Big Country Expat

Greetings and Salutations!
I know, mad shocker.

Two updates within a 24 hour period.

I do seriously apologize for this, but as of late, when my stress levels peak out, I’m utterly incapable of writing. Most fellow bloggers can relate I’m sure. I mean it’s not an excuse, more of a “pardon moi, I’m currently overwhelmed by my life” sort of thing.

Either way, the short but sweet update, and y’alls comments were greatly appreciated again by myself and Gretchen. She’s been a trooper through all of this, and adding on the self-inflicted stoopid of DumbC, she’s managing very well TBH.

Me?

I’ve made my ‘red lines’ clearer and harder than VodkaManBads.

Cross those lines at your fucking peril.

THAT is what a .45ACP is for.

Why, you may ask, a .45ACP?

Well, because they don’t make a .46 or .47.

So anywho…
Back to the CEO of UnitedHealth.

Word is now leaking out (like the blood from his CEO corpse, slowly, but surely) that there were ‘messages’ engraved on the shell casings that the shooter left behind… What they are, at this time, are unknown to this Intrepid Reporter. HOWEVER, the very fact that the shooter felt the need to insure that “the message was sent” tells me that there was a message…

Now the reason I bring this up?

Whelp, as “Fire Marshal Bill” would say:

Seems shortly after I poasted the update to Gretchen’s (and mine) current ‘medical adventures’ she/we got a letter from UnitedHealthCare in tonight’s mail…

Hold on, as this’s gonna be a doozy…

Per United:
“We received a request to cover health care services recently…. After the review of the information submitted…
…it was determined that this service was not medically necessary.”… blah-fucking-blah…

The “…” spaces cover the ‘other legalese’ language…

Despite a Medical Code of: “K62.5 Hemorrhage of anus and rectum” (with Doctors notes stating this was severe AF) they fucking are denying her three day stay in the hospital and ALL the costs associated to and with it. Which means We’re (for now) on the hook for about 20k in medical bills.

You know what I have to say to this?

Ho.
Ho.
Ho.

Yep.
I can -get- a machinegun if needed.
Friends in Low/DotGov places doncha know…
That and a flammenwerfer….

Jes’ Sayin’

And you can be sure AF when I call the appeal line tomorrow that I’m going to be very pointedly asking them if they want to be added to the “…should be shot on sight” list that the rest of ‘Murica seems to be drawing up.

See…

TBH, I’ve been feeling something that has me worried, but also rather? jubilant? I dunno but it seems in my opinion, that there’s a vast amount of based Americans that are coming out of their collective shells… The folks with the guns…

Meaning that the “Original Spirit of 1776” is still alive, and possibly thriving in the background… The Spirit that drove us to shoot the motherfuckers who ‘taxed our tea’ too much… the Spirit that drove us to kill anyone who stood before us, to include the Native Americans who were stupid enough to resist the inevitable…

Am I saying it’s right?
Fuck no.
HOWEVER
I am saying that I’m seeing a baseline rebirth…

All it’s going to take for me to cement these beliefs that shit has had a major change is a few moar assholes being killed out of hand for being ‘members of the Corporate-Globo-Homo-Judeo-Oligarchic Control Group’. A couple moar CEO brains “splattered and scattered”, and a few moar family homes burned to the ground… some tar-and-featherings plus general shunning… Hell, let’s cut NYFC off.

No moar food.
If you’re a farmer, stop selling the product.
If you know someone who is selling their product, reason with them at first, and then go to slightly moar drastic measures as needed. I gar-ron-damned-tee that NYFC would go full on nigra-cannibal within a week or two…

We might even get to watch Whoopi Goldberg eat that Jewess Joy Behar live onscreen…

But Like I said? After getting that notice?

Yeah, I’ll profusely apologize to the first line “Customer Service Rep” as I’ve both been one, and managed them. My own experience was working a healthcare Call Center as a Manager for the VA… you want to talk about abusive???? Yeah, me and mine: BT-DT.

My personal IRE is going to be saved for whatever level of fucktardery that I can get to… and I’m pretty good as far as ‘climbing the ladder’ on the phone with these folks… between being sympathetic and empathetic to the ‘front line’ folks who usually take the most shit from the callers, I let them know that I -know- it’s NOT their fault, and that IF they pass me on, and stay connected, they can hear me burn an asshole (usually their boss) a new asshole…

They tend to ‘pass me on’ when I tell them that.

EVERYONE likes to hear the boss take a verbal asswhuppin’

Even my people when we (on that rare occasion were responsible for a fuckup) positively loved to hear me get my anus et the fuck oot by someone for aforementioned fuck up….

Yeah
I know it’s in bad taste, but being told that some desk jockey accountant, at a company that had a $138 BILLION dollar profit last year has determined that my wife’s anal bleeding wasn’t enough to warrant a three day stay in the hospital?

Get me fucking names

Fuckers will learn what “personal responsibility to the people and or customers” means in short motherfucking order, I guaran-damned-tee it…

Yeah… I didn’t go into extreme detail but for the sake of this, the way it went down was this:

Gretchen called me into the bathroom after she pooped.

