What's the latest in people's lives?

[Mikey]

As Columbia’s brave scions, in anger array’d,
Once defy’d a proud monarch and built a new nation;
’Gainst their brothers of Britain unsheath’d the sharp blade
That hath ne’er met defeat nor endur’d desecration;
So must we in this hour
Show our valour and pow’r,
And dispel the black perils that over us low’r:
Whilst the sons of Britannia, no longer our foes,
Will rejoice in our triumphs and strengthen our blows!

See the banners of Liberty float in the breeze
That plays light o’er the regions our fathers defended;
Hear the voice of the million resound o’er the leas,
As the deeds of the past are proclaim’d and commended;
And in splendour on high
Where our flags proudly fly,
See the folds we tore down flung again to the sky:
For the Emblem of England, in kinship unfurl’d,
Shall divide with Old Glory the praise of the world!

Bury’d now are the hatreds of subject and King,
And the strife that once sunder’d an Empire hath vanish’d.
With the fame of the Saxon the heavens shall ring
As the vultures of darkness are baffled and banish’d;
And the broad British sea,
Of her enemies free,
Shall in tribute bow gladly, Columbia to thee:
For the friends of the Right, in the field side by side,
Form a fabric of Freedom no hand can divide!

- "Ode for July Fourth, 1917"

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

As Columbia’s brave scions, in anger array’d,
Once defy’d a proud monarch and built a new nation;
’Gainst their brothers of Britain unsheath’d the sharp blade
That hath ne’er met defeat nor endur’d desecration;
So must we in this hour
Show our valour and pow’r,
And dispel the black perils that over us low’r:
Whilst the sons of Britannia, no longer our foes,
Will rejoice in our triumphs and strengthen our blows!

See the banners of Liberty float in the breeze
That plays light o’er the regions our fathers defended;
Hear the voice of the million resound o’er the leas,
As the deeds of the past are proclaim’d and commended;
And in splendour on high
Where our flags proudly fly,
See the folds we tore down flung again to the sky:
For the Emblem of England, in kinship unfurl’d,
Shall divide with Old Glory the praise of the world!

Bury’d now are the hatreds of subject and King,
And the strife that once sunder’d an Empire hath vanish’d.
With the fame of the Saxon the heavens shall ring
As the vultures of darkness are baffled and banish’d;
And the broad British sea,
Of her enemies free,
Shall in tribute bow gladly, Columbia to thee:
For the friends of the Right, in the field side by side,
Form a fabric of Freedom no hand can divide!

- "Ode for July Fourth, 1917"

Holy crap. This might be the first thing of Lovecraft I like!

[Mikey]

Holy crap. This might be the first thing of Lovecraft I like!

I'm conflicted. On one hand, I'm glad you like it. OTOH, that means you don't like his other work, and that makes me feel a bit icky.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Holy crap. This might be the first thing of Lovecraft I like!

I'm conflicted. On one hand, I'm glad you like it. OTOH, that means you don't like his other work, and that makes me feel a bit icky.

I can't lie. I hate Lovecraft's work. Only time I feel an inkling of liking it is when expies of his Old Gods or whatever get the crap kicked outta him by a band of scrappy underdogs who either didn't get the memo about them, or got the memo and took it as a challenge. 8)

[Mikey]

Hmm. Sounds like you've conflated some of his successors' work, but technically I understand that his style is very much a product of it's times and not to the taste of every modern reader.

[Bryan Moore]

So I am on Day 10, approximately hour 100 of this ceaseless vigil at work.... not many hugs and back pats I can give that will keep my staff motivated any more. I have guys in this warehouse that have worked 19-20 days straight without rest, some of them 18 hour shifts. Remarkable respect for some of my crew here.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

So I am on Day 10, approximately hour 100 of this ceaseless vigil at work.... not many hugs and back pats I can give that will keep my staff motivated any more. I have guys in this warehouse that have worked 19-20 days straight without rest, some of them 18 hour shifts. Remarkable respect for some of my crew here.

