Mala Fide dotcom

"It is more tolerable to be refused than deceived."

Pubilius (Publilius) Syrus

Счастливый понедельник!

An Army buddy contacted me recently after finding Mala Fide dotcom. We’ll call him Speedy to protect the innocent…and us too.

A lot of really stupid things happen when you put a bunch of young men in the same place with nothing to do. The statute of limitations has probably run out for most of them. We napped through a simulated firefight, nearly got decapitated by a bridge, were visited by the cat in Stephen King’s Pet Sematary, and had military ordnance fired in our room.

No, really. Military ordnance.

One of our squadmates, Ox, was getting short, id est, he was about to ETS, end his term of service. Ox was spending more time than usual being drunk. One evening Ox and another roommate of Speedy’s and mine, Mono, had been setting off fireworks. This attracted the attention of the MPs forcing Ox and Mono to hide from them in our barracks. Mono came tearing into the room, and, while diving for his bunk, extracted a promise from us to cover for him. We were more than happy to do so, and went back to sleep. Or tried to. There was a knock at the door. It was Ox. Since Ox had been forced indoors, he had no other choice but to lob a smoke grenade into our room.

This wasn’t the kind of thing you can pick up at a fireworks stand during the holidays, this was a SMOKE GRENADE. These are used for serious cover during firefights and signaling in jungles. Speedy threw a helmet over the grenade (not one of ours, a married squadmate’s who kept some gear in our room) which limited its output somewhat, but our room and soon the entire first floor of the building were filled with thick green smoke. Speedy and Mono dived out a window. I found out that the fire safety tip of crawling under smoke works well.

We didn’t end up with a room full of MPs, but we had our rights read to us by someone from batallion HQ. It was obvious the we had woken ourselves up and smoke grenaded our own room. We maintained solidarity and didn’t give Ox up to The Man, but Ox had caused a few other problems and was moved to another company to finish outprocessing. He was forbidden to return to our company area, but stopped in to say goodbye anyway.

We never did get those stains cleaned up.

Your tax dollar at work!

Handy answers to common questions:

"Yes, but I’ll need $500 first."

"It’s in an hermetically sealed jar in an undisclosed location."

"The horror! The horror!"

"We already have the entire set."

"I have an alibi."

"Only if you wear the Nixon mask this time."

"The voices in my head are a very reliable source."

37! Battle of Hastings! Issac Newton!

From Merriam-Webster.

Absurd

Pronunciation: &b-‘s&rd, -‘z&rd

Function: adjective

Etymology: Middle French absurde, from Latin absurdus, from ab- + surdus: deaf, stupid

Date: 1557

1 : ridiculously unreasonable, unsound, or incongruous

2 : having no rational or orderly relationship to human life : MEANINGLESS; also : lacking order or value

3 : dealing with the absurd or with absurdism

– ab·surd·ly: adverb

– ab·surd·ness: noun

Gooood morning, Southwest Asia!

Part of my tax refund was spent on a Saeco Vienna automatic espresso machine. I’ve used it a couple of times for practice. The time to make a mocha will be roughly the time it takes to drive to St*rb**k’s and buy said mocha. It should pay for itself in a few weeks, if not days.

Now I can be Ray all of the time.

Mmmooochaaa.

Things Ray Says #10:

"Physics, biology, personal preference. It’s gnomic but it works for me."

(Insert rimshot here.)