Weather Watches and Warnings

The other day when driving home, I heard that the weather service had issued a flood watch in anticipation of rain we would be receiving that evening. OK. I looked everywhere and couldn’t find signs of a flood anywhere. I guess I’m supposed to go upstream from some body of water and note when it starts to rise. I drove home, ate supper, watched television and went to bed. Heck, I live on a hill.

If somebody lives in a flood prone area they might ought to stay up and watch for rising water. If they live in a flood prone area and know about it, then I think they’re stupid. Stupid is hard to fix.

It seems like we are always getting a weather watch issued. I guess it makes the guys and gals at the weather service feel important or something, but it is absolutely useless information. Let’s see, there’s the winter weather watch which is always issued in the winter. Then there’s the flood watch, the thunderstorm watch, the tornado watch, the hurricane watch, and I guess several others that the weather folks issue. I’ve always said a weather watch means there’s a cloud somewhere in a hundred mile radius of my house…..maybe.

After watches, we get warnings...flood warnings, thunderstorm warnings….wait a minute...I’m not going to flood. Just what do they think I’m going to do about a thunderstorm warning? I don’t play golf and I’ve got enough sense to get off the water during a thunderstorm. I’m not going to stand outside holding metal rods in the air or try to fly a kite with metal wire. So what the heck am I supposed to do?

Thunderstorms bring lightning, rain and thunder. On occasions, but about as rarely as snowfall in the area, we get some hail. About every ten or fifteen years we get a hell of a hail storm. Most likely I’m either going to be at home or at work when a thunderstorm happens. I can’t do a darn thing about it. So why warn me? I’ve never been hurt by a thunderstorm and no family members or friends of mine have been hurt by a thunderstorm, so what’s the big deal?

Bottom line, it makes the weather forecasters feel important. They interrupt programs and talk about fictional rotation and possible hail and all kinds of bad goblins out there. In reality, there might be some heavy rain, some lightning, and maybe some high winds. I don’t have any magic shield to protect my home from that, so why should I worry? Honestly, I don’t.

I’m always amused that, after a thunderstorm, some newscaster will stand outside in the dark and show us pictures of a tree that was blown down. There’s probably 400 million trees in Mississippi and they found ONE that was blown down and it’s on the news. Sorry, that’s NOT news.

BUT…..I think tornado warnings are rather significant. And yes, I know that most tornados evolve out of a thunderstorm, but not all thunderstorms spawn tornados. A tornado is a devastating freak of nature that can wreak all kinds of havoc. I’ve been through four of them. If there is anything I want to be warned about, it’s a tornado. We have a basement where we gather with the cat when we hear the sirens going off. I appreciate our weather sirens. I think ours only sound when there is an actual tornado warning. No fictional, “I think I see a rotation”, no interruption of television programming, just a simple siren that means I ought to take cover. And I do.

Now why can’t everything else be that simple and that useful?

USNS Comfort (AH-20)

I served on a hospital ship in Viet Nam and have a good idea of how wonderful these ships can be for those in need. The ship I served on was USS Sanctuary (AH-17). This ship is (AH-20) meaning that she is only the third hospital ship commissioned since Viet Nam. Our ship had 750 beds which is larger than Baptist (639 beds), St. Dominic(571 beds) or University Medical Center(722 beds)in Jackson. It was also larger than North Mississippi Medical Center(650 beds) in Tupelo. The Comfort has 1,000 beds. I'm confident this ship of mercy will play a vital role in providing much needed acute medical care to the casualties in Haiti.

USNS Comfort (AH-20)





General characteristics
Displacement: 69,360 tons (70,470 t)

Length: 894 ft (272 m)
Beam: 105 ft 7 in (32.18 m)
Propulsion: two boilers, two GE turbines, one shaft, 24,500 hp (18.3 MW)
Speed: 17.5 knots (32 km/h)
Complement: 63 civilian, 956 naval hospital staff, 258 naval support staff, up to 1000 bed patients
Time to activate: 5 days

Patient Capacity:
o Intensive care wards: 80 beds
o Recovery wards: 20 beds
o Intermediate care wards: 280 beds
o Light care wards: 120 beds
o Limited care wards: 500 beds
o Total Patient Capacity: 1000 beds
o Operating Rooms: 12
Departments and Facilities:
o Casualty reception
o Intensive care unit
o Radiological services
o Main laboratory plus satellite lab
o Central sterile receiving
o Medical supply/pharmacy
o Physical therapy and burn care
o Dental services
o Optometry/lens lab
o Morgue
o Laundry
o Oxygen producing plants (two)
o Medical Photography
o Four distilling plants to make drinking water from sea water (300,000 gallons per day)
o Flight deck can handle world's largest military helicopters (CH-53D, CH-53E, MH-53E, Mi-17

Things That Work—Electronics

I like electronic things. I’m not into computer gaming, but I do like computers, and the things that go with them. For the record, I do not have an iPhone and I just started texting.

