The origins of coffee...

As those that frequent my little corner of the internet, probably have gathered from the name of my blog...that I love coffee, I don't drink, smoke, dabble in recreational pharmaceutical or drink soda.  The only vice I have is coffee and I don't consider it a 'vice".  Well the inspiration for the name of my blog came from my brother.  He didn't even realized it.   I was over visiting him and he gave me a cup of "Kona" coffee.....Man that stuff was awesome and every time I went over there, I would pick up a few bags from the PX  and bring it back with me in my suitcase since I couldn't get "Hawaiian Isles" Kona coffee except at some snooty coffee house in midtown.   I am a bit of a coffee snob.

Coffee is a brewed drink with a distinct aroma and flavor, prepared from roasted coffee beans, the seeds found inside "berries" of the Coffea plant. Coffee plants are cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia, India and Africa. The two most commonly grown are the highly regarded arabica, and the less sophisticated but stronger and more hardy robusta. The latter is resistant to the coffee leaf rust, Hemileia vastatrix, but has a more bitter taste. Once ripe, coffee beans are picked, processed, and dried. Green (unroasted) coffee beans are one of the most traded agricultural commodities in the world. Once traded, the beans are roasted to varying degrees, depending on the desired flavor, before being ground and brewed to create coffee.

My Coffee mug in the morning

     I work at a place where the coffeemakers are running 24 hours a day 7 days a week, coffee serves as both a morning drink to wake people up...remember the caffeine? and a social lubricant.  People would get their morning coffee(or afternoon or night) depending on the shift and sip their coffee and B.S with their colleagues, it reaffirms the social bonds of the crew.  This happens all over the world and that is a good thing.

This would be my workplace if decaffeinated coffee(dirt) was introduced.

Last 747 off the assy line might be the new Air Force One.....And the Democrats pick up an endorsement...

Ever notice how their slogans are all the same theme of some magical path to utopia? The Great Leap Forward, Lean Forward, The Shining Path, Yes We Can, The Red Banner, Hope And Change, etc, etc. It's all the same crap about social justice and equality and all they do is make everyone equally miserable.  The Hillary pics are compliments of "google" and the 747 pics are in my blogfolder

 John Bachtell, chairman of the National Committee of the Communist Party USA, said in a lengthy essay for “People’s World” that America needed a third political party committed to uphold labor — but until that time comes, communists ought to work with Democrats, especially in the coming elections.

Labor has already found a home with the Democratic Party, and the Communist Party would be hard-pressed to draw this voting bloc away at this time, Mr. Bachtell wrote on the “People’s World” website.

So the logical course then is to assist Democrats now with an eye on the long-term, he said, The Daily Caller reported.

“It’s true both parties are dominated by Wall Street interests … [but] the Democratic Party is also home to labor, African Americans, Latinos, other communities of color, women, most union members, young people and a wide range of social and democratic movements … [and] labor and other key social forces are not about to leave the Democratic Party anytime soon,” Mr. Bachtell wrote.

His point?

“This necessarily means working with the Democratic Party,” Mr. Bachtell wrote.

He also made clear the communist goal wasn’t to “build the Democratic Party,” but rather “the broad people’s movement led by labor that utilizes the vehicle of the Democratic Party to advance its agenda.”

And the way to do that, he said, was to grab the support of those “people that can help shape election contours and debates … [and] building movements in the electoral arena.”

One of the world’s most exclusive customers could be the last buyer of the aircraft that democratised long-haul air travel after the US defence department selected Boeing’s 747-8 to be the US president’s new Air Force One.

The fleet of presidential aircraft, due to enter service later this decade, could be among the very last passenger versions of the long-haul aircraft to be built because airlines increasingly favor two-engine long-haul aircraft over four-engine craft

The new aircraft will replace a pair of 747-200s that came into service as the presidential aircraft in 1990, during the presidency of George HW Bush. The type became an all but inevitable choice after the Pentagon decided that the presidential aircraft needed to have four engines. The only other currently manufactured four-engine long-haul jet is Airbus’s A380, manufactured in France.

The Pentagon announced on Wednesday that it planned to award the contract on a “sole-source” basis to Boeing after negotiation but that it would encourage competition between suppliers to equip the aircraft interior. The Pentagon specified neither precisely how many aircraft it would order nor when they would enter service.

Boeing currently has 24 passenger 747-8s and 12 747-8F freighters on order but has been struggling according to analysts to win new orders for the aircraft. It has slowed production to three every two months.

