Daisy stir-fry

what does a girl have to do to stay warm around here?

Spring is in the Air

January 28th and the wildflowers are blooming like crazy. The rain we had in December and the warm, sunny days we've had in mid-January have colored the hills and canyons with bright reds, yellows, purples and whites.

And, by the way, I've joined the Harbor Sailboats club. Tomorrow I begin the 2 day 'basic keelboating' class. Once I complete the class I am o.k. to compete in the racing program and with Kyle as my crew start collecting some club trophies. Starting gun, here I come!

I'm OK, You're OK?

Sunny II and Dave's boat (Kaigon? Saigon? King Kong?) have weathered the storm nicely, as they are sitting comfortably in the garage. I can't quite say the same for Sunny I and Red Weather, although at least they are visible.

and more expected

live from new england... sometimes when the wind blows it's a complete whiteout.



spring seems a long way away. cher is still visible but "the snoopster" (miata) is now completely buried.

Question of the Day

When your car needs to be fixed, you bring it into the shop, leave it for a few days, and rent another while the work takes place. Why can't they do that with human bodies? "Yeah, I'd like to rent another body while mine's in here for healing. Could I get the 25-year-old stud model? And by the way, there's not really any hurry on the repairs...."

Dave Makes a Decision

That's it! No more physical labor ever! If it's worth doing, it's worth having done by a qualified professional.

These thoughts ran through my mind yesterday about 0.75 seconds into a fall from a ladder — about 10 feet.

The good news: No head injury, and I wiggle my toes and fingers just fine.

The bad news: Broken rib and chewed-up lower back. (Nothing that won't heal in time.) Ah well, I guess I'll be taking an indefinite sabbatical from my Aikido studies....

I can't sail in them, but . . .

Vema III; Mouette; Nyala; Northern Light; Nereus; Vim; Seven Seas; Columbia; Dorothee; Constellation; Intrepid; Valiant; Courageous; Enterprise; Spirit of America; America II - All of them 12-meters and all of them designed by Sparkman & Stephens, who just happen to be a tenant of ours at 529 Fifth Avenue. I met with them yesterday and just walking around, looking at the plans/models/photographs, was awesome. There was a photograph of one of their yachts under sail - it goes for a cool $10 million. The spinnaker alone costs $25,000 (apparently they were out one time, sailing it with the owner in heavy winds . . . they recommended taking the spinnaker down . . . the owner disagreed . . . a few moments later, the spinnaker ripped to shreds . . . oops!). I made a preliminary offer on it - they said they'd consider a trade in of the sunfish!

Happy New Year Back At Ya

And what do sports fans love on New Year's Eve but hate on New Year's Day? For those who haven't solved the puzzle yet, a coded answer:

xbudijoh uif cbmm espq

Happy New Year

A Happy and Healthy New Year to all MSYCers!!!!!

here's marge!

the only way i get computer-smart is when linda comes to visit!

fame

i happened across this entry in a "tips and tricks" site which explains how to check if any other sites have links to your site. so you would type link:msyc.blogspot.com in the google search window and see what it finds....

here's the problem

instead of doing a search for "writer" you should be searching for "sailing".
i found the following using this methodology:

We are actively seeking experienced RF Integrated Circuit (RFIC) Engineers (multiple openings). Understanding of the following analytical techniques desired: Cascaded NF, intercept point, PLL gain/phase margin, spurious analyses, etc.

but wait - here's another... it's true the pay is not much but...

The Ocean Institute, Dana Point CA
INSTRUCTOR: MARITIME PROGRAMS(Positions also available in Science Instruction)DESCRIPTION: Join our maritime instructional staff in providing award-winning educational programs aboard a tallship! Our instructors utilize role-play, combined with traditional teaching skills and strategies, to take students grades 4 and above on exciting voyages of learning. Programs take place dockside in Dana Point Harbor and on the open sea.QUALIFICATIONS: Two or four year degree in social science, drama, or education (work in progress or equivalent relevant experience may be acceptable.)  Applicant should have experience working with groups of young people.  Self-motivation, quick thinking, humor and curiosity are essential.  Background or coursework in California History, U.S. History, sailing, drama, or music is a plus! Conditions of employment: Approximately 10-40 hours per week (varies week to week)  Wage starts at $9.79 per hour with possible increases to $12.00 per hour  Up to two overnights per week and some weekend work may be required

What Does This Mean?

