Firemen. You pull the lever, dial the phone, and they just come. They’re often found going the opposite direction as everyone else. The definition of bravery has to include going one way while everyone’s going the other, surely.
Sometimes it’s the minor wonders that remind you of the major ones.
While we’re busy worrying whether to use the female or male pronoun for the little twerp that leaked our military secrets, the Russians are using tanks instead of .22s for plinking practice. Tank biathlon is my new favorite sport!
Tank biathlon is a mechanized kind of sport invented by the Russian Military. It is supposed to utilize the complex training of tank crews including their rough terrain passing skills combined with the ability to provide accurate and rapid fire whilst on-route.
Tanks go on a three-round route of 6-10 kilometers. During the first round crews fire at targets positioned at a distances of 1800, 1700, 1500 meters. The second round firing is at targets imitating an anti-tank mortar (RPG) squad and an infantry unit – these targets are at a distance of 600–700 meters, and must be engaged with a 7.62mm coaxial machine gun. The third round targeting is at an anti-tank gun and ATGM unit by use of the NSV 12.7mm remotely controlled anti-aircraft Heavy machine gun at a distance of 1200 meters.
Like in usual biathlon firing misses lead to an extra round, 500 meters long. On the final round tanks have to go through various terrain obstacles, here an error (missed or crashed obstacle) lead to a 10-seconds increment to crew’s final timing.
The first such contests ran in several of Russia’s Military Districts with final part taking place at the Alabino proving ground on 2013 August 11–17, with crews from Kazakhstan, Belarus and Armenia invited for the contest.
Of course, we could always one-up them, and start using ICBMs to play lawn darts, but of course lawn darts are banned now, although I’m fairly certain ICBMs are still legal, at least if you’re not a Nork or an Iranian. How’s a kid supposed to have any fun in this world anymore?
(Thanks to our west-coast correspondent, Gerard at American Digest, for sending that one along. I heard he can see Russia from his house)
Our intrepid narrator and tinkerer, sounding like he just downed three Seconals with a bourbon chaser, gives us a tour of his various “Honeydew List” projects. In the past, I used to make a joke about building a house and then slipping the foundation under it later when impatient prospective homeowners wondered aloud why we had to wait until spring to pour a foundation for their house, but this wildman seems to actually done it with his shed. He’s a better man than me, that’s for sure.
He also seems to have a PHD in Simpson angle brackets, those L-shaped pieces of metal that he uses to hold his entire world together. He’s like the Michelangelo of angle brackets. But of course, no tour around his home-cum-bunker would be complete without showing you his homebrew airplane. His narration of the structure of his spruce goose is magnificent:
… you take these pieces of metal like this, and install them, every so often, on the wing…
Now that’s aviation engineering at the bleeding edge of innovation, isn’t it? You know John Denver would buy that thing from him. If he was still alive, I mean.
If I were his neighbors, I’d be heading on out to Lowes, and buying all the angle brackets they have, and beefing up my roof with them. It’s useless to go to Home Depot for the brackets. He’s cleaned them out.
He’s wearing a football helmet, but then again, the Saint Louis Rams don’t hit that hard.
The Borderline Sociopathic Blog For Boys does not condone pestering animals. It’s OK to kill them and eat them, but annoying them isn’t cricket. However any form of mano a mano is a fair fight, even if they don’t have manos.
(Thanks to Friend of the BSBFB Charles Schneider for sending that one along)