J0nny Ling0

Thanks Dooj, Ala P, and Jim! Yeah well, I will continue to perservere. I actually have some memoirs written from when I was sixteen on that near fated voyage, and I have written two chapters for the "novel" that should go with it. Man, there is sex, macho fist fights, dramatic rescue situations, and all of the conflict that should go with a good novel and eventually a rippin Hollywood movie! In my mind, a young (very young) Matt Damon should play me, and the Girl would be Salma Hayek, the one whom I had three nights with in Barcelona, Spain. But it wasn't Salma, it was "Angela", a 22 year old... And oh, Ala Prochaine, it would be naughty of me to tell of the time I had in old Quebec City at Chateau Frontenac just before we went to sea on the SS Merrimack! Those French Canadian ladies were too totally sex,ylike you! But I was denied the full opportunity, for our ship sailed too soon... :(

Lotsa looks, but not many comments. I put this up because Belle inspired me to. She said she liked my stow-ries. But thanks Mark O'Malley! :) JL

Yeah! And what would The Donald say? No doubt he would say right off? "You are fired!"

Well, I was in the Tenth Corps, and our Kansas Safe Hunter course was a lot of fun. The people who ran it were fun and loving. We laughed alot, and did our best to help those who had a fear of "guns". No doubt it could well have been different with you all. They didn't "assume we were idiots" (idiotes-grin)

FIDDLEBACKS IN THE FIDDLEY, GABOONS IN THE GALLEY, OR…. WHICH WAY TO THE GANGWAY?! Thomas J. Wallender of Juneau, AK. had no idea things would turn out the way they did when he went to work last Friday. While working up in the fiddley (upper reaches of the engine room where the exhaust and steam pipes go up to the stack) of the M/V Kennecott, Thomas Wallender was bitten by a vicious Brown Recluse, or, as they are known down South, the deadly Fiddleback Spider. The Fiddleback gained it’s unique name because of the extroardinarily clear outline of a Stradivarious Violin on top of it’s back. I have captured a couple of them down in Oklahoma, and I am here to tell you that nature’s artwork in this case is quite amazing with it’s ironic twist of the macabre. For obvious reasons, it has also been known as the “Violin Spider”. Although a benign looking little fellow, the Brown Recluse is responsible for many deaths as well as horrible bite scars in the U.S. of A. According to many in the Penguin Department (Steward’s Department), Wallender felt a sharp pain in his left foot when he was reaching for the next rung on the vertical ladder as he was moving up to check the level in the waste heat boilers. When he got to the next catwalk, he quickly pulled off his shoe and could see that a vicious and deadly Fiddleback had its’ ¼ inch fangs buried deeply into his foot. Apparently the vicious little b a st ard had bitten him right through the material of his sock! Imagine that, right through the material! Apparently these mad Fiddlebacks are completely out of control! Immediately upon seeing this little horror “glombing on” to his own foot, Wallender, beside himself with terror and consumed with a rage to kill the little son of a bit ch, grabbed the 12 in Crescent wrench out of his back pocket and swinging wildly, began to beat the living sh it out of the spider and his foot! As the spider was dead with the first whack, Tom’s crazed smashing of the now brown goo of what once was the spider’s body, managed to infuse all of the spider’s venom straight into his bloodstream, resulting in Tom’s foot swelling up bigger than an Arkansas mushmellon! By the time we got to Bellingham, Wallender was declared unfit for duty and had to ride home to Juneau with the ship. Yet, this is only the second of a series of incidents that have involved unwanted creatures aboard the M/V Kennicott. Just prior to the ugly Fiddleback incident, Brenda, the breakfast cook, encountered a beautiful yet deadly Gaboon Viper in the ship’s galley. The Gaboon Viper is native to Indonesia, and part of it’s camouflage system is that they have the marking of what looks like a beautiful golden Aspen leaf right smack on the top of it’s head. It is extremely deceptive, and in my travels, I have almost stepped on them a number of times. I have also spoken with many villagers whose loved ones had succumbed to its deadly bite. It is not known how this deadly Gaboon got aboard the ship. It is suspected, however, that it may have dropped out of the trees as the ship passed through the Panama Canal on it’s trip up from the “Fiddleback infested shipyard” in Mississippi where the Kennicott was recently built. What the deadly Gaboon was doing in Panama is anybodies’ guess. At any rate, it was 0400 in the morning when Brenda showed up in the galley to get the home fries and the bacon going when she lifted a plate that was sitting upside down on her cutting board. To her absolute horror, there, staring directly into her eyes in strike position, was the deadly Gaboon! With a horrifying shriek, she ran screaming from the galley into the food court area screaming; “Run for your life! It’s a deadly Gaboon! It's a deadly Gaboon!” causing great alarm among the two other early morning galley workers. When the watchman, Pam Wittenen, arrived on the scene to investigate, the deadly Gaboon had slipped down onto the deck and gotten away. Fortunately, 3rd Mate Jane Wayne (also known as “GI Jane”), disregarding any sense of self preservation and with a dedication to the safety of the ship’s crew and passengers, hunted down and hacked the three foot Gaboon into a bloody mess with the machete which she wears strapped to her back at all times. Having the machete on her back is a habit she picked up while guarding gold shipments down the Amazon a few years back. Apparently, when Wayne was bending down to look at a pile of mooring line, the vicious viper which was hiding amongst the coiled line struck like lightning right for her lovely, yet un-protected face! Wayne, with more than equal lightning speed, whipped the machete off her back and cleanly sliced off the Gaboon’s head in mid air leaving the sickening sight writhing and spewing all over the car deck! With glee, she commenced to finish the job hacking away with sadistic glee… When Wayne was asked if she felt any fear when she took the Gaboon out, she tilted her head back and just laughed! It was only shortly after that when Wallender encountered the Attack Of The Fiddleback. Once again, it is apparent that these wild and deadly creatures are completely out of control! When the ship finally docked in Juneau, Brenda, stonefaced and silent, walked stoically up the car deck ramp, got in her car and drove off. We don’t know if she will ever come back… Wallender, on the other hand, (and under heavy sedation), was last seen laughing maniacally as he was driven off in the handi-capped van to Bartlett Memorial Hospital for treatment. Wallender, a most excellent guitarist, received the grave news that, even though an amputation of his foot from the ankle down would not be necessary, he may never be able to play the guitar with his toes again, which has always been a delight to his audiences. Wallender is now recuperating at his home in Juneau and being ministered to by a host of very lovely ladies who are his fans…… So, it seems as if things turned out well enough for the crew of the M/V Kennicott, in that there was no loss of life. Fortunately, the ship’s “herpetentemologist”, Kevin Nye the Oiler Guy was there to identify these deadly miscreants. It was equally fortunate that Jane Wayne was aboard, and that, well, that Tom had his wrench….. When Day Oiler Jack Slatt, from Petersburg AK, was asked what he thought of this weeks’ peculiar turn of events, he mused for a moment and said with a wry grin replied; “Well, it’s a ghastly, stranger than fiction, twisted sort of tale……. For the record: Everything described about the Fiddleback Spiders’ characteristics are true except the part in the story where it is mentioned that it had “¼ inch fangs”. That was embellishment pure and simple. Also, everything about the Gaboon Viper (including it’s name) is true except I am not sure whether it is indigenous to S.E. Asia, or to South America. I am reasonably sure it is an Asian reptile. The rest of the story is completely true, and I’m not making this up…………… :blink:

Tis very sad indeed EX10... And WW, sorry, I thought you meant otherwise. But, yea-ah! I could hardly believe my ears when the story of my WOW sis pointing that loaded rifle at everyone was relayed to me. But, that's the point, people have and will continue to act with incredible stupidity when it comes to firearms! The stories abound, and sadly will continue to do so. In fact, with a number of Corps brothers and sistahs' I did my usual " .22 caliber exhibtion", just to show how deadly even a .22 can be. Like with my Irish friend, I took an empty coke can, filled it with water, and then at a decent distance had him shoot it and watch as the whole can literally exploded, with water a flyin', demonstrating the effect of "hydroshock" from even a little old .22 caliber rifle or handgun. As you may know, our bodies are a high percentage of water. Education is the key, and so this is why I thought that aspect of Corps training was worthwhile, as you may well agree... The Red Dragon said that to you Dooj? What a bee-otch! And good for you for sticking up for yourself like that! You went girl!

