ShowMeBlog

Smoking or gays?

“WASHINGTON (CNN) -- You've seen the iconic picture of a soldier with a cigarette dangling from his mouth, but that could soon be a thing of the past.

A new study commissioned by the Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs recommends a complete ban on tobacco, which would end tobacco sales on military bases and prohibit smoking by anyone in uniform, not even combat troops in the thick of battle.

According to the study, tobacco use impairs military readiness in the short term. Over the long term, it can cause serious health problems, including lung cancer and cardiovascular disease. The study also says smokeless tobacco use can lead to oral and pancreatic cancer.

The Defense Department's top health officials are studying the report's suggestions and will make recommendations to the Pentagon's policy team and Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

The study recommends phasing out tobacco products such as cigarettes and cigars over a five- to 10-year period…”

    The CNN story goes on to say that many in the military object to a ban on smoking.  

    The military is so upset with the idea of gays in the military, and we know that about 10% of the military is gay, I think we should offer a deal …It could be you can smoke if you agree to gays in the military.  Smile
   

Blogging before 2003

  I been doing a blog for a long time.  In fact I been doing one since 1982!  I know many people say that blogging began in 1995.  They are wrong.  I know they are wrong on that information.
  I could just be the father and inventor of blogging.  Whip that smile off your face buddy!  Smile
  There was a web site that listed the inventor of blogging.  I left a comment on the site and one of the readers of the comment went to ShowMeBlog and checked it out and then he posted a comment that I was not telling the truth because he saw that I started blogging using TypePad in 2003.
  I also had a blog review site do a review of my blog and in the review the guy said that I said I had been online since 1982.  He said the same thing…that I was using TypePad and began blogging in 2003.
  I do not understand how they can not see that I was around and blogging before there was a TypePad, before there was a LiveJournal.  Hell, I was blogging  before there was a world wide web.
  I had to write my own software at first.  I did not use it very long because other people started to write software.

  By the way just before I started using TypePad, 2003, to host my blog I used LiveJournal.  If you want to read my blog before 2003 you will have to go to HowardNet on LiveJournal.  
   I also had a blog on Xanga and it began 12/28/2002.

  I started doing the LiveJournal blog on 06/04/2000.  I made 1,278 post to the site and 242 comments were left on the site.
  The important thing to keep in mind is that I was blogging before there was a TypePad, LiveJournal or even the world wide web.

Swollen Feet

  Last month I was at 200 pounds and I even hit 199 one day.  Now I am at 210 pounds.  Last month my feet were not swollen.  This month both of them are swollen and one looks like it is going to explode.  
  It is the food I eat.  If you think I am eating fast food you are wrong.  I am just eating what I pick up at the store. 
  I am just eating the wrong things…Cashew nuts, Ritz Crackers and other foods with to much salt.

  It looks like the only way I can eat right is to not eat.  I can lose weight and not have swollen feet and feel better if I just eat almost nothing.

  I have a FL Power Ball ticket for tonight.  The jackpot is $20 million.  I could buy a lot of food with $20 million.  I guess I could hire someone to just fix health meals for me.
  I have a Fl Lotto ticket for tonight and the jackpot is $7 million.

  If I won a lottery, and this may surprise you, here is one thing I would buy:


  It is a scale model (1:50) of a KW Dart truck.  I worked in the body shop of KW Dart Truck (Kansas City, MO) for years and I worked in the body shop.  The person selling this item, on eBay, wants $654.41 for it. 

  I would never buy something like that unless I won a lottery.  I hope I am buying it soon.  Smile 

The SysOp Next Door

Joe Taibi made a comment about your note "BBS: The Documentary Photos":

“I do remember you're doing something very similar and it was for that very reason i contacted you first when looking for people to join us in the Fidonet thing! I was a user of your BBS for some time before jumping in and doing it as well. By some time meaning a few months since we all know how fanatical we all were back then once we got the bug. And damnit I know you were blogging in the early 80's cause that's what Howard's NOTEBOOK was! A blog! Your Blog! But no one had coined that stupid bastardization of phrases yet! lol”

  If it is not in Wikipedia it is not true.  Smile
I use Wikipedia all the time to look up information.  I guess I need to get someone to enter the information into Wikipedia.
  I wish I had saved old messages and data that would be great.  I wish my memory was better.  I wish the guy that made “BBS: The Documentary” would post my two and a half hour interview.  He started posting some of the interviews with people on the Internet archive site but I guess he got tired of doing it.  It has to be a major amount of work because he interviewed over 200 people.
  If you watch his documentary you will see that many of the people he interviewed still had their old computers, BBS software and all sorts of things saved.  I have nothing.
  My mind is a  blank right now but the guy in Belton that was running the FidoNet hub there at the last…He owned a computer shop..I heard he died.  He was a nice guy but I did not hear about his death until later.  I think he was part of the Fido net wars that seemed to go on later.  You started up the Fidonet thing in KC but later toward the end, I think, there was some real fighting going on.  I was not part of it.  I just wanted the feeds and did not get into the fighting. 
  Jason Scott, creator of the documentary, asked me about FidoNet.  He had some stories about it.  It seems the fighting was taking place not just in KC but all over the United States. 
  There was a lot going on that I did not know about…I was sort of in my own little world and that was Howard’s Notebook. 
  Do you remember “The Sysop Next Door” series of stories that was posted on Howard’s Notebook and that many other BBS picked up and re-printed?  You do know who the author was?  After all these years it can be told.

