Wednesday - February 19, 2014

rolling on up

By some small bit of divine intervention, we achieved syzygy tonight at Greed League: all our planets were in alignment. This is akin to getting all your ducks in a row, only with much more gravity. And with levity, the only real antidote to gravity!

We bowled the 4th place team. While they brought their A Game, somehow we brought our A+ Game. And we flat out out bowled them. Super. We took all 3 games and had wood by over 220 pins. I threw 201 - 237 - 221 for a 659; 131 over and my highest series in this league this season. Probably one of my best series ever, truth be told.

So we had a pretty decent time too, swapping car stories and hanging out. Which is what it’s supposed to be all about, not this fretting and worrying and getting all depressed nonsense. It’s a game. Entertainment. A night out with the guys. I’m going to print up a copy of this post to re-read the next time I’m having an awful night, just as a reminder.

So, with our latest 7, we might just have fought our way all the way up to being tied for last place. No, we’re probably still 4 down. We were almost 30 down a few weeks ago. And that’s the goal we’ve set: top not finish at the bottom. We’ve still got 10 weeks or so. So look out, here we come.

Posted by Drew458     on 02/19/2014 at 02:42 AM   
Filed Under: • Bowling Blogging •  
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   Tuesday - February 18, 2014

You Put Your Left Foot In

I Found The New Car I Want

Only One Problem: I have to move to France to buy one

I was going to make this a post about the dearth of manual transmission vehicles for sale in the USA. Sure, you can find one on most stripped down el-cheapo econoboxes. And you can find them on the big-bucks, super powered sports cars. But in between, where the rest of us live? Good luck Chuck.

People complain ... ooh, it would be a bear in traffic, and I’d have bulging muscles in my left leg. Wrong. There hasn’t been a non-hydraulic clutch car for sale in 20 years. It takes hardly any effort to work the left pedal these days. And shifting quickly becomes second nature; working your way through a traffic jam, even one going uphill, is no big deal. Heck, it isn’t even a small deal. It’s dead easy, if you know how to shift gears. What a manual transmission WON’T let you do is zone out behind the wheel. You have to pay attention. You have to be involved. Gee, that’s what makes driving fun, isn’t it? Funny how all the major car companies outside of Germany seem to have forgotten this.

And then there was Mazda. Zoom-zoom.

I am thoroughly in lust with the new Mazda 6. A mid-size car that’s available in the USA as either a 4 door sedan or as a 5 door hatchback, the new “6” has earned rave reviews all over the place, from Consumer Report’s Best Value award to highly positive words at Edmunds.com, Car & Driver, etc. It has unseated the Honda as best car for the money, and initial impressions are that this one is more of an entry level luxury car than “merely” a very well done mid-size family car.

So, great. Can I have it with a warm V6 and a 6 speed stick please? No.

Can I have it with a hot turbo 4 and a 6 speed stick please? No.

Can I have it with a warm 4 banger and a 6 speed stick please? Yes.

Super. Hey, the other car I’ve been looking at is the older Passat wagon. Mini wagons - or “estates” as they’re known in some countries - are really useful vehicles, better than hatchbacks, far more fun to drive than rolly bouncy little SUVs. And since the “estate” is popular in Europe, where everyone knows how to work a clutch, you can often find one with a stick over here. Well, you used to. Not anymore.

So how about it Mazda; can you make me a 6 wagon? With some power? And a manual? Oui, oui, mais seulement si vous êtes en France.

quoi?

Yup, only in France. Nobody else even sells the wagon. And nobody sells the Mazda 6, in any of the 3 body styles, with a V6, or with a turbo 4, or with the peppy 2.5 liter gasoline engine and a 6 speed manual in the higher trim lines. You want fancy, you get an automatic. Period. That sucks.

So there goes that daydream, at least for another year. I looked all around the world, 7 different countries, and it seems that only in France can you get this sleeper:

“175 ch (BVM)” is the french way of saying horsepower. Horse Vapor to be exact; and it’s metric horsepower at that. But what that means in American is a 2.2 liter (132 cubic inches) diesel engine that makes 173 hp at 4500 rpm, and gives you 310 lb-ft at 2000 rpm. Which is V8 levels of torque right off of idel, which means this one pulls like a tank as you bort your way through the gears. It’s a sleeper. A mid-size family wagon ( BORING ) in a flashy paint color (très sexy !) that should be pretty zippy. And it still gets 35mpg on the tank. I want one.

