On 3/29/2010 11:00 AM, Michael Wells wrote:
It always helps me to attach jumper cables to my nipples and fire up the car, you might want to give it a try.Zamboni
Now there's an idea!Serially, when I was just a young and innocent lad (well, it COULD have happened) and Uncle Sam invited me to come and play with the other young and innocent lads who were all dressed in green, baggy clothes, I found myself stationed at Ft. Bliss, Tx. Right across the Rio Grande river (which was more like a trickle in 1967) was the teeming metropolis of Juarez, Mexico. One of its main attractions were the bars that allowed underage soldiers to drink and carouse til all hours of the morning and night. As one might expect, said drinking and carousing could put a drain on a fella's energy. So every few hours, a gent would come around with a device that was probably invented in by the Spanish Inquisition and left in Mexico when all those dudes went off to play at the Vatican.
But I digress. The apparatus the enterprising gentleman had consisted of a couple of metal cylinders about the size and length of a large cigar with wires leading to a wooden box that was hung around his neck with a strap. The idea was that a young, innocent fella who'd caroused and partied to excess might be rejuvenated by holding the cylinders as the erstwhile entrepreneur cranked vigorously on a handle that spun a generator and ran untold billions of electrons thru the lad's body.
Now I never tried this. Really. But I saw a coupla guys who did. Their hair (what little hair GIs were allowed to have) stood on end and they tried to speak but nothing but inarticulate noises came from their mouths. Then the gentleman would request payment. If he didn't find it forthcoming, he'd offer to repeat the treatment. I never saw him leave empty-handed. :)
The question of the device's efficacy in restoring one's vitality was always somewhat suspect, but it was somewhat entertaining to see someone pay to get an experience that would be about as close to an electric chair as most of us would ever get.
The (almost) final irony to this is that most of the young troopers were, like me, in training that involved one form of electronic equipment or another. I was being trained to maintain radar and vacuum-tube analog computers for Nike-Hercules guided missile systems (there are some very old and mostly bad photos here: http://chevyasylum.com/earlydaze/01-army/Welcome.html ) and virtually every training session opened with a brief remonstration of the perils of high-voltage electricity. No matter how many times that lesson was repeated, there would still be someone close to the point of passing out from the effects of the highest-quality alcoholic beverages available in the pits of hell who would opt for a "jump start."
One more irony. When I experienced a heart attack for the first time in 1997, I got to experience a jump start of the defibrillator type...8 times in a row. Fortunately, I was unconscious for most of it, but I had burns on my chest that took months to heal.
So. I think I'll pass on the jumper cables for the moment. Maybe a 5-hour Energy Drink, but none of the high-voltage stuff. I spose I learned when I tried to remove the plate cap from a 450 volt power supply tube and it knocked me across the van in which I was working...I spose I shoulda turned the power off first, huh? I feel somewhat lucky in only having a fingertip burned off and cauterized. The embarrassment served up by the chief warrant officer as he pointed me out as a bad example was worse than the zap.
Well. With all the mirth and frivolity out of the way, I think I'll take a nap.
RtR Sent from my Dreadnought using that barely tolerable Thunderbird email program
On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 10:55 AM, Ray Buck <rbuck@xxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:rbuck@xxxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote:Hybrid, huh? I knew something was wrong. Must be the low voltage and RF noise goin on in the head that's causin all the parity errors and stuff. r Sent from my Dreadnought using that barely tolerable Thunderbird email program On 3/29/2010 5:24 AM, John Christensen wrote:Just MERGE the memory...... Oh.... I think you already have. You are a hybrid now Ray <G> JC 133d0d2310 --- John Christensen Saint Charles, IL 133d0d2310 On Sat, Mar 27, 2010 at 12:09 PM, Ray Buck <rbuck@xxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:rbuck@xxxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote: I was gonna make some comment about yer senile ol' man thing...but I forgot what I was gonna say. Unfortunately, that's not much of a joke. My memory problems are getting worse. It really sucks. RtR (16 gig of memory in my computer and only a coupla cells in the head...I think I need a transplant.) Sent from my Dreadnought using that barely tolerable Thunderbird email program On 3/27/2010 10:27 AM, PAUL W WATSON wrote:Far as I know! but then I am just a senile old man. Technotard ----- Original Message ----- *From:* muttley128@xxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:muttley128@xxxxxxxxxxx> *To:* Rat Pack <mailto:ratpack@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> *Sent:* Saturday, March 27, 2010 10:09 AM *Subject:* [ratpack] Lunch today? We on for today, Sent from my Verizon Wireless Phone-- Michael Wells MCWells Photography mcwellsphoto@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:mcwellsphoto@xxxxxxxxx> 801-850-7279
