Thread: The book, An introduction

no, you read it right... finished re reading it now.. yes, its true today I knew I was going to have one of those days... Ive known I was going to have one of those days today for nearly a week...

I was actually looking forwards to it, Why? because today we had a recruiting display on for the RAAF and as per normal everyone had organized some kind of display to show the kiddies but for the Meoms. We werent invited to display but got volentold to provide the personnel to make the rest of the logistics to work, Included in the duties were escorting people from one place to the next.

Ohhh goody an oportunity for me to be left alone with a bunch of people who know nothing about whats going on and likely to believe anything that the guys running the show will tell them .

you can guess why I was looking forwards to it..

And before I go on with the rest of todays events I should tell you about the idiot from the politcal post... no, I shouldnt not now in this post but Im going to anyway because I've found that writing this thing is very very theraputic It gives me a kind of silly internal grin because I know that long after Ive turned to ashes that someone somewhere is going to poke his mate and say "Hey Fred, come and read about the kind of idiots this Blknight fella has to deal with, and you thought our guys were out there" Its a prepubescent kind of happy, like a kid whose just been told he can stick his head under the soft serve dispenser and have at it. You know it I know it but he probably doesn't but there's going to be repercussions in his case icecream headaches and I have no idea in mine. Heres the kicker on that, that makes me want to do it all the more.

so anyway its legacy donation collection morning and here I am slowly crawling along to work in fozzy in second behind a white wagon and pondering what car on earth is so slow that has got me going so slowly I can barely keep 4th gear in a 1.6ish ton vehicle pushed by a 2.25l diesel engine with hot air induction and 2 of the injectors with a spray pattern that resembles a nozzleless hose rather than the nice mist of a spritz bottle and thats with the factory "lower than any other car out of the box" high range ratio and diff ratio. But Im enjoying the sunshine, listening to country and drinking my coffee so its not that bad.

till we hit the gates, now Id forgotten it but today was the day of the legacy collection and theres an extra 2 people out the front of the gate with the collection buckets sure enough she slows down even more. (no Im not being sexist, it was a she, she wound up going to the same building I was and I watched her get out of the car) After doing the clutch dance in first while waiting for the que of traffic to get through the collectors and the gate guard and she stops at the first collector...

AND HAS A 10 MINUTE CHAT... I know I listened to wreck of the old 97, yeeha, living in fast forward , and I aint no quitter while waiting for her to move off and was seriously starting to contemplate pulling the red lever back and seeing if the tractive effort of my rover could overcome the braking and traction limits of her vehicle followed by the structural resistance of the boom gate when she move off and pulled up to the boom gate and stopped.

I eased up the clutch and let it idle forwards expecting it to be the usual flash id, gate up and gone pass check when her brake lights came on and she stopped dead. I did the same with my, laxidasical not yet caffeine spiked nervous system locked into first low, reaction time stopped just clear of her tail gate. By just clear I'm talking microns.

She then got out and walked to the back of the vehicle, asked me to back up so she could open her boot and get her ID out....

now to be fair shes only had to go through the gates at work showing her ID EVERY working day since the events of 9/11 proved that you could save millions of dollars in blowdown technicians fees by simply slamming a pair of planes into the buildings you want removed. she then got on the phone and drove at about 35 Kph (just under what I need to do to be able to hold 4th without the engine sounding like its having a door knockothon) while talking on her mobile phone and from where I was sitting looking like she was applying make up.

Then I got chewed for being late........

but Thats a big digression and lets get back to the job at hand... correcting the fancy of recruiters and generally bringing anarcy to what should have been a well planned and operated event. Well I neednt have bothered The group efforts of the chaotic anarchists movement couldnt have made a bigger mess out of it than we had so I just settled for making a mockery of people and having fun.

For some reason someone asked me what was a sign of a professional airman. I replied its easy hes carrying a couple of important things. one of the kids chipped in pen and paper right.. No, coin money for a coke machine and a stubbie cooler at which point I unzipped the shin zip on my tank suit and pulled out a stubbie holder and then fished some coin out of a pocket. someone with more rank than me glared.

someone with more rank than me asked me to give a speech on what I do and knowing that I tend to get technical mentioned I should keep it simple..."well kids my job is pretty simple, If somethings airforce, doesnt have wings and some dolt breaks it I unbreak it."

