A few days ago, I intended to post a bunch of news articles and a bunch of stuff about me. This is the continuation of that post.
* * *Popular Mechanics has an interesting article on
MSN that discusses possible non-nuclear weapons that could be employed in the next few years. Personally, I think a couple of the ideas are interesting, but I'm not convinced of their ultimate feasibility.
There's renewed fighting in Pakistan between indigenous and foreign militants in northwest Pakistan. (
AP,
BBC) This fighting has been going on in fits and starts for several weeks now. A largely Uzbek force of foreign militants is up against local Waziri tribes allied with the Pakistani government. The Uzbeks support the Taliban and al Qaeda; the local Waziris, who appear to be wiping the floor with the Uzbeks on a regular basis, are trying to drive them out. The linked AP article is worth reading, as it notes the unclear motives and alliances of the two groups.
Representative Pelosi will be
leading a Congressional delegation to Syria next week, against the objections of the White House. At the risk of sounding partisan, I was under the impression that foreign relations were handled by the
State Department, a division of the
Executive Branch of government, and that it was the prerogative of the Legislative Branch to confirm or decline the nomination of diplomats by the President. And on the subject of Syria, following up on
this post that implied that Syria is receiving weapons from Iran and Russia and sending them into Lebanon to arm Hezbollah, the United Nations is
issuing a stern warning to Syrian arms dealers who are shipping weapons into Lebanon to arm Hezbollah.
In another piece of good news coming out of Iraq, British forces are continuing to
consolidate their presence in the southern province of Basra. The local Iraqi security forces are continually increasing their role in security operations, allowing British troops to continue a phased withdrawal of their garrison there.
And finally, Mauritanians have held the second and final round of
presidential elections, and elected
a former cabinet minister named Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdullahi.
* * *Last week I made
Sharba Libya, or Libyan soup. I tailored the recipe a bit, and it turned out alright, though I'm sure that any self-respecting Libyan wouldn't have recognized it. I have a few notes for anyone who decides to attempt this recipe.
First, if you can't find orzo, use brown rice; if you use brown rice, cook it on its own before adding it. Three tablespoons of tomato sauce is a good substitute for the three chopped tomatoes and the chopped onion. Also, don't skimp on the lamb meat; in fact, the more lamb meat, the better.
It will probably be awhile before I try making Sharba Libya again, but I look forward to giving it another try. In fact, I might even use this recipe again, because it turned out to be a great lamb and rice dish, even if it bore no resemblance to "soup" whatsoever.
* * *Iran still has custody of fifteen British service personnel who were detained by superior Iranian naval forces after they searched an Indian commercial ship in Iraqi sovereign waters. As the diplomatic standoff has grown, the Iranians have gotten increasingly belligerent. Even President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad has gotten involved, demanding an apology for Western arrogance. The Iranians have released two videotaped confessions made by their captives, and footage of the detainees in small groups. The detainees have also reportedly been interrogated.
The Iranians have made particularly frequent use of the sole female member of the contingent, Leading Seaman Faye Turney. In addition to having been one of two personnel to make a videotaped confession, Turney allegedly
wrote an anti-war letter to representatives of the House of Commons. She is reportedly being detained separately from the the other sailors and marines.
The British government has suspended all diplomatic and economic activity with Iran, save for diplomatic efforts to secure the release of the hostages. It appears that they will likely seek diplomatic capital in the form of a United Nations resolution; however, U.N. resolutions have proven ineffective in recent negotiations with Iran.
Yesterday, in the shower of all places, I was struck by how the Iranian government closely resembles a college fraternity in its actions. Unfortunately, this is nothing new; and although a similar incident happened a couple of years ago between Iran and the United Kingdom, I'm struck by the similarities between the latest incident and the
Iran Hostage Crisis of 1979-1981.
* * *I'm continuing to appy for jobs. I've applied for a promotion at my current job, as well as several analyst spots with the government. In the near future, I'll update my profile with
Boeing, and apply for positions with the
Missile Defense Agency and the
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.
While there are jobs in the Northwest (my home region) that I'll be applying for, I'll also be looking for positions in other western states (Colorado, Montana, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming), as well as in the Beltway area. I'm trying to apply for at least one job a week, just in case I end up needing to evacuate. That having been said, it would be nice to stick around Zoo Station for a while longer.
And for the record, I'm keeping up with my physical training plan. This week was another "prep" week, but I still got sufficient pool time. Tomorrow I'll stage up the gear I'll need to start doing
yomps. The physical training schedule for this week calls for between three and five twenty-minute pool workouts, two yomps of two miles with a ten pound ruck, and three pushup/situp workouts. I'll have my hands full, but I've been doing pretty well in the pool so far.
* * *Sometimes I'm struck by the sheer comedy of some of the stuff I've written on this blog in the past. For example, this week I was putting together a Fly Report when I came up with the random line, "In retrospect, I've decided that I'm against any Ashton Kutcher film that doesn't involve someone's missing car." Now, since this seemed like the kind of thing I might have said in a Fly Report before, I decided to search my blog for it; and, for the record, the search option on the new version of Blogger works considerably better than the old search utility did.
My search brought me to a post from 07th August, 2005, entitled
Seann William Scott: Lifetime Achiever? in which I hypothesized that "Stifler" from
American Pie may very well receive a lifetime achievement award someday at the Academy Awards, or the Golden Globes, or some other such "respected" awards show. I E-Mailed blogger maven
Mo-Licious the entire text of the post, and she responded with the following (which is reproduced without permission, though I doubt she'll care):
You should write like that more often. You might have more readers. ;o)
More readers, indeed. I'm so seldom inspired to write such entertaining posts, so one like that feels extremely special when I go back and read it. Another one I'm fond of, though I don't know if anyone ever actually read it, was my
Jeremy Gets Hired post that put me in the shoes of Jeremy Goodwin from Sports Night.
* * *Over at
Bane's blog, I came across a link to
Crossing The Wilderness, a survey/game by Kim du Toit. If you're interested in things like guns and survival, and I know many of my occasional readers are, go check it out. Here are my answers:
1. M-14 rifle - 7.62mm combines versatility with good stopping power, good size and range; and the M-14 is a reliable, accurate weapon.
2. Ruger P89 9mm - another versatile round, good size, good stopping power with properly aimed head shots at at short distances (which is what a handgun is for); and of all the guns I've shot, the Ruger P89 has been the best overall.
3. classic Ka-Bar fighting knife, boot knife, and standard Leatherman PST
4. Black Labrador - best all-around dog there is
Feel free to post your answers in the comments to this post, but if you do, send them to Kim as well.
* * *Okay, that's it for now. Stay tuned in the next couple of days for a post about the situation in Iraq, and I'll be continuing work on my article about the ballistic missile defense system. Don't miss out!
