Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Never Worked

Posted on by chappyshi

In the Washington Post Outlook section article, Joseph Rocha — ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Didn’t Protect Me From Abuse in the Navy , dated October 11, 2009, Mr. Rocha tells a tale of how the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy for gays in the military not only did not work for him but worked against him.  Rocha joined the U.S. Navy in 2005 and was sent to the Bahrain, perhaps in Shore Patrol unit.

After qualifying and training for a spot in a dog handling unit, he joined a unit of 24 individuals responsible for 32 dogs.  The dogs were used to search for and detect  explosives, drugs, contraband,  bound from Bahrain to Iraq and Afghanistan.   Joe’s description of how he was treated vies with notoriety for stories of Abu Graib:

“– the chief had decided that I would be down on my hands and knees, simulating oral sex. A kennel support staff member and I were supposed to pretend that we were in our bedroom and that the dogs were catching us having sex. Over and over, with each of the 32 dogs, I was forced to enact this scenario.”

To make matters worse, the only person that stood up for Joseph, was the unit second in command, a 1st Class Petty Officer, who was named “Sailor of the Year” when she was 27, was blamed for  not reigning in her boss, a Chief Petty Officer.  WTF?  This woman, with orders to return to the States, was charged with negligence, had her orders rescinded and had to stay in Bahrain.  She killed herself.

The story continues.  Please read the whole article and write to your elected representatives and ask them to support gays in the military…or  anywhere.

I hadn’t had the time, or energy, to publish this entry before I read in the Washington Post on October 21, 2009, that the Chief Petty Officer responsible for the dog handing unit was under investigation for  “years-old allegations of hazing and sexual harassment against a gay sailor and others.”  Read more here…”Navy petty officer to face punishment in hazing.”

Disclaimer:  I am not gay.  I spent 10 enjoyable years in the Navy.  I worked for five years as an equal opportunity coordinator while I was in the Navy.  I have written, planned, coordinated, and conducted numerous classes/seminars on equal rights/opportunities, sexual harassment, and discrimination and briefed the Chief of Staff, Chief of Naval Operations, Korea, on said topics.

Acid Reflux…

Posted on by chappyshi

I was listening to the Worst of Airplane some days ago in commemoration of having just read, for the second (not seconal) time, “The Electric Koolaid Acid Test” by Tom Wolfe.  A non-fiction work of art, “true” as it were, the book records the antics of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters as they trip and grok through the “LSD is not yet illegal” world of the 1960’s.

Most of the action takes place in the San Francisco Bay area and Mexico but includes a noted bus trip  (no pun intended) to the East Coast and back.  The thread of the book runs around the Kesey rapper, tripper, grokker persona, and his role as a polarizer or a freak.  He definitely drew people to him who wallowed in his “our existence really means nothing until we can go beyond acid” attitude.

Items, bands, persona, and thoughts referenced in the book are randomly listed below.  If you have any interest in the diverse history of the USA as relates to the 1960’s, “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” is a must read.

  • Freedom of expression w/o criticism
  • The bus
  • The music and the recordings
  • “The Movie”
  • Getting the police involved in “The Movie”
  • Owlsey Blues
  • Beatles concert
  • Stones concert
  • The Grateful Dead
  • The Hell’s Angels
  • Writer and Poet Jack Kerouac who wrote “On the Road,” “Big Sur, and “Dharma Bums”
  • Ken Kesey who wrote “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”
  • Allen Ginsberg who wrote the poem “Howl,” not to be confused with the painting “Scream,” by Evard Munch
  • Hunter S. Thompson who wrote “Hell’s Angels” and “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”
  • Country Joe and the Fish

Elaine’s Casserole

Posted on by chappyshi

Serves: 10-12
Prep Time: 1 hr
Prehead oven to 350 degrees

Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 small onion, chopped
  • 42 oz meatless spagetti sauce w/ mushrooms
  • 1 lb medium noodles, cooked
  • 2 lbs ground beef, lean
  • 1 lb cheddar cheese, grated
  • salt, pepper, garlic to taste
  1. Saute onions in oil until tender.
  2. Add meat sprinkled with salt, pepper, and garlic and brown.
  3. Add spaghetti sauce and heat thoroughly.
  4. Combine meat sauce with noodles.
  5. In 4-quart casserole, make layers of meat and noodles with grated cheese making final topping of cheese
  6. Bake in 350 degree oven for one hour or until top is bubbly and brown.

