Fogbow

Foggy wrote: ↑Thu Aug 25, 2022 4:55 pm Yeah, well, everything she ever said about my weight was wrong, after which she decided she was the boss of how much I'm allowed to weigh.

So why should I invite comment?

She's very smart about a lot of things. My weight isn't one of them. :batting:sign

Hey buddy... I had to up-size my wardrobe -in the past year. However I have not signed up for dancing w/barbells (which I probably need to do)

Yeah, kids today, get off a my lawn.

You have to join a gym, and after 65 there are options for Medicare supplements that are zero premium and include free membership in the gym. So if you live long enough, dancing with barbells is free.

Today I had a wonderful opportunity to get a cute little girl to stop crying ... and it worked! I still got it!

So the instructor of my class had to bring her 3 year old to the class. There's a little equipment room off the big room, and I built the kid a desk out of the meter-wide benches and risers (this is the second desk I've built for a small girl in that room, I'm putting it on my résumé now). And Mom brought a tablet, a toy tablet to keep her occupied, and she could use it on her new desk. So far, so good.

But her mom was flitting about getting ready to start the class (she has a butterfly tattoo on her shoulder, I get to say flitting) and suddenly Mommy walked right out of the big room and was gone.

And I was standing there minding my own business getting ready for the class, and all of a sudden the little girl was melting down completely and managed to squeak out, "My mom!" OMG, end of the world.

That's when my instincts kicked in, and I did three things:

1) I started telling her that her mom was COMING RIGHT BACK, which was a completely insufficient response by a total stranger (who's a large scary mammal), but at least it was the correct thing to say, and it got her attention, and

2) I kneeled down so I would be approximately her height, and wouldn't tower over her in any kind of threatening way, but

3) I didn't kneel down facing her, like I had any idea of touching her or even really paying attention to her at all, and definitely not even looking at her. Instead, I knelt down facing the door of the big room, where her mom had left. And I pointed to the door, because that's where we were going to look until Mommy came back.

So that little girl didn't know who the hell I was, but she knew that from that moment forward, by gum, we were waiting together until Mommy came back, and I wasn't going to do anything or go anywhere until Mommy came back ... and damn if'n that little girl didn't stop crying and decided to wait it out with me.

And we stuck it out at least another whole 25 or 30 seconds before sure enough, Mommy came back and life was good again.

What a fabulous way to start a class, huh? I still got it. Sometimes I worry that I've become a scary scary monster in my dotage, and then something like that happens.

That's my last good deed for the day, though.

Foggy's a HERO!!!!!!!!!!!! Great tips so you won't be scary to kids. I liked the idea of giving her something to do with you!

I am not scary to kids. Of course a three year old is likely half of my height anyway.

Well done, Foggy!

If you need any other distraction/help, here's the Gangnam Style Elevator Guy for 10 FREAKING HOURS. Of course, this is Noh Hong-chul with his trademark pelvis-thrusting dance. For 10 full hours. Enjoy!





Here's a funny short video that shows the making of the scene, they had to keep pressing the elevator button to get it to open/close the doors.


https://serviceapi.nmv.naver.com/ugc/fl ... height=408


(In case you haven't seen it in a while, here's Gangnam Style, but with English subtitles to understand what the lyrics are about.)

That dance looks like they watched too many bad cowboy musicals...

What is with all the hip-thrusting ??? Is that from pornhub.com? My poor eyes. I thought we were a family friendly site.
So what is his onlyfans link so I may sign up?

Scheduled Maintenance: We will shut down briefly at 6:00 a.m. Eastern (US), September 11.

Um, ah. 9/11 -- could you not pick a better day to potentially crash/burn?

I do maintenance every Sunday at 6:00 a.m.

My control over the numbering system of the Gregorian calendar is somewhat limited.

I have it on good authority that OBL is feeding the goldfish sharks and poses no threat to any forum

OMG, existential crisis today, I thought I misplaced a tool! But it's okay, I found it.

New staple gun, bought it in the spring, super nice graphite composite construction, and I know I bought several sizes of staples. Let's see, I used it to repair some screen on the screened-in porch, and it was in the yellow/black toolbox, but when I finished that project I put everything away, and ... and I know I put everything in the garage, because they're tools ... and I know it's black, whereas all my previous staple guns have been stainless steel ... and wherever it is, the boxes of staples have to be with it, because that's the kind of anal Earthling I am ... but I've been spending a lot of time in the garage lately and I have seen almost everything in there, but I haven't seen the staple gun since at least May ... and where the heck?

Oh, wait. I put it in a box that it didn't come in so there would be room for the boxes of staples, so as to keep everything together, and I even made a label with my label making gizmo, and it says "STAPLE GUN" and it's right there on the shelf that I looked at four times already, but I was looking for a staple gun, not a box labeled "STAPLE GUN". Whew.