Ground Observer Corp

  I was a member of the Ground Observer Corp for years.  After they did away with the GOC our post all became weather observers. 
  Now I lived in Kansas City (Missouri) and KC is right in the middle of the United States so I am not sure it made much sense having us watch for Soviet bombers.  Smile

  But I found the following on the Gizmodo site:

“…Here's a transcript of a panel about SAGE that occurred at the Computer History Museum in 1998. I found this passage, about why they couldn't use human spotters to warn of invasions, fascinating:

"And they saw lots of things! [Laughter] They saw airplanes — many of them were civilian; they saw birds; they saw all kinds of things, and most of them they thought were Soviet bombers. I mean, this was a scary period. They would then telephone the nearest air base, which would then have to figure out if this information was worth anything. And pretty much none of it was worth anything. So, it very rapidly became obvious that despite the huge size of this program — there were 8,000 observation posts, and at the peak of the program 305,000 volunteers staffing these things 24 hours a day — the information was pretty much useless. So, commanders just ignored it. For one thing, by the time it had been verified, the bombers would already be there. So, what was the point?

The reason I'm telling you this story is that the purpose of this program was not really air defense. It was public relations. It was saying to the public, "We are doing something about this problem — we see it." At the same time, the Air Force started looking everywhere for ideas from scientists and engineers, and [referring to the slide presentation] now we're restarting, and I'm not sure what's going on.

What's the modern equivalent system that we'd use to defend ourselves against North Korean nukes? I don't know. I just hope its more than just a PR stunt…”

 

   I do not know who was making that statement but I guess it was very funny.  I wonder if there was anyone there to tell the speaker that he was full of shit and did not know what he was talking about.  I wish I had been at the meeting to show everyone that the  clown did not know his ass from a hole in the ground.

  We did NOT report Soviet bombers.  We reported ALL airplanes.  We did not call the nearest air base.  We dialed the operator and said “Aircraft FLASH – Aircraft FLASH” and the operator connected us with Air Defense Command. 

The First Blogger by with Scott Rosenberg

Scott Rosenberg, author of the new "SAY EVERYTHING", goes on a quest to track down the primal blogger. In SAY EVERYTHING, Rosenberg chronicles bloggings unplanned rise and improbable triumph, tracing its impact on politics, business, the media, and our personal lives.

  Should I tell him who invented blogging? 
No, I do not think he cares.  If you have an idea who invented blogging his blog is:    say everything. 

  I made the following video in August of 2007 and posted it on YouTube at that time.  It tells how I invented the blog and my feeling about who is the father of blogging.

The Internet in 1969

  Here is a video of what they were saying the Internet would be like in 1969.  Keep in mind that the world wide web was not invented until 1995.

  I got my first computer in 1978 and I went on line 24/7 in June of 1982. 

  God, that was a long time ago.  I found some “lost” photos of me.  They are 35mm slides and I am nude standing in front of computer.  I will have to convert them from 35mm to digital photos and create a little side show or something.  Give you something to look forward too.  SMILE

The end of Television

  I was 9 years old when Jim and Betty, my father and mother, took me to a event someplace in Kansas City.  They were showing something new called television.  There was no TV in Kansas City but a station was getting ready to start broadcasting.
  We got a TV set and had it waiting in the living room for the first TV broadcast.
  WDAF-TV began broadcasting on October 16, 1949.  We saw television for the first time.  

  In a few days that sort of television will come to an end.    On June 12th old analog TV will end and the transition to digital TV will take place.  Thousands of people in FL have little portable battery powered TV sets, for Hurricane season, and they will no longer work. 

  I wish I had a old TV antenna on the house.  On June 12th when analog TV ends here in the United States I would like to see what I could pick up on the TV set.  My guess is that I could pick up Cuba and some other nations broadcasting TV.

  I was 9 years old when I saw my first TV broadcast.  I am 68 years old now and the old “analog” TV will come to an end and we will be in the days of digital TV.

Liberty Ship Sunk Off Florida Coast

“KEY WEST, Florida (CNN) -- The USNS General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, a retired U.S. Navy warship, embarked on a sedentary new career Wednesday on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico near Key West.

The former warship was intentionally sunk in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary between 10:20 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. ET to become the world's second-largest artificial coral reef…

…The Vandenberg was built at the Kaiser shipyard in Richmond, California, in 1943. It was commissioned as a World War II troop transport ship. After Japan surrendered, the Vandenberg was the first Navy ship to return to New York Harbor.

During the 1950s, the ship was used to transport refugees from Europe and Australia to America. In the 1960s, the Air Force used the Vandenberg as a tracking vessel for possible missile attacks, and for rocket and early space shuttle launches.

The ship was decommissioned in 1986 and was anchored with more than 25 other retired ships in Norfolk, Virginia. The Vandenberg was towed to Key West last month…”

  My mother and father worked in the Richmond (CA) ship yard in 1943.  My mother was a welder and my father a welding inspector.  They were both members of the boilermaker union.
  I was three years old at the time.  They had a teenage girl baby sitting me.  They said I like her a great deal.  I do not remember here at all. 
  Many years later I would also be a member of the boilermakers union.
 

“…On October 14, 2000, the Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park was opened in Richmond, California, site of four Kaiser shipyards, where thousands of "Rosies" from around the country worked (although ships at the Kaiser yards were not riveted, but rather welded). Over 200 former Rosies attended the ceremony…”  My mother’s name is listed at the site.  She was a welder at the Kaiser shipyard.

BBS The Documentary + Dave Hallas

  You may remember that I am in “BBS: The Documentary” and that I went to CA for the first showing of the documentary.  I am only in the video about three or four times and then each time only for a line or two.
  But the video interview of me went on for three hours.  During that interview I talked about Dave Hallas.  Someday that entire 3 hour interview will be online.  Not sure why anyone would want to watch it but when people do watch it they will hear me talk about Dave Hallas and his bulletin board system.

  I am not sure when my interview will make it to the Internet Archive but it should be there one day.