I have learned by re-eading about this pic that all of these instruments are "Balalaika's". The big one must be the bass, and the little the "lead". It must be the Les Paul or the Strat..Hah! I guess this is actually a modern group. And, I read that these are Russian instruments, and not the medievel instrument that I thought it was, although with no doubt with an equally old history...

Why, thank you! I love to write short stories and have a bunch of them written down already. Many of them sea stories though... Here is a possible link to one at Myspace.com I don't know if it will let you in there thoguh, but you can try. I could post it somewhere her, but maybe it wouldn't work because it has a few swear words in it. But here: http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...A04805134944141 Drat. It won't work. Okay, I'll start a thread in Open

Uh oh. Looks like I was posting as you were posting EX10. And thanks. :). And, I appreciate your rundown of your time as branch coordinators in KS. Reminds me of my first two years of marriage in Alaska. My wife and I with new baby were expected to drive to Anchorage three hours away every weekend for "leaders meetings". I was the twig area coordinator of five twigs on the Kenai Peninsula. And that drive was over snowy mountain passes to boot, at least in the winter. And we never dropped less than $100.00 plus of our won money each time we went there. Yeah, that's like four hundred plus a month, and no TWI credit card to pay the costs. Also, I remember that the LC had a big leaders meeting on the opening day of Moose Season the first year of hi LC-ship. And it was funny, the local Alaskans were like "f___ you! We hunt for meat! We ain't comin!" And, they didn't show. But dutifully, I and my wife and baby drove to Anchortown anyway, where we listened to the LC rant over the lack of love for God just because people "liked to hunt." But ya know, since I had recently been ordained, I took the opportunity to take offense at what he said and point out that he was out of touch with reality, having just come from Kansas as the LC there, and that Alaskans work very hard and many hunt annually to fill their freezers, and that just maybe, in the name of "Word in Culture" he could have scheduled the first big leaders meeting of the year at a different time. This brought many nods of agreement from the few present who did come, and caused him to shut up for the moment. But I did get reamed later in private, but I still enjoyed my "peer level advantage" and disagreed with him to his face, which really pi ssed him off. And to think that I passed up on an enormous bull on my drive to Anchorage with my rifle in the truck! I could have bagged him, told the LC, "sorry, I can't make it, got lots of cuttin and wrappin to do!" But, I quelled my "selfish desires", and drove on, and Bullwinkle got to live to see another day. Well, at least it turned out good for old Bullwinkle on that :) day... :)

Ex10, that is exactly why I posted what I posted. Easy to say as an American who may well also have grown up around firearms. But to so many of these Europeans, and to many of our city dwelling Countrymen and women, the only owners of guns are terrorists and criminals.

I just read one of the "homo" letters Belle. Thanks for posting the link. And so, what's wrong with what he said? Just kidding. Whoa. Glad I wasn't around for all of that! After reading that certain letter, I wonder how a certain old friend of mine made out during the homo purges. I do happen to know that he was gay when we witnessed to him on the WOW field in L.A. And I know that he certainly displayed his effeminate nature as he worked on staff at HQ, and frankly, I always wondered if he still dabbled in it. I won't say his name here, but if any of you are aware of any people who were "smoked out" at HQ, maybe you could invite me to a PM and let me know if this guy was sorely treated and booted... JL