Around the world, the Mazda 6 comes with several engines, from 2 to 2.5 liters in gasoline, or 2 to 2.2 liters in diesel. In the UK, Mazda offers you your choice of a medium small rubber band with diesel, and a very small rubber band for petrol. But at least you can get them with a clutch pedal.

The 2.2-liter oil burner is quiet, smooth, and loaded for bear with torque to spare. Available in standard (148 hp at 4500 rpm, 280 lb-ft of torque at 2000 rpm) and High Power versions (173 hp at 4500 rpm, 310 lb-ft at 2000 rpm), we drove the latter. A delight with either the six-speed manual or six-speed automatic transmission handling cog-changing duties, the stronger diesel does without the extra hassle of an exhaust after-treatment solution to meet European emissions regulations. Shove is available right off idle, and the diesel pulls strongly to its redline. Only in the quietest moments are strains of clatter or injector tick audible; at speed on the highway, the diesel is indistinguishable from its petrol-swilling sibling.

According to Mazda, the 2.2-liter’s compression ratio of 14.0:1 is the world’s lowest in a production diesel engine. This enables the adoption of an all-aluminum block, lighter engine components, and optimized combustion timing. We had only a few hours with the engine, but we came away convinced that it could make a run at dethroning VW’s TDI as the mass-market, family-sedan compression-ignition king. Bring it, Mazda.

The direct-injected 2.5-liter, 16-valve Skyactiv gasoline engine that is confirmed for the States performs with equal aplomb, exploiting its higher-rpm capabilities to produce 189 hp at 5700 rpm. When called on to perform downshifts, the six-speed auto responds smartly and delivers 189 ft-lb of torque at 3250 rpm, hustling the vehicle with relative ease. (We estimate curb weights to ring in at 3200 to 3300 pounds.) Only in the direct shadow of the diesel does the gasoline engine feel a little anemic, and that’s primarily at low rpm.

Ah well. Guess I’ll have to wait another year. So I made an appointment for tomorrow to get the exhaust pipe welded up on my old Saturn. It’s been chugging along like a motorboat for a couple of weeks now, and it’s getting irritating. OTOH, that loud hole is giving me another 4mpg on the highway, using up nearly as little fuel as a brand new Mazda 6, which is a third larger with nearly half again as much power. And that’s the 2.5 gasoline American engine, with a 6 speed manual. Which isn’t available in the top-line versions sold here that have all the cool modern technology bits. And they don’t even sell the wagon here. Yet. Ever? Please??

PS - As a somnolent citizen, you have probably been lulled into narcolepsy by the meme that modern automatic transmissions are more cost effective than manuals because they get better gas mileage. In truth, the only time they get better gas mileage is on the EPA’s computer model. In the real world, they do what they can to increase MPG by shifting into high gear and staying there forever. This sucks all the fun out of driving, and turns your car into a putt-putt, no matter how big an engine is under the hood. A manual can get you better mpg than an auto if that’s the way you drive it. What I dislike about them the most is that they’re slow. Manual shift cars are faster off the line and accelerate quicker under normal driving conditions. None of this stoplight grand prix nonsense. I’m talking day to day. Put me in an automatic and I’m suddenly the most impatient driver around. Come on, let’s go already!!! as the auto just sits there sucking up rpm. And these new CVT go-kart transmissions are even worse.

And when push comes to shove, the automatic can never really justify itself from an economic standpoint. The numbers never really add up. Perhaps the convenience you think you’re getting

Posted by Drew458     on 02/18/2014 at 04:45 PM   
Filed Under: • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •  
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the gun is too big for lady cops … authorities ignore them … they sue …. and win

What else could you expect when standards are lowered to comply more with diversity, pol. correctness and the right quotas.

It’s sort of like that post I did a couple weeks ago about the complaints from feminazis about there not being train drivers in that industry. You may recall that bit of stupidity.  So in a push to make every man a king and every woman a queen, and every single body with a god given human right to any kind of job their hearts desire, things must be altered to fit the applicant. And as it turns out here, even with the police, well. Since not every person comes in one size where one size does not fit all ... especially with guns ....

Take a look at this one.  The ladies may have a point, considering how the laws are now written.