Again someone with more rank than me glared.... I could feel a point of localised heat on the back of my neck.

having had enough of that I told a bunch of the kids to spread the word, that the IMV seats 8 people and if a group of exactly 8 people goes up and asks the guys at the IMV display for a ride that they will get one, Its part of an intelligence test thats being done for potential officer recruits if you work out how to get the rides on the IMV then it gets annotated on the paperwork you filled out to get on the base. when they didnt believe me i just pointed out the officer that was walking around with a clip board... kids Eyes lit up and later after seeing one of the kids I was talking to talking to said officer I got that funny warm feeling on the nape of my neck again...

even got to have an argument with one of the young guys who was running one of the display stands about some of the stuff that some of the gear he had on there could do and when he tried to settle the argument with "your just a mechanic, what would you know about field gear and weaponry" I was baled out by the Flight SGT in charge of the display who had come over after hearing him rasing his voice "Urmm hes ex army, did 10 years, has done a deployment to a warlike environment is Ex Cav and assult trooper trained.. I think he might know a bit more about what your talking about than you do jube..."

more hot spots but not from someone who out ranks me.

some of the kids, older ones who were actually interested in what was going on and not just bludging off of a school day for nix, started asking about why I was a mechanic if I done all that stuff and why a lot of the guys on the displays weren't putting the logistical support trades in the best light along with some other burning questions. I started out with the jealousy line becuase we get paid more, have less physically demanding work to do, have a trade thats worth something when we get out and basically because we were a lot more intelligent than most of them. now Im not going to turn this into a full blown insult argument but some of the more fun snippets that I had were

"land mines"
he said "XYZ" is what you should do if you step on a land mine what would you do.

"well for starters I wouldnt get in a position to step on a mine, Id make sure one of those guys had gone first. But theres no way Id stay still If I stepped on a mine, What I would do Is immediately Jump about 30-40 feet into the air and try to land in as many places as possible while wondering why I feel like Im laying down flat on my back but can distinctly see my boot making a contrail off into the distance" Even the outranking glare monkey laughed at at that one.

and while escorting a bunch of kids from one stand to another one asked me what kind of person I thought would like to be one of the guys who were manning the displays near the IMV.

"Special people mate, special people."
"what do you mean"
"well you know how every village has an idiot"
"yes"
"well picture a village populated by nothing other than village idiots"
"ok"
"the special kind of person who wants to do that job would be the kind of person that would be that villages village idiot"

stunned silence followed by the glare monkey snickering and then the kids laughing.



and that doesnt even go into some of the emails that were in my inbox...

in case I forget I need to tell you about

RAAF Identity
Cutting up and disposing of parts

they're a bit dry by themselves, hopefully I can tie them in as filler for an idiot driver or clerk story... given the rate I run into these fools that should be tomorrow.

cheers.

man..... ive gotta start saving these to read while im having breakfast...... definitely makes the outlook for the day that much brighter!

Originally Posted by Sprint

pfft, everyone knows Nato Standard= coffee, white and two, preferably served in mugs resembling kegs

We used nato standard in the RN. The book I am currently reading called Eight lives Down about an explosives expert uses julie andrews

I dont know where you live, and truth be told it doesnt matter. I bet at some time youve had the missfortune to have to try and drive on a major highway and have it come to a grinding halt. Im not talking slowing down a bit, nor am I talking 1st low with the rock crawing gear mods and the reduction portal hubs creeping slow Im talking Stopped, dead. pretend all the cars are parked driverless like they are in a car park but lined up nose to tail that kind of stopped.

It happened to me twice in one day hell in under an hour. To be fair it was my fault I was tempting Murphy far to much for the day... The itinery for the afternoon was from lunch travel about 95k to pick up something for the wife then head back about another 60K to install a carby onto a series landrover then turn again and scoot my self out to pick up my son from daycare, another 50 odd K's. I had a list of objectives, I had a plan, I had the required recourses to make the plan work AND I had some redundancy in the plan in terms of time.. I had enough time up my sleeve that even if i ran overtime getting the carby on and setup I could still afford to his some bad traffic... and since I was going to be attempting the dipswitch carpark during peak time Id sort of counted on that.