So I didn't misplace a tool, I outsmarted myself in placing the tool in its new home.

Momma said there'd be days like this.

Tsk tsk tsk ... don't intermingle staple guns with all those top secret documents, like some 30'000 emails

Yeah, on the bright side, I found it before we went to bed, otherwise I'd have some stupid idea where it might be and I'd be sneaking very quietly downstairs to check out my goddamned garage at two o'clock in the morning, because I can't lose a tool.

Ol' Wifehorn thinks I'm a little anal about my tools, but that's utterly ridiculous.

Foggy, you just described my life.

Whoa, you thought you misplaced a tool too also?

Oh, wait ...

Yeah, I've met the gentleman.

Not him. Not a tool. Placing any object any place. I need a ring in every room in my house and three in the garage.

Tiredretiredlawyer wrote: ↑Mon Sep 12, 2022 5:30 pm Placing any object any place. I need a ring in every room in my house and three in the garage.

I think I get it. Ol' Wifehorn is constantly looking for stuff, because - this is just an example that actually doesn't happen any more, but ... back in the day, when she finished a phone conversation, she was done with the phone and she would set it down on the nearest flat surface, with no conscious attention to where she was putting it, and she would just walk away. Then it would take her time to find the phone when she wanted to make a call, and I'd have to call her number so it would (hopefully) ring where she could hear it.

Is that what you mean?

Today she spends so much time on the phone, she can't misplace it.

And she's like that with tools, which would make me insane. I take the time to put my tools back where they belong so I can find them immediately when I need them. What happened today fits my pattern precisely, EXCEPT I had never used the tool even once since May, when I gave it a new home in the garage. NOW I know where it's kept, and finding it will never be a problem again, even if I don't need it until next May ... or unless ol' Wifehorn borrows it, whichever comes first.

And even then, I'll see the boxes of staples lying around.

My great-grandfather on my paternal grandmother's side, Isaac William Littell, who graciously donated his middle and last names to be my first and middle names. At the bottom of this article, you will see that he had five children, and his daughter Mary Frances Littell married Admiral George Sloan Bryan. She was my grandmother, my dad's mother, who died in 1986.

That collar looks really uncomfortable.

Whoa, my grandpa won the Navy Cross and the Legion of Merit. I had no idea.




From his obit in the failing NY Times:

In World War I he commanded the Yangtze River gunboat Monacacy and later became fleet engineer for the Asiatic Fleet. After the war he was commander of the destroyer Yarborough, the destroyer tender Melville and the battleship Maryland.

He won the Navy Cross in World War I and the Legion of Merit in World War II.

So continuing my research, my dad's brother George Jr. had a master's degree in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University, but they didn't give him a degree in law for some reason. I have no idea why not, they gave one to everybody else.

And now it turns out that Grandpa George wrote three books:

Radio Manual for the Instruction of Midshipmen, 1926

Edison, The Man And His Work, 1926 (I ordered a copy on Amazon)

Aeronautical Charts, 1942 (height of WWII)

About the Yarborough

.

Coooooooolllllll!

Yeah, and I get seasick.

Okay, last post about my paternal grandfather, I'm brushing up because Thursday we're going up to Bathysphere or wherever it is to see my dad, and I want to surprise him.

So I've learned that my grandpa (we called him Dee) was captain of four ships, and I showed two of those today, and the Maryland upthread somewhere.

I do find it amusing that he was commanding officer of one of the largest ships in the United States Navy, and it was nicknamed "Old Mary" to all the hundreds of officers and sailors aboard ... and his wife's name was Mary. Some things are simply written.

Anyway, The three I've shown are:

The Yangtze River gunboat, USS Monocacy

The destroyer, USS Yarborough

The battleship USS Maryland

And now I learned that the ship I haven't shown, the USS Melville, has an interesting story too also (but long after Dee was captain) in WWII.

But wait, Melville was a destroyer tender, a floating gas station and repair shop with additional food supplies, not a fighting ship!

According to Wikipedia:

Melville [then stationed at Norfolk, Virginia] got underway on 12 January 1942 for Europe, reaching Derry, Northern Ireland on 31 January to begin tending escort ships of Allied convoys crossing the submarine infested Atlantic. In the next two years, she also based at Hvalfjörður, Iceland; Recife, Brazil; and Rosneath naval base in Scotland, as well as Newport and Casco Bay, while continuing support services for warships ranging from battleships to landing craft and minesweepers.

On 1 May 1944, Melville sailed from Rosneath for Portland, England to begin the massive task of preparing the Allied minesweepers and landing craft for the Normandy Landings of 6 June. For the next year, she was busy maintaining and repairing landing craft for the Allied push toward Germany.

The destroyer tender was at Portland when Germany surrendered on 7 May 1945. Melville continued her support duties, now servicing the amphibious craft for final operations in the Pacific theater.

Yeah, yeah, basta.