[MaxBigfoot]

How to tell a retired sailor's car.   

[solvegas]

A flight of World War 2 aircraft honoring the 80th anniversary of the April 18, 1942 Doolittle raid of B-25 bombers which had launched from the USS Hornet aircraft carrier and bombed Tokyo. The B-25 was a US Army Air Corps bomber and were actually launched from the carrier about 600 miles from Japan even though the plan was to do it from 350 miles so they could land in China safely but the task force was sighted by Japanese fishing vessels on picket duty which sent a radio transmission warning Japan. The raid was successful, not because of the damage done which was minimal, but because Japanese propaganda assured the Japanese people that they were invulnerable and safe and the raid proved that wrong. The Japanese Navy was embarrassed and then Admiral Yamamoto started the plan to hit the US Territory of Hawaii and the American mainland but he did not know that the US had mostly broken the Japanese code and the battle of Midway of June 4, 1942, ended up as disaster which the Japanese never recovered from.

[TheZookie007]

Channel 9 News in 2020, a live weather report on location in Scone, Australia, when all of a sudden, along comes the god of thunder...

[solvegas]

Channel 9 News in 2020, a live weather report on location in Scone, Australia, when all of a sudden, along comes the god of thunder...

That was great! Thanks Zook. 

[Hiram]

I was out cycling today - I literally couldn't hardly keep up with this women

[rtpoe]

Effective.....

[solvegas]

Effective.....

So true. A lot of young people nowadays do not know how to use a stick shift and I even had to coach a 23 year old man how to change a tire since he had a flat in the employee lot and did not know how to use the jack or the tire wrench. Pitiful. 

[TheZookie007]

How to tell a retired sailor's car.   

That, and the eyepatch.

[TheZookie007]

Channel 9 News in 2020, a live weather report on location in Scone, Australia, when all of a sudden, along comes the god of thunder...

That was great! Thanks Zook. 

You're welcome

[TheZookie007]

From the Manchester (UK) Evening News, 24 March 2012:

"Guest of honour: Queen leaves couple stunned after Her Majesty accepts wedding invitation at Manchester town hall"
Sweethearts Frances and John Canning were amazed when the Queen appeared as surprise guest of honour on their big day.

A couple invited the Queen to their wedding – and she accepted.

Sweethearts Frances and John Canning were amazed when Queen Elizabeth II appeared as surprise guest of honour on their big day.

The couple, from Prestwich, had booked Manchester town hall for their civil wedding.

But they were shocked when staff phoned to say they would be sharing the venue with ‘an important VIP’.

After learning it was the Queen, the couple wrote a lighthearted letter to Buckingham Palace inviting her to join their party.

They were pleasantly surprised to receive a reply from the Palace thanking them for the invite – and stunned when the Royal visitor made a detour from her original schedule to turn up to wish them the best.

Bride Frances, 44, who runs a hairdressing salon, said she was flabbergasted to be greeted by name by the Queen.

She said: “We booked the town hall ages ago but we got a phone call four weeks ago telling us that a VIP would be in the building on the same day. We never dreamt we would be able to meet her. When we had our ceremony, the staff asked us to wait for a moment in the corridor and just a few minutes later the Queen arrived. She knew both our names and apparently we had been especially added to her rota.”

Groom John, 48, said: “I’m a big fan of the Royal family. When we found out who the VIP was we wrote to her, a bit light-heartedly, and got a nice letter back from a lady in waiting. We didn’t expect anything further to come from it.”

The couple’s 40 guests stared in amazement as the Queen, Prince Philip, and dignitaries lined up to congratulate the newlyweds. John, who works in a hairdressing supply business, said the moment was ‘like a dream’.

He said: “The Queen asked how we were feeling, and congratulated us. Prince Philip was asking where in Italy we were going for our honeymoon. They had clearly been briefed about what we were doing.”

The Queen enjoyed a three-course banquet at the town hall as part of her Diamond Jubilee visit to Manchester and Salford.

Earlier in the day, a crowd of thousands who were waiting for the Queen to emerge cheered as Frances climbed the steps of the  town hall, before tying the knot in a first-floor conference room.

But the couple’s pal Peter Jackson, a self-employed businessman, said there was no hint of what was to follow. He said: “We had to have security checks in advance. So we knew that she was going to be there. But we thought we would be kept well away from the reception.”

Fellow guest Hayley Fitzpatrick added: “We didn’t know where to look. All of a sudden the Queen and Prince Philip were there in front of us. I was so surprised I knocked something over - she looked at me and asked if I was okay.”

[solvegas]

Battleship USS Texas (BB-35), tied up near the San Jacinto battle site East of Houston where the Texans under General Sam Houston, later President of the Republic of Texas and then Governor of the state of Texas when Texas was annexed by the United States of America, defeated the forces of Mexico under that incompetent idiot Lopez de Santa Ana and got their freedom from Mexico. Anyways, the USS Texas is the only surviving battleship from World War 1 (1914-1918) and it is a museum ship. Armed with 8, 14" main guns, she served in World War 2 in both the Pacific and Atlantic and she was at Omaha Beach during the D-Day invasion battle providing accurate bombardment and destroy3d several German pillboxes. Decommissioned soon after World War 2, she was going to be used for atomic bomb testing at Bikini Island but Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn from Texas objected and she was saved from that awful fate.

[TheZookie007]

Adam Savage's Tested: "Adam Savage Takes the Aluminum Foil Ball Challenge!"

[Hiram]

So true. A lot of young people nowadays do not know how to use a stick shift

That'll get even more so when electric cars become more widespread.

When I first drove a truck you had to use double-clutching technique to change gears (no synchro rings).  Not many manual transmission drivers can do that anymore.

I even had to coach a 23 year old man how to change a tire since he had a flat in the employee lot and did not know how to use the jack or the tire wrench. Pitiful. 

That is just young people today, they don't fix anything like we used to.

[MaxBigfoot]

I can't understand how they built it, let alone how it remains standing!   

[TheZookie007]

I can't understand how they built it, let alone how it remains standing!   

That's some solid "redneck engineering" right there!