Month: January 2017

Speak Out With A Vote

/ Leland Olson Hoel / 4 Comments

bipart

Speak Out

Get inspired by those who speak out. Whether through blogging or marching, make your voice heard.

The last presidential election day could have been compared to a wedding day. We went into the voting booths, we should have heard the words echoing in our ears, “speak now or forever hold your peace.” You must hold your peace and accept the changes.

The WordPress discover challenge is Speak Out, we should all speak our piece before we decide anything. It is rather late to speak out now on the outcome of the past election.
For the sake of preserving our democracy, we must speak out, not on the past. We must be heard, be involved in future government actions. This must be done with a United Bipartisan voice. Keep in touch with your lawmakers and speak your piece, “state your opinion or view.” on what you feel they should be doing in managing the business affairs of our nation.

If they refuse to be part of a bipartisan government you must remind them there are other elections coming in the near future. “The 2018 United States elections will be held on Tuesday, November 6, 2018. These midterm elections will take place in the middle of Republican President Donald Trump’s term. All 435 seats in the United States House of Representatives and 33 of the 100 seats in the United States Senate will be contested. 39 state and territorial governorships and numerous other state and local elections will also be contested.”

old-bi

Old Time Bipartisanship

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Share Your World

/ Leland Olson Hoel / 1 Comment

pacific

https://willowscottling.wordpress.com/2017/01/30/sharing-my-world-2/
Share Your World
January 30, 2017

What is the most incredible natural venue that you’ve ever seen in person?

Flying Above the Clouds

The Lockheed Super Constellation was cruising at 24,000 feet. Looking out the windows of the airplane the colors we’re out of this world as the sun was coming up, we were flying above the clouds every shade of pink and orange and blue imaginable.

pacific-2

The pilot reached cruising altitude and was about to make a blower change, the inside of the plane became total quiet. The silence seemed to last a long time, there was nothing but water down below us. In a very short while the engines were purring right along. I spent a long time looking out the window, it was what you might call out of this world, half way to heaven. This was in 1960, crossing the Pacific Ocean in a Super Constellation was an adventure for this farm kid. I will never forget it. Cruising at from 10,000 to 20,000 feet over the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a destination of Japan, speed 290 MPH, 24 hours flying time.

connie

How many siblings do you have? What’s your birth order?
I had two brothers, my brother Karlton who was born in July of 1935, Harlan was born on December 17, 1939, and I was born on December 1, 1940. It was rumored that my mother had some problems with anxiety in 1941.

If you were a shoe, what kind would you be and why?
I would be a golf shoe. I have a special reason for being a golf shoe. I love to play golf but no longer can play. As a golf shoe, I could get on the course. I might become the first golf shoe/caddy/combo. Being a shoe on some golfers foot would be better than nothing. I better be two shoes or he’s going to play a lousy game, I couldn’t handle that.

What is the strangest/weirdest thing you have ever eaten?
I have eaten fish head soup with the eyeballs floating around looking at me. I have also eaten squid, that seemed to still be moving. A roast raccoon is a real holiday treat but you should always make sure to take the sweat glands out from their armpits when you butcher them.

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Nuclear Exposure Japan 1961

/ Leland Olson Hoel / 1 Comment

japan-copy

Daily Prompt

Exposure

Write a new post in response to today’s one-word prompt.

Nuclear Exposure

The one-word prompt is exposure. I thought about exposure to my body, mainly ears and nose from spending my life in the Upper Midwest of the United States. Winters here are known to be downright long, bitter cold, with nasty strong winds. I have also been exposed to hard times and good times, bad jokes and good jokes, bad memories and good memories. I guess you might say I have almost been overexposed.

The word exposure invariably takes you to radiation exposure, which brought me back to the time I was stationed in Northern Japan in 1961 and 62. I was stationed on the far north end of Japan, at Misawa Air Force Base. This was also a place to easily get a hundred inches of snow in the winter and also very cold temperatures.

The Russians tested 57 different nuclear devices between 1 September 1961 and 4 November 1961. Weather patterns on our planet earth travel from west to east. The radiation fallout from the Russian tests came right down on us, changing our daily lives very dramatically for a few months. Time outdoors was cut to a minimum during falling rain and snow.

We had an assortment of fallout meters and geiger and ion-chamber survey meters. Learning how to run some of that radiation test equipment was a hurry up process, as very few people on the base were familiar with using them. Most of our jobs we’re all about working with airplanes out of doors so we had to be outside. It all came down to limiting the amount of time we were exposed. We spent most of the day going back inside to have radiation levels checked. If they got to a certain limit you had to shower and stay indoors longer. The base laundry and showers were busy 24/7.