Allow extra 1/2 hour for baking of casserole is prepared in advance and chilled.

Bats in the Belfry

Posted on by chappyshi

In this Washington Post article, “Environmentalists divided over wind turbines, endangered bats, ” dated October 22, 2009, the merits of a wind turbine farm planned near Greenbriar, WV, are compared to the threat the farm might pose to the endangered Indiana bat.

According to one self-proclaimed caving fanatic and animal rights activist, “…if the turbines kill one Indiana bat, that ought to end it.  That ought to shut it down.”  I am all for animal rights but maybe we should stop driving cars too…fool!

Personal Cellphones in the Workplace, Not!

Posted on by chappyshi

Someone wrote to the Washington Post Jobs section asking “Who Do You Call When Your Boss Bans Cellphones?”  Apparently the boss had not only outlawed personal cellphone usage at all times including getting alerts silently and during break times but also forbade using company landlines for personal use.  That is a bit excessive in my estimation.  I believe that an organization has a responsibility to make it’s employees available to their friends and families in emergencies.

I do believe in banning cell phone usage, not during break time though, and allowing use of company landlines for personal use in emergency situations.  I can’t think of any reason that phone usage should be verboten in personal/family emergencies.  Were cellphones used only in emergencies, I wouldn’t ban them either.  We all know however that cellphone use in the workplace is rampant and flagrant.  I bet most organizations could realize a 5  to 10 percent increase in productivity were cell phone usage to be banned.

Growing up as a child (oxymoron or impossibility???), I cannot remember a time that my mother called my dad at work or that my dad called home from work.  I am sure it happened  but those occurrences could in no way mirror the frequent instances of frivolous cell phone usage that I have seen in the work place.  On top of cell phone usage, corporate email is also blatantly abused for personal use.  At least, for the employee, that is not as visible to management and coworkers.

Fortunately, company landlines and corporate email can be monitored, abuse documented, and disciplinary action taken when warranted.  I know from personal experience in the workplace that too much time is wasted on personal business using cellphones, landlines, and email.  In an effort to trim telecom costs at a previous company, I found company cellphone users who were nighttime supervisors who racked up three times  the amount of minutes per month the site VP racked up.  Please reconcile for me why a night supervisor should need to spend an average of 100 minutes per shift on the telephone. Really, you don’t need to.  I know from  viewing the call records that those minutes were not used for business…

Disclaimer, I am in no way commenting on policies of any company I ever worked for.  Also, I am single, have no exes, and no children, so my experiences having to keep in touch with people are extremely limited compared to many others.  Nonetheless, we have done without the current modes of  instantaneous and constant communications for thousands of years.  What makes us sure that we have to have them now?

My Cat, Hamlet

Posted on by chappyshi

My cat, Hamlet, turns 19 next month.  I have had him since he was six months old.  For 10 or 12 years he has had problems with constipation and weak muscles in his colorectal area.  He’s been to the vets for enemas, eats special food, and takes medications for the constipation.  He has bad arthritis in his lower spine which makes getting around, including getting in and out of the cat box, and getting in position to do his business painful.

As a result, especially if there is anything in the cat box, he leaves me surprises on the carpet outside of his bathroom.  He is also, very deaf and runs around the house screaming his head off, which is very disconcerting.  I often say that I won’t miss all these things when he passes away and wonder if he hasn’t lived too long already.  But I love the little booger!

