common response he got was, "you've got to be sh**ing me." Played out about like the cartoon suggests.

THUS ENDED CAPITALISM

Speaks for itself.
Adios

9-11 From Space

This striking photo taken from orbit overhead provides a terrific overview of the outrage. It started circulating on some of the online news outlets yesterday. To my mind, an image like this clearly shows just how much real estate enemies of this country would have to overcome to really do us serious damage.

Although the attack was immensely tragic and those who would try more such attacks remain focused on their evil intent, it’s worth remembering that most of them lack running water, are mostly illiterate, and they go to war with box cutters or in the back of small pick-up trucks. It seems constructive to use images like this to keep things in perspective.

The direct loss of human life at this site on this day was about 0.001% of our population, or stated another way, less than half the number of all people we lose every day in this country from all causes.

On the eve of the 10th anniversary of the savage act in 2001, we are looking for a number of potential threats, but mostly for 3 individuals who have apparently been tasked to detonate a car bomb somewhere. The news further states that if they fail in that attack, they have been ordered to murder as many of our citizens as possible where they can. Seems to me that a similar attack could be activated on any given day anywhere, so it’s incumbent on us to remain vigilant, say a prayer, but not to be frightened to go about our business…it’s only 3 morons, after all. And even if it were to be 20 morons, the image shows the worst they have been able to muster thus far.

Hitch ‘em up, my fellow Americans.

By the way, Capt. Sully landed his plane just under the "H" in Hudson River.

Adios

Dilbert and the Poor Communicator

If you spent any time in a large corporation or university during the past 15-years or so, you most likely heard some of this stuff. Utter gibberish flowing from the mouths of newly-minted MBAs.

Adios