Female firearms officers win £70,000 ( $116,780 ) payout for sex discrimination - because their guns were too big for their small hands

Victoria Wheatley and Rachel Giles are part of armed units at nuclear sites

As part of their jobs, they are required to take test shoots

Failing a test shoot could mean that officers lose their jobs

Pair complained that their performance was hampered by equipment

They said the handles of their guns were too big

Both officers say they complained to senior staff but were ignored

By Larisa Brown

Two ‘petite’ firearms officers are set to receive a pay-out of £70,000 after winning a sex discrimination case over the size of their big guns.

Victoria Wheatley and Rachael Giles said their weapons were too big for their small hands and as a result they could not reach the trigger, a tribunal has heard.

The two women struggled with the grip of the pistols they were using – a Glock 17 – and they also claimed their heads and legs were too small for their protective gear.

The case, held at the Central London Employment Tribunal last week, found the Civil Nuclear Constabulary (CNC) guilty of discrimination against both officers in the provision of suitable firearms and safety equipment.

It is understood the officers are set to receive £35,000 each after winning the case against the force – but there is expected to be an appeal.

The decision comes after a number of extraordinary cases where police forces across the country have had to pay out thousands in compensation to officers due to injuries at work -

including £8,000 to a policeman bitten by fleas.

Both females, who were described as being ‘petite in stature’ and with ‘small hands’, asked on several occasions for a smaller and suitable grip on the weapon when they could not reach the trigger, but this did not happen, the tribunal heard.

They also said their trainers failed to adjust their pistols while carrying out a test shoot.

Posted by peiper     on 02/18/2014 at 02:37 PM   
Filed Under: • Product Safety • work and the workplace •  
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one problem and two different ways to face it.

A tale of two towns.  Well, one is a city and the other is a village.

I keep promising myself I won’t bother with this kind of post, and here I am again. Sometimes, some things can’t be avoided.

Take a look.

Council to blow £2.5MILLION to turn this squalid travellers’ site into a deluxe park. Caravans will have their own driveway, lighting and soundproofing and cost the same as a first-time buyer’s property

Critics said it would be cheaper to buy houses for the travellers in Bath
Gypsies moved onto the council-owned greenfield site five years ago
Lib Dem-controlled authority bizarrely claim building the site will save them money as they won’t have to keep moving the travellers along
The site is currently a muddy field with litter piled high

By Rob Cooper

A council is planning to spend £2.5million on a traveller site for just 13 caravans - which will cost as much as the average first time buyer spends to get on the property ladder.

Bath and North East Somerset Council will spend £190,000 ( $ 317,092.92 ) on each pitch on the green belt site while neighbouring properties sell for just £160,000.

Opposition councillors have slammed the project and insisted it would be cheaper to buy properties for gypsies to live in.

HERE, for the rest

However .... in another place with another group, a village decides to take the vermin on and not accommodate and appease.

Victory for villagers as gypsies are FINALLY told they will be evicted from illegal camp… but four-year battle has cost taxpayers £200,000

The Supreme Court has rejected pleas for the travellers to be allowed to appeal eviction ordered by the Court of Appeal
Gypsies moved on to site in ‘military-style’ operation overnight four years ago - after council offices had closed for the weekend
Group had argued that eviction would violate their children’s human rights
Council has spent £200,000 fighting the case since November 2009

By Lucy Crossley

A group of gypsies who used human rights laws to stay in their illegal camp for more than four years have finally been told to move on - leaving taxpayers with a legal bill of £200,000.

The 78 Irish travellers, who hail from just four families, had refused to budge despite facing three different courts, a planning inquiry, a council, and a battle by locals who accused the group of trashing their village.

Last October the camp in Hardhorn, Lancashire, who had flouted planning rules, appeared to have lost its case when they were told to move out by the Court of Appeal.

However, despite being given four months to quit the site without the chance to appeal, the group used a loophole to take their case to the Supreme Court claiming the eviction ‘violated’ the human rights of the 39 children living on the site in 60 caravans.