Now, she has gastro-issues.
THIS is a ‘regular thing’ so to speak.
She ONLY calls me if thing are really fucked up.

She interrupted my Fallout London Game by calling my on my cell phone. The house is large enough that while we don’t warrant an intercom, I’m so fucking deaf that if she yells, I can’t hear her. She called me on the cellie, and said “I have a problem….”

So I went back to see what was up with whut.

OK….

There’s bleeding.
Then there’s bleeding
Then there’s “Oh Holy Fuck” levels

In this particular instance?

I know, TMI, but this wasn’t a blown ‘rhoid, nor some light bleeding… this was a coating of arterial blood… ALLLLLL over the bowl… like the last time I saw this much bleeding, I put a tourniquet on dude’s leg in Iraq… No fucking joke. THIS was a “OH FUCK” moment where my initial reaction was, quite honestly, to stuff a QuikClot suppository up there… not that there’s such a thing, but I was doing the ‘out of the box’ thought mode, as there was that much fucking blood.

I even went as far as to make sure that this was a ‘thick coat’ via a Q-Tip…. I wanted to make sure we weren’t just dealing with a minor hemorrhoidal blowout… and when I ran the Q-Tip over the bowl (and mind you, it was COATING the bowl, a THICK blood coating, alllll the way up to the rim… she had had a full on O-Ring Integrity Blowout from what I could see….).

Fuck.

When I saw how thick the blood was, and how severe it was, adding on that she started almost immediately feeling light-headed (blood loss IMO) I threw her big Amazonian Ass in the car and rolled hot and heavy to the ER.

Now granted, in the end (pardon the pun) it apparently was tied into a previously (two days before) diagnosed UTI, as well as her general gut problems (PCOS, as well as a slew of ‘other’ stomach issues’) that it allllll culminated in her having an O-Ring Blowout in a literal bloody fashion. Seems her lower colon didn’t like the meds that the doc-in-the-box put her on for the UTI, and it showed via the blow-out.

BUT

For United to make a baseline call that this wasn’t necessary?

Oh Yeah…
I’m positively looking forward to my call with the appeals folks. They know not with whom they’ll be dealing with…

I have no problem asking/informing them that

“You know what? How would YOU like to be the next contestant on the “Healthcare Fuckers We Need Kil’t?” It can easily be arranged. YOU are not high enough on the corporate ‘food chain’ to warrant any sort of ‘protection’…. you AND your co-workers are easy fucking meat. You, as well as your families. Your CEO was ‘the easy meat’… and he’s waaay better protected in theory and higher on the food chain than you… Jes’ Sayin’ ”

No threats per se…
Just a reminder, as Caesar was told during his triumph:

“Remember thou art mortal.”

Rather prescient innit?

So, I look forward to seeing if they catch this guy.

Personally, I hope he gets away clean.

Considering it’s NFYC, my own persona bet (80-20) is they grab some random mook and lay the blame on him… not the real shooter mind you, but some ree-ree tardy kid they’ve had under observation for a while that’s an easy frame, who’ll make a good patsy so’s to make the NYFPD look good, and make the rest of the potentially targeted fucktards chill out… that’s how –I’d– be playing it if -I- were ‘large and in charge’

Have to see if THAT prediction comes true…
If it does, you heard it here first.

Lots of info drooling out (which is appropriate as the mass enemedia are nothing but if retarded) that the guy made a bunch of mistakes, but as of now? I say “Best of Luck Bro… you done did good!”

More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
OK:

First off: Good News/Bad News

Bad News: The Martians have landed in Los Angeles.
Good News: They’re eating niggers and spic -only-, pissing hi-octane gasoline, and headed East.

>Drum Riff<
OK… seriously. Been so busy as to make one’s head spin. Good News/Bad News here vis-a-vis Gretchen’s ‘issues’:

Good News: NOTHING actually wrong with her.

Bad News: A fucking moron Radiologist who didn’t know how to read a post-operative Breast Cancer survivors scan(s) needs to be beaten to the tune of three-four days of lost vacation time, $1000.00 in hospital (out of pocket no insurance I had to pay) and about a Million FiatBux in stress and fear and aggravation. Plus travel time and expenses.

Gretchen has forbidden me from kneecapping the fucker.

I really would love to do an good ole ‘Irish Job’ on the fucker’s knees… he doesn’t need knees to read the scans… he can do it from a wheelchair amiright?

<Le Sigh>

No one ever lets me have any fun.

Got home today. Been beat. Been ‘out of it’ worried to death. Couldn’t blog… hard to do when the stress level is that high… We both appreciated ALL the kindness and thoughts and prayers tho… my most humble thanks again.

The only other interesting thing about this trip was that BIG funeral for the three cops killed in West Palm? It was right around the corner (starting point?) from the Doc’s office on Saturday. The office being located at the West Palm Beach State Fairground.

No joke or exaggeration: there must have been 2-3k cop cars/motorcycles and I have no idea how many fuzz from around the nation there. Never mind that OrangeManBad was there with his protective detail, the roads were highly fucked regarding flow of traffic and such. Never seen so many cops in one place at one time let me tell you.