The boss had knocked us off 10 minutes early after an entertaining morning
I had a bottle of coke so cold that when I opened it It turned to ice slushie.
my Mp3 player was loaded with my favorite golden oldie, rock and country tunes with fresh batteries.
The sun was shining.
I was in a fully fueled series III with 200K to run and some tinkering to do on a landy.
I didnt even spill the coke on my uniform when i opened it and it fizzed to ice.

What more could a guy want in life... I was a 10 foot tall and bullet proof man on a mission...

I got the pickup done, no sweat, traffic was a little dense and traveling slowly but thats relative I like to cruise at 75K as thats about the most fuel effecient and not revving its ring off speed and I was keeping pace with the traffic. Got a good perv in on at the pick up and on the way to the pick up, yep it was good.

got to the place I had to do the tinkering and as expected ran into some problems with linkages and the likes but no dramas when I called it on the surgery I was only 20 minutes behind schedule which still left me plenty of fat on the time budget. Of I headed with a fresh 6 back of cold jim beam and coke in the car not bad, wasnt expecting that...

and at this point in the narrative I need to quote Wes Harrison. "this is where the fun starts"

on the way back traffic came to a sudden halt a total complete halt...

after taking 10 minutes to cover less than 300m people had started getting out of cars I took advantage and did the same, Started talking to the truck that had pulled up along side me. Turns out some idiot has run his truck out of fuel towies reckon their about 5 minutes away.

What actually happened is this..

The truck had run out of fuel, rather than stay in the right hand lane hes tried to make it over to the left hand emergancy lane, failed and blocked both lanes and most of the emergancy lane. no-one going anywhere...

so 20 minutes later and we're turning keys and back on the way. about 10 minutes after that im back down to second gear and just over idle which is fair enough Im about to merge into the ipswich motorway.

theres 3 cars in front of me evenly spaced and lined up nicely with the gaps that make up the safe following distance of the vehicles in the left hand lane of whats about to become the first part of the dipswich carpark.

oh on merging....
Yes merging generally slows down the flow of traffic a little, basic physics takes care of that take a look at an hour glass in particular the little constriction where the sand almost has to line up single file to get though. same concept more lanes into less. It works and works well providing everyone does it right... heres how it should work...

Everyone is supposed to follow at a safe following distance when traveling along 2.5 seconds of travel time this leaves a 50ish meter gap between vehicles. when you merge in from the left you line up along side a vehicle and hit your indicator.

now heres what a lot of people dont get the lane you are pulling into should be going at the same speed or faster than you, what should now happen is that the vehicle on your right should be overtaking you once you see that his tail is clear of your nose you pull into the lane while getting on the noise and cancelling the indicator.. the vehicle behind you lifts off very slightly to compensate for the following distance that has been lost and then when back at the right following distance accelerates again. IF its done right by the time you get up to speed in your lane behind the vehicle in front due to your lower initial speed you should be at the correct following distance and the vehicle behind you will still be at the right distance when you get up to speed.

Heres what happened when I did it....

It went perfectly. 3 cars in front of me do perfect merges, admitedly only at 30 KPh but still perfectly. No brake lights came on and thats always a good indication of a good merge. Right up untill the spoon jocky in the lifted 4x4 with the uber fat wobbly mud tyres, enough lights on board to put a christmas tree to shame and with the illegal straight out the side mufflerless exhaust system from the V8

heres what he did, After the 3 cars infront of me,myself and the 2 cars behind me had merged out of his way he nailed it up the merging lane, hopped the wheels up onto the kerb and proceded at full tilt up the side strip till the concrete barriers forced him to merge with the traffic, which he did without indicating and without even checking what he was cutting off...

the end result was chaos, brake lights everywhere and a couple of cars slewed slightly out of lane doing avoidance measures... and me again at a complete stop on a multilane highway

and heres the kicker by driving carefully and watching the traffic flow I managed to get up alongside the yahoo in the Hawaii 5 0 mudbogger special and get to the end of the motor way 2 car lengths in front of him...


