Weather

How was your day?
Autumn leaves a fallin,
Lightening flashes at night,
Hail stones hitting the skylight,
Snow on the car,
All in a day on the Northcoast!

Just a little ditty on today.
There's a group of people who write 55 word stories on Friday's.
Here's half a 55 on Wednesday. hehehe

Sorry I haven't written in so long...
Been sick for a while, slows me down with fatigue and then there's also the blog war drama that steals too much time.

As exciting as our weather can be on the Northcoast at least we're not in Tornado Alley.
There is a TV show called StormChasers where they drive around looking for Tornadoes with a DOW (Doppler Radar on Wheels) and then try to predict the path of a tornado and send the TIV (Tornado Intercept Vehicle) into its path. The Dow has an 8 foot radar dish on the back and several computers inside monitored by a specialist. The TIV is a souped up truck rebuilt like a tank with 8000 pounds of additional metal plate and bullet proof windows, with a driver and an IMAX film photographer who sits in a turret that can rotate to any angle. As the builder of the TIV describes it, it is a mobile tripod that can take a direct hit from a Tornado so he can get the 20 seconds of footage no one has ever got from inside an active tornado.

We do get occasional tornadoes, since I've lived here (15 years now) I've seen the damage from two that passed within a half mile from my house. The tell tale signs are easy to spot, when you see a neighbor's tree top that is twisted off like a corkscrew and tossed several houses down or drive by a development that has finished homes missing one side and half a roof, you know a tornado has been by.

9/11

I live in a big city, we have a 9/11 memorial with items (ground and building) from each of the 9/11 sites (NYC, DC, PA). In the foreground you can see an eternal flame and behind that iron work from the twin towers. Below is a close up of damaged iron work from the twin towers in NYC.

Of the suspected hijacked planes that day, one (Flight 93 that later crashed in PA) entered our air space and one was forced to land at our International Airport.

NYC is one of the cities I have visited often, I consider it one of my 2nd home cities that I have spent so much time at over the years that I feel at home there.

I heard what was happening after the first tower was hit, but saw both towers collapse live on TV and I was just numb in disbelief. It was such a senseless loss.

I have been to those towers so many times, photographed from the roof top, circled them in a helicopter and the Circle Line cruise, photographed them from the Brooklyn Promenade and the Empire State rooftop. It’s still hard to believe that they are really gone.

Mentioned in Dispatches

I am so honored, am I close enough to the microphone, can you hear me in the back. I humbly accept this great honor of being officially 'Mentioned in Dispatches' ... I'd like to thank...

Well it was only a matter of time before someone took notice of my blog posts and decided to give me an award. I was attempting to comment on LittleWing's blog and while I was doing it she was updating it and things went awry so I commented about the trouble she caused me just to see some questionably funny comics. Nearly all the readers enjoyed LittleWing's comics but only one man took pity on my plight and thought that my experience was funnier than LittleWing's comics.

Not only did dickiebo take the unpopular minority position of sticking up for me, he also declared it publicly in a separate post by bestowing the honor of 'Mentioned in Dispatches' upon me.

Click here to see the LittleWing's entire post, click on the comics to enlarge:

My initial comment to the comics was:

Ugh, shaking head, but smiling...
and you didn't think my dam joke was funny... lol

So then I went on to relate my story...

ahem... AHEM...My dearest littlewing are ya trying to drive me nuts... You are makin me work way too hard for this joke...

I have started to use Atom feeds to monitor Blogs I read regularly, so I don't have to check on them manually, and beep, it told me you updated yours so one click and it launches me directly to the newest post, I looked at it, wrote a comment, as I was posting the comment, you deleted the post to rearrange the comics and give the post a different name. Meanwhile I'm trying to force the comment to post by issuing a refresh and repost command impatiently while cussing my computer and crash boom bang my browser and all the windows and tabs (like to keep a dozen or so open) go clattering to the ground, my diagnostic recovery kicked in dumping the system memory, advising me of my privacy, asking me all kinds of questions about what I was doing then connecting to the vendor's (Firefox, the alternative browser for those who hate Micro$oft, Go Mozilla) quality control database...

So after restarting my browser and signing into Blogger, what did I do, take a short cut by using the link in the Atom feed to go directly to the post that was now completely gone, and almost started the process over again... Then I said - Wait is that girl playin with me... Would she do that, sure she would...

Of course I'm just teasin ya, LOL

Oh and for those into technical details I was reorganizing my bookmarks, and doing about three other things at the same time, so maybe Blogger wasn't to blame, but I still think its all LW's fault... So people what's funnier her comics or what she did to me???

LittleWing defended her comics with:

John, you are just being evil, lol!!!!!!!!!

dickiebo is a retired police officer who calls them as he sees them. And after all those comments agreeing with LittleWing, he had the courage to say:

Well. I think they're awful! BUT...boy, what you did to that chap's computer. Brill. Laughed me socks off.

To which I responded:

Figures it would take someone across the pond to appreciate my wit. Thanks dickiebo...
Yeah, LW is in rare form today. Was that GOOD or should it be "GOOD"...

What tickled dickiebo the most was how this all looked

Poor sod! Can you just picture all that hassle, frustration, curses, and what-have-you, and all ‘cos of Little Wing’s awful cartoons!

Thanks for the recognition dickiebo...
So what do you think, which is funnier, my comment or the her comics...
Now LW don't take any offense its all in good fun...