I’ve had satellite television for years; formerly DirectTV and now Dish Network. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. Dish Network used to have cruddy customer service, but they have done a complete turnaround on that. I’m sticking with Dish because of two reasons; their DVR is superior to those offered by DirectTV and their signal is not as easily knocked out by rain.

I’ve also used satellite radio and enjoyed it for a year or two. I started with Sirius. A good signal, excellent music, very good sports and news. After a couple of years I signed up for XP and paid a year in advance. Three months into the year, I begged them to please cancel my subscription. Their music is horrible. At least that’s my opinion. They offered to extend my subscription so I would get two years for the price of one. I told them, “No”. They refunded the remainder of my subscription and I’ve not used satellite radio since. I think I would really enjoy satellite radio if I did a lot of traveling. I don’t know what it is like since the two networks merged.

We have a Sony Bravia LCD 1080p television. The unit I bought over three years ago has yet to miss a beat. I paid several thousand dollars for it then. The same unit now sells for less than a thousand. There are newer models with advanced features. I’ll have a newer model someday, but my Sony LCD gets an excellent picture so I’ll stick with it for the time being.

I have a Sony DVD player which is OK for watching movies. Yes it will play music too, but it doesn’t do what I want in a music CD player. It will not allow me to play songs in random sequence.

So I purchased a Pioneer CD player that uses the six disc cartridges. It’s low tech but it does what I want and I can recommend it if you think you need a separate CD player.

A year or so ago, I purchased a new Pioneer receiver which can produce 7:1 sound and THX sound. It works just fine. A word to the wise, you need to make sure your speaker system is as good or better than your receiver or you won’t get to use the full range of features on the receiver. I’m happy with my receiver, but still would like to know how an Onkyo system would sound.

Late last year I purchased a Bose Acoustimass 16 speaker system. It has been a delightful addition to my entertainment system. If you are playing a DVD with THX sound, the system just absolutely ROCKS. I have found the speaker system to be quite versatile and very competent with every genre. I can recommend it without reservation.

About a year ago, I purchased an IPod. I only use it for music. It does what it is supposed to do. It downloads MP3 sound, stores it and plays it back. I can use it in my car and have enjoyed that feature. It beats carrying a bunch of CD’s around. I can plug it into my computer at work and listen to music. I can also plug it into my home entertainment system by using one cord which plugs into the IPod and splits into a left/right connection at the other end. So while others are listening to their music on a device made especially for an IPod, I’m listening to my IPod music on a genuine top notch system. Overall, the IPod is a good purchase but the proprietary program one must use to download music sucks, sucks, sucks. I don’t know if “download” is the correct term. The only music I have on my IPod is from my own CD collection, but I have to upload them to ITunes and then download them to my IPod. It’s not much fun

As far as computers go, I think most of them are plenty good unless you need something for massive problem solving, engineering, or gaming. We have two Dell desktops and two HP laptops that work fine for us. There are two ancillary items I think are worth mentioning. I have an “old” HP stand alone scanner that does a great job on photos and documents. It has been a very useful tool. The other item I think is worth a purchase is an external hard drive unit. We have a Seagate unit that gives us plenty of back up capacity. The external hard drives are relatively inexpensive and very convenient if you are dealing with a lot of files. Get you one.

We have had several compact digital cameras. I have found the best pictures come from a Canon. At least that’s my opinion. I currently have a Canon PowerShot SD990 IS which has 14.7 megapixels. It also has all the bells and whistles you can get with a compact digital. It takes an excellent picture. I have often been complimented on the detail. But, that model is just a bit larger than a real compact should be and is very difficult to use if you are shooting on anything other than an automatic mode. So, it’s great for picture quality, but otherwise not recommended by me. For that type of product, I would go with a full sized “35” mm style body with detachable lenses.