Still trying assiduously to resume my gainful employment, I opened monster.com on the computer the other day. I typed in the keyword "writer," selected the usual filters (San Diego for location, four or five likely job categories), and discovered the usual seemingly endless listings for "Start a business on your home computer and earn six figures while working just two hours a day!!!" Almost hidden among them, however, was a listing for a real job — technical writer for a company that... uh... well, you be the judge:

"CalAmp is a leading provider of comprehensive breakthrough communications access and content delivery solutions, services, and products."

Huh? What do these people do for a living? Is it just me? In order to get the job, do I have to learn how to talk like this?

Just thought I'd share....

#18 on the List

the List of 50 things to do in one's life:

#18. Sail on an America's Cup Yacht

Mom ___ Cathie ___ Kyle ___ Graham ___ Linda ___

Ross ___ Rosemary ___ Caroline ___ Emma ___X

Dave ___X Vanessa ___ Stuart ___ Lauren ___

A Cruise to Remember

Imagine: Someone comes along and says, Hey, why don't you take a ride on this bike that Lance rode in the Tour de France? Well here's a proposition that's arguably better: Someone came up to me and said, Let's sail Stars & Stripes, the boat in which Dennis Connor raced for the Americas Cup in 1995. And so yesterday, off we went cruising.

Some background: I once sailed in a San-Deigo-to-Ensenada race, and another member of the crew was a woman named Camille Rasdal, who has a husband named Andy, who not so long ago bought a Beneteau First 36.7 called Valhalla. Andy and Camille needed crew to race the boat, Camille remembered me, and now I crew for them regularly.

More background: There's a guy who was affiliated in some background way with several of the recent Americas Cup regattas. He purchased two of the boats — Stars & Stripes and Abracadabra — and keeps them at the Broadway pier in downtown San Diego. On them, he takes passengers cruising on San Diego Bay. Andy and Camille decided to reward their crew after a season of racing by taking us out on Stars & Stripes. (Pretty successful racing, I might add: After an admittedly shaky start to the season, we placed third in the West Coast Championships of the Beneteau First 36.7 class, and in the final race of the season we took our first first place.)

But: Back to Americas Cup sailing. The boat was amazing. I know you're wondering, and yes, I did get to steer it. Although I still have great respect for the sailors who compete in Americas Cup racing, I have to say that this was the easiest boat to sail that I've ever been on.

First of all, the hull is made entirely of carbon fiber, which makes it very light; as a result 80 percent of the weight of the hull is concentrated in the bulb of the keel; as a result the boat is incredibly stable. Most large boats have lifelines (wire lines suspended from stanchions about two to three feet above the rails); to hike, you sit on the rail facing outward, with your feet dangling overboard, and lean your chest against the lifeline. As originally designed, an Americas Cup Class boat has no lifelines, because there's no need to hike; no matter how close you are to the wind, the boat heels a tiny bit and just stays there. (S&S now has lifelines, but only because the Coast Guard requires them for the taking out of passengers.)

Second, it's incredibly fast. Lots of times yesterday, we were sailing faster than the wind speed (and this was with a suit of sails that had seen better days). I don't know if you know about sailboat handicapping: Because boats often race against boats of differing capabilities, every boat gets a PHRF (Pacific Handicap Racing Formula, I think) number that corresponds to a number of seconds per mile. The higher your number is, the slower your boat is. Valhalla (a pretty good boat in its own right) has a rating of 80-something (for the sake of explanation, let's say it's 80). If another boat had a rating of 90, then for every mile of a race Valhalla would owe that boat 10 seconds — that is, if the race were three miles long, 30 seconds would be added to Valhalla's time to evaluate its performance against the other boat. Well, the rating for Stars & Stripes is negative 120. It's really fast.

