robert.admin – Page 209 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

August 26, 2012

The Sea Witch (Review)

The Sea Witch is a collection of three aviation short stories by Stephen Coonts, rich author guy, written between 1999 and 2003. They aren’t bad, not if you like planes, but with one exception, I’m not sure what the point of the stories are. Anyway, the three shorts are… The Sea Witch: The titular story centers on a PBY flying boat that has been tasked with a night bombing run over Rabal in WW2. Coonts demonstrates a full working knowledge of the craft itself (which is interesting). And it’s one of those “desperate crew fearfully flies the edge” deals. However, […]

August 25, 2012

Bridge to somewhere

After that horrible leg-pull last week, I was looking at my bike like it was the horse that had thrown me. Since dropping the meds (because they made me into a staggering zombie), the leg’s been a little sore. When Citracare called to see how I was doing, I asked if I could ride. “Sure, but for goodness sakes, take it easy.” Knew just the place. I’d seen the ladies down the street riding on the new urban trail downtown, one that wends between the lakes and parks. I’d been dying to try it and its only two miles off. […]

August 23, 2012

OpsLog LM&O 8/22/2012

You might have remembered my story about having my leg ripped clean off my torso (or something like that) HERE. As I mentioned, I just wanted to watch Jersey Shore in my pain/drugged haze. But tonight was ops and I had to be there. Since my ePass transponder was in the shop with the rest of my car, I had to drive all the way out on Colonial Drive, a study of stop-n-go Iphone-distracted reaction times. I took something like an hour to get there. Anyway, good session though sparsely attended. Matthew wanted to dispatch – he’d been watching how […]

August 23, 2012

Pull the other one…

Car’s in the shop after being rammed. Thought I could be urbane and hip by riding in all four days when I wouldn’t have it, a show of reliance and such. Was at the intersection of 1792 and Orange, waiting the light on my way to work. It changed, I went onto the right pedal and suddenly pain shot through my leg. It felt like the ratlines of a ship giving way, right before the mast topples, a physical thrum. I remember making a “Yip” noise and wobbling across the intersection, which was suddenly a borderless realm of concrete. Thought […]

August 21, 2012

Fans from Hell (DOG EAR)

I’ve heard tell that one of the drives for Steven King’s novel Misery came from his reaction to fans stealing bat statues off the tops of his gateposts. I don’t know if it’s true, but it should be. We all dream of adoring fans popping up at opportune moments to gush about how great we are. I’ve had that happen exactly once (when a person at a train event, realizing who I was, went delightfully ga-ga about Fire and Bronze). Very, very nice. But what we don’t think about are the over-cooked fans, the ones who haunt us, pester us, […]

August 18, 2012

Embedded (Review)

I hate Embedded. I hate Dan Abnett. This is writer’s hate, you see. It happens when a writer reads a book that’s really, really good. I just sit here hating the book, the author, all while I’m really, really marveling at it. Think I’m alone? Hemingway felt that way… Gil: I would like you to read my novel and get your opinion. Ernest Hemingway: I hate it. Gil: You haven’t even read it yet. Ernest Hemingway: If it’s bad, I’ll hate it. If it’s good, then I’ll be envious and hate it even more. You don’t want the opinion of […]

August 14, 2012

Watership What? (DOG EAR)

Just had an eye-opening (and speech-busting) moment in my Dale Carnegie course this week. The speech was to be done with enthusiasm, addressing an earlier goal. Well, MY goal for this task was redoing my agency-pitch cover letter. See, I had the idea that I needed a cover letter for every occasion, an actual stable of them on hand, maintained and ready (see Augean stables). And it worked well. So now I had to report. Enthusiastically. About cover letters. Tricky. So I figured that, rather than describe the monotone tasks actually associated with this effort, I’d give them a slam-bang […]

August 12, 2012

Back in the Star Wars saddle

Last week the nieces asked if I’d like to role play again. We’d had a fun (but confusing) session (HERE) about a year ago. Everyone wanted to play again. While it wasn’t the usual weekly session I was used to, sure, I’d ref. From my side of the shield, the story was pretty twisted. The action took place on the Imperial space station Tarkin, a trade-routes-straddling drum that used centrifugal force to keep things glued down. The spaceport and slums were on the inside (deck three), the poor huddled beneath a vault of greasy smog, the outer deck for the […]

August 12, 2012

OpsLog – Longwood & Sweetwater – 8/12/2012

I was pretty beat – I’ve been going full bore all weekend. And now it was ops in a warn garage and I was waiting for my train to be built in Orlando Yard. The two kids running the yard (ordinarily competent on their own) were bickering and scuffling, both working counterpoint to each other. Three adults were waiting for trains to be built. I was out of patience. I walked in, tried to reason, got nowhere, and went edge-on – told them these trains and throttles weren’t their’s, that they needed to treat the layout with care and respect […]

August 9, 2012

The Odyssey (Review)

Odysseus’ household is in trouble, worse than an upside down mortgage. See, this King of Ithaca has been away in the Trojan war for nine years, then missing for another decade. Convinced that he is dead, a hundred suitors for his wife Penelope’s hand have flooded his hall, working through the larder like cockroaches, threatening his son Telemacus. They are insistent to wed Penelope (not for her beauty, which appears to have held up well into her mid-thirties (if not later), but for Odysseus’ riches). She’s already started one gambit, claiming that she needs to finish sewing a funeral pall […]