Not to make light of a grim situation, but I do get some satisfaction from the less than impressive Russian armed forces performance in the Ukraine, considering all the crap I've read on-line about how American armed forces may be able to handle a bunch of Iraqi camel jockeys and Afghan goat fuckers, but just wait till they have to deal with a serious military like Russia's. Uh huh.
He also wanted to withdraw the Marines from Okinawa and reduce our military presence in Japan. I imagine Carter's views were formed by his Naval Academy education and his career as a naval officer. The stationing of ground forces in exposed and static positions abroad is counter to traditional naval thinking. Air and sea power operating from offshore, augmented by mobile landing forces if needed, are the preferred solutions of naval doctrine. Seems pretty sensible to me. I've often wondered if the enmity of the powers that be that Carter incurred by trying to draw down our military footprint overseas is one of the reasons he is so ridiculed to this day. Looking at his presidency, and the world situation as he inherited it, it doesn't seem all that bad.
The men I know are always giving each other the razz, calling each other names like duck butt and pencil dick not in a hostile way, but in a friendly, comradely way. They all have I guess what could be called seriously masculine jobs, although these days, saying that out loud would get you defenestrated from the top of the World Trade Center's ghost. But the males whose comments I read on-line take 
One time back in the States I went off-base with some marines wearing my cammies -- combat utility uniform, to give it its formal name, basically desert camouflage overalls. As we were passing through an outdoor food court I accidentally bumped into a table where some guys were having beers. One of them looked up at me as I said, "Sorry!" and said in a loud voice, "Well, well, a girl marine ( I was navy). I feel really safe knowing you're out there fighting for me. I bet you terrify the enemy!"
At this, one of the marines grabbed the guy by his shirt, lifted him out of his chair and slammed him against a wall and asked him to repeat what he had just said. 
When he didn't, but just stared in stunned fear, the marine threw him against a trash can, where he just lay. Then we continued on our way, me thinking oh, Lord, we're going to get arrested and.... But as we walked away, another guy at the same table said in a loud voice, "Guess who's going to get his dick sucked!" All the marines stopped and headed back toward the table. The guy got up so fast he knocked over the table and scattered chairs as he rocketed out of there. But he was not necessarily wrong.
I've only known four Jews that I associated with and knew were Jews in my whole life. I suppose I have associated with some more, especially at university, but I didn't know they were Jews. The subject never came up. Why would it?
One of the Jews, who I mentioned briefly in another post, was my good friend. We had similar service brat backgrounds, she Air Force, me Navy. We were both stationed on Guam at the same time and had lots of fun together. She was a natural blonde, quite attractive, with a gregarious personality, and had lots of boyfriends buzzing about her. I only found out that she was Jewish when we were invited to a Christmas dinner and she off-handedly mentioned it while accepting the invitation.
Another of the Jews was a woman a few years older than me that I met while working a temp job in college. She sort of glommed on to me and was always inviting me to lunch, dinner, concerts, exhibitions and whatnot. She made no secret of being Jewish but didn't make a big deal of it. It was more like she would bring some Jewish dish, or maybe just Eastern European, I don't know (I was totally ignorant of ethnic white lifestyles) to work and urge me to try it, saying it was her mother's special recipe or whatever. Thinking back, she looked sort of Jewish or maybe Greek or southern Italian, dark hair and eyes, olive skin, although at the time I never really gave that much thought to it. She kept asking me to call her Bambi, which was not going to happen.
We kept in touch after she moved back to her home town of New York City, or rather she kept in touch with me, and when I mentioned I had an opportunity to visit that city, she offered to be my guide and a splendid one she proved to be, giving me a Cook's tour of all sorts of things I'd never have known about on my own and taking me to fabulous little restaurants only a local would know about. She loved New York and wanted me to love it, too. I considered the fact that she was Jewish the same way I would have an Irishman showing me around Dublin. 
The only odd part of the experience was the last night of my visit at a night club where Tierney Sutton was singing she asked me to dance and while we were she stroked my rump and kissed me, then invited me back to her apartment. I declined, saying I had an early flight the next morning (true) and all my stuff was at my hotel and I had to pack.... She didn't push it. I'd noticed she was slamming Johnny Walker Black Label in amounts that would have put me in a coma and was slurring her words a little bit. So I put down her action to being drunk, and considered it yet another lesson in why you shouldn't drink in public unless your goal is to make an ass of yourself. Go ahead, ask me how I know this. I won't tell you.
And the final Jew I knew was a guy I met at college. I don't know why I knew he was Jewish, maybe he took off a Jewish holiday or something. He didn't look in any way "ethnic" to me, just a regular person. I dated him a few times but I found him rather dull and totally not my type at all. During the third date he put the moves on me, assuming apparently that was the established protocol. I told him to rein in Trigger to his baffled disappointment. To his credit...I suppose...he did so. The guys I usually dated would have brushed aside my objection and I would have had to knee them in the nuts to get them to settle down. Every date would end in a wrestling match. It was kind of fun.