“The presidential aircraft is one of the most visible symbols of the United States of America and the office of the president of the United States,” Deborah Lee James, the secretary of the air force, said. “The Boeing 747-8 is the only aircraft manufactured in the United States that ... meets the necessary capabilities established to execute the presidential support mission.”
Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with the Virginia-based Teal Group, said there was a possibility that Boeing would close the 747 production lines — which have been rolling since the late 1960s — after the presidential aircraft rolled off.

Boeing points to robust aircraft orders

Boeing on Wednesday expressed confidence in the prospects for its $440bn commercial aircraft order book, saying that lower oil prices would not deter customers that have ordered record numbers of its new, more fuel-efficient models to reduce their fuel bills, writes Robert Wright.

“There is the risk now that this order provides the opportunity for a graceful exit — unless cargo demand comes roaring back,” Mr Aboulafia said.

Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Virginia-based Lexington Institute, said airlines increasingly favoured twin-engine aircraft such as Boeing’s 777 and 787 for long-haul routes, rather than larger, four-engine aircraft.

“Airlines prefer to have more flexibility,” he said.
The presidential order would provide a fitting end to production of an aircraft type that helped sharply to reduce the cost of long-haul air travel by accommodating up to 490 passengers on a single aircraft, bringing down costs per seat. The aircraft first flew in February 1969.
However, Boeing insisted on Wednesday it was still seeking other orders for the aircraft.
“We continue to pursue campaigns for both the 747-8 Intercontinental and freighter,” it said.

The announcement came on the same day that Boeing announced better than expected full-year results that had sent its shares up 5.4 per cent to $139.64 by close of trading.

Certain Police organizations trying to ban a traffic app.....

   I saw this on Yahoo Finance,  I am slightly annoyed, I am a big believer in this app, it is the only app that I use all the time.  Everytime I drive, I use this app, it is nice to know what is going down the road.  This app has saved me numerous times from bad traffic and the occasional revenue generation speed traps and I swear by it.  I have equated this app to driving with twitter.
     I am annoyed that several police groups are wanting to remove this feature and they are citing "officer safety" for the reason.  I understand the possible concern but they are rolling out that term for everything, and I and many others are getting"officer safety" burnout.  it is used to excuse any and all police interaction with the public that usually results in a citizen getting shot, beaten or harassed.  Usually the perp deserves it by doing something stupid, but there are many examples of police overreacting and it is all over you-tube.  And the supervisors excuse it by "Officer Safety" and the police that break the rules get a "get out of jail free" card.  The average person is starting to resent the double standard that this will entail.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sheriffs are campaigning to pressure Google Inc. to turn off a feature on its Waze traffic software that warns drivers when police are nearby. They say one of the technology industry's most popular mobile apps could put officers' lives in danger from would-be police killers who can find where their targets are parked.

Waze, which Google purchased for $966 million in 2013, is a combination of GPS navigation and social networking. Fifty million users in 200 countries turn to the free service for real-time traffic guidance and warnings about nearby congestion, car accidents, speed traps or traffic cameras, construction zones, potholes, stalled vehicles or unsafe weather conditions.

To Sergio Kopelev, a reserve deputy sheriff in Southern California, Waze is also a stalking app for law enforcement.

There are no known connections between any attack on police and Waze, but law enforcers such as Kopelev are concerned it's only a matter of time. They are seeking support among other law enforcement trade groups to pressure Google to disable the police-reporting function. The emerging policy debate places Google again at the center of an ongoing global debate about public safety, consumer rights and privacy.

Waze users mark police presence on maps without much distinction other than "visible" or "hidden." Users see a police icon, but it's not immediately clear whether police are there for a speed trap, a sobriety check or a lunch break. The police generally are operating in public spaces.

      

A Waze spokeswoman, Julie Mossler, said the company thinks deeply about safety and security. She said Waze works with the New York Police Department and others around the world by sharing information. Google declined to comment.

"These relationships keep citizens safe, promote faster emergency response and help alleviate traffic congestion," Mossler said.

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Google has a complicated relationship with government and law enforcement. The company worked closely with the Obama administration to defend itself against hacking by China's government, and it is regularly compelled to turn over to police worldwide copies of emails or other information about its customers. Last year, after disclosures that the National Security Agency had illicitly broken into Google's overseas Internet communication lines, Google and other technology companies rolled out encryption for users, which the U.S. government said could hamper law enforcement investigations. Also last year, Google and other companies sued the U.S. to allow them to more fully disclose to customers details about how much information they were required to hand over each year.

