As per request, Grand Canyon pics from 03 and 05.

This is one of the most famous photo spots in the canyon,
about, mid way into the '03 trip. We hiked up a trail to see
Anasazi ruins, turned around and this was what we saw.
Note the perspective by comparing the size of the boats
down at the shore. Teenie weenie. It is a "grand" canyon after all.

Here's the typical scene. We're all luggage, unless you
chose to row. Note, geezers can make it just as well as
younger folks. Two of the folks in on the '05 trip were
geologists from Yale, in their 70s. The guy sitting on the
very back of this boat was a retired park ranger, also in his
70s, who had had a hip replaced a while earlier. He beat
me down the trail, bastard. Hell of a guy. Fun times. Note
the rocks. The further down river you go the more ancient
the rocks get. These are Lava I think, not far from the
biggest rapid we ran on the trip.

Here's a typical view, about 3 days into the '03
trip. That trip took us from Lee's Ferry to
Phantom Ranch, about 7 days worth of floating,
after which we hiked up to the South rim of the
canyon from the floor. Took me about 8 hours to hike
it. Some times if sucks to be a fat hairy bastard.

The Mitt has hit the fan, I think.

D'you hear about Mitt Romney coming up with the term "Tar Baby" in the midst of a talk on the Big Dig fiasco (check Drudge)? The usual suspects are furious, trying to "tar" him as a racist, demanding apologies. Is it 08 yet?

Now lets see if I can make some money with this byotch...

And finally...

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Ok, now I realize that I should have done these postings backwards, cause that's how they're gonna look to you. Remember, bare with.

Anyway, here's a picture of what looks like the same system (see earlier posting), only this one's being used to pound the shit out of people in Chechnya back in the 1990s. I think its a BM-21, 122mm system. These are the rockets that the PLO used in Lebanon back in the 1980s, which led to Israel's invasion to try to push them back beyond rocket range, and they are the very same rockets used by Hezbollah today. Lets not shit ourselves, this is gonna go on for a good while. Those things are almost impossible to hit until they fire them and expose the launch site, and they can be fired simply by leaning them up against a tree and setting them off with a battery. The VC used to do that sort of shit in Viet Nam. If I was Israeli I might be thinkin of movin to Florida. They can fight the Cubans over whose gonna get the beach front property, until the next hurricane.

Indulging my voluminous knowledge of things trivial...

First of all, I'm still trying to figure this friggin system out, so bare with. Trying to post more than one picture in this thing but it keeps going tits up on me, so it'll be a two or three parter. Here goes.

If anyone is curious about the rockets that Hezbollah are firing at Israel every day, called "Katyushas" in the press, here's yer lesson. No charge. Started in the 1930s when the Soviets deployed a 132mm rocket artillery system in deep secrecy. Nobody knew they had them till they started pounding the shit out of the Germans with them in 1941. They were supposedly initially manned by special NKVD (secret police) troops till the mid part of the war. They mounted them on American Lend-Lease Studebakers, which we gave them by the tens of thousands (about 180,000 by 1943). They liked to fire them off in groups of four trucks at a time, something to do with long standing soviet practice with artillery, as well as the fact that these things are notoriously inaccurate. Sort of like a fancy bottle rocket. You can imagine the effect on a widely spread out target, like a concentration of German troops or armor. The folks in Northern Israel can tell you a little bit about that today.

Everybody ended up producing their own version of this thing during the war, even the Germans, and they still find their way onto the battlefields today. We have a very fancy, high tech, very effective version in use today called an MLRS (Multiple Launch Rocket System). You DON'T want to be on the receiving end, believe me. Believe it or not, the name comes from a popular Russian folk song of the time made famous by a lady named Lidiya Ruslanova. The Germans called them "Stalin's Organs". Ever since this current unpleasantness began in Lebanon I've had that fuckin song runnin through my head every time I tune in the news. In Russian. First verse only. It's about the only Russian I remember from college. Anyway...

Well, Mel Gibson is apparently NOT a happy drunk. Check the Drudge Report. Amazing.

Slowly getting the hang of this shit, as if I needed another way to avoid work and piss huge wodges of time away. That's it, I'm turning the computer off.

This is a cool shot.

Some soviet officer in Afghanistan on a mountain top fire base back in the 80s (now probably occupied by our guys) with his pet vulture/eagle, you tell me. Cool image though. Is that a huge fuckin bird or a seriously height- challenged Russian? I'm thinkin lolly-pop guild.

Found a picture for the profile that says a lot about me without revealing anything. Hence, anonymous.

Well, I've been tryin to post a picture in my profile, and all the adequate pictures I have are apparently over the 50 kbt limit. So fuck it. You don't need to see my ass anyway. Can't be Anonymous if yer picture is splashed all over the site, right? Anyway, I'm new to all this stuff, so be kind. Posted a few comments on a few other blogs in the last few days; Big Dick, Oz, Bugs Butt, so I guess I'm hooked now. I'll do what I can to bore everyone with my rude musings. Anyway, Its Saturday and I've got all sorts of chores to ignore, so I'll be laying on the couch, taking things in hand, watching Anne of 1000 Days on Turner. Excellent. Good times. Later.

Damn. I'm gonna rue this day.

Well, I guess I'm no longer anonymous.

Damn, like I don't have enough to do already. Shit. What have I done? The dark side.