Well that’s it for electronics. Yep, I know I’m not the most advanced person, but I do know what I like and what sound I want to get and the items mentioned above do a fine job for me.

Three Days A Week

Do we really need it six days a week? They talk about going to five days a week. Well, I have a suggestion: Go to three days a week.

What am I talking about? I talking about the mismanaged, broke, red ink sponge called the United States Postal Service. They’re losing billions faster than you can lick a stamp. Oops, we don’t lick them anymore. But you get the point, they’re broke and getting broker.

So why not cut the service in half? Deliver the mail on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Still move the mail as usual, just don’t send it out to houses and businesses except three days a week. That would cut a lot of labor, fuel, and vehicle costs.

Do we really need mail six days a week? Most business are geared to internet banking and prefer for you to pay your bills electronically. So they don’t really need the extra delivery. Most of us email rather in lieu of snail mail. It’s faster and much less expensive.

Another thing; why are there so many different stamps? It seems to me that one stamp for every denomination of currency would be enough. That should reduce costs significantly and make it easier for customers to determine which stamp to use. It’s called management for all you postal managers.

I think there is still a place for the United States Postal Service, but I am not in favor of spending more and more and more for an antiquated service. So, let’s get real. Bring them into the 21st century.

Oh yeah they will scream and holler and tell us how important they are. But I don’t think that is a valid conclusion in this century.

Things That Work--Kitchen

Most things we purchase are satisfactory. If they aren’t, I normally return them.

There are some things that go above and beyond our expectations. Those are the items I want to let you know about in my Things That Work blog. This time lets look at the kitchen.

First of all is our Kitchen Aid mixer. Ours is avocado green and has been well used for about 40 years. When we were in Southaven, MS the church ladies named the old green machine, “Fred”. I don’t know why. Fred spent many nights and weekends at church when the ladies were making their year’s supply of St. Timothy cheese balls. I’m certain ours didn’t cost $299.99 as they do today, but I do think the cost was well above average for a mixer. It has proved to be an excellent purchase.

Looking around the kitchen, I have to include the Chef's Choice electric knife sharpener. I used to spend about an hour just sharpening a couple of knives. Now I can do them all in about fifteen minutes. Consequently our knives stay sharp.

To go with the knife sharpener, I must list our plain oak handled Chicago Cutlery knives. We’ve had our knives for over 30 years and they still work wonderfully well. It’s nice to have a set of knives that can take care of all our cutlery needs. We have ten knives ranging from 10” butcher and carving knives to 3” paring knives with various sizes and configurations in between. Two suggestions: Don’t throw them in a drawer. Use a wooden block or a magnetic strip for storage. And keep them out of the dishwasher.

The newest item I'd like to mention is called "The 'Ove' Glove". We have two of them. They can handle hot objects up to 540 degrees. Since they fit like a regular glove, you can get a much better grip on objects. In addition, they are washable.

Looking just a bit further in the kitchen I notice our Bunn coffeemaker. We love that thing. It brews up a pot of coffee in three minutes flat. Some people say they don’t like the taste of coffee made in a Bunn coffeemaker. I suggest they just haven’t worked out their measurements. Ours makes a very consistent good cup of coffee.

I also like the smooth top electric cook top we have. Since we don’t have gas in the kitchen, we had to go with electric. Ours is a Kenmore. If you ever spill stuff or have something boil over, you will appreciate the ease of clean up.

My biggest disappointment, though generally satisfactory, has been the Jenn-Air double convection ovens. Those babies cost a few thousand. You can put food in the oven, set the timer and it will bake what you want when you want it baked and will keep it warm until you get home. It has an automatic thermostat that can be used for meats that will cut the oven off when the desired temperature is reached and then will keep the meat warm until you are ready to serve it.

With a convection oven, you supposedly can bake fish, bread and pies in the same oven at the same time without transferring the taste from one dish to the other. A nice feature. When reading on ovens, I figured the convection aspect was super duper so I made sure that both ovens were convection ovens. I have been disappointed when I’ve tried to use convection for baking. Convection for meat is wonderful, but forget baking. I’ve also been disappointed that the two ovens are not consistent. A pan of cookies will turn out great and the next pan from the same recipe will be over cooked. That shouldn’t happen. With our old ovens, if something turned out well the first time it would be the same the next time.

One more suggestion…one convection oven is sufficient. We don’t need two of them.

Well that’s it for the kitchen. If I didn’t mention it, I consider the items to be functioning in a satisfactory manner.