Sheriff Mike Brown of Bedford County, Virginia, said the police-reporting feature, which he called the "police stalker," presents a danger to law enforcement.

"The police community needs to coordinate an effort to have the owner, Google, act like the responsible corporate citizen they have always been and remove this feature from the application even before any litigation or statutory action," said Brown, who also serves as the chairman of the National Sheriffs Association technology committee.

Nuala O'Connor, head of the Center for Democracy and Technology, a Washington civil liberties group, said it would not be appropriate for Google to disable the police-reporting feature.

"I do not think it is legitimate to ask a person-to-person communication to cease simply because it reports on publicly visible law enforcement," she said. She said a bigger concern among privacy advocates is how much information about customers Waze shares with law enforcement, since the service necessarily monitors their location continually as long as it's turned on.

Brown and Kopelev raised concerns during the meeting of the National Sheriffs Association winter conference in Washington. They pointed to the Instagram account of the man accused of shooting two NYPD officers last month. Ismaaiyl Brinsley posted a screenshot from Waze on his Instagram account along with messages threatening police. Investigators do not believe he used Waze to ambush the officers, in part because police say Brinsley tossed his cellphone more than two miles from where he shot the officers.

Kopelev said he hadn't heard about the Waze app until mid-December when he saw his wife using it. Afterward, Kopelev said he couldn't stop thinking about the app and was motivated to act by the NYPD shooting. While attending the funeral of one of the officers in New York, he spoke with Brown, his former boss. Brown asked Kopelev to discuss Waze at the upcoming sheriffs' association conference. Kopelev refers to his efforts as his "personal jihad."

The executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, Jim Pasco, said his organization has concerns, too.

"I can think of 100 ways that it could present an officer-safety issue," Pasco said. "There's no control over who uses it. So, if you're a criminal and you want to rob a bank, hypothetically, you use your Waze."

This is not the first time law enforcement has raised concerns with these types of apps. In 2011, four U.S. senators asked Apple to remove all applications that alert users to drunken driving checkpoints. Nokia removed the sobriety check tracking function of one of the most popular apps, Trapster, according to Trapster founder Pete Tenereillo. Trapster was eventually discontinued at the end of last year due to Waze's popularity.

"You Make Loving Fun" by Fleetwood Mac. Monday Music

I was busy as heck this weekend doing Klondike, I ran the first ever archery range, The order of the Arrow lodge here in council ever did.  They host this event every January and it is a round robin of demonstration and competition of scout skills and spirit.  I ran the event as the patrols showed up, I would tell them" Pick the best shooter amongst y'all to represent your patrol and troop."  So I only had 20 minutes per cycle.  There would be 6 boys shooting 3 arrows each, one at a time since there is only 1 bow.  No warmup and using the equipment furnished by council, the equipment is worn from the thousands of boys using it so the results are as much luck as skill.  Nothing like adding some variety in it.  Then the last event was the scout leaders shooting.  Man this event wrecked a few ego's.  The skilled ones missed the target and the one that won the event with 6 points was achieved by luck.  The leaders bantered about themselves in good spirit, but the competitive was there. 
    We did our "call out" for the new members to join the lodge, the boys are supposed to vote for the ones amongst themselves that best typifies the belief in selfless service.  My son was "called out" for induction into the order of the Arrow. 

     Ordeal
After being elected or nominated, candidates may participate in a call-out ceremony to recognize those Scouts and Scouters that were selected before they attend their Ordeal. The call-out ceremony may be performed at summer camp, a camporee, a call-out weekend or at a unit meeting. Candidates subsequently participate in an Ordeal, intended to emphasize service and selflessness during the induction, "candidates maintain complete silence, receive small amounts of food, work on camp improvement projects, and are required to sleep alone, apart from other campers, which teaches significant values." If they succeed in their ordeal the candidates are then welcomed as Ordeal members in a formal Ordeal Ceremony.


     I am very proud of my son because he was selected by his troop and he is a good kid whom I hopes will be a good man one day.  The order of the Arrow is a different part of the Boy Scout experience and it compliments it greatly.  The pride I felt was difficult to express.  

