PFC Dan Gronde was the victim of an I.E.D in Afghanistan on July 24th. He suffered fragmentation wounds to his abdomen and back. His buddy suffered knee damage. With a very grateful and troubled look he tells me feels lucky. Most of the casualties in his unit's area suffer limb loss or death.

Dan is on medical leave here in Indianapolis, and got treated to a meal at Chili's. He didn't realize that while he ate, a small crowd of family, friends, vets and even a member of the Young Marines were gathering outside to greet him.

There were cameras, hugs, handshakes and Dan graciously accepted all of it, looking a bit embarrassed at all the attention.

Then it was time to go to the Legion Hall, with a police escort. There are lots of ways to travel in style, but his family found something unique. Dan is a big fan of Batman.

Mark Racop of Logansport builds officially licensed 1966 Batmobiles.

Photobucket

 Photobucket

Quite a few thousand locals must have wondered what kind of emergency required the attention of police, Batman and Soldiers.

I have to admit, it was fun being in one of the chase cars, watching people pull over, and the expressions on faces, especially of young men in their rice burners. Sorry, son, but no matter what you do to your Honda, it will never be as cool as a 1966 Batmobile.

The Legion had their own greeting ready.

Photobucket

 Photobucket

Dan was very gracious and modest, with strangers and children, and was a gentleman with maturity and manners far beyond his 20 years.

Photobucket

 Photobucket

By the way, just in case you ever wondered, the secret to the Batmobile is a Chevy engine

Photobucket

And rockets for backup

Please extend wishes of recovery and good luck to PFC Gronde, and thanks to Chili's, the Zionsville Police and Fire Departments, the American Legion, and Mark Racop of www.FiberglassFreaks.com.

Item The First

You live in a city. You don't know how to change a tire or oil. You don't know how to build a fire.  You can't communicate without a cell phone. You can't fix your plumbing. You can't set up your own wifi. You're untrained in basic economics, chemistry, physics and history.  You can't prepare food without packages, and aren't even aware that food has to be processed from root or bone before that. You only know and get paid for one very specialized task.

Yet you call me a "hick."

~~~

Item The Second

http://news.yahoo.com/york-police-shoot-down-plane-needed-144444290.html

Said threat is probably departing from Newark, Long Island or the Hamptons.

So, by the time they get CONCRETE PROOF OF CRIMINAL INTENT, get THE FEDS TO AUTHORIZE THE SHOT, because sure as hell the FAA and USAF ain't letting urban hick trash make that call, scramble a bird and a sharpshooter, intercept, take the shot, take another shot, take a few more shots, the plane will crash in Times Square just as the pilot intended after spraying whatever he was going to spray, and there'll be a few holes in buildings as well.

If I turned that in as a plot outline I'd be laughed at.

Sounds like this hick was talking out of his ass to try to impress the media on a question he really couldn't answer. In the meantime he's just told every dedicated hostile "No, we really don't have any plans, they're screwed." Capital! Bravo!

 But don't worry, because:

"Kelly also told "60 Minutes" that the NYPD has intelligence officers stationed in cities around the world, including Abu Dhabi, Amman, Montreal, Toronto, Singapore and Paris."

And the CIA is okay with this?

OR:

Officials said it is now nearly impossible to walk a block in lower Manhattan without being on surveillance camera.
"Nobody has a system like this," said Jessica Tisch, the NYPD's director of policy and planning for counterterrorism.

That's supposed to make us feel better?  What exactly do these camerae accomplish?  Enable fat donut munchers to watch more crime?

Wildcats are customized calibers, usually from existing cases with the dimensions changed.

I think the greatest thing about wildcats is the names.

.577 Tyrannosaur
.600 OverKill

But what about some others? The 12 Gauge Rifle From Hell http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=178655 reaches up to 18,000 foot pounds. I suggested it should be called ".729 Redneck."

So, one of the fora I'm on started a thread.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

HANDGUN:


The .2 Pac.  Used for drive by shooting of rap artists.

9mm Doubletap.  A perfectly standard 9mm.  We just wanted to remind you of that.

.357 Excedrin Headache.  Cure yours by causing theirs.

10mm JBT. If they're going to do it, they need to do it right.

10mm Vasectomy.  Because we all know someone who needs one.

.45 MRI.  They need this, too.

.451 Fahrenheit.  A .308 case necked to .45 and shot from a 6" barrel. The muzzle blast will take care of the paperwork.

.50 Cent.  When you want to make sure you get rid of the rapper with one shot.