Reminded me of a Cartel Funeral I saw on YouTube once…
Which sorta-kinda tells you something about the cops right?

Speaking of which, Chad Chronister, our Sherriff here in Hillsborough who had been nominated to run the DEA pulled out… seems that his arrest and persecution of a Christian Minister for holding services during the ‘Vid Lockdown didn’t play too well with OMB when he found out…

Don’t look at me man, I didn’t voat for the fucker.
Chronister is a POS IMO.
Some of his deputies (like the former Navy Chief who took control when DC “swatted me” and didn’t let me get arrested/shot) are cool. Other? Not so much.

Yeah… then the pardon?
If you were surprised, then shame on you.
We ALL know that we get no justice
That they always protect each other
Two Tiered indeed

That being said however, seems -someone- has a sense of justice/humor. The CEO of UnitedHealth (who fucked me/us over and was the reason I had to go OOP on this to maybe keep my wife, you know alive and all) was brutally and proficiently (from the looks of the video released) gunned down in NYFC this early AM.

I wholeheartedly applaud the hit.

Well done. <slow golf clap>

Well planned, perfectly executed (pardon the pun), good E&E (escape and evade) and from the looks of it, the perp is going to just f-a-d-eeeee into the background and be forgotten… Not that I necessarily condone such actions, however as the Joker said:

Yep.
NOW what would be extraordinarily hilarious would be the next guy -whomever he is- who steps in and takes over, that he also gets blown the fuck away. As well as any other major CEO of these diseased and felonious corporate empires who’s sole purpose is to drain the cash from the working class… the very example of a parasitic corporate entity who make their INSANE profits off the misery of people.

Their deaths can’t come soon enough IMO.

AntiFa ‘claims’ to be ‘of the people’?
THEY can lead the charge IF they aren’t IRL controlled by the enemy. (Hint: they are) However, we all know what’s really happening. My question is that IS this the beginning of ‘something’?

MAJOR CEOs of a $138 billion dollar profit company generally don’t get whacked like that. I would think, and if it were me? I’d have -some form- of guard… at a bare minimum.

I mean shit…

If these clowns are that ‘touchable’ well Hell…

I look forward to the news of the next clown getting his shit ‘scattered and splattered’

Serves them right.
So More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Well, first off, my great appreciation and thanks to all of y’all who come by here to hear my whining and bitching. This’s my one refuge I have where I can do a mind-dump.

I’m thankful for so many things this year.

One is that despite the recent news, Gretchen survived and thrived after the first round of Cancer, (cursed be it’s name).
Two is that both grands are thriving in their respective ages and areas. I’m also happy that BabyDaddy seems to have finally gotten his head out of his 4th point of contact.
Three is I’m thankful for Sapper still having my back. Much appreciated man.
Four are the few friends I still have despite my obnoxious and rather toxic personality. I’m trying to improve, but being an utter bastard is sort of in the DNA. This includes a LOT of my fellow bloggers, like Wirecutter, Mike at Cold Fury and the Tactical Hermit, to name just a few… CA as well for his efforts especially in keeping the signal alive.
And lastly I’m thankful for the People’s Glorious Tractor Factory as I’ve now seen up close and personal how utterly shitty the job market is, and especially thankful for the Operations Commissar who at the time was IT Commissar before his promotion who got me in to begin with.

I mean this is ostensibly what this particular holiday is about.

Giving thanks to the Big Guy in The Sky, be it whatever name you prefer to label him. And yeah, I’m pretty sure its a male deity. Call me a sexist. This is where we’re luck enough to give Thanks to Him for the Blessing of us living here, and for all the bounty and wealth of friends and family we have. That and turkey with dressing.

So, may you ALL have a fantastic day, and I’ll be catching up tomorrow as I’ve been s-l-o-w-l-y starting work on the Enfield. I have her completely stripped down to pieces-parts, and have started the in-depth inspection and stripping of the finish. So far it looks great.

So More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Saluatations
Where to begin?
So, last Thursday I find Gretchen bleeding out from ‘something;’ that was unexpected, nor welcome. This was from an area that I’d rather not get into, but no, t’wasn’t the lady bits.

To give you an idea, I’ve seen a bit of Hemorrhoidal bleeding before, and trust me, this wasn’t it. TBH perfectly honest, I haven’t seen anything like that out of some arterial bleeding that I had to put a tourniquet on said-guy when he took a hit to the leg in Iraq.

Yeah THAT fucking bad. Freaked my ass out.

So know you know the ‘where’ of it.

The problem?

The WHY of it.

Of course immediately after said literal bloody shit-show, I packed her off to the literal BRAND NEW hospital that’s within spitting distance of Ye Olde Casa. Because when I say new, I mean “new-new”… like only opened officially like a few weeks ago… a 13 million dollar full service hospital that, from what I can tell, no one realizes is in full-on operation. This is a thing of goodness as when we got there, the Emergency Room was literally empty, they triaged her, and immediately admitted her, and started working on her.

Hence my extended absence.