   Now on to my Monday Music, I was driving home and I was debating what music to do on my blog, I had my radio on XMSIRIUS and I normally have it on the "80's" channel which is "8", but I also listen to stuff from the 70's and 90's.  Well I had it on the 70's channel and this song came on and it was Fleetwood Mac, one of my favorite all time bands.  Normally Stevie Nicks does the vocals, but Christine McVie did the vocals, and she is no slouch either.  She has an excellent voice and really does a number on this song.   I have this album on vinyl, and CD.  It is a good what I call "Roadtrip" album.  All of the songs are good.

   "You Make Loving Fun" is a song written and sung by Christine McVie of the British-American band Fleetwood Mac. It was released as the fourth and final 45 rpm single from the band's album Rumours in 1977; its fourth top-ten hit from Rumours, it peaked at number nine on the Billboard Pop Singles Chart.
      

The song was inspired by an affair McVie had with Curry Grant. "To avoid flare-ups", she told her then-husband John McVie that the song was about her dog; he found out later what it was really about.
Early tracking of the song was done, according to McVie, in the absence of Lindsey Buckingham, which allowed her the freedom to "build the song on my own". The recording sessions were saturated with cocaine use. Buckingham played rhythm guitar (through a Leslie) and tracking was done with a Fender Rhodes, Nicks playing tambourine. John McVie's bass was rerecorded again later, and Mick Fleetwood and Christine McVie dubbed Hohner Clavinet parts. In an interview with the New York Post she remarked that she wanted it to be the third US single from the album, but instead "Don't Stop" was chosen, which boosted the album's commercial success in the US and the UK.
"You Make Loving Fun" was a concert staple for Fleetwood Mac and was played during every tour involving Christine McVie from 1976 until 1997, a year before McVie's departure from the band and retirement from touring. It has since been revived for Fleetwood Mac's 2014-2015 tour when McVie rejoined the band.

      This is a live performance of the band and song back in 1977.  This was before they started realizing that music video's can be used to better market the song and get it better exposure.  I kinda prefer the live performances of the 70's music for you really see how the bands were like back then.
    I will also include the 1997 performance during the reunion tour and live album "the Dance"

"Some favors come at too high a price"

   This will be on the scheduler since I will be camping this weekend doing Klondike.  I will do a quick post on "some favors come at too high a price".  This came to me while I was at work and the video came to mind so I would tie it to a post and a quick explaination.

      Since I am a hardcore fan of of Babylon5 and this is one of the most popular phrases from the show and it talks about the cost of accepting favors from other people without understanding their motives for granting you a favor,  Youy might think that you and your partners are working on the same problem but they may have a different reason for assisting you and in the long run this will cause you more problems in the future than the initial favor might have helped you with.
     I believe that this is the problem that is prevalent in Washington D.C.  You get there wanting to help but you get subverted by the promise of glory, perks, and bennies and before you know it, you have sold your soul to the establishment and they own you.   Where is the freedom then?   Sure you have the perks and bennies...but you have lost your soul and your integrity....You have lost your good name.  When we all cross over and do the accounting with Saint Peter at the pearly gates for our actions they will have to explain themselves.  All you take with you is your name...all the other stuff stays behind...all the perks, money and bennies stay down on earth.

Vir gets what he wants

And this was the clip that started it all:

If I was the royalty in Saudi Arabia I would be thinking "Aw crap"

  Well I will have a few pithy comments, I am going camping again with the boy Scouts this weekend.   It almost feels like the U.S. Army where I spend a lot of time in the field.  

     there is a lot going on in the middle east, and I do squarely blame the President for the chaos in the middle East.   It all started with the "Arab Spring" back in 2009 and the President earlier had gone to the University in Cairo and talked about the great reset in U.S and Muslim relations and basically apologized to the world for all the baaaaaaaad things that the United States has done and that the Muslims shouldn't hate us anymore.  Right after that the Arab spring erupted, and the President basically had an hands off policy and voiced support for the "people" while long time American allies were besieged by radicals.  he supported the radicals/Muslim Brotherhood against Mobarak in Egypt and everywhere else.  And when there was an uprising against the mad mullah's in Iran, President Obama was strangely quiet, I think his handler Valerie Jarrett his senior adviser who is Iranian probably told his to not do anything so the pro freedom group in Iran collapsed. 
    President Obama isn't the only person I blame for the chaos in the middle east, I also blame the Royal House of Saud, they espouse publicly a radical form of Islam called Wahhabism.  To keep peace inside the kingdom, they throw a lot of money at the radicals inside their borders to export that sect of Islam to the other places.  All these places that where there is grinding poverty and no real education possibilities, they set up these religious schools to educate and indoctrinate the illiterate and the poor.  Now those chickens are coming back to roost.  also you have the Iranians in the mix, they are wanting to be the power player in the region, and that means getting rid of the United States.  It also isn't good that the Soviets Russians recently signed a trade agreement.  
     Now Saudi Arabia had her king die, they had an assassination on a General in her Army who was visiting the border area, this shows that ISIS had good intel on the movements of the general so that makes me wonder how many have infiltrated her armed services.  Also the radicals believe that the House of Saud are corrupt and apostates and not deserving the "honor" of protecting and representing the 2 holiest cities of Islam.   The government in Yemen collapsed, and they share the peninsula and the border.   the Suez canal and the straits of Hormuz are in danger of being closed up. I can see a major uprising in the kingdom this spring and the price of oil to shoot up.   And President Obama will be busy doing his favorite pastime.

