USS Helena (SSN-725)

I should add that I spent about 4.5 years of my life (from 1990-1995) living on a submarine. The ‘boat’ was stationed in Pearl Harbor, HI at that time and made several deployments in the Pacific Ocean. For you bubble-heads, it consisted of one NORPAC, two WESTPAC (the second one incuded some time in the Persian Gulf), and several EASTPAC deployments.
More information can be found here… http://www.skotfred.com/ssn725.php

I’ve made port calls in the following places…

  • San Diego, CA (Point Loma)
  • Bangor/Bremerton, WA
  • Victoria/Esquimalt, BC Canada
  • Nanoose, BC Canada
  • Guam
  • Yokosuka, Japan (south of Tokyo)
  • Sasebo, Japan (north of Nagasaki)
  • Chinhae, Korea
  • Pattaya Beach, Thailand
  • Singapore
  • Bahrain
  • Abu Dhabi, UAE
  • Dubai
  • Darwin, NT Australia

September 11th conspiracy?

Many of the events of this day have never felt quite right or even been ‘believable’ to me. The physics and timing of many of the events just seem too convenient, and have obviously been manipulated for the press-believing, conforming, masses of ‘sheep’ that are so common in this time and country. True patriots of the past fought against such oppression as exists now, but current ‘Americans’ have willingly given up so many of their rights in the face and fear of ‘terrorism’. I ask, just who are the terrorists, some Islamic extremists, or the elected goverment officials themselves?

I don’t make or take these statements lightly, I am a U.S. veteran of the first Gulf War and spent my entire life in a military family. I beleive in the jobs and lives of these people, I believe in the ‘country’. But I don’t believe the common ‘story’ that a bunch of terrorists planned the events of that day without assistance and full knowledge and support from high places in our own government.

Here’s a few sources I urge you to check…

Blood Donation

As I’ve often done in the past, I gave blood recently. Since I’ve lived in the Chicago area, I’ve always done so at LifeSource Blood Centers. This time, however I was introduced to a new device/method this time. As I’m RH Type A+ (being pretty common in the US), it was recommended that I donate ‘red cells’ instead of just whole blood.

Other than taking only a few extra minutes, here’s how it’s different….

After the usual bureaucratic process and paperwork involved in giving blood, they hook you up to a machine called ALYX that runs the process.

It may sound complex, but the process is really simple…
1. A unit of whole blood is taken from you.
2. The blood is then separated into plasma and red blood cells.
3. The plasma is mixed with ‘room temperature’ saline solution.
4. The plasma/saline is returned to your body. (room temperature seems a little ‘cold’ when it returns).
5. Steps 1-4 repeat several times.
6. Remaining ‘whole’ blood, and plasma is returned to your body.
7. Done!

My first experience doing this was a pleasure, the worst part of all being the ‘stick’ they did in my finger to test my hemoglobin, which hurt like hell even hours later!

Added benefits of this process…
1. You actually give ‘twice’ the blood you would if you just gave whole blood. As such, you only visit half as often (16 weeks vs. 8, I think!)
2. With the addition of ‘saline’ to your body, you are slightly more hydrated when you leave.

I recommend that you all “save a life” by giving blood!

Ego searching – skotfred

So, here’s a little more about me… feel free to network with me if you’d like…

Direct linked to my profile:

Indirectly linked:

I’ll add more links as I become aware of them.

ReplayTV vs. Tivo

I’ve had a PVR / DVR for years now… and it’s a distand memory for me to channel surf while at home (it still happens a lot when i travel). Anyways, I’ve always been and advocate of the ReplayTV.

One of it’s most notable features is that they’ve ALWAYS been network ready, so it’s been able to use my existing household LAN network to connect to the Internet for updates and television schedules. It can be used with most cable networks, broadcast television, as well as satellite subscriptions…. it can even use combinations of them! With some simple configuration you can link multiple units in your household to share recording and viewing duties and even share your recordings with “others” on the Internet. Some opensource software will even allow for you to view the recorded shows on your computer in MPEG4 format.

References:

Senseo vs. Keurig

I mentioned Adam Curry in my earlier ‘Podcasting’ post… as such i’ll throw this into the mix.

Adam seems to prefer (and promote, thru his now infamous “burp”) his Senseo machine, personally I’ve got a Keurig B50 that provides my daily caffeine dosage, the big advantage of this machine is that there is a much wider variety of coffee and tea available.

It’s been a big hit with my guests, and there’s nothing better than your own cup o’ joe in about 10 seconds!

Podcasting

Just figured i’d share in the knowledge of this topic as it’s been a part of my life since about May 2005. Podcasting is essentially an MP3 (audio) blog, some have developed to the point of having adds or even being broadcast over satellite radio.

I’m subscribed to several podcasts, the most popular being Adam Curry‘s Daily Source Code…. yeah, for those of you that are my age, you’ll remember this guy as an MTV JV (as a regular top-40 jock as well as on HeadBangers Ball).

I don’t anticipate ever doing one of these on my own, but would be willing to provide some content for anyone that would like my input.

Listen in and enjoy!

Whoami

I’m skotfred, aka ‘Giant Geek’, developer of (predominantly web-based) applications. Primary development done with JSP/Java, PHP, XHTML/CSS/JavaScript. Previous applications in VisualBASIC, C/C++, Perl, COBOL/CICS, BASIC (various), Assember (PC & MVS), and Pascal.

Standards ARE everything, particularly when building for multiple platforms… look for more ramblings soon!