But wait, there’s MOAR!
This’s an aside:

During this entire fucking nightmare, I didn’t tell you guys, but DumbCunt is back… I got, if you will, “Machiavelli’d” to use it as a descriptive adjective. DC had been made homeless… I heard somewhere about it, however, her life means less to me than the Red Hot Chili-Pupper or Stella the Sausage Queen’s freshly deposited steaming loafs on the lawn in the AM.

Quite literally, I don’t give a fuck.

HOWEVER

The in-laws, on finding out that DC was again homeless/jobless/worthless saw this as a prime opportunity to stay out of the home, and sent her a bus ticket to get here. The idea being that she can become their caretaker, and try and redeem herself…

Lots of fucking luck there folks amiright?

Either way, it was ALL done behind my back
SO yeah… I’m over it.
Told ’em that when not if it all blows up I’m not fucking helping.

Part of the reason the in-laws did this (besides trying to stay out of the home, which at the time I was fully ready to commit to having them involuntarily committed so to speak… there’s been a ton of issues of which I have NOT spoken of to y’all) is that DC IS their only grand…

Soooooo…. literally while Gretchen is in Intensive Care, we got DC en-route Via Greyhound.

I sure picked a bad weekend to stop sniffin’ glue….

Long(er) story short is there is something potentially Cancer-Level shytte is happening with Gretchen. Doc Samizdat is on the case, as well as some other(s), however, Moffit here does not take her insurance, and we don’t have time to fuck around again. As they say in that flick: “…just when you though it was safe…”

Dammit.

Now… I got Gretchen back on Sunday… This was a good thing… it was early morning when I picked her up… to which she turns right around and bails. However, that was also my 55th Birfday. AND it turned out that was ALSO the day DC showed up to the Great State of Florida. Hence her bailing on me for the cunt.

As I am who I am, and since I was told “This’s the way it is” Gretchen went to get DC and deliver her to the in-laws Area of Operations…

And as you ALL know, nothing in my life could be that easy.

DC showed up with a temp of 103.9, sick AF and Gretchen had to take her to the hospital, where she’s currently in the intensive care ward as her homeless living left her ALLLLL sorts of fucked up.

I literally spent my entire 55th birfday by myself
Yay Me.
Meh… it’s only a day.
I did however get my birfday gift that I got myself, of which y’all WILL be seeing:

A Royal Tiger Imports Short Magazine Lee-Enfield Mod1 Mark 3 or SMLE. It was $99 and is missing the bolt and mag, and in rough shape, but not so much as to be irretrievable. The bore and rifling are great that I can tell.

The wood, the top parts are broken and beaten on, but the stock and lower handguard are fine. It looks like I’ll be able to restore it, so I’m taking pics as I go. As an FYI, it was made in 1939:

Have to see what happens…

I have all the tools and solutions to clean it up. In fact I have it completely disassembled… it comes down to the “when I have enough time to do this on top of all my other shytte” and the balance of dealing with the wife’s “Oh my baby!” instincts which personally? I don’t buy.

Some instincts are better smothered in the crib.
Much like how DC should have been handled back in the day IMO
Fuck it… I have a rifle to work on amiright?

So More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Well, considering Russia just dropped an Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile on the Krain, I myself have to say that this tweet sums it up rather nicely:

https://x.com/4nt1p4tt3rn/status/1859669271468494933

H/T to WiscoDave for that

Putin is definitely giving a warning here.
The problem is the current crop of Retards and Reprobates are too stupid, vain and clueless to understand that they are not the “Masters of the World”… in fact the past 6-8 years have shown them to be utterly incompetent with regards to running anything at all… in truth they couldn’t organize a gangbang in a Tijuana Whorehouse with a suitcase full of Pesos and a Hundred Horny Dudes.

Ergo the Hubris of these Fuckers is probably going to get us all killed. Ah well… so much for it…

Just like my “Cupboard of Fucks” it too, is empty.

So… other things:
One lighthearted thing I found from the Lockdown Times was a video I found on YouTube at the time… if that makes sense? Meaning I found this vid, and it tickled me sideways:

OK:

Got an issue here. Got to take Gretchen to the E.R.
OK…0345, they admitted her. I’m home to get some quick ZZZs then back to the hospital. She’s stable and they’re trying to figure out what happened… NOT cancer related that they can tell… this’s a new issue…

More Later
BCE

Greetings and Salutations!
I know, I know…. been AWOL again…
What can I say?
Truth be told, I’ve been about ‘done in’ with the current day bullshit. I figured that maybe since the (s)election was over and done with, we might finally get a break from the wall-to-wall bullshitfestivus that had been going on.

More the fool sez I apparently.

So much so, it’s been hard to find the motivation to blegg. How bad you ask? It’s almost as bad as the whole “Christmas Music/Decorations before Halloween” even gets here thing we seem to have going on every year… It was what? a two? three? year run up to that pile of shit that was the (s)election?

Tell you what, if there was ONE. THING. I would positively beg that OrangeManBad do, it’s issuing an Executive Order that Not a Single Political Ad nor any mention of an Election be allowed to be on the news, in the papers, or put out there until 90 days BEFORE the -actual- election.