I know whats causing the traffic problems, Its idiot drivers who think that they are more important than anyone else so they can bend the rules and procedures to suit themselves without regard to anyone esle.


And while I can think of a dozen different ways to make sure that everyone recieves the appropriate training in how to do the right thing at the right time so everyones life is that little easier when it comes to traffic I cant work out how to get it past the one stumbling block that is becoming more and more prevalent in todays society.

It doesnt matter how much training you give a person if they think they can do it differently so they make a little personal gain from it they will. Once that starts to happen we're no longer dancing all dancing to the same tune. That ladies and gentleman leads to chaos. Chaos is good at making a cluster of things. Generally people in clusters panic...

Its been said that at moments of great stress people go into fight or flight... thats true but I have a theory that there is a 3rd option, they roll over and play dead.

In a car that means that you either start fighting and that wont work, I dont care how loudly you toot your horn, shout obscenites and flick fingers you cant get 2 cars in the same space without putting them through a crusher first. If you try flight you tend to wind up in the spoon drain with a bent chassis which leaves playing dead, lock up the brakes and come to a stop, generally its the safest thing to do.

In traffic that means you all stop because someone ahead has had to.

Originally Posted by Blknight.aus

If you have a cardboard box with 30 toilets

You had a cardboard box with 30 toilets? We dreamed of having a cardboard box... we just had a toilet.


r

Originally Posted by martinozcmax

We used nato standard in the RN. The book I am currently reading called Eight lives Down about an explosives expert uses julie andrews

and whoopi goldbergs?

Originally Posted by carjunkieanon

and whoopi goldbergs?

Excellent, well done.

Today was an entertaining day... nope no lambasting. this was a good day... A day so good it makes up for living through all the days that you've read about and will no doubt read about in my life...

yesterday was overcast near the end and I was fully expecting today to be a wet windy and miserable day. Nope, wrong, sunshine all day everything I wanted to get done got done and for a change Alex slept through the time period that 2 shows I like to watch on the discovery type channels while eating lunch and taking a break so I got to watch them in peace instead of watching bob the builder as he slowly got round to getting it together enough to go outside and run around like the ball of energy he usually is.

we even took him to the park to play on the slides and to kick his current favorite ball around.

now what he likes to do is push the ball down the slide and then slide down after it kick it back between the 2 slides and the pick it up, run up the hill with it and do it again...

now hes done this for about the 10th time and halfway up some girl tries to grab the ball of him, he fights for a bit but shes a bit older and a fair bit bigger than him and hes loosing so he clutches it to his chest holds on grimly and with that teary sad "Im not happy please come help me dad pleaaase" look on his face as SWMBOs telling him to play nice and share I told him to smile and share, shes not going to take it she just want to play with it as well.

a bit upset and doing the whole chugging breath and fighting back crying with tears in his eyes he lets go and she runs up the hill with his ball and rolls it down the slide. By the time this has happened hes gone back down the hill unhappy with dad and hugs with mum for a bit when he gets hit in the bum with the ball. Smiles...

the girl slides down the slide and by the time shes at the bottom hes halfway up again with the ball she works out whats going on and then shes doing the whole chuggy breath almost crying thing... Alex gets to the top rolls the ball down and slides down after it. Shes got it and is on the way up while hes on the way down and then he turns around looks up the slide and waits for her to roll it down to him. She does and the game goes on...

Eventually she gets bored or tired or whatever else and toddles off somewhere esle, Alex just keeps going with what he was doing before. Eventually we leave and kick the ball as we're going just making sure that we kick the ball closer to the car or make him kick it to whichever one of us is closer to the car as we go... We get to the car and start packing things away and a guy pushing a pram walks up and just out of the blue says "should have figured you'd be driving the landy" He must have read the "who what why where and how the hell" confused look on my face and continued on "most of the guys Ive met who own them are pretty good blokes." then with me standing there doing my best impression of a fish he walked off.

when I finally got back in the car to drive home SWBMO asked what he wanted and all I could come up with was "I have no idea" as i keyed the donk into life and 1st geared it down the hill out of the park.