Friday

Good morning,

Quote of the day:

“Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.”

              Napoleon Bonaparte

Let's do a recap of the last couple of days. There was a rain and flood down on the Florida Panhandle that would make Noah jealous. One of the major north-south roads in Pensacola was washed out and the road collapsed. A gas leak at the Escambia County (Pensacola) jail triggered an explosion that cause even further death and destruction. It is thought that the gas leak was caused by flooding damaging some of the piping. Are the Gods angry at that area? It seems like it.

I guess all of you know that Detroit, Michigan has declared bankruptcy. This means that the police department is operating on crumbs handed to them which effects their ability to keep up their patrol cars. As a result there have been 8 shootings of burglars so far this year. I appears that the residents have decided that they cannot rely on the cops any longer and have armed themselves much to the chagrin of the no good criminal jackasses that had rather rob people than work. The Chief of Police has defended these actions saying that everyone has the right to protect themselves. Why is that the present administration has asked for us to not condemn all Muslims for the actions of a few lunatics but condemn all gun owners as being dangers to the community?

I was reading an item naming the top ten Mexican restaurants in America. The top ranked one was in Los Angeles and number two was in San Antonio but in the top few was Hugo's in Houston. I have been to this one but it was not in the present location but I assume the food is as good as I remember. There was another Mexican restaurant about halfway between LaPorte and the Hobby airport south of Houston. This place was a hoot. It was always packed. It had a small bar and the seats were stacked cases of Corona beer.

I was working for Fluor who had engineered an addition to a chemical plant near LaPorte. I was doing “field verification” meaning that one of the clients representative and I would walk the completed parts of the addition and verify that everything was in compliance with the approved drawings. It is called a “walk down”. There were four of us Fluor employees using one car to go back and forth from our motel to the plant site (about 4 miles). We had to park the car in a designated parking lot that was a considerable distance from the plant so we would alternate drivers day to day. The driver had to let the others out near the plant gate then park the car and walk back. That evening the same designated driver had to go get the car and bring it to the gate an pick the others up. The summertime heat in the Houston area is almost unbearable. One particular day after work the designated driver went to get the car, started it up, turned the A/C wide open and then decided that he had to relieve himself. He got out and aimed at one of the tires and let loose. The problem was that he had locked the doors when he got out with the car running. We called a locksmith who was unsuccessful after about 1 ½ hours of trying. We called another locksmith who got the door open and we got back to “Partners” bar and grill 3 hours late. Partners was the closest bar to the motel. What a day. By the way, after sitting in the sun for about three hours with the A/C running, the windows inside the car were totally fogged and watery.

The bad part of this job was that the client had their own inspectors that did some checking on their own and found discrepancies that were unacceptable and kicked us (Fluor) off the plant site. That day when I got back to the motel room there was a phone message from Fluor headquarters in Greenville telling me that there was a plane ticket awaiting me at the Southwest Airline ticket counter at the Hobby airport...be there at 1:00p the next afternoon along with the other three. We came back to Greenville. The problem was that the client felt that the wrong gaskets had been used at nearly 300 locations which would require a lot of dis-assembly and re-assembly...and a hell of a lot of labor costs. Fluor sent a team down there to try to figure out what the hell happened. I never heard the results.

On the way home from this fiasco we had to change planes in the Atlanta airport and we were pretty morose. We were sitting on a bench near the departure gate and I saw one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen across the way in a book store. I went over to her and said “Excuse me, I just wanted to tell you that I have had a very bad couple of days but your beauty has made this day worthwhile.” She was shocked, of course, and quietly thanked me and I went back to the bench. I don't know why I did that...but it felt good.