I dig that it’s the main ‘feeder’ for the news cycle but Oh My Gawd is it sooooo out of control. They’re already fucking talking about potential 2028 candidates.

Have any of these fuckers have no shame?

Of course we know the answer there.
Hence my somewhat extended absence.

I sort of feel like “Hawkeye” Pierce from M.A.S.H. towards the end of the series… It’s reported that Alan Alda, the guy who played Hawkeye was experiencing some serious ‘role-burnout’ and because of this, is why they ‘wrapped’ it like they did, with Hawkeye being taken to a nuthouse.

I’ve been feeling sort of the same way.

So I’m going to be poasting mostly weapons/tactics and the occasional observation of and about ‘stuff’ in the future. I’m done with a lot of the ‘current day thing’ and the blegging I hope will reflect that.

Let me know in the comments what YOU would like to see. I have to get caught up on some projects too, like a couple of you who asked me to check up on deceased WW2 relations and their service…. no, I haven’t forgotten… just me being overwhelmed per usual.

Otherwise, the fam is the fam. Addy is doing well… and the Baby Daddy and I chat on the regular. These are good things. I’m -still- trying to get him to relocate down here, as he does do roofing, and I’ve been trying to explain that here in Florida, a guy w/his skillsets can make enough $$$ in one ‘season’ that he’d be able to be off the rest of the year. Tennessee’s construction season is so short, he only gets work for like 4-5 months maybe out of the year, then the winter hits and that’s all she wrote.

Told him he and Addy can doss up here until he gets established. Win-Win in my book either way. He gets a full time babysitter (we don’t mind) Addy gets our influence and maybe the kid can finally get himself squared away in a decent job for once.

So that’s what I got.
How about Y’all?

More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
So tonight is going to be extremely light. I had to make a trip down to Glorious Home Office to see new IT Commissar as Laptop was toast. This being the like 18th? or so time that it shit the bed, the new IT Commissar told me to actually come into the Home Office, and they’d pay the mileage.

Works for me!

So not only did I get to take a 3-4 hour drive on company time, I got paid for it, as well as a new lappie out of the deal.

Tell you what however, it’s been a bad week for me and computers. AFTER the initial report of the work PC doing the crash and burn on Wednesday, Thursday had it’s own challenges that almost made me cry like a bitch.

My front room, home to the “Big Country Museum of War and Mayhem” is also my workspace. I have a workbench, loading bench and my gaming PC there, as well as my dedicated People’s Glorious Tractor Factory spot.

Well, I had a bottle of water on the bench with my gaming pc under it. By all rights, it should have been fine. However I did not figure on Bob-The-Asshole-Cat to decide to play fuck-fuck-chase-chase, and run across the top of the bench, and knock the water over.

The water thankfully missed the MAJORITY of the PC.

HOWEVER
A wee bit did get through the top.
The case is pretty much open on the front with 3 fans, the back with two BIG fans, and the top, which is open with a very tight mesh screen. Lots of cooling for it… The Processor cooling tower I think is liquid cooled, self contained. Not sure as Spawn #1 built it, and he’s no longer speaking to me, mores the pity.

It’s been a minute since the interior has been ‘blown out’ completely of dust, so it was easy to spot just where the water did or did not hit. I cleaned everything up, and since the thing was still running, I figured I was good.

Until I wasn’t.
The mouse was frozen, and the power button had ceased to work. Turns out that the plugs on the motherboard? The ones that controlled the USB 2.0 connector(s) and the JFP1, JFP2: Front Panel Connectors had ONE drop of water that hit each one. I ended up having to unplug the pin connectors, dry everything, and WAIT.

Thanks be to Crom or God or (insert your Deity of Choice) after about two hours, a lot of prayer and begging for mercy to the Computer Gods, I reset everything and YAY!

It’s back and working.

I’m VERY pleased with this, as while I was waiting, I went to price a replacement board. Now I got this as a leftover from Spawn when he upgraded HIS rig. The motherboard came out in 2016…. I figured “…how expensive could it be?”

Wow
Even for an older board, $160+ shipping is pricey.
And never mind the fact that I’d be without my rig?
Yeah… it would have sucked.

So THAT frens is what has been happening here.

And as far as the current Polly-Ticks?

Well, anything that makes the current group of fucktards, on BOTH sides of the aisle wail, gnash their teeth, and scream and cry like the fucking cunts they are is a good fucking thing.

I sooooo look forward to the next round of mental breakdowns.
There are reports state that nationally, the suicide count is like 2500% above the norm since the election.

You know what I call that?

A good fucking start.

If they keep it up, we might actually run out of drunken blue haired lezbos, crazy wine aunts and deranged anti-American Karens by January. IRL I know it won’t happen, but a man can dream right? And the ones not offing themselves? Who’ve sworn off sex and reproduction? Even fucking better. That means they’ve stopped pissing in our collective gene pool, and I’m comfortable with that.

So More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
My Lord, it’s been an interesting couple of days around these parts. The Number One issue was my work computer ‘bricked’ on me again after another Microsuck Update. And because it’s a work issued computer, I can’t turn it off… I have to ‘allow’ the updates to install, which in turn becomes the post-update “Morning of Fear” when I turn it on.

