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The Two Weeks That Were

November 19, 2023 by 4 Comments

I don’t like to post anything about being on vacation when we are actually away. However, now that we are back home for a week it is fair game.

For the last four years we have been vacationing with the Complementary Spouse’s two siblings and their spouses. We have been doing it at the end of October and beginning of November in the Panhandle of Florida. The last two years we have been fortunate enough to make it for two weeks. Last year was especially good as I had retired a little more than a month earlier and I was still unwinding from the stress of work.

We did a little bit of everything this year. We visited a distillery, we did a bourbon tasting, we compared Key Lime pies, we ate seafood, we hung out at the beach, we visited the Air Force Armaments Museum, and we went flying in a small plane. We were joined by friends of my sister-in-law Cindy and her husband Scott who were camping nearby. Laura and Don were a fun addition.

The last, of course, was probably the most memorable. The plane, a Piper PA-28 Cherokee was owned by Rick who was an old Air Force friend of my brother-in-law Larry. Rick had flown as an EWO when Larry piloted the EF-111 out of Mountain Home AFB. Rick had his Cherokee hangered at Ruckel Airport which is a small private airport with a grass runway in Niceville, Florida. Larry and Rick had stayed friends after their Air Force service and Larry arranged for us to go flying.

Taking off:

Flying the plane though a few turns:

Preparing to land and afterwards:

I have to give the Complementary Spouse a lot of credit. She was a bit unsure about going up in such a small plane but she did it. So did her sister and, of course, her brother who said he had not flown since Delta and the FAA forced him to retire last December due to turning 65. With a shortage of experienced pilots in the airline industry, that is a stupid rule especially given the stringent oversight of the pilot’s health.

As I said earlier, we ate a lot of seafood. We visited Stewby’s Seafood Shanty on Okaloosa Island three times and I can highly recommend it. Between us all, I think we tried almost all their dishes and none disappointed. The shrimp, whether boiled or fried, were fresh and tasty. It was smart how they had everything set up. In one building, they had their steamed seafood and seafood market. In the other building they had all their fried specialties. In between was a courtyard with picnic tables. You could take food from one side to the other and eat inside or in the courtyard. I thought this was a smart way to do it.

30A Florida Distillery is a newer start-up. It has been in business for only about 18 months and is located in Santa Rosa Beach. They distill their own rum, gin, limoncello, agave spirit (tequila), and vodka. They also had sourced rye and bourbon. After doing a flight of gin, aged gin, and orange rum, I came home with a bottle of their Santa Rosa Beach Citrus Rosemary Gin.

Photo from 30A Distillery

Continuing with the spirits tasting theme, three of us, Larry, Don, and myself did a whiskey tasting at Beach Liquors in Destin. They had a tasting room where you could get 1 oz. pours of a number of bourbons, ryes, and whiskeys. They also had many craft beers of tap. While they had set flights of bourbons and ryes, you can also make your own flight and pay accordingly. My own flight was made up of a Bardstown Bourbon bottled in bond, a Peerless Small Batch bourbon, and a Barrell Bourbon cask strength. Given the weakest was 100 proof, I’m glad my brother-in-law Scott was the designated driver.

Larry, me, Don

We tasted a lot of Key Lime pies. We had pies from Publix (big supermarket chain in Florida), the Donut Hole (bakery in Destin), a Stewby’s “shanty pie”, Edwards, and Marie Callendars. They were all good. Some were more cheesecake-like, some had more lime flavor, and some had better crust. I will say we didn’t like the fake whipped cream that Publix used but the rest of their pie was very good. I know this may sound like heresy to Floridians but I liked the Edwards Key Lime pie the best as it had the most tartness.

Every day was concluded by watching the sun set. The Complementary Spouse got some great sunset photos.

I’m sure, God willing, we will aim to do this trip again next year. Late October into November is a great time to visit the area. The weather is warm but not hot. The water is still warm enough to go into the Gulf. The crowds have left and traffic is not bad. Most places have not closed for the season. All in all, it is a great time to go and this year was no exception.

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Veterans Day 2021

November 11, 2021 by 1 Comment

I often think of my father on Veterans Day. He was inducted into the US Army on December 11, 1940, did his basic training at Fort Bragg (which doesn’t need renaming), and was first assigned to a quartermaster company. He transferred to the Corps of Engineers in 1942 and remained in that branch the rest of his 28 year military career.

He, like most veterans of WW2, got out after the war, got married, and went to school on the GI Bill. He graduated college and became a school teacher for a few years. Along the way he joined the local National Guard unit. Then in 1953, he transferred from the National Guard back into the Regular Army where he remained on active duty until he was medically retired in 1972. He passed away almost nine years to the day after his retirement.

I know about his military career in detail because I got his records from the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis. It is part of the National Archives. As next of kin, I was entitled to get his records. My first request to the NPRC got about 20 pages of documents and replacements for all the medals and ribbons earned. My second request resulted in a stack of paper about 2.5 inches thick. It contained much of his medical history, his evaluations, his re-enlistments, and his entire military history.

It contained both the good and the bad. It seems my dad was AWOL at the replacement depot in Miami on the morning of January 1, 1945. Go figure.

If your deceased father or mother served in the armed services, I would urge you to request a copy of their records. You learn so much about the person who helped create you. It might not always be what you want to hear but it is what it is. For those living veterans with children, I would say get those records anyway. One day it will be too late for your kids and grandkids to ask what did dad or mom do in the Army (or any of the armed forces). Put them away in a safe place if you don’t feel like sharing now.

To all those who served our great nation, I say thank you. It may have been during peace time or during a war. Nonetheless, it was a sacrifice and for that I’m eternally grateful.

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Veterans Day 2019

November 11, 2019 by 1 Comment

Let me start off by thanking everyone who served in the military regardless of branch. Without your service, in both peacetime and war, we wouldn’t have the freedoms that we have today.

I was thinking about my Dad this morning. He served 28 years of active duty in the Army and was medically retired in 1972. He was 53 and was suffering from a wide range of health conditions probably brought on by his military service.

My Dad died at age 62 and 10 days. He was actually born on April 3rd and not April 13th like it says on the grave marker.

On May 5th, I officially outlived him. Unlike him, I never smoked, I never was in a war zone, and I was never exposed to Agent Orange. With the exception of not smoking, I wasn’t exposed to the things he was thanks to his service and that of millions of more men and women just like him.

So on this Veterans Day, remember and thank those family members and friends who did serve. Thank them for the lives we live thanks to their hard work and sacrifices.

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Memorial Day

May 27, 2019 by

The 3rd Infantry Regiment or The Old Guard is the oldest active duty infantry regiment in the US Army. They are charged with providing the casket teams at Arlington National Cemetery. The soldiers in these teams perform this duty with solemnity and reverence for the fallen. My best friend’s son John served as a platoon leader with the 4th Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment after his service in Afghanistan.

On this Memorial Day, I’d also like to remember my father. He is not buried in Arlington but is buried next to his parents and siblings in North Carolina. He served in WWII in the Caribbean, served in Germany as part of the Army of Occupation during the 1950s, served in Korea post-Korean war, and finally served in South Vietnam for two tours of duty. He was medically retired in 1972 and passed away nine years later in 1981. He was 62 and 10 days old when he died in his sleep. This year I passed a milestone as I have now outlived my dad.

The footstone provided by the military makes it seem like he died on his birthday. His actual birthday was April 3rd and not the 13th. I think my mother made the decision not to force them to correct it.

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Picture Of The Day

April 30, 2019 by 1 Comment

Today marks the 44th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. The poignant picture below shows the evacuation of Americans and South Vietnamese staff from the roof top of the US Embassy in Saigon.

