Did a good thing today.

Well I am doing this post and watching the Army/Navy Game, looks like Navy will win...Dang....Oh Well.

    Today My son and I participated again with "Wreaths Across America".  Normally I would have rode with the "Patriots Guard Riders", but with the weather being iffy and my motorcycle being surrounded by Christmas stuff, We just took my sons Truck.

Before we hit the road, we stopped by our favorite place,  The great Krasnovian Franchise.  We left and headed down the road.  It took a couple of hours but we got here..

The Main Marker at the Gate.

It was cold, dreary and cloudy when we got there, but when the service started the Sun came out and the sky cleared up.

The Service started, and after the National Anthem followed by "Taps" and several speeches by various VFW and Patriot Guard leaders, they had a person representing each branch present a wreath.

My Dad representing the Army laying the Wreath at the Memorial.

After the ceremony everyone headed to distribution points to start laying the Wreaths on the headstone of a veteran.

And we spread out laying Wreaths on the Headstones...

We kept going until every headstone, got a Wreath...

This was one of several sections.

 A Soldier from "My War".

My Dad, My Brother and my Son, it truly was a family affair.  My Niece was also present as was my Aunt and her husband who was a Squid Navy Veteran off the U.S.S Yorktown.

 My Uncle Don, My Dad and My Son.

 She asked me if my son was planning on going into the Service.  I replied "I am torn, part of me wants him to join, to pay his obligation as citizen of the Republic, and  to serve.  Part of me says, "no" my family had paid the debt since the revolutionary war, and if it skips a generation, it isn't a bad thing and I will not force him either way."  She seemed to agree with the sentiment.

BTW, Navy did win the CinC cup...This year.  But this is one game that everyone wins.  We all represent the United States.

 

Been really busy

To my 2 readers, I apologize for the delay in posting, I have been working a lot of overtime and Christmas activities on top of it, don't leave much room for posting.

   I will post in a day.

Monday Music "Don't Fear the Reaper" by BOC

I am continuing my run of songs that you would play if you saw this forming up outside your house on your home security camera's

And you get a song ready for the main event...

I have loaded several weeks of songs into my scheduler thingie.  This has been a fun theme to run.


"(Don't Fear) The Reaper" is a song by American rock band Blue Öyster Cult from the band's 1976 album Agents of Fortune. The song, written and sung by lead guitarist Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser, deals with eternal love and the inevitability of death. Dharma wrote the song while picturing an early death for himself.
Released as an edited single (omitting the slow building interlude in the original), the song was Blue Öyster Cult's highest chart success, reaching #7 in Cash Box and #12 on the Billboard Hot 100 in late 1976. Critical reception was mainly positive, and in 2004, "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" was listed at number 405 on Rolling Stone's list of the top 500 songs of all time.


"(Don't Fear) The Reaper" was written and sung by lead guitarist Buck Dharma and produced by David Lucas, Murray Krugman, and Sandy Pearlman. The song's distinctive guitar riff is built on the "i-VII-VI" chord progression, in an A minor scale.The riff was recorded with Krugman's Gibson ES-175 guitar, which was run through a Music Man 410 combo amplifier, and Dharma's vocals were captured with a Telefunken U47 tube microphone. The guitar solo and guitar rhythm sections were recorded in one take, while a four-track tape machine amplified them on the recording. Sound engineer Shelly Yakus remembers piecing together the separate vocals, guitar and rhythm section into a master track, with the overdubbing occurring in that order.
Mojo described its creation: "'Guys, this is it!’ engineer Shelly Yakus announced at the end of the first take. ‘The legendary once-in-a-lifetime groove!’ ... What evolved in the studio was the extended solo section; it took them nearly as long to edit the five-minute track down to manageable length as it did to record it."
The song features prominent use of the cowbell percussion instrument, overdubbed on the original recording. Bassist Joe Bouchard remembered the producer requesting his brother, drummer Albert Bouchard, play the cowbell: "Albert thought he was crazy. But he put all this tape around a cowbell and played it. It really pulled the track together." However, producer David Lucas says that he played it, a claim supported by bandmember Eric Bloom.

In 1976 Rolling Stone named "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" the song of the year and, in 2004, the magazine placed the song at number 397 on its list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time";however, the 2010 version of the list moved it down to number 405. In 1997 Mojo listed the song as the 80th best single of all time, while Q ranked "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" number 404 in its 2003 countdown of the "1001 Best Songs Ever."
When The Guardian released its unranked list of the "1000 Songs Everyone Must Hear" in 2009, the song was included. The publication wrote that the song's charm "lies in the disjuncture between its gothic storyline and the sprightly, Byrdsian guitar line that carries it." In his book The Heart of Rock and Soul: The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever Made, rock critic Dave Marsh ranked the song at number 997.

 "More Cowbells"

The song was memorialized in the April 2000 Saturday Night Live comedy sketch "More Cowbells". The six-minute sketch presents a fictionalized version of the recording of "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" on an episode of VH1's Behind the Music. Will Ferrell wrote the sketch and played Gene Frenkle, an overweight cowbell player. "Legendary" producer Bruce Dickinson, played by Christopher Walken, asked Frenkle to "really explore the studio space" and up the ante on his cowbell playing. The rest of the band are visibly annoyed by Frenkle, but Dickinson tells everyone, "I got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell!" Buck Dharma said that the sketch was fantastic and he never gets tired of it but also lamented that it made the song lose its 'creepy' vibe for some time.
A segment of the song was performed by Red Hot Chili Peppers on May 22, 2014,  as the conclusion of a drumming contest between the band's drummer Chad Smith and actor Will Ferrell. In a repeat of the 2000 SNL sketch, Ferrell again played cowbell for the rendition, which appeared on an episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

Got a new Pistol..

 I picked up a Beretta Model 81.  the pistol was a Law enforcement turn in from Italy.  I am not sure what year the pistol is made, but I will see if I can figure out when the pistol was made.  the pistol qualifies for C&R purchases due to its model's age.  The pistol series first come out in 1976.

Pistol has a couple of nicks in the finish, but overall the pistol is on very good shape and I am pleased with the purchase.  The Pistol has a great ergonomic feel.

Classic Firearms had a special running on the pistols, $199 plus tax and shipping and FFL charges.  I did buy the extra magazine though.  I gotta find time to go to Macks Place of Employment and shoot the pistol and a rifle that I recently bought.

Happy Birthday to Old NFO!

 This is the guy that got me started blogging about 8 years ago...so blame him for foisting me on the blogosphere.  Old NFO besides being a real nice guy and a class act, has been around a while...This was the guy that had the tiller when Admiral Farragut stated "Damm the Torpedo's full speed ahead" and his flagship the USS Hartford as they sailed past the Confederate Batteries protecting Mobile Bay during the American Civil War.

                              You can see Old NFO on the Tiller during the battle.

This Gentleman was by no means ready to hang it up, he continued to serve, He was with Admiral Dewey in the Battle of Manila bay in 1898 when Admiral Dewey broke the Spanish fleet at Manila with superior gunnery and ships.   

As I understand it, he was on the bridge with Admiral Dewey during this battle.

Not content to just sail, he started working with the new arm of the fleet, the air arm.  Old NFO became an accomplished aviator....I had to look for his first plane

 Here is Old NFO earning his wings for the first time...

After many years and many airplanes and many adventures Old NFO finally retired and became an author where he writes several kinds of books and they are an awesome read.  Please go to his website Here and check out what he has written and visit his spot on the web.  I know the article above is a mild exaggeration but the man is really larger than life and a class act and I sincerely wish him a "Happy Birthday."