Skyrider said: Come on Skyrider, lighten up. I was raised to shoot and hunt also. Firearm safety was drilled into me at a young age. But really, I remember certain Europeans who literally "jumped out of their skins" when they watched and then heard the sound of a bolt action being racked an locked down at the front of the classroom. And when it came to shooting the "dreaded mule kicking 12 gage" at the range, I remember one poor Irish guy literally shaking as he was handed the shotgun. Complete and total fear some of these people had, and the experience for them was very valuable. And then you said; "been around, done that". Well, good for you! But it certainly wasn't everybody, or even half of everybody. What I did as the time approached to do some minimal shooting, was to talk with my Irish friend, and help him to allay his fears as he shakily raised that shotgun up. Yet you say; "And, they assumed we were idiots or something. Like the gun training thing", Look "They" didn't "assume we were idiots", They simply supplied the Kansas Safe Hunters course for us. And, if you are a hunter, and have been around firearms, you will know, brother, that there really are some very careless and ignorant people out there when it comes to firearms. Not that they are "evil stupid", but just flat out ignorant. When I was WOW in Los Angeles, my two WOW sistahs went to dinner with these two guys they were witnessing to. They went to the guys's apartment where the guys made them spaghetti. Then the guys gave them wine, and they all got fairly loaded-yeah, you know what they wanted. And then this guy gets out his 30.06 (high powered rifle for those of you who may not know), and passes it around. As my one WOW sistah holds the rifle, she "jokingly" points it at the other three and says "Freeze dirtbags!" One of the guys, knowing that the rifle was loaded, reaches out, pushes the barrel towards the ceiling, just as the sumbit*h goes off! Yeah, there was the deafening roar of a 30.06 in a small apartment, which also put a hole in the ceiling which could have killed one to two innocent people in the apartments above. When the story was relayed to me, I was aghast! Needless to say, I grilled them on gun safety! And so, when I was in the in residence training program in the Corps, I was glad to see such a practicle course made available to us. The knowledge and practicle experience was not for we who "already knew", but for those who didn't. And certainly it could have been more extensive when it came to the time on the shooting range, but at least it whet their whistles, and help allay some needless fears. Look folks, you may believe that you were ripped off by The Way, and that years of your life were totally wasted. And maybe it is easy because of the bitterness to "pick apart" every little thing and supply a "bandwagon" for others to jump on with you, but, come on. In The Way Corps training, the Hunter Safety course was not supplied because "they assumed we were idiots". It was supplied because many many people are entirely unknowledgeable about the safe handling of firearms, and the course just may well have given some individual just enough practical knowledge and experience that could have saved some one's life down the road. Certainly there were injustices done, but let's not invent injustices just for the sake of griping. Certainly that four years of our lives could have been used doing something else. But at the very least, the Hunter Safety course was a major thrill for my Irish friend (after the time on the range), and later, at Gunnison, I took him shooting up in the hills behind the water tank, and I was glad that he'd had the safety factor drilled into his head. And believe me, for him, walking the sage brush in the American West with a .22 looking for jack rabbits was such a thrill! (I carried the .12 gage ). But at the end of the "hunt" it was only "empty pop bottles was all we did kill".

No, I don't think it started with the Crusades. I think it started with Abraham shagging his wife's handmaid Hagar, who gave birth to Ishmael which means "wild foot of a man" and who is the father of the bloody A-Rabs. Too bad old Abe wasn't a little more patient... :blink:

The Pentalaika name was a play on the old Balalaika, which is like an old medievel mandolin type of a deal. Maybe I can find a pic and post it. Yeah here is a picture of a humongous one, and a little one as well...

Honestly, the song that I would really pick is one by Joyful Noise. I almost lost my life in a ship at sea in the North Atlantic in what I refer to as a "Near Perfect Storm". Eighty foot seas, broke down engines, a hole in the side of the ship down in the engine room, engine crew swimming about as we flooded to near sinking capacity until we finally managed to get some pumps running to help keep us afloat. For six days straight we limped and wallowed and thrashed, got banged up physically, no sleep, and the Captains' words to me when I asked him if he thought we might sink were; "Do you know how to pray son?" And my sixteen year old scared kid's response was a frightened; "No...." But, I did pray with what little I knew about praying, and I prayed alot. I begged God to allow us to live. And, He did. We limped into Bermuda, dropped the hook, and we all slept like logs for a day and a half. And so, the song I choose is the one sung by Brian Bliss called "Captain of Salvation". I'd post the words, but I can't remember them all. But I do remember that when I heard that song, I was overwhelmed with thankfulness for God having saved me at sea, as well as God having SAVED me through Jesus Christ, the Captain of our Salvation...

Yeah, kidnapped girl and I were in Fargo together on our interim. I loved that "FBI In Denver" written on the butter pat when the stewardess returned with her food. Pretty cool, that. I also remember that my Corps Sistah (kidnapped girl) wrote her research paper on the "attempted deprogramming Of Jesus Christ", although I never read it.