HUGH VAN ES/UPI/NEWSCOM

Newsweek had this on the scale of the airlift:

It was the biggest helicopter lift of its kind in history—an 18-hour operation that carried 1,373 Americans and 5,595 Vietnamese to safety. Yet in sheer numbers, the feat was overshadowed by the incredible impromptu flight of perhaps another 65,000 South Vietnamese. In fishing boats and barges, homemade rafts and sampans, they sailed by the thousands out to sea, hoping to make it to the 40 U.S. warships beckoning on the horizon. Many were taken aboard the American vessels, while others joined a convoy of 27 South Vietnamese Navy ships that limped slowly—without adequate food or water—toward an uncertain welcome in the Philippine Islands. Hundreds of South Vietnamese also fled by military plane and helicopter, landing at airfields in Thailand or ditching their craft alongside American ships.

My father who was drafted into the US Army in December 1940 for “the Hawaiian Department” was to serve two tours of duty in South Vietnam. His first tour was in Cam Rahn Bay from October 1967 until October 1968 and then again from April 1970 until the end of March 1971 in Lai Khe an Bao Loc. He was thus in Vietnam for two of the more momentous events of the war – the Tet Offensive and the Cambodian Invasion.

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Celebrating The Important Things

February 19, 2018 by 1 Comment

While I didn’t tune out entirely this weekend from social media and the news, I also didn’t dwell on it excessively. I had more important things to do.

Things like watch little kids scramble all over the place at Kaeideum in Winston-Salem. It is a children’s science museum with tons of hands-on activities.

Things like being there as Olivia had her third birthday party.

Things like going out to dinner with Granny Karen and Papaw Jeff as we all watched the birthday girl eat lamb gyros and french fries fed to her by the Complementary Spouse.

There will be time today and tomorrow and the weeks afterwards to figure out why a 19 year-old who had lost his parents, who had been bullied and ostracized, who had mental problems, who had been expelled from a high school went back to that school and killed as many as he did. There will also be time to investigate why the FBI dropped the ball on this guy. And the fight against those who would roll in the blood of the victims in order to curtail our civil rights will continue as always.

As for this weekend, it was for Olivia and family.

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A Rite Of Passage

June 25, 2017 by 1 Comment

As we go through life we all have rites of passage. It might be a momentous occasion such as our graduation from high school or college, our wedding, or, sadly, the death of a parent. Rites of passage can also be simpler things such as our first kiss or our first hit in Little League.

I had such a rite of passage on Friday:  I closed on the sale of the house I grew up in. The house had been in the family for just a few months short of 51 years.

My mom bought the house in September 1966. She had been looking for a house in the Sunset Hills neighborhood of Greensboro for years and finally found one in her price range. Her goals in buying this house were to cut down on her commute to the high school where she taught and, more important in her mind, to allow me to walk to Our Lady of Grace School which was a mere 1 1/2 blocks away. She also wanted me to be in a neighborhood where there were a lot of kids my age with which to play. I just didn’t have that in Asheboro.

I was nine and had just started 4th grade when we moved in. My grandmother soon joined us as the stairs in her house in New York were getting to be too much for her. She would live there until she passed away in the house in 1972.

This house was my permanent residence until I left for grad school in Chapel Hill in 1979. Even then I would come back many a weekend to see my mom or just hang out. My mom lived there until her dementia and another broken hip made it impossible. Save for the occasional renter and my sporadic visits, the house sat empty for the last number of years.

Given all the things this house saw, I have been asked whether I am happy or sad about selling the house. Actually, I am quite happy. Aaron, the new owner, is excited about buying the house and he loves the fact that basics of the house have not changed since it was built in 1927 (or so). Aaron has plans to make this a home for he and his partner and I think it will be the showplace that I had neither the time nor the inclination to make it. He will transform something that was becoming a burden for me into a source of joy.