Will it or will it not BSoD?
That’s the ‘Blue Screen of Death’ for those of you non-techs out there. I actually don’t know if Windows 11 has the actual BSoD… I know it, specifically my lappie just ‘stops working’. In this mornings fun, I was able to log in, it started running and then nothing… The screen went to black, and refused to function after.

I was able to get to the task manager (Ctrl-Alt-Del still worked) and I tried various ways of disabling like almost everything that the start-up had set to enabled. A dozen reboot and failures later, I went to do a restore, and that even was done… I ended up doing a factory/image reinstall…

And even after that, I now have hardware failures.

Soooooooo this means a road trip on Friday to exchange the computer. Since this’s work related, I can expense it thankfully. I’ll get a room for the night and Gretchen and I can just get out of town for an overnight which will be enjoyable.

So… now to the crux of tonight.
Pete Hegseth, the nominee for SecDef.

Hard charging former infantryman.
Outspoken to the max.
Tatted up and causing Libtards heads to positively explode.

These things IMO are good things…
And the tat in the lower right hand corner of that pic above?
Look familiar?

That’s a Rakkasan Crest in both pictures.
Now, Two Issues here IMO.

The minor:
I noticed that his tat is actually fucked up.
If you look at the ‘sawblade’ (that’s on either side of the two handed sword) HIS isn’t alternating… it should be… his is blue-on-blue and gray-on-gray going vertically… it should be blue-gray-blue-gray as it is on my wall display… instead of a sawblade, his looks like the end of a guitar neck.

That’s the minor.

The major however is this.  And this one I don’t really want to get into, BUT: According to his record, he did 20 years +/- in the Minnesota National Guard. ZERO mention of any active duty. I mean deployments count, but as far as actual active duty assignments? I can’t find any. Does being attached to the unit make one a Rakk? I mean this is a legit question IMO.
According to the Wiki:

In 2004 his unit was called to Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, where he served as an infantry platoon leader with the Minnesota Army National Guard. His unit was under the operational control of the 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment 101st Airborne Division

Being under the “operational control” last time I checked does not a Rakkasan make. Unless he made his “Regimental Affiliation” with the Rakkasans? Well… even then… that’s a bit weak. I mean ANYONE can file for a Regimental Affiliation… usually you get affiliated with a Unit that was special to you… Mine in fact -is- the Rakkasans… specifically 2nd Batt 187th, which is no more. They reflagged in the early 2000s to 1/33 CAV (AAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH!)

So, depending on your perspective, if being “under the command of” the Rakkasans makes you a Rakkasan, well OK.

As far as my own POV?

Unless you got orders assigning you to a unit of the 187th you are not a Rakkasan. A Rakkasan is a serving member of the Regiment. In fact our Facebook Groups have very strict rules that wives/girlfriends/and whatnot can’t join the FB Group (with the exception of Gold Star family members of course). You have to be vetted by being checked against the Unit Roster(s).

And to that point, I think it’s something that he needs to get out in front of now as I know there’s some ‘other Rakks’ out there who’re straight up “bad actors”… in fact it’s rumored that that fucking freak “PupRavage”?

‘Member that fucking psycho?

Supposedly (much to my horror) the intel I got is he –was– (was is a good thing IMO) a Rakkasan as well… and there’s a lot of other fucking bad actors out there like him… If they make a call that he’s doing ‘performative stolen valor?’ I mean TBH the regimental crest tat IF he was only an augmentee/attached to the 187th seems a bit ‘wannabe’/’cringe’

Not trying to stir the pot, but I feel it’s a legit one.
Tampon Timmah got majorly dragged for his bullshit, and I’d fucking hate to see the same shit happen with this guy, as he’s got the Left utterly shitting themselves in terror. That alone makes him great in my book…

Update While Writing:
So I asked the very same question on my Rakkasan Group(s) that very same question of whether or not he’s a legit Rakk. Most interestingly, I got a couple of responses from guys who served with him and knew him:

From: Ben X

I was in Charlie Company 3-187 during the 05-06 deployment to Iraq.

Pete Hegseth was 2nd Platoons PL. he was an E-6 that went OCS I believe to become an officer.

OK… whew.
Like I said, I really didn’t want to ”go there’… and Ben wasn’t the only guy to DM me. Lots of guys who either served with him, or under him said he was the real deal. It looks like in 2005, when Big Army was waaaay short on usable manpower, they offered Reservists and Gaurd guys one year contracts to fill in in critical slots (like the Infantry) and Hegseth volunteered, and got assigned to the 187th. That also means that his awards are more than likely legit too… which means the Bronze Star actually means something unlike some of the ‘chairborne rangers’ who earned theirs for being under indirect fire a couple of times while making coffee for the brass…

So this means they got a total asskicking outsider there…

Going to be an interesting few weeks leading up to the Inauguration. Keep the head on a swivel. Avoid Crowds.

More Later
Big Country

Happy Veterans Day ya Filthy Animals!

Everything is good
Just a lot going on here at the Casa
No operational immediate problems, just the normal SNAFU.

