From here to...well...it SEEMS like an eternity

[witpqs]

Am I reading that right? Are you related to Egyptian Girl?

[Naskra]

It's not something the family brags about.

You may remember Rio Bravo as the winner of the 1971 Oaklawn Handicap.

[Cap Mandrake]

Rio Bravo is one of my brother-in-laws favorite movie along with Spencer's Mountain and that one with John Wayne and Maureen O'hara in Ireland (whatever that is called). Oh, I forgot, Big Trouble in Little China. His tastes seem somehat uneven but he is so earnest I can't bring myself to say anything.

Speaking of Little China, the Burma Road is now well and mightily severed. After a seesaw battle where 2 Chinese divisions evicted a Jap brigade from the Salween River crossings, and the RAF and the Emperor's flyboys tangled in some major furballs, the coup de gras was the appearance of two full Jap divisions which had marched over the mountains. A bit too late as the battle of Yenen is now over, but still, Stillwell is ticked

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake
...and that one with John Wayne and Maureen O'hara in Ireland (whatever that is called)...

That would be The Quiet Man.

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake
...and that one with John Wayne and Maureen O'hara in Ireland (whatever that is called)...

That would be The Quiet Man.

Yes! I remembered that in the middle of the night. I, somewhat ironically, sat bolt upright and yelled "The Quiet Man!"


Free Darwin Anitpersonel Bomb recipe card to the first with the correct answers.

[DuckofTindalos]

.

[VSWG]

"Nagasaki - Bright Light in sky." Now this is just MEAN, Cap Mandrake. [:D]

I just spent several hours catching up on this AAR - now my tummy hurts from too much laughter! [:)] Fortunately, as an experienced reader of this AAR, I refrained from eating or drinking while reading - lest I need a Heimlich Maneuver (this is the first time I've used "lest", I hope I've done it correctly [Coming to think of it, it is also the first time I've used "Heimlich Maneuver" - this is so exciting! [:)] But I digress...])

So M&M ventured into shipbuilding... Will they expand this business? If they could get hold of a list of ships that have so far sunken in this war, they should be able to identify shortages. Of course 'shortage' is just another word for 'scarcity'. And we all know what the color ouf scarcity is...

[Cap Mandrake]

Dang, that felt good! [;)] It is the curve, you see.

In fairness, though, that was a dang good effort.
BTW..I was serious about the arrows. How did you do those?

[DuckofTindalos]

I can see what the other three should have been, now:

Myitchina -> Little China
Foochow -> This tastes like dog food
Haa'pai -> Something..in..my..throat

And the arrows are standard Paint.Net arrows. They come out as three-point objects, which can be curved and stretched and shaped and coloured to your heart's content!

BTW: 70% gets a C??? B- at least!

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

I can see what the other three should have been, now:

Myitchina -> Little China
Foochow -> This tastes like dog food
Haa'pai -> Something..in..my..throat

Well done! Expect to receive your free Darwin Antipersonel Bomb recipe soon.

And the arrows are standard Paint.Net arrows. They come out as three-point objects, which can be curved and stretched and shaped and coloured to your heart's content!

I shall check it out.

BTW: 70% gets a C??? B- at least!

Oh, alright already, but don't expect any more favorable treatment just because of the Terminus Family Foundation Gaming Lecture Hall.

[DuckofTindalos]

[:D][:D][:D]

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: VSWG

"Nagasaki - Bright Light in sky." Now this is just MEAN, Cap Mandrake. [:D]

I just spent several hours catching up on this AAR - now my tummy hurts from too much laughter! [:)] Fortunately, as an experienced reader of this AAR, I refrained from eating or drinking while reading - lest I need a Heimlich Maneuver (this is the first time I've used "lest", I hope I've done it correctly [Coming to think of it, it is also the first time I've used "Heimlich Maneuver" - this is so exciting! [:)] But I digress...])

So M&M ventured into shipbuilding... Will they expand this business? If they could get hold of a list of ships that have so far sunken in this war, they should be able to identify shortages. Of course 'shortage' is just another word for 'scarcity'. And we all know what the color ouf scarcity is...