So goodbye old house. Protect Aaron and his partner from the elements and give them another 50 years of memories just as you have given them to me.

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Life Causes A Change In Plans

January 10, 2017 by 8 Comments

The Complementary Spouse and I had plans to attend the SHOT Show and the Media Day at the Range. We had our plane tickets and our hotel reservation. We had received our badges that would allow us into the SHOT Show and to Media Day. We have been getting dozens of press releases by email daily. I was excited to get my hands on the Colt Cobra and see how it differed from the older Colt revolvers. We had started to map out who we planned to visit and on what day.

Then real life interrupted.

Sunday a week ago the nursing home where my mother-in-law Grace resided called to let us know she had what they suspected was a stroke of some sort. She wasn’t able to hold her head up and had some weakness on one side. From there, her health started to rapidly decline. After a consultation with her care team, it was decided that she should be transferred into hospice care. Hospice care doesn’t mean that death is imminent but rather that the person’s life expectancy is six months or less. That said, there are many elderly in hospice care who live over a year. This was not to be our case.

On Wednesday we were told that she was declining even more rapidly than we expected. My sister-in-law Cindy who was with her said we needed to get there sooner than later. We used Thursday to make work arrangements for being gone and left for St. Louis on Friday. Though we tried to get ahead of the snow storm that swept across the Southeast, we still had to slog our way through slick roads and snowy conditions a good part of the way there. Fortunately, we missed some of the big wrecks that virtually closed down Interstate 40 in places.

We arrived in the late afternoon. It was obvious to all that Grace was in the end stage of her life and that it was good that we arrived when we did. Soon after we arrived, we were joined by some of Grace’s grandkids who had driven over from Kentucky to say their goodbyes. We spent the evening in the room reminiscing about Grace’s life and how she enjoyed her children and grandchildren. Eventually, all of us except Cindy and the Complementary Spouse went to where we were staying. The two daughters had decided that they would keep watch over Grace throughout the night.

Grace died on Saturday just after noon. She was surrounded by many of her family as she took her last breath. It was a quiet, peaceful, and dignified passing.

I am one of those lucky people in that I got as good a mother-in-law as one could ever hope to have. Grace treated me as much like a son as a son-in-law. I remember her saying to the Complementary Spouse that if we didn’t hurry up and get married, she would just have to adopt me. She loved me and I loved her.

As to the SHOT Show, it will be there next year. Family will always come first.

The obituary for Grace is here. She was a wonderful and kind woman and I will miss her terribly.

May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

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Sorry For The Light Blogging

August 1, 2016 by 2 Comments

Sorry for the light blogging this past week. We just got back this weekend from St. Louis where we were visiting family and friends.

I did get to visit with fellow gun blogger Charlie Foxtrot and his wife. He helps us on The Polite Society Podcast and he blogs at Not One More Gun Law. After a lifetime of living in Southern California, he is still somewhat amazed at the change in the role of the gun culture in local politics. He noted that politicians in California would never mention their NRA-PVF grades especially if they were better than a “F”. By contrast, in Missouri, candidates fight over who is more gun friendly and brag on it.

I also got to visit a really great reloading shop in St. Charles. Graf’s Reloading – not be confused with Graf & Sons – is a full-service shop dedicated to reloading. While they have a small gun counter, reloading is their specialty. Seeing row after row of just bullets in any weight, style, or caliber was amazing. If you are in the St. Louis area and have time, they are just off of Interstate 70 in St. Charles. I found their prices to be very competitive and cheaper than the Bass Pro Shop down the street.

My granddaughter Olivia Grace traveled with us to St. Louis and was a big hit. She is fast approaching one and a half. As the picture below shows, she might have a future in reloading as she was quite interested in the bags of bullets.

We also trolled a number of thrift shops while in the St. Louis area. I picked up that cast iron pot in the picture at thrift shop and think it will be just right to serve as a lead melting pot. For $4 it can’t be beat.