More Later
Big Country

h/t Eatgrueldog

Greetings and Salutations!
OK: Note to everybody (and self).
When handling a can of cop-grade pepper spray that’s faaar beyond the “Date of Use/Expiration”, I highly recommend utilizing gloves and even a a respirator depending on the circumstances.

Yep.

I’m ok, because it seems as it ages, it (the capsicum itself) loses a certain amount of potency. Lets get into the specifics shall we?

The story behind it is that earlier this evening, Gretchen was digging and rooting around the 4th bedroom in the back of the house, this being DumbCunts former dossing space. She (Gretchen) was looking for a shirt or something in the closet.

Now mind you, we’ve cleaned and (for the most part) exorcised and sterilized the room, to the point of even shitcanning the bed/mattress and bedspring that her nasty ass used. Gretchen then reclaimed the majority of the closet for her excess clothing… (God knows that chick has a LOT of clothing LOL) I keep some smol stuff in there myself… anywho

That room is now the ‘guest room’, with a nice queen sized 4 Poster bed that was made by the Bombay Furniture Company. Post Divorce I still had ‘Ye Olde Marital Bed’ which lasted until Gretchen moved in, at which point she made it clear that she did NOT want to keep “…sleeping on another woman’s bed” and found that one on Facebook Marketplace. That was back when I was making pretty good bank so it wasn’t an issue. Even then, the one she found, and the price? $300.00 for a Bombay 4 Poster in awesome condition wasn’t to be sneezed at. (She’s really good about finding deals, and even talking folks down on price… I wish I had her with me in the Souk(s) in the Middle East back in the day… she’s a great bargainer).

So after we got rid of DC, she found ANOTHER 4 Poster bed, except this one was a king size. To be honest, the two of us need a King. I mean my shoulders are 26in across, and my chest is 59.5 (call it 60in) around. Gretchen as you’ve seen from pictures is only a wee bit shorter than I am, but as broad as I am, and her chest?

Don’t get me started.
Even the post-op Boobies are Yuuuuuge.

So yeah, King gives us a lot more room to get comfy. That too was another “OMFG we paid how much for this!?!” I mean I feel like we stole it TBH. We paid less than we did for the Bombay… but there was a catch, we had to take a bunch of ‘other shit’ they wanted gone, which only made it to the nearest dumpster on the way home.

I mean to save $100?

So anyways… after she found the shirt she was looking for, she found something -I’ve- been looking for for a long minute (a file folder of all my FEMA/Disaster Management/Counter-Terror certificates) and brought it out to me. This was a thing of goodness, as I’ve been trying to locate that for a while. I then went back, and put it with ‘other’ important documents that I have in a centralized and locked fireproof filing cabinet.

Just an aside: A very good thing to have IMO

Double locked, fireproof… I got all the critical dot.docs in there in physical form, as well as some thumb drives with scanned copies that are in (theoretically) thermal proof containers inside the supposedly heat-proof/fireproof file cabinet… YMMV, don’t run with scissors as well. I always make sure I have Backups of the Backups of the Originals if you will…

To continue…

The rooting around made me realize I haven’t, outside of transferring a lot of the deep storage food/prepping items, rooted around in some of the boxes like since the separation/divorce. That was allllll the way back in 2016. While looking, I came across an insignificant little square/cubical (8x8x8in maybe?) woven wooden basket… one of those ‘decorative’ ones that has a cloth liner that chicks love to use for various displays and whatnot…

This one however had some of MY ‘stuff’ in it… nothing major, just a couple of tactical pouches and tactical cell phone holders and the like, as well as a pouch holding a can of ‘Fox’ brand pepper spray… It was in its proper pouch, and was pretty much untouched… I think the last time I has that particular item out and in operation was when I was working between contracts as a Counter-Terror Officer for the Tampa Electric Company, TECO as it’s better known as… it was part of our basic pistol belt loadout. That was OMG… Like between Iraq Tour #7 and Pre-Afghanistan… “A long time ago, in a Galaxy far, far away…”

I did the 10 second “pull it out, examined it, and put it back in the pouch thing” noting only that it seemed extremely light and almost empty? when I shook it? Meh. Either way, back into the holster it went. I didn’t really pay it any mind because in the same basket, I found a bunch sheets of 2in tall black vinyl stickers like we used to use in the Army for bumper numbers in there.

I ALWAYS have a use for such items, so I thought “COOL DEAL!” and put up the basket, as well as all the other crap I had disturbed during my rooting around…

I then came back here to “Chaos Central Command” which is the A.O. that I’m at right now. I started going through the sheets of stickers to determine if they were at ALL salvageable, or if any of them had gotten messed up sitting for what? Almost 14 years +/- of laying around?

As I started pulling the sheets apart, the majority of them were in perfect shape. However, one or two sheet(s) of them was/were stuck to another sheet, and I was having trouble getting a grip on it…

This’s when I had my Oops! moment.

I licked my thumb and index finger to get the recalcitrant pages apart.