I..err. I mean Milo will have to think of something to do with the icebreakers he started. Hard to believe the Japs will really go for Dunedin at this point to force Allied shipping to the Antarctic.

BTW..it is possible to do a Heimlich Maneuver on oneself by bending forward forcefully over a table. If you come from Flores Island stock you can likely use a standard table (you might even half to hop up a little) but if you are full-bred Homo sapiens you might have to use one of those tall bistro tables. If none is available, grab your neck in the universal choking sign and run around with your eyes bulging out. If Doc Daneka is about, he can probably help.

[DuckofTindalos]

If you haven't got it, Paint.Net can be found here:

http://www.getpaint.net/index.html

[Cap Mandrake]

Editors Note:

A number of readers have written to say that the Heimlich Maneuver had not been invented at the time of WWII. This is strictly true (or at least it had not yet been popularized) but the seed of the idea may have germinated on the small South Pacific Island of Ha'Apai (also Haa'pai and Ha-A'pai). We were able to uncover information about a trip Dr. Hemilich took to the South Pacific during the Summer before his junior year at Cornell. The natives of this island had developed a very effective strategy to deal with the many tragedies that resulted from the cultural practice of slurping down whole, raw, conch meat right out the shell after a co-participant pried the conch loose with a sharpened abalone shell. To make matters worse, this delicacy was often enjoyed during feasts after prodigious quatitities of fermented coconut milk had been imbibed. On one memorable occaision, the Island Chieftan himself was nearly killed when he aspirated conch meat into his trachea. Legend has it that he stumbled about grabbing his throat, eyes bulging until he fell unconscious across a nearly horizontal palm trunk, exposing his ample undercarriage to the terrified villagers. One enterprising shaman, recognizing the emergency grabbed a very large taro root and thrust it home with sufficient vigor to expel the offending conch and save the Chief, who was none the worse for the affair save some tenderness which required him to undertake tribal duties in a recumbant position for a week or so.

The success of the technique was adopted by nearby islanders who even adopted the word "ha'apai" to mean rougly, "one who has something...caught... in..his ...throat". Quite possibly, the future Dr Hemilich adapted this technique to the environs of Cornell Medical College where taro root was hard to find and much time could be lost in properly preparing the choking victim for the Ha'apai maneuver.

Margin Note: Please run this by D,C & H for the next edition. I have some reservations about liability exposure.

Gen. Marshall

PS..and PLEASE, PLEASE stop putting the margin notes in the published text for the love of God!

PPS..Let's go with that Egyptian girl for the internship position. The other ones insist on using the word "like" every third word. It seems at once a noun, a verb, a conjunction. I simply can't tolerate it. There was a time a Bryn Mahr education meant something.

[Cap Mandrake]

It has been a tough day for SEAC:


1) 2 Jap divisions, a couple of hundred toy tanks and 3 regts. of artillery have set up camp outside of Myitkinia..not to mention about 220 Tonys and Zeroes. More on the massive furball in the skies over Myitkinia to come.

2) The stalker girl from Idaho told me she is leaving her husband [X(]

3) My teenage daughter borrowed my cell phone (after breaking hers and having a replacement stolen). I am over that. The real problem is I am about 95% certain that she picked up a phone message left by the stalker girl and I have reason to believe it was definitely not G-rated.[X(]

I have requested 23rd Fighter Group, (USAAF) to fly in from Generalissimo Chiang Tabpub's command at Chungking. That should fix everything. [8|]

[Cap Mandrake]

Lt. Gen Alexander to Lt. Gen. Pownall...HELP! Of course, he is a bit more dignified about it.

[DuckofTindalos]

PS: HEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!!![:D]

[Cap Mandrake]

************SEAC HQ, Ledo, 18:40, Sept 10, 1942**********


Gen. Pownall (CIC SEAC): Generals, I am afraid I am going to ask for a greater sacrifice both from both Third Tactical, RAF and 10th USAAF. Our boys at Myitkinia are in a bad spot. The Japanese are preparing what is sure to be a mjor offensive along the rail line toward Myitkinia. It appears this is a coordianted effort with the Salween River offensive as Gen. Alexander's Salween relief force is now poorly positioned and will be lucky to make Myitkinia in a week or more. That leaves only one colonial brigade and one Indian plus what can best be described as Chinese "irregulars". 14th, 16th Chindit and 64 tubes of artillery are at least 2 weeks out on the Ledo Road. I need your boys to slow down the Jap preparations and interdict their supply and we need local air superiority over Myitkinia. Lastly, we need the air bridge to Myitkinia at maximal effort.

