Re: I'm back

On Sat, 3 Jul 2004 09:22:32 -0500 Doug Evans <devans@nebraska.edu>
writes:
<snip>
>I vaguely recall a short thread about undersea operations; nothing 
>detailed
>in my recollection. Some comments about transparency of ocean water to
>'new' tech, and how Traveller still used oceans as places to hide 
>system
>defense boats.
>

I guess it depends if you see the future of "waterborne warfare" as
Submariner's Fantasy ("Submarines and targets" School of projection) or
whether detection improves to allow surface (unlikely) or
airborne/spaceborne?? (possible) units to combat sub reasonably well.

>Also, there have been some conversions of FT to undersea warfare.
>

Any URLs?

>>Anything special happen on list while I was incommunicado?
>
>Recently, a good time for gropos: long thread on engineers, with 
>shorter
>ones on other TOE's. Just, don't ask about [SG] 
>Bananas-with-pajamas...
>

O-k-a-a-a-a-a-a-y, I won't... I'll look it up instead... maybe...

>Be sure to check the archives on the various alternate FT cloaking 
>schemes.
>

Firedrake.org??

>Small flack about some humor during exchange of best wishes for Canada 
>Day and the 4th; good feelings won. 

English - the language that separates US/UK/Australia/NZ.

Jon announced he had a few DLD pieces
>available for purchase in the UK, though I'm doubting they'll last 
>through
>the con he's taking them to, so no real news for those of us on this 
>side
>of pond. Maybe he'll take your hint. ;->=
>

Hope so, I am waiting and scheming on getting some ($100???) of the
unused 1300 dollars we didn't spend on vacation to add to my current
'set
aside' funds - which would double it.  With  a bad refrigerator (7 years
old, multiple repairs and  never again will we get an ice maker) and a
kitchen floor ruined by the leaking water that might not be in the cards
though.  At least I will get a few $$ after taxes from my Special Act
Award from work that is on this paycheck.  

*******  OT warning header 
********************************************************

*******  NOTE,	NON-gaming, Non-GZG,  "biased" religious based viewpoint
and personal idiosyncratic type chit chat follows - you have been warned
<grin> proceed at your own risk  ********

>Welcome back; if the Alzheimer's connection gets depressing, know ye 
>are
>not alone.
>

Discovering that 'linkage' is more common then I had suspected.  Three
of
the people I am closer to at work have revealed their parents are in end
stage (My father is  in beginning stage I guess) Alzheimer's or have
just
lost a parent to the disease.  The meaning of "Sandwich Generation" - 
with a parent with Alzheimer's and a Mother-in-law who SHOULD move in
with us before she has no choice plus two  grand kids and my youngest in
elementary school - is becoming very real lately.  I have sympathy for
the cheese in my ham (or as my non-practicing great-grandfather used to
say "White Meat Land Fish - not pig, never pig")and cheese sandwich.

>My biggest problem is listening to complaints about forgetfulness, 
>and, being the flake I am, not able to tell if it's normal or really a 
>problem loss. Mom's STILL generally more competent than I.
>
>The_Beast
>
>

My Dad has always had a forgetful trait (which I inherited along with
his
personality and skin color along with my Mother's body type - short
and..
stocky...) which masked the changes initially I suspect.

A lot of my father's apparent 'confusion' is/was 1) Hearing loss (only
20% correctable) abetted by chronic wax build up - and his damn Cherokee
pride means he won't get a hearing aid that won't make a 'real
difference' at 20% -  2) He does 100% better in one on one then in
groups
(see #1.)  My mother mumbles some times lately which only makes it
worse.
 And she is being over protective and (in a role reversal) looking
for/fearing the worst while my father is (role reversal again) taking
the
possibility in stride.	He is getting worse but not quite as bad as it
seemed over the phone.	On his good days he is almost the person he was
when I was child and he was (is still) my hero.  On his bad days he does
show significant short term memory loss.

Had a chance for some one on one time and had the "where do you go after
death" conversation - as suspected my father is a believer in God (or
G_d
as Jewish World Review prints it) but not a Christian, which was, while
not reassuring to this evangelical, at least was a good sign that he was
able to hold a more then just daily functional type conversation and
that
WAS reassuring because the phone conversations were becoming quite
fragmented and difficult to follow.  

I now can attribute the phone conversation problems in part to his
hearing problems and in part to their static filled old phone (bet that
thing is as old as I am, maybe that - a decent phone - would be a good
Christmas gift for them.)  I didn't hear the static when I called form
Missouri but my Tia called from Fontana to Whittier to speak to me while
we were there and it was almost impossible to follow her Spanish laden
sentences because of the noise in the receiver part of their phone.  She
and my adult (well that might be a overstating their behavior) aged
cousins came over for a great visit one day.  Talk about different
children of the same father- my loca prima (crazy cousin) holds church
in
her house since churches are becoming "too corrupted" while my primo
(her
brother) has an e-mail address of something along the lines of
"Are-you-evil-I-Am-too" and my very Roman Catholic Tia lets it all wash
over like water over a duck's back.  I think my Tio would find them
living in the same house with my money/self-centered cun~ado
(brother-in-law) hilarious.  Almost as funny as typing Spanish words on
this 'Anglo' typewriter.  Tildes and accents are a pain to reproduce.

Life is too strange to be some deity's imagination.  No being could have
THAT warped a dream!  <LOL!>

Gracias,
Glenn

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