This was a family event, and I was very happy to have Emma with me. (She brought a book along, of course.) I was also thinking of Dad while I was out there — I'm sure he would have loved to have a crack at a boat like that.

There are pictures: go to this link.

Crabs for a Thousand, Please, Alex

Way back in time, last summer, July,
Ken Jennings was the JEOPARDY guy.
Every night at 7:30 we'd turn the show on.
By eight, another two challengers were gone.
Potpourri, religion and questions high tech,
Quick with the answer, he amazed Al Trebek.
Ken'd win about 50 thousand dollars a show.
By December, he'd won a whole lot of dough.
He knew all the questions/answers, whatever...
He even knew NY state governors, clever!
Any category at all: capital cities, Star Trek,
presidents, wine...he's always correct.
He'd get obscure questions about a volcano
I'd just shake my head, "how did he know?"
We couldn't believe he could win every day,
He's so damn smart, he's just gotta be gay.
No category in JEOPARDY was beyond his scope,
Every other contestant would look like a dope.
His unique genius had taken him so far,
That he became an American celebrity star.
But, after 74 games of ruling the Daily Double
he blanked on some questions that gave him real trouble.
Finally it happened...a brain freeze lock,
He couldn't come up with "H&R Block"
Nancy Zerg had it right! and then
the audience gasped, but cheered for Ken!
Thanks Ken for the run, you made it interesting.
You're number one, the all-time game show king.

Not Just a Sunday Stroll around the Bay

One thing that Captain Dave left out was that there was a party at the club after the race and trophys were presented to the first three finishers by the club president. During the presentation Tom consoled those that finished in the back of the fleet by explaining that they shouldn't feel bad about their performances because they were sailing against experienced and competitive sailors and that the top five finishers in the Capri 22 group are all "very good sailors."

Representin'

It may be November in some parts of the world (well, technically, it's November here too), but in San Diego there are still sailboat races to be raced. And so on Sunday Dave, Ross, & Midshipman Krabby, representing the Maris Stella Yacht Club, entered a Capri 22 in the 2004 Harbor Sailboats Fall Fleet Race.

The format was a course around channel buoys from mid-Harbor Island to the northeast tip of Shelter Island, then across the bay, then down past the Coronado Bridge, and finally back up to the western tip of Harbor Island — roughly 10 nautical miles. Boats of all sizes were welcome to enter.

Since larger boats go faster, the start was staggered according to boat capabilities. The 22s were to go off the line at 11:30, the next largest a couple of minutes later, and so on. Chaotic as that may seem, the start turned out to be a little more so as the race committee only set up the line at about 11:20, and at some distance from where everyone had gathered. The committee was determined to hold to schedule, however, so boats turned on engines just to reach the line on time, a planned 10-minute gun was never sounded, and much pre-start maneuvering went by the wayside. Even so, that didn't excuse our having left ourselves in position to be luffed up at the committee-boat end by our old friend Steve McNally and, as a result — how shall I say it — "nudging," "grazing," "kissing" the committee boat itself. Doh! Penalty turn for you, Captain Dave!

But after that we sailed well enough, remaining near the front at the first several marks. The long leg from Shelter Island down past the Coronado Bridge was downwind with crews winging the jib (that is to say, holding it out by hand on the side opposite the main) in a breeze that freshened enough to raise whitecaps on the bay (a much rarer occurrence here than on Barnegat, with our much deeper water and typically lighter winds). Many crew members complained of sore arms at the after-race party. The lead boats (us among them) were initially close enough to hail one another, but near downtown, where the bay widens, they separated into two groups on opposite sides of the course. Near the bridge they converged again and incredibly everyone seemed to be in the same position and the same relative distance apart. Everyone except, that is, for Frederic Hayem — you remember him, the one who you never see anything of him except his transom? Well, we couldn't see anything of him except his transom. Somewhere way ahead.

We rounded the downwind buoy and started some hard tacking (remember, whitecaps, strong breeze) and had a "moment." Somehow we slipped back and lost quite a few boat lengths and positions. But we kept sailing, regained much of what we had lost, and found that Frederic was untouchable, so was the second-place boat (that pesky Steve), but we were neck and neck for third (out of 15 boats, by the way) with a guy named Sheldon Black. We would gain a bit, he would gain a bit; we'd have a good tack, he'd get a good lift, and so on until...we ended a two-and-a-half-hour race with him crossing the finish line 15 seconds ahead of us.

Ah, but all was not lost: It turns out that in that chaotic start Sheldon crossed the line early by about a boat length and a half and never came back to start properly. A race committee would typically, I gather, assess a three-minute penalty for that; our committee had already resolved to be "nice" and assess only a one-minute penalty, but even that was enough to give us the third.

Results and pictures are at this link.

There's been some talk already about the 2005 Spring Fleet Race: Ross might join the club and enter his own boat, and we might be recruiting some high-quality east-coast crewing talent. Waddaya think?

Peace Is Our Profession

The military insanity is closer to home than we thought, or I thought. Next time you are driving down the Garden State Parkway it might be wise to keep your eyes on the sky as well as the road. And a bullet proof vehicle might not be a bad idea.......

Fighter jet strafes New Jersey school


Friday, November 5, 2004 Posted: 7:49 AM EST (1249 GMT)
Little Egg Harbor Intermediate School is cordoned off after it was fired on Wednesday night.


LITTLE EGG HARBOR, New Jersey (AP) -- The target was an object on the ground well within the confines of the Warren Grove firing range, a 2,400-acre scrub pine expanse used by the military to train pilots in bombing and strafing techniques.

But when the heavy gun in the left wing of an Air National Guard F-16 fighter jet fired Wednesday night, it sent 25 rounds of 20mm ammunition smashing through the roof and zinging off the asphalt parking lot of the Little Egg Harbor Intermediate School 3 1/2 miles from the range.

Military investigators are trying to determine how it could have happened.

A custodian was the only person in the school when the shots hit at 11 p.m., and no one was injured.

The jet that fired the rounds was assigned to the 113th Wing of the District of Columbia Air National Guard, based at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. It returned there after the shots were fired, an Air National Guard spokesman said.

Military officials would not identify the pilot. Operations were suspended at the firing range pending completion of the investigation.

Police were called after the custodian heard what sounded like someone running across the roof.

Police Chief Mark Siino said officers who responded noticed punctures in the roof. Ceiling tiles had fallen into classrooms, and there were scratch marks in the asphalt outside.

The pilot of the single-seat jet was supposed to fire at a ground target on the firing range 31/2 miles from the school, said Col. Brian Webster, commander of the 177th Fighter Wing of the New Jersey Air National Guard, which is responsible for the range.

The plane was flying at 7,000 feet when the rounds were fired from the M61-A1 Vulcan cannon in the plane's left wing. The weapon fires 2-inch-long lead projectiles that do not explode, Webster said.

Webster said he did not know what caused the gun to fire.

"The National Guard takes this situation very seriously," said Lt. Col. Roberta Niedt, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Military and Veterans Affairs. "The safety of our people and the surrounding communities are our foremost concern."

Mike Dupuis, president of the township's Board of Education, said school workers are mindful that the firing range is nearby.

"Being so close to the range, that's always in the back of our minds. It is very scary. I have children in that school and relatives that work there," he said.

Schools in New Jersey were closed Thursday because of a teachers convention.

The Warren Grove range, about 30 miles north of Atlantic City, has been used by the military since the end of World War II, long before the surrounding area was developed.

In 2002, an Air National Guard F-16 that had been practicing at the range crashed along the Garden State Parkway. The plane's pilot ejected safely, and no one on the ground was hurt.

Errant practice bombs were blamed for forest fires that burned more than 11,000 acres of the Pine Barrens near the range in 1999 and more than 1,600 acres in 2002.

Old Barney Photo Contest

We all know of Linda’s idea (it was Linda’s, wasn’t it?) to equip everyone with cameras and see who can take the most photographs of Barnegat Lighthouse likenesses. In case the contest actually takes place next year, I thought I’d stake a claim for the image of Old Barney taken farthest from the actual Old Barney — at Nugent’s Seafood Grille in Del Mar, California, some 2,430 miles away.



[Just a moment of levity in trying times.....]