Saturday, September 17, 2011
Command and Colors
Josh and I had our first game of Command & Colors: Napoleonics today. His French crushed my Brits, 5:0. The After Action Report is at my new wargaming blog, Battle Honors.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Autumn
A cold front came in with rain, accompanied by rain, followed by rain, and taking a short break for rain. I believe we're going to call this the beginning of Autumn.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Muy delicioso
Josh and Tom Paul went to El Taco Loco. TP said the steak was excellent; I pointed out that, being beef, it was moo-y delicioso.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Command
Josh is working for a HVAC company, doing data entry and bookkeeping. The owner wanted new TV commercials, Josh got involved in editing the script, and ended up being the director for the commercials. When Diana asked Josh what he'd liked most about the experience, he said "Having people do what I tell them." She looked a bit taken aback by that response, but I thought it was eminently in character for him.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Jet ski
Josh is rather fond of jet skis. He's planning on jet skiing across the Pacific; his first apartment is likely to be a refrigerator box in an alley, with room to park a jet ski trailer. So we gave him a couple of jet ski rentals as part of his graduation congratulations. Today was the day to use one, as a father-son bonding experience. I bonded as best I could, but he still managed to jink and swerve hard enough to throw me (unintentionally, no doubt--purely accidental, I'm sure) three times. The first couple of times he stopped and I swam back and climbed back aboard. Unfortunately, the third time around, the sharks got me. That did leave Josh free to rev it up for 65mph, though.
Ten Years Later
I remember where I was on 9-11.
I'd worked at AIN Plastics for five years, leaving in March 2001 to join Jubilee Tech and sell linguistic services. My AIN boss, Brian Inman, had died of lung cancer, leaving a wife and three boys. His funeral had been the day before.
I was at my desk at work. Business had slowed down as the tech bubble popped and there wasn't much for me to do; the company had been laying people off all summer. Josh was in school. Diana and a friend of hers had left early in the morning to go to some pro-life thing in Washington DC; since she was travelling and I wasn't, she had my cell phone.
When the first plane hit, I assumed it was some idiot in a Cessna who'd done something fatally stupid. When the second plane hit, it sounded as if there was only one plane, with confused reports on which tower it hit. When it finally became clear that it really was two planes, two airliners that had been hijacked and deliberately crashed, most of our staff gathered in the lunch room to watch the TV. I went back to my desk and started trying to call Diana. All lines busy. Redial. The news said maybe 50,000 killed. All lines busy. Redial, redial, redial, redial. Meanwhile I was trying to get to CNN.com or any news site, and they were overloaded. Emailed a friend of mine who lived near DC, in case Diana needed to go to ground there; yes, he said. Meanwhile...Norfolk is a major Navy base; whoever launched this attack has to know that our carriers and Marines will going after them. Unless the attackers do something about it first. Radiological attack? That's what I would do. No word of that, but I was sitting there for a long time, wondering if I needed to just go get Josh out of school and head west. Finally, after 45 minutes of continuously hitting redial, I got through to Diana--she was in DC but hadn't gone past the Pentagon, hadn't seen the crash there, she was okay. Eventually it was clear that the only attack was the four planes; it was ultimately a symbolic attack rather than a strategic one.
And I couldn't help think the events of 9-11 would overshadow our loss of Brian.
I'd worked at AIN Plastics for five years, leaving in March 2001 to join Jubilee Tech and sell linguistic services. My AIN boss, Brian Inman, had died of lung cancer, leaving a wife and three boys. His funeral had been the day before.
I was at my desk at work. Business had slowed down as the tech bubble popped and there wasn't much for me to do; the company had been laying people off all summer. Josh was in school. Diana and a friend of hers had left early in the morning to go to some pro-life thing in Washington DC; since she was travelling and I wasn't, she had my cell phone.
When the first plane hit, I assumed it was some idiot in a Cessna who'd done something fatally stupid. When the second plane hit, it sounded as if there was only one plane, with confused reports on which tower it hit. When it finally became clear that it really was two planes, two airliners that had been hijacked and deliberately crashed, most of our staff gathered in the lunch room to watch the TV. I went back to my desk and started trying to call Diana. All lines busy. Redial. The news said maybe 50,000 killed. All lines busy. Redial, redial, redial, redial. Meanwhile I was trying to get to CNN.com or any news site, and they were overloaded. Emailed a friend of mine who lived near DC, in case Diana needed to go to ground there; yes, he said. Meanwhile...Norfolk is a major Navy base; whoever launched this attack has to know that our carriers and Marines will going after them. Unless the attackers do something about it first. Radiological attack? That's what I would do. No word of that, but I was sitting there for a long time, wondering if I needed to just go get Josh out of school and head west. Finally, after 45 minutes of continuously hitting redial, I got through to Diana--she was in DC but hadn't gone past the Pentagon, hadn't seen the crash there, she was okay. Eventually it was clear that the only attack was the four planes; it was ultimately a symbolic attack rather than a strategic one.
And I couldn't help think the events of 9-11 would overshadow our loss of Brian.
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