Air Marshal Peirce (RAF): As you know, the weather has been poor, but we can try pushing in under the weather. We will lose some crews.

Gen. Pownall (CIC SEAC): Can't be helped, Richard. If we can stop them here, we may just be able to get behind them with 2nd Div and 7th Armoured from Imphal. Claire, how about the heavies? Can they get in under the weather?

Gen. Chennault (1oth AF, USAAF):There is nothing I would enjoy more but we can't go under 10,000 ft.

Gen. Pownall (CIC SEAC): Why is that?

Gen. Chennault (1oth AF, USAAF): House rule, sir.

Gen. Pownall (CIC SEAC): Oh, bloody Hell! First there is tha pedant Phillips and his 1925 Naval Treaty and now we must suffer through a house rule on B-17's. I would say we were asleep at the switch on the "house rule" negotiations. Air intel shows at least 400 aircraft at Rangoon. That has to be WAAAY overstacked. Can't you just send them in at 4000 feet and claim later you accidentally hit the "set all" button?......

[DuckofTindalos]

Damn House Rules![:D][:D][:D]

[Cap Mandrake]

I forgot to mention another disaster. I was driving to Barnes and Noble last night about 8:20 to buy "Guests of the Ayatollah". The bookstore is in a big outdoor mall with stores and restaurants and a couple of meat market type bars (well, at least that is what I heard). So I am in a freeway interchange merge lane and I pull up next to a California Highway Patrol car. I need to get into his lane to go where I want to go but everytime I slow down, he slows down and it is the freeway so I can't slow down too much and I dare not give it the juice and try to cut him off, so finally I just have to make a right turn that I didn't want to make. I stop to look over my shoulder then realize I have a dedicated lane to make a right so I proceed (no light, no stop sign). Then I get stuck making another right because of the traffic flow..then another right..then there are center islands everywhere and pretty soon I am on the other side of the huge freeway from the mall and half the friggin' way back home so now I am getting pissed off. Finally, I find a big, lighted intersection with a dedicated left turn signal so I line up to make a U-turn. I wait for the light, it turns green, I make the turn, voila. Another half hour or so and I will be back at the mall. Dooohhhh! Flashing lights. What now? Did I forget to put the registration tag on? I pull over and it is a CHiP.

"What is the problem officer"? (I try politeness first, holding unmanly crying and pleading in reserve)

"That intersection is posted no U-turn"

"F***", I say to myself. "Oh Hell", I say out loud.

"Are you aware you were driving on the shoulder back there?"

"Me, on the freeway you mean? Are you sure about that?" "That was a God****** merge lane you idiot", I say to myself. Then I think better of my tone. "I believe you are mistaken sir."

"I have been following you since then."

"Christ..it's the same jerk who purposely wouldn't let me merge", I say to myself. "What does he mean following me? I was follwoing him?"

"Have you had anything to drink tonight, sir?"

"No" I did have a gin and tonic while I was walking the dogs about 4:30 but that is not nightime...so there[:'(]

"Where are you headed?"

"To the bookstore"

"Oh, bookstore, eh?" in a really annoying sarcastic tone.

"Look guy, if you are trying to stop bar denizens maybe you should wait until they GET to the bar." That is what I wanted to say. I didn't say it.

So he goes as far to get me out of the car to do the field sobriety test and calls for back up. Then it begins to dawn on him I may be telling the truth after I gave him a neurophysiology lesson on why most people have a little bit of nystagmus when you make them gaze at extreme lateral gaze for a few seconds and it doesn't mean they are toasted especailly when there is nothing else wrong.

Finally, he decides to cut his losses before the back-up gets there.

"I am going to let you off with a U-turn violation"

"LET ME OFF? Gee, that is bloody generous of you". I wanted to say that too. I didn't. I also refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry. [:'(]