Our airplanes would return from flying through highly contaminated clouds, we still had to perform intake inspections on them. Intake inspections required crawling up into the intake and checking for foreign object damage. I never felt quite clean enough, even showering after coming back out of one of those jet intakes. They had been sucking up a lot of radiation contaminated air, the geiger counter made a lot of noise inside those large intakes.

Fallout continued a long time before the radiation levels got low enough to let us get back to a fairly normal routine. I have often wondered just how high some of those levels got. It was probably just as well, not to know numbers. Even after the Chernobyl Nuclear incident in Russia, many people lived there for years and never left the contaminated areas.

We went on one RED alert while I was stationed in Japan. My Chief Master Sergeant had a look on his face that I had never seen before. Everyone went into full alert mode, instantly. The sergeant told me, “We had about 15 minutes to get our airplanes in the air where they would be safe, before we became vaporized and turned into fallout.” I asked, “What can we do?” He told me, “The best thing you can do after we get these planes out of here, bend over as far as you can, spread your legs, put your head up between your legs and kiss your rear end goodbye.” I didn’t think that was a very comforting statement.

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Reach Assistant

/ Leland Olson Hoel / 4 Comments

win_20170129_15_54_03_pro

Repurpose

Show us something that you’ve recycled or repurposed, or an object for which you’ve discovered a clever new use.

Reach Assistant

This is without a doubt my favorite and most used repurposed tool. My arms don’t reach up well anymore so I have plenty of clothes hangers to work with, while clothes lay on the floor. If you find a tree branch that looks like a long, forked slingshot, you can hang your clothes on the closet bar with it. The modern pick up tools are much too floppy.

My left arm is mostly paralyzed and is very weak, consequently, I have a problem closing my car door after I get in. I fashioned this handy reach assistant from a coat hanger, I also have a longer one in case the wind blows my door open all the way and I can’t reach it with the short one.

This tool also works great for hooking my shoulder harness and seat belt and pulling it around in front of me. I’m sure many people have died or at least had heart attacks reaching around to locate their always hidden seat belt, I came close a few times.

This is my first repurpose tool to have two different uses in such close proximity. I take extra pride in that fact, even if it was discovered by accident. Most repurpose tools don’t seem to come from drawing boards, blueprints or engineering firms.

A great thing about using coat hangers for tools, you have a wide choice of colors to choose from. Not being fashion minded, I never match reach assistants to the coat color for the day.

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What is Syringomyelia (SM)?

/ Leland Olson Hoel / Leave a comment

sm2

What Is Syringomyelia?

I received a spinal fracture in my lower back in 1964. My spine continued to deteriorate, I could not find a doctor to diagnose my problems. In 1985 I was finally diagnosed with Syringomyelia. It was considered a rare disorder at that time. I contacted NORD, the National Organization for Rare Disorders that year. I was told by them they knew of a person living in Texas who also had Syringomyelia.

NORD suggested someone start a support group for people with the disorder and also start educating people and the medical society about this rare spinal condition. Barbara White and I exchanged letters and ideas. She agreed to start a support group with her husband Don at that time. After that first memorable, year there was an annual meeting held in Colorado, Springs Colorado. The number of people attending was large after just one year.

EPSON scanner image

EPSON scanner image

I’m attaching some pictures from that first ASAP meeting and also the URL address for ASAP. Click on the link below to find out more information about Syringomyelia or ‘SM’. I thank ASAP for being a great support group and an outlet for the most up-to-date information about spinal disorders also for outstanding fundraising for SCI research.

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The Simple Life

/ Leland Olson Hoel / 2 Comments

simple

Daily Prompt
Simple
Write a new post in response to today’s one-word prompt
The Simple Life

I like to take sentimental trips back to the simple life, to the days of my youth. I often get nostalgic thoughts of my humble origin and those days of long ago. There was very little stress or strain badgering everyday people. Even during the worst of the wartime years, life was simple, uncomplicated at home. Family units were strong and supportive of one another.

Money was scarce, credit non existent, no hurry, or scurry to the shopping malls. There were no shopping malls! Daily life was just plain simple, poor innocent, people were more humble. Vanity was something you saw on the movie screen, you did not see it on the mirrors in your house or your neighbors house.

We cannot fool ourselves for long with nostalgic mental excursions back to the simple life. There is no going back, except for those magic short trips from time to time. Then it dawned on me, when you come to the end of this life on earth you are there, arrived back at the simple life. You have it far more abundantly than you ever dreamed, all of your family is with you again as a reward. What a glorious thing to think of, spending eternity with your simple life, in a simple place of peace, harmony and good will among all.

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Common Conventional Wisdom

/ Leland Olson Hoel / Leave a comment

p-wind

 

conventional-wisdom

This week, go against the grain.