~~~~

ON TO THE RIFLES!

~~~~

.23 Skidoo.  A necked down .30-06.  For grandpa, who can't shut up about how much better things were 80 years ago.

.300 Spartan. For sniping Persians in a completely epic fashion.

.458 Darwin.  For hunting endangered species the right way.

.499 Feinstein.  a .50 BMG shortened 2mm to get around California's ban.

.6000000 Holocaust.  Oh, we're going to hell for that one.

.666 Antichrist.  For time traveling back to hunt dinosaur.

.729 Redneck.  a 3.75" 12 gauge slug, brass cased, for rifled bores.  http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=178655

http://io9.com/5840415/why-a-little-self+delusion-can-be-a-very-good-thing A bit of excerpt:

In general, the more aware of reality you are, the more likely you are to survive. But sometimes lying to yourself has its advantages. Possessing an over-inflated belief in yourself can help you perform better than accurately knowing your abilities.

That said, they suggest that overconfidence works particularly well in unfamiliar situations, where it's difficult to even make an accurate assessment of one's position. Faced with an unknown enemy or technology, the best course may be to simply assume that you can win until proven wrong. In that scenario, it might make some sense why overconfidence is an desirable trait from an evolutionary perspective, particularly since so much of human history seems dominated by exploring unfamiliar and potentially dangerous situations. Very well.

So then we come to this comment: jinchoung

14 Sep 2011 6:18 PM "why did you say you could fly the plane?!"

"i just assumed i could."

it's one thing to say that there are situations where delusions of grandeur can help STATISTICALLY SPEAKING - OVER TIME - FOR A BIOLOGICAL SPECIES...

but in everyday, real life existence for a single human being, while confidence can have a psycho/sociological effect that can manipulate the weak of mind - VERY * SERIOUS * REAL WORLD * NEGATIVES are the primary consequences of such delusion.

it is because of this phenomenon that people all over our country have an opinion on global warming.

THINK ABOUT THAT.

local yokel yahoos who don't know their asshole from a hole in the ground HAVE AN OPINION ON CLIMATE CHANGE - A VERY TECHNICAL SUBJECT MATTER which this group of opiners can ONLY get SECOND HAND from scientists.

further, these imbeciles have such a hopped up sense of self that they are confident:

- TO THE POINT THAT THEY'RE ****ARGUING**** with the scientist from whence this information comes!

Which scientist?

- to the point where JENNY MOTHERFUCKING MCCARTNEY thinks she has something to contribute to the field of childhood vaccinations.

Wait, wasn't this about climate change?

- where a bunch of backwoods fucktards call themselves a teabagging express are convinced that a nation... A NATION... should be run like their own households - with NO HINT of irony or grasp of the fallacies of such a notion.

Wait, wasn't this about immunizations?

------------------------------------------------------
as for novel, unique situations in which we need to go in blind... how many such situations exist in this day and age?

perhaps cocksure boldness works better than timidity when completely ignorant but what works better than that is simply not to be ignorant.

fucking google it.

um...ignorance? I can google it?

------------------------------------------------------

i'm actually going to disagree with the gist of this article

Wait, are you an expert in this field? or getting your information from an expert? Or are you, you know, arguing with experts? Which would be ironic.

and say that this is on par with "studies" that say chocolate or red wine is healthful... in a very particular way of looking, yes, that can be so... but it also must ignore huge swathes of other complicating factors that frustrate such easy generalizations.

DELUSION IS BAD. FALSEHOODS ARE BAD.

IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH! FREEDOM IS SLAVERY! TRUTH IS BEAUTY!

TRUTH IS GOOD. KNOWING REALITY IS GOOD. period.
it is with UTTER, GRAVE, MORTAL PERIL that we do not understand and grasp our ineptitude.

Oh, I'm pretty sure I grasp it when I see it.

we JACK UP OUR WORLD because we overestimate our own prowess and come off as utter DOUCHEBAGS - to ourselves, our friends and family and to the societies in which we belong.

Well, maybe you do...

as clint eastwood said, "A MAN'S GOTTA KNOW HIS LIMITATION".

that mouthbreathing, overweight chess nerd is not going to get the cheerleader... no matter how bold.

you can find the way if you don't even know where you currently are.

Deep, man. You should send that to Reader's Digest.

There's more. Much more. I must applaud this gentleman on a fantastic first-person demonstration of self-delusion. He couldn't do better if he were actually self-deluded.