   We live in interesting times........

camping and shooting....or shooting and camping......

   I finally got a bit of time to post what transpired this past weekend.  I ran a .22 LR Rifle range for a troop that came up from Florida for what they call "Winter Camp".  While waiting for the  boys to show up, I went ahead and fired my *ahem* .22 LR rifle.  I immediately noticed that my Vortex strike fire was dead(Dead battery).  So I removed the optical sight and utilized my backup flip sight( that is what it is for) and sighted it in.

     Then the boys started showing up, so I had to put up my rifle and start running the range.  The boys were a bunch of good kids, very well behaved and they were here just to shoot.  I immediately gave them the safety briefing and I specified the 3 "always":

"Always keep the barrel in a safe direction"

"Always keep your finger off the trigger until ready to use"

"Always keep your firearm unloaded until ready to use"

Personally I think the 2nd and 3rd should be switched around on purely technical reasons, but that is the way that the NRA wants the range run.

   Well the boys had a lot of fun just wanting to shoot, since there was no "qualifications", I ran a more casual range with more emphasis on letting them shoot rather than lessons.  

   The boys were using a bunch of  bolt action rifles from  BRNO CZ.  With the way that the B.S.A works, that they usually buy the cheapest rifles on the planet, These rifles were actually very good.    For a supposedly cheap rifle, they shot very well.   I will get some information on the next time I run a range the model number if somebody is looking for a "cheap" .22 bolt action rifle that handles the abuse well and shoots well.

     Well anyway, some of the adult leaders invited my for supper, man I though my troop rolled out in style....this troop came in a big Penske box truck and a trailer....they traveled fully equipped.  The adults ate well:

   I was soo full, and it was a looooong drive back home Sunday night, for I had to work Monday morning.....I didn't have MLK off.......with the airlines...if you actually touch an airplane...it is a regular work day.  I can take the holiday off later for it is a "floating" holiday for us.  

     The food was totally prepared by ""Dutch Ovens" and it was very good.  A good dutch oven cook can make just about anything.  

   All I can say was that they honored me with their hospitality on Sunday night.  The fellowship was why I am a scout leader(Besides helping my son and the other kids). 
     On a different note, I refused to watch the SOTU address by Obungler, I saw an exerpt of the speech,   Free community college....sure create another entitlement...and he couldn't even give any cost.  Anything the government touches immediately explodes in cost as the industries involved view the government as the "free money machine", cost and quality be dammed.

  He also talked about civility in Washington, then immediately reminded the GOP of the 2 elections that "He" won.  civility...right....he only will be civil if the GOP caves to his demand.....and unfortunately with the GOP leadership in place...that is a distinct possibility.   he also ran out a bunch of new tax increase proposals to soak the rich some more.  I am sure the rich Hollywood liberals and others won mind giving more of their money to the "cause"  but the rest of us already believe that we pay too much to support a government that doesn't listen to us and views us as "wage slaves"  or sheep to be sheared for our wool, and then eventually slaughtered(Death tax) for the last bits of benefits to the state.    The state of the United States is grave, we are in 2 polarizing camps, and the rhetoric and vitriol is getting worse....usually from our friends on the left side of the political landscape.

        President Obama was elected in 2008 to be the great uniter of the people, but instead he has polarized relations between all Americans to a point not seen since the 60's.  Some of the people that was around back then believe that things are worse now than they were back then.

      I fear for my country and I truly don't know how it will go, if we go in fire or just fade away into the dustbin of history.