Remarkable respect for them and for you, Bryan.

[Bryan Moore]

Thanks. More respect to them than to myself... They're the manual labor, I'm just the brains and warehouse general... Easier to shake hands and kiss babies than it is to throw boxes in a -25C warehouse all day/night.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Thanks. More respect to them than to myself... They're the manual labor, I'm just the brains and warehouse general... Easier to shake hands and kiss babies than it is to throw boxes in a -25C warehouse all day/night.

Well, okay. But I'm gonna reserve some respect for you, dude.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Been a bit of a busy week. Tomorrow I'll be seeing Spider-Man:Homecoming.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Dear jerk behind me honking their horn. There are people in the crosswalk. I don't feel like committing vehicular manslaughter because you're not patient. Screw you. Screw you. Sa-crew you.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

Dear jerk behind me honking their horn. There are people in the crosswalk. I don't feel like committing vehicular manslaughter because you're not patient. Screw you. Screw you. Sa-crew you.

Since I have no car (but live in a convenient, if not wealthy, area with lots of stuff either in walking distance or available by public transport) I'm usually on the other end of that. I shouldn't have to say thanks in spirit but there are some drivers who are really aggressive with what's perceived as a limited window to turn, even with pedestrians around. I've had uncomfortably close calls that often were no fault of mine.

I'm off this whole week. This is sort of a stay-cation, though I squeezed time at the Wildwood beach area in southern NJ a week ago when my father was off (thanks to my boss for letting me squeeze that in). OF course, there's lots to do in NYC. I'll head to Coney Island one day, have a ticket to a Mets baseball game Friday and booked a cruise around the city and a trip to the Intrepid Air-Sea-Space museum (an actual retired Airplane carrier if you're unfamiliar, docked permanently at a Manhattan pier). Those two piers are two blocks away, so it's a double ticket. Friday is also a double event, since there's a NY Museum of Science in Flushing Meadows-Corona park, a short walk from Citi Field (home of the Mets) which I'll visit that afternoon before the game. A movie or two should round out the week; there are a few choices between Valerian, Atomic Blonde and Dunkirk.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Have a good time, CPH.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

Have a good time, CPH.

Thanks. Here's a bunch of photos. I'll have to return later to get inside Intrepid, as that closed just as the boat tour returned to dock but the ticket is good for 30 days. I did get shots of the outside of the Intrepid, as well as others from all around during a circumnavigation of Manhattan taking 2 and a half hours.

Included among the obvious sights are ventilation towers serving one of the tunnels between Manhattan and NJ - since one of those is the busiest in the world it helps to prevent drivers choking on their cars' own emissions! At the top of the island the neighborhood of Washington Heights is the highest point on the island and reveals some of the hilly nature of it which is hidden, as well as some exposed bedrock. The "C" is on the Bronx side, opposite land owned by Columbia University (NYC's member of the Ivy League). On the NJ side and in pictures looking up the Hudson River Valley are the Palisades, a natural cliff formation left over from the last major ice age. Alongside Riverside Park towards the end of the show are various buildings; a couple of shots feature Riverside Church, to the left of which is Grant's Tomb (referring to Ulysses Grant, Civil War hero of the Union and later President). Among the 20 (!) bridges we passed directly (not including the Verrazzano-Narrows between Brooklyn and Staten Island which was seen from a distance, as passing under that would take us into the Atlantic Ocean) the largest was the George Washington Bridge, the only of those to connect to New Jersey. It preceded the more famous Golden Gate bridge by a few years but ushered in the style of exposed metalwork (though the original plans called for a stone facade). We passed Gracie Mansion (traditional home of the Mayor of NYC since the days of mayor Fiorello La Guardia) though it's hard to see in a direct shot due to parkland and trees obscuring it.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

What looks like a Roman style aqueduct is exactly that, the main water source from a large reservoir 35 miles or so upstate runs down a gradual incline into the pump tower on the Manhattan side. There's enough water to serve a city twice the size of the current city in the aquifer there, and the water which feeds our taps is quite clean too.