I agree with this. Too bad the Crusades failed...

I remember that Toppie. I think it may have been Advanced Class 79 though. The guy was St*ve W@rga, my Portland Or branch leader that previous year. I remember him being really *%^#*ed about it. He was a guy who was fairly self important, and it really smashed his ego infront of 4000 plus people. Personally, I was snickering, for that guy had done me dirty in public many a time... And umm, Belle, sorry about mentioning the typos. I guess I had thought you had scanned those letters in. And maybe because I am somewhat of a spelig Nazi, I brot that up to make shur thet peolpe wood spell beter when they wrote Way Crops. Becuz if people dunt have the luv to spel "Crops" rite, they shood not have bin in the Crops but rather the Armee

Geez. I'd never ever tell a perspective employer of my involvement w/ The Way International. In fact, I have been sharing God's Word with an old friend of mine, a woman who now is going through a nasty divorce with the man she married who molested her 14 year old daughter, and I DO NOT want her to even know the name of the "Bible Ministry" I was once involved with! I can just see it now. She googles TWI, and ends up here! How embarrassing! With all of our squabbling and such, as well as all of the negative facts about The Way published here, why, I don't think she'd ever trust me. No, I won't mention the name of The Way anymore to prospective employers or Christian people with whom we fellowship. In fact, other than with my wife, and coming to this place, I rarely if ever discuss The Way anymore. Then why do I come here? I don't know... :blink:

Hey! What happened to my post!? I had a fairly long post in here about how me and Toppie and many other Eighth and', Tenth Corps Saved The World! It was right after Toppie's post with the pic of the "Mal Pack". What gives? Moderator? :(

Ya know, I was surprised by those letters. Not that I was surprised by the venom and wickedness, but, I was surprised by the typographical errors. Craig must have spelled the word "Crops" for "Corps" at least three times. And to think that he used to rant in residence when people mis-spelled the word. If people would spell it "Corp", or "Corpes", in a letter to him, he would be sure to not only reprove that person for the innacurate spelling, but on a number of occasions, make sure to point it out publicly. I remember one 12th Crops (oops!) Corps fella who I saw one morning in the lobby of Uncle Harry Highrise with his bags all packed. He seemed distraught, and when I asked him where he was going, he replied that Craig had asked him to leave the Corps. When I asked him why, he said that it was because he didn't have the love to spell "Corps" correctly. He was really down in the mouth about it, because, he believed it too. He said he was going to "go and join the Army, I guess". And so, I prayed with him over by the piano, and then I was off to morning teaches in top floor Wierwille. Now, I would guess that "Crops" was a typo, but really, I don't remember him making errors like that and allowing a letter to get out to the field without making sure that it was written correctly, as if he didn't even write the letter. But I do not doubt that he wrote those, but not only had his wickedness reached new levels since I "heard from" him last, but it seems as if his usual "sharpness" on things like that had diminished also. I think that so much of his accusations took a toll on his thinking. I think this must be a classic case of what our Lord Jesus once said "He who judgest doeth the same thing...."

Who is dat guy? Looks somewhat familiar...

My dad once made a stringed instrument with the help of my sister, and they called it a "Pentalika". It was a science project thing. My sister did a read up on the pentatonic scale, hung some glass bottles from a wood rack that my dad built, put verying amounts of water in the bottles to where they had the proper sounds, and when she "dinged them" from left to right, it was the pentatonic scale. And then, she conscripted my dad to take it a step farther by building this guitar looking thing out of 2x2's and wood paneling. The body was cut in a triangle with the panel nailed to the 2x2 frame on top and bottom, creating the "box". There was a hole in the middle on top to catch the sound of the six strings (six I think) that ran from the peg head to the bridge. Regular guitar strings were used, and it was tuned to the pentatonic scale. I think they used "screw eyes" for the pegs. It didn't sound very good of course, but it did have the correct scale, and it's uniqueness along with the bottles of "tuned water" earned her a major award at the Junior High science fair that year. Yeah, that old Daddy of mine was something else! :)

Wascal! You wook wuvwee!!

Thanks for the post Socks. Well said... JL