Now the Supreme Court has rejected pleas for the travellers’ to be allowed the right of appeal under a ‘point of law of general public importance’.

read and see all the rest here

Posted by peiper     on 02/18/2014 at 01:49 PM   
Filed Under: • Travelers/Gypsies/Squatters • UK •  
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   Monday - February 17, 2014

It’s peiper’s fault

peiper’s comment on my last Pat Condell post caused me to checkout Wikipedia. Indeed Mr. Condell WAS a comedian:

Patrick “Pat” Condell (born 1949 or 1950)[2] is a writer, comedian and atheist internet personality. He performed alternative comedy shows during the 1980s and 1990s in the United Kingdom, and won a Time Out Comedy Award in 1991. He was also a regular panellist on BBC Radio 1’s “Loose Talk”.
From early 2007, he began posting short monologues denouncing religion to a number of video sharing websites. His videos have been featured on many websites, including YouTube and LiveLeak. They have also been published on DVD, and also as a book of video transcripts. As of July 2013, Condell’s YouTube channel has over 189,689 subscribers and 46 million video views.

I’d post the link but I’m sure you can find Wikipedia and type in Pat Condell all by yourselves.

Peace.  

Posted by Christopher     on 02/17/2014 at 07:05 PM   
Filed Under: • PAT CONDELL •  
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How can you tell when the Obamunist is lying?

Posted by Christopher     on 02/17/2014 at 02:48 PM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Obama, The One •  
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gosh, eye candy didn’t look like this when i was a kid. not even when i grew up.

I haven’t posted any eye candy in awhile.  Drew seems to have covered the subject pretty well, and we aren’t in competition, exactly. Although every now and then I think maybe I found one better or at least every bit as good.  Anyway ... I stumbled upon this very young lady and I thought wow!  She’s how old?

I take it she’s an actress and a singer. And a dancer too.  I wouldn’t know as before a few days ago, I’d never heard of her.

Here she is at sweet 16.

BELLA THORNE

And according to what I read .... below is also Beautiful Bella at 15.

Posted by peiper     on 02/17/2014 at 06:52 AM   
Filed Under: • Eye-Candy •  
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show me the way to go home, i’m tired and i wanna go to bed. i had a little drink about an hour ago

So then. Watcha think?

Will this bring back Polish jokes?

· Mikolaj Tomaszewski, 38, drinking all afternoon in Gielniow, Poland
· Called son Juliusz, told him to cycle to the pub then drive him home
· Told police he lets eight-year-old practice driving at the weekends
· Juliusz lost control, went into other lane, hit one car then another
· All cars written off and five people taken to hospital with cuts and bruising

As the eight-year-old struggled behind the wheel of the Opel Corsa, he pulled in front of a car coming the other way at a crossing.

The collision sent them flying across the road into a third car.

source and more to read

Posted by peiper     on 02/17/2014 at 05:57 AM   
Filed Under: • Stoopid-People •  
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cry me a river

Oh boo-hoo.

I can hear Johnnie Ray singing “Cry” and “The Little White Cloud That Cried”. 

What is it with people these days?  These are only two very brief examples of grown ups shedding tears in public. Most often I find it’s people in the news by which which I mean, generally they are celebs. And all of em seem to be in tears over something.

So with Julie London’s “Cry Me a River” I give you these two and only two cos anymore might be depressing.

I think I should explain something because I don’t think it’s hit the USA, yet, but it most likely will.

Sugar my friends has become, for the health Nazis, the new tobacco.  It’s killing us all prematurely or if not that it’s making us fat and unhappy and a few minister types want to see curbs on the amount of sugar in food we buy. 
So that is what this photo thing is about.
I also recall a time when eggs were the enemy. They were killing us also. But a few months ago we saw a report that said, never mind about the eggs thing. Haha, sorry.  We got that one wrong. It’s now okay to go back to having two eggs at brekers instead of just one. Now they tell me.  When I can’t manage more than one anymore. Grumble. So anyway the lady above is in tears.

And so is this guy.

Posted by peiper     on 02/17/2014 at 05:35 AM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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   Sunday - February 16, 2014

There’s no racist like a liberal racist

A recent one from Pat Condell

Hi, I’m Pat Condell.

I don’t respect your beliefs and I don’t care if you’re offended.

Cheers.

Now that we’ve got the formalities out of the way, welcome to my website.

Pat has his own website. I don’t know how long he’s had it. It is at Godless Comedy. What I found most interesting was that he links to news stories related to each of his commentaries. 

Posted by Christopher     on 02/16/2014 at 01:19 PM   
Filed Under: • PAT CONDELL • Racism and race relations •  
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Update

A short update to Police Brutality:

“Idaho, US: Muslim Police Officer Shoots and Kills a Disabled Man’s Service Dog (Video)”

FILER, Idaho: Police Officer Tarek Hassani was placed Tuesday on administrative leave following Saturday’s shooting death of a resident’s dog, said city Mayor Rick Dunn.

The city’s move follows local and national outcry stemming from a video recording of the black Labrador’s demise, including many calls from Magic Valley residents for his job.

“We want (Hassani) fired,” said Rick Clubb, Hooch’s owner. “He had other options. He didn’t have to kill my dog.”

After the Times-News posted the police department’s video of the shooting — from Hassani’s dashboard-mounted camera — on Magicvalley.com on Monday, calls began to flood City Hall, city officials said.

Note the name of the police officer? He’s Muslim. I missed that before. I was too shocked by an officer shooting the dog to notice. Maybe he should be charged with a ‘hate crime’?

Hostility to dogs is deeply ingrained in Muslim culture. Muhammad said that a dog passing in front of a man who was praying would invalidate his prayer (so would a woman passing in front of him, which is why women pray behind men at mosques). Other hadiths depict him ordering all dogs killed except hunting dogs. So this Muslim police officer’s actions were consistent with Islamic culture, but reprehensible in American culture. This cop gives the lie to the multicultural idea that American can allow mass immigration of Muslims without any consequences.

H/T: Pamela Geller

Posted by Christopher     on 02/16/2014 at 11:06 AM   
Filed Under: • RoPMA •  
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   Saturday - February 15, 2014

Pirate TV

The STARZ network has their new show out called Black Sails. Oh sure, it’s about pirates, mixing several historical pirates with half the cast of Treasure Island. So there is some pretty fancy CGI at times, and nearly a whole full sized wooden ship as a set. Problem is, 3 or 4 episodes into the series, and nearly all the action goes on in some dirty pirate town in the Bahamas. So it’s rather a costume drama so far, with lots of relationship drama and nefarious plotting going on. Ok, and some drinking, carousing, and wenching about. And the smallest bit of bad boy pirate sex. Let’s face it, all that Errol Flynn swinging about from ropes stuff would wear on you if you had to do it every day, so most of the time real pirates probably just hung about looking all dusty and flinty and saying “arrgh” from their cheap rum hangovers and rotting teeth.

The show has nowhere near the buckets of blood and chop ‘em up with cutlasses kind of action I was expecting. Of course, I was sort of expecting some kind of Caribbean Spartacus, only with less peen and more cannons and broadsides and “tray-zhure”. But there is hope ... the theme song is a happy little march straight from Hell, done on a scratchy, evil, and properly piratical hurdy-gurdy, the one instrument out there even worse than bagpipes (if you don’t like bagpipes). Think of it as a banjo mated to a seasick raccoon glued to a musical handsaw, then make it sound even worse by giving the drone string a sort of breathy, blowing in a bottle, sound.

On a scale of 1-5, rating it’s pirateness, I’d give Black Sails just 2 drawn cutlasses. So far. Maybe things will heat up in the next couple of episodes. I hope. Arrgh.

A proper cutlass is smaller than a mid-19th century cavalry saber but much bigger than a machete.
It’s a short sword made for infighting, good for stabbing as well as slashing, and for cracking heads.
With a blade just 2 feet long, the above cutlass was just about perfect. So perfect that it was issued by the US Navy in 1917,
when cutlasses were almost never used any longer. It is a highly intimidating looking chopper though.
Kind of like George Patton’s new cavalry saber of 1913,
a lovely, lively toadsticker issued at just about the same time as tanks and machine guns replaced horses and cavalry on the battlefield. 

Posted by Drew458     on 02/15/2014 at 11:44 PM   
Filed Under: • Pirates, aarrgh! • Television •  
• Comments (1) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

Canadian Models eh? eh!

GET ME OUT OF HERE ...

Posted by Drew458     on 02/15/2014 at 07:07 PM   
Filed Under: • Eye-Candy •  
• Comments (2) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

No Joke This Time

Q. What goes “clip-clop, clip-clop, clip-clop, bang bang bang, clip-clop, clip-clop, clip-clop?

A. This does.

Gun fans may wonder ... did he fulfill the stereotype?

explanation below for those who don’t get it ... 

Posted by Drew458     on 02/15/2014 at 01:39 PM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Guns and Gun Control • Racism and race relations •  
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