Common Conventional Wisdom

Conventional wisdom is a generally accepted belief. A prime example of conventional wisdom is, “never judge a book by its cover.” If you do, it will be a let down when you read it for the first time, your mind has already been set so you are in for disappointment. Be it a paperback or hardcover, never judge it by the picture on the cover or the small amount of print that is on the cover or the back binding of the book. Conventional wisdom is usually written in stone, man, time or the environment does not affect it, it is static, it stays the same.

A prime, passing example of the conventional wisdom is peeing into the wind. If circumstances, ‘like a tour bus going past’ causes you to change your stance or the direction you were aiming. You will automatically go against the conventional wisdom without thinking about the consequences. Sure enough, the wind blows it back on your shoes.

The same conventional wisdom goes for spitting into the wind. You try to be polite if you are walking with someone so you turn your head, just a wee bit and try to do a half way spit. That is your big mistake, you cut down your volume and velocity. There will always be some fine mist that drifts back and gets on your glasses, or on your face if you don’t wear glasses.

There have been many instances throughout history when man’s ingenuity has created new inventions that has changed the conventional wisdom in some cases. The technology for spreading manure did not get headlines like a man walking on the moon. For centuries man cleaned manure from the barn with a fork or shovel, he put it onto a wagon or a wheelbarrow. In the case of the wheelbarrow all he had to do was push it outside and dump it in a pile. If he pitched it onto a wagon and he wanted to fertilize his crops he had to pull the wagon out to the field with his horses or tractor, then he had to use his fork again ‘double work’ to unload the manure and scatter it around on the ground.

After the Industrial Revolution modern machinery and modern equipment were the order of the day, man invented a manure spreader. All he had to do was pitch the manure on the spreader, pull it out to the field with his horses or tractor. That fancy machine, that was so shiny when new, shredded the manure and a cloud of manure flew out the back, high into the air. After using a pitchforks for centuries this was real progress, care had to be used turning around, the wind could blow a cloud of manure down on top of the driver.

People sat in outhouses for years reading the Sears or Wards catalogs prior to Charmin, the index pages did not have glossy ink, the closest thing to Charmin, they went first. The only indoor toilets were in the movies. The conventional wisdom, for some reason, found people happy and content with farm life.

I always thought the conventional wisdom was solid, like a rock, unshakeable, then I read the following article! I now wonder if peeing or spitting into the wind is the only conventional wisdom we can actually count on.

Conventional wisdom often dead wrong

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Federal Oversight Committees?

/ Leland Olson Hoel / Leave a comment
oversight

WHAT??

 

Daily Prompt
Oversight

Write a new post in response to today’s one-word prompt.

Oversight Committees

Gentlemen there was no forgetfulness or laxity on my part, a slight oversight maybe. “I’m not a crook!” I don’t understand why I have been hauled up in front of this House Select Oversight Committee. I do believe it must have been a slight clerical error. The 44 billion dollars was supposed to go into research and development on the new bomber for the Navy’s submarine fleet. Sir, “I have since learned the Navy submarine fleet does not use bombers.” “Thank you.”

I don’t have the foggiest idea how those funds ended up getting into my business accounts down South. My attorneys tell me that investment has been already re- leveraged. Now that it is in my personal business accounts the oversight committee will have an awful time getting it back out. The paperwork will be a huge, extra time. a burden, getting those funds back into federal coffers will just be too darn much paperwork.

Now I know we got an oversight committee checking on the working of this new Congress and I’m sure they’re going to do a very commendable job, every last one of them, to the last man, outstanding people, they have all been in Washington for at least 30 years so we know we can count on them to know all the ins and outs of every closet in town.

The new incoming oversight committee has not really been formed, so surely they’re not up to speed yet, don’t have on their running shoes so to speak. My dear colleagues, “If you consider my record and how long I have intimately known and worked with all of you.” “I know everything about each one of you.” “I’m sure you all will conclude and realize that this can be overlooked, you will all be rewarded.” I’m quite sure this could just as easily be overlooked, for the courts time if nothing else.

We are here in this closed-door meeting until we get this sorted out. “We could be on Mars, nothing leaves this room for other eyes or ears, right”? You all understand the complexity of book keeping between the Caman banks and Abu Dhabi. All the books look quite neat, tidy and orderly no oversights. You got to look over your shoulder, or out the window, look at everybody. I’m sure you’ll agree but mainly look to your futures. “You all will be rewarded discreetly and generously in your retirement years.”

The committee on Oversight and Government Reform, we will work with our colleagues in the minority to exercise effective oversight over the federal government and will work proactively to investigate and expose waste, fraud, and abuse.

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