It took about 10-15 seconds for it to hit…
My tongue first, followed by the rest of my mouth, then lips.
Dull pain, followed by fire…

I’ve been pepper sprayed before in training, so I knew exactly what happened. First thing I did was go to the sink, set the water to ‘scalding’ and scrubbed my paws. I then immediately walked over to the fridge, and did a full on rinse/gargle/spit/repeat with the milk about 4 times. THEN I went out to the ‘Redneck Freezer’ in the garage and got me one of those awesome Ice Cream Cones I have on hand…

Hey…
They were BOGO at Publix last week…
Even the BCE deserves a treat now and again!
They also are a great solution for instances like this
Jes’ Sayin’

I’ll say this, it worked… between the milk rinse(s) and the Ice Cream Cone, I’m now back to normal.

After that, it was time to figure out just what the fuck happened. I knew I had handled Ye Olde Pepper Spray, but I wanted to know EXACTLY WTF had happened. To be safe, I got me some gloves, and a respirator that is capable of keeping me from breathing that shit in…

I also got my goggles, pretty much the same ones pictured above. These items are ‘leftovers’ from a shit-gig I had with ServPro a waaaays back, doing home disaster/mold remediation. I didn’t want to break into the NBC Gear Storage Boxes, so this was what I had on hand… BTW ServPro? Worst “job” I ever had in the respect that I got utterly fucked as the guy who owned and ran the particular branch never put anyone on the books… EVERYTHING was under the table, but at the time, I didn’t give two shits as being paid cash at the end of the week, ZERO taxes being pulled out? MOAR cash for me, and Yeah, that kept me afloat for a while… but in the end he cheated me of almost $400 and I had no recourse…

So, dealing with shit like this? Not my first rodeo with a potentially toxic/dangerous item like that. My biggest concern was that it was going to really “pop open” and get alllll over the Casa. I went in and checked, and it turned out to be pretty damned easy. From what I can tell, the seal around the edges on the top of the can, where the spray nozzle mates to the can itself just went bad over time. Shit had leaked out ALL over.

The pouch as well as ALL the other gear in there are pretty much soaked/covered/contaminated with this stuff. I can tell it got everywhere as this’s a can of Fox “Mean Green” spray:

It’s got green dye in it to help ID whomever you hose down with it… that same green colored dye was ALLLLLL over the rest of the pouches, the basket and well almost everything else. I might be able to salvage some stuff… but not I’m sure if I want to put in the effort TBH.

Needless to say, a couple of take-a-ways from this:

ONE: I’m thankful as fuck I didn’t go and hit the latrine right after the initial exposure. I saw some guys in Basic who went and touched their pee-pee whilst still covered in powdered CS, and the term “Great Balls of Screaming Agonized Fire” comes leaping to mind.

TWO: I’m also happy I didn’t rub my eyes, nor pretty much touch any ‘sensitive’ body part (aside from my big ole yapper). Thankfully as I stated earlier, the older it got, well… I’ve had hotter ghost peppers than that, so it definitely degraded over time IMO.

THREE: Same goes for Gretchen She’s in a particular happy mood about this… it’s supposed to be cuddle time tonight, and maaaan I’d have been kil’t if I done touched her with ‘pepper paws’ let me tell y’all… on top of that, she’s also laughing her ass off at me for the absurdity factor…

FOUR: Most importantly, it’s become critical (in my eyes) that I (man, lets make that a ‘we’ for all of y’all who come here on the regular) that items we think are immune to degradation ARE (possibly) NOT. Until this happened, I -thought- the expiration date/best used by date(s) on a can of CS/Pepper-spray was just oh so much bullshit or a recommendation to spark return customers… much like “300,000 year old Salt from Nepal, (expires 2028)”

Guess it’s not Aye?
Keep in mind, this can was in a specialized holster, that I bought specifically because it was a perfect fit and designed to carry an item EXACTLY like this. The can itself? It was stored inside for the most part (unless I was on duty and actively carrying it) in a climate controlled area for the majority of it’s lifespan.

If anything, this’s now made me realize I need to triple check some of the items that I had previously figured were safe from “issues” such as this…

“Entropy is a bitch” as one of the characters in the book written by Sci-Fi author Dan Simmons in his epic “Endymion”… I think it was Aenea…

And again, a quick aside: the whole series of 4 books, called “The Hyperion Cantos” from which that quote is from? That’s the third book… ALL are fantastic and I can’t recommend the series enough… dead serious… the name of all 4 are named as follows:
‘Hyperion’
‘The Fall of Hyperion’
‘Endymion’
‘The Rise of Endymion’
I own them in print, as well as digitally, and in print I got both hardcover AND paperback, just in case. As some say, some books are like old friends, and these particular four are very good ones at that.

But as I was saying, best check the ‘stuff’ you think might be or even worse expect to be fine over the long term. We know food (for the most part) has to be ‘rotated’ but I sure as Hell never expected that something as simple (and potentially critical) as a can of Pepperspray would ‘go bad’ and become worthless.

Thank God I found out this way as opposed to an instance when I wanted/needed a non-lethal alternative, grabbed that particular item and had it spectacularly fail on me.

So YYMV as I said.
Take and Make of It What You Will
More Later
Big Country