Here is from more than ten years ago hanging out at the sliding glass doors of my friend Dave Schleusener’s house when I was renting a room there.

Hamlet
Hamlet, Click to Enlarge

No Auto Bathroom Fan

Posted on by chappyshi

For four years since I moved into my current apartment, I have had to listen to the horribly loud ventilation fans in my bathrooms whenever I turned the lights on.  I have no windows in the bathrooms so the fans are definitely needed and I appreciate them when I take a shower.  However, there was only one switch and it turned both the light and the fan on as one.

Most of the time I really did not want or need to have the fan on.  I was so happy that my maintenance guys were willing and able to separate out the connections and put a controller in that had separate switches for the lights and fans.  Sometimes the simplest things make me so happy!

Bibimbap..What Is It…Really?

Posted on by chappyshi

In the Washington Post article, “Eating Well on Singapore’s Seedy Side,” dated 09/27/2009, a particular Chinese dish, no name, is said to be tossed “bibimbap style.”  There is absolutely no indication of what “bibimbap” is in the article.  I know, only after having spent the greater part of ten years learning Korean and living in Korea for seven of those years, what bibimbap is…a Korean rice dish.

Certainly, 98% of the Washington Posts readers won’t have a clue though.  The only similarity to bibimbap that the Chinese dish has is that they are both served in hot clay pots filled with rice.  In Korea, vegetables, sometimes fresh, sometimes slightly marinated, including seaweed, kimchi (do I need to clarify that one?), bean sprouts, shredded Korean radish,  perhaps some meat, etc, are placed on top of the rice.  Oft times, a fried egg will top the whole concoction and always a side  of kochujang, red pepper paste, will be included.

One then adds the desired amount of kochujang and mixes up the whole deal and noshes away.  It is more of a summertime dish but really can be served year round.  My well thumbed Korean to English dictionary defines bibimbap as a “rice hash, boiled rice mixed with subsidiary articles of diet.  Bibim means “hash” or mixture.  Bap refers to a dish based on rice.  Bibim Naeng Myun, for example, is a cold noodle dished with assorted mixed vegetables.

It’s a shame that the Washington Post could put such an obscure reference in an article and then never elaborate on it.  I assume that the writer felt confident that the reference was common knowledge and that the editor didn’t have a clue otherwise.

Rise and Fall of Saturn

Posted on by chappyshi

According to the Washington Post article, “GM to Shut Down Saturn After Penske Walks Away,” dated September 30, 2009, GM  is dumping Saturn after Penske decided not to buy the division.

What about that?  Saturn was, and I thought would continue to be, a major success story.  Penske really wanted to buy Saturn when the option came up as we (as in, we the citizens) bought GM a few months ago.  Does not bode well for the economy in my estimation.  I wonder what queered the deal.

Bear Facts

Posted on by chappyshi

My uncle who has lived in Alaska since 1972 or so sent me this story of a rogue black bear’s recent activity in their area.

“What isn’t normal is having a problem black bear in the neighborhood.  One night it pushed open a front door a half mile away and stuck it’s head inside before a very startled guest of the owners yelled and scared it away.  It got into an outbuilding a mile or so away and ripped up a bunch of bulk food stuffs (flour, coconut, all sorts of stuff).  At the cabin downstream from us (only occupied about a week a year these days) the bear went through a window and made a huge mess of their kitchen area.  At our place, one night it opened the freezer in our entryway and pulled out a bag of ice cubes, ignoring salmon, halibut, moose, caribou, etc.  Then the next night it pulled up our locked shop/garage door, pulled out a closed plastic garbage can, carted it 50 feet away, and opened the unopened bag of dog food inside and gorged itself.  The next night it was back to the shop again, but didn’t appear to go inside, perhaps because all possible goodies were now inside the house.  A neighbor apparently wounded it soon after, but didn’t kill it.  But we haven’t heard of any sign of it since.”

Barely knew him….