For the record, I only have known one Seventh Day Adventist. She was a spectacularly beautiful, sloe-eyed Spanishesque Guatemalan-American who married a Japanese national and moved to Japan. They have the most gorgeous children. She tried to convert me to Adventism but I declined, saying that I was a confirmed Zen Holy Roller. I don't know what a Holy Roller is, but I like the name. I should know what Zen is. I even spent some time studying at the Zen temple 永平寺 (Eihei-ji) in Fukui, but I really couldn't get into it. It was just too alien. Intellectually, I grasped it...I think. But emotionally, spiritually? No.
I have also only been friends with one Catholic, although, doubtless, I have known more than that but the subject of their religion never came up. Anyway, this guy was a Mexican (from Monterrey) who I liked a lot and he liked me a lot, too. But he was the least ambitious person I ever knew. He dropped out of college before completing even one semester, got a customer service job with some internet/cable company and that was it. He spent all of his paycheck every week, not saving even a penny. When he got an unsolicited credit card in the mail, he maxed it out and never made even one payment. As a result, his credit is ruined. Although he always said he was a proud Catholic, he admitted he'd never been to church, not even once.
He always had lots of girlfriends. I know for a fact that at one time he 
Oh, right. One time he asked me to have sex with his friend, whom he said was between girlfriends. I got the feeling that he had gotten some kind of favor from his friend and in return his friend wanted the favor of having sex with me. That tells you a lot about the way women are treated in Mexico. I told him to take a long walk off a short pier, as my aunt used to say. Adios, Pancho.
So why did I like a character like that? I dunno. I just did.
The last I heard from him, he had gotten married to a woman "of the blood" -- his phrase -- so I assume a fellow Mexican. Hey, señor gringo, you better not say you have married a woman of your blood. You just better not!
We finally got the auxiliary generator for our cattle well, delivered by a big tractor-trailer rig (we had some other equipment delivered, too) whose driver demonstrated phenomenal maneuvering and backing-up skills. Those watching actually broke out into applause it was so amazing. When he dismounted, a middle-aged white guy, he said to the nearest man, "Now, you try it!" Everyone laughed and cheered.
One of the unsung casualties of the Covid craziness was the almost total collapse of restaurant demand for beef. Business has picked up since the darkest days but, still, this year if we clear $70 per cowbrute after expenses, but before taxes, we'll be lucky. If the government offers us some kind of greenhouse gas abatement subsidy or tax credit for not raising cattle, we'll take it and get out of the business. And you muttering in the peanut gallery can just shut up and eat your soyburger, the soy, of course, coming from Brazilian farmlands created by clear-cutting rainforests and burning the slash. Petrochemical fertilizers will keep the land productive for a while until the soil becomes salinized and hard-panned; what hasn't been eroded and washed away, that is.
I read that the Ukrainians are firing a lot of Javelins at Russian armor. I also read people referring to them as "cheap." I guess cheap is relative. In Afghanistan, the joke was that the Javelin, which was said to cost $70,000 each, was fired by a marine who didn't make that much in a year to kill a haji who wouldn't make that much in his entire life if he lived to be a hundred.
Speaking of Afghanistan, this was copied from a handwritten notice at a patrol base in Helmand's Gereshk Valley. I thought it was funny. Now it's kind of nostalgic. Ya know?
1. No smoking at night.
2. Red lens -- You were doing this in boot camp, so why are you fucking this up in combat?
3. Clean your area. If trash is full take it to the burn pit nasty.
4. Stop peeing on post! Honestly, what the fuck!
5. Pass all word to the next sentry. It's part of your general orders, stop fucking it up.
6. No horse play over the radio. If you wanted to tell jokes you should have been a comedian.
7. Keep area organized and wear your fucking PPE, what the fuck Marine.
8. If any stupid shit or graffiti ends up on this sign or post, the marine currently standing it will clean that shit up. Police yourselves!
9. No sleeping on watch. I don't even know why you have to be told this.
10. Stop jerking off. I don't care if you are thinking about your mom.
When I was in AFG sometimes I would find myself humming and singing the Mickey Mouse song. It's from the old 1950s-era Mickey Mouse Club television program, which I've never seen. It was apparently a variety show, with cartoons, skits, continuing serials, songs and so forth, with a cast of child actors. My mother says she never watched it because it came on at the same time as American Bandstand, which she never missed. My dad liked it and still remembers his favorite serial, Spin and Marty. I thought maybe my humming its theme song came from remembering him doing so, but try as I might, I could not recall that.
Then one time I saw the movie Full Metal Jacket in the
company of a couple of crayon eaters. We all thought it was kind of
lame, although there are a few good scenes. This was the best one, we all
agreed, as we sang along and got the tune stuck in our heads.
To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be actualized by all things.
To be actualized by all things is
to let the body and mind of the self
and the body and mind of others
drop off.
~ Shōbōgenzō, Genjō-Kōan
Dedicated to all the guys who look for and find that special girl that they need in their lives --