This Date in History May 2

1670 On this date King Charles II of England chartered the Hudson Bay Company which was essentially a group of French explorers that was beginning a fur trapping operation in what is now Canada. The charter allowed the Frenchmen to set up a lucrative trade monopoly with London merchants. Not only this, it gave control of most of the lands around North America’s Hudson Bay. This deal was highly contested by English traders in the area and French fur trappers already in place but none the less the Hudson Bay Company enjoyed enormous success in what would become eastern Canada. France lost influence in Canada during the French and Indian war and some Montreal merchants established the North West Company and began a fur trade with Scottish traders. The Hudson Bay Company continued enjoying success in spite of the company’s failure to find a northwest passage out of Hudson Bay. Eventually the North West Company and the Hudson Bay Company merged under the better known name of the Hudson Bay Company. The united companies then controlled the fur trade from the Atlantic to the Pacific in Canada. The company was under the governorship of Sir George Simpson from 1821-1856 when the company reached its monetary peak. Canada was granted dominion status in 1867 and the monopoly fell apart. But by then the company was diversified and remained Canada’s largest corporation through the 1920’s. Speaking of King Charles II, it was his father King Charles I that was beheaded during the English Civil War in 1649 and Oliver Cromwell became the Lord Protector of England until his death in 1660. After this England decided they wanted a monarchy again and Charles II assumed the throne but he argued with the Presbyterians in Scotland for several years before he was named as King of Scotland. Charles II was known as “The Merry Monarch” for his many parties. He also acknowledged to fathering 14 illegitimate children but did not name any as his heir. “Merry” indeed.

1808 Earlier France under the leadership of Napoleon Bonaparte had successfully invaded the Iberian Peninsula (Portugal and Spain). On this date the Spaniards in Madrid, Spain get fed up and begin a rebellion. The fight against the occupying Frenchmen reached a crescendo in the main square of Madrid. The Spanish rebels were defeated and that night the French commander Grand Duke Joachim Marat sent his troops through the city and hundreds of Spaniards were unmercifully killed in retribution. The success of Napoleon in his occupation forced the King of Spain, Charles IV, to abdicate. But eventually the British sent an expeditionary force under the leadership of Arthur Wellesley to kick the French out the peninsula. The French were kicked out of Portugal in short order but the struggle for Spain took a while. In 1813 Wellington finally routed the French army in the Battle of Vitorio and Spain was free once again. Later on Napoleon and Wellesley met again in the Battle of Waterloo in Belgium where Wellesley beat the crap out of Napoleon and was titled the Duke of Wellington for his efforts. He was known as the “Iron Duke” for his rigid discipline, but it paid off in the long run.

1924 On this date Patrick Mahon was arrested in a London train station for murder. He had a bloody knife in his luggage the he readily admitted he used to dismember his mistress. He said the she had fallen and struck her head and died and he felt the need to hide her remains so his wife would not find out. The police go to the apartment and find that Patrick had indeed dismembered his mistress to the point that there was nothing larger than a foot square. To verify that the mistress had died from a blow to the head or not, the police had to reassemble the corpse for an autopsy to confirm the cause of death. This job was the beginning of the police using rubber gloves in an investigation of a murder. They could not confirm that the woman had died from a blow to the head because they never found a head but the rest of the corpse was reassembled. Patrick was tried and convicted of murder and was executed in September of the same year. I like it. By the way, Patrick was caught because his wife found a receipt for a storage locker in Patrick’s clothing and sent the police to the locker. There they found Patrick’s bloody clothing from the murder. Moral: Men, do not cheat and kill and dismember your mistress unless you have a change of clothes.

1972 On this date the movie “Jaws” begins production. A great deal of the filming was done in and around Pensacola, Florida and not Amity, Massachusetts as indicated in the movie. I was living in Pensacola then and it was not unusual to see a twenty foot mechanical looking Great White shark in the back of a semi traveling down the highway.

Born today:

1762 Russian Empress Catherine the Great. She said “You philosophers are lucky people. You write on paper and the paper is patient. I, as an unfortunate Empress, must write on the skins of living beings.” Did she mean she was a tattoo artist?

1859 English writer Jerome K. Jerome. He said “But then, everything has its drawbacks, as the man said when his mother-in-law died, they came after me for the funeral expenses.” No Comment

1879 South Carolina governor James F, Byrnes. He said “The closest thing to immortality on earth is a government bureau.” Right on, Jimmy.

Died today:

1519 Renaissance man Leonardo da Vinci. He said “As a well spent day brings a happy sleep, a well spent life brings a happy death.” Leonardo was so smart he was scary.

1857 French writer Andre Musset. He said “Things they do not understand always creates a sensation with the English.” It doesn’t happen with the French because they are so damned stupid.

1972 FBI founder J. Edgar Hoover. He said “I regret to say that we of the FBI are powerless to act in cases of oral-genital intimacy unless it in some way has affected interstate commerce.” Edgar, shut up.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow