Not Musubi

Man, I sure had a hankering for Spam Musubi. It's Spam and rice with flavourings, wrapped in Nori [seaweed], kinda like sushi. Big, big fave over in Hawaii [Therese, since you are going over, try it! Oopsie - Teesss is a vegetarian! Never mind!]

**** Kathy and Hiro-san, my apologies: I'll likely be by for proper Sushi tomorrow :-) [Note: in Virginia Beach, visit Daruma of Japan for Japanese and Thai food, at the corner of Birdneck and Laskin Road, more or less.... wonderful, wonderful food and atmosphere, and the owners are truly treasures :-)]

Back to my story. Steamed up some rice. Had some Nori standing by [seaweed which one wraps sushi with]. Actually, I had Chef Kev standing by as well, but I elected to let him watch TV ;-) Pan fried some Spam in Teriyaki sauce until it was good and brown [actually, it was the generic substitute, and I pretty well charred it into oblivion....] - make sure there is plenty of sugar in the sauce! Dinna have a musubi press to form the rice, so I served the dish up as a plate of rice with Teriyaki Spam on top. [Not to mention I have been drinking beer, so my motor skills are ebbing a bit at the moment].

Hey! It's not horrible! Anyway, turning the remnants over to Kev, to see if he can salvage something. We often do that: I set a few random ingredients on the counter, and Kevin gets to make a meal from those and whatever else he chooses. Just like TV, and it keeps his skills sharp :-) Gotta scoot - more Teriyaki Spam on Rice awaits.....

Pelicans and the Great Get-Off

Yesterday was a pretty nice day outside, and seeing as how I had not gone kayaking for a while, I set out to. The 15 footer does not fit well in the back of my truck, and I intended to go south, in the canals, so I loaded up the 10 footer and headed down to Pep Boys to splash [there's a small floating dock that you can get into a canoe or kayak easily from - Derek has been there.]

The ten footer is a Pelican Pursuit. Plastic, injection molded, fairly light - around 40 pounds. Nice beginner and utility boat, nowhere near as fast as my other boat, but just the thing for a leisurely paddle. Pelican also makes plastic watertight cases, and they are awesome! I will explain why presently.

I wanted to head down the canal and get out at the dock on Princess Anne Road, where Nikki and I first kayaked together, back in December. Nikki was not along for this trip; we have broken up. I wish her great good fortune, but we are not currently kayaking together. It's about seven and a half miles, and I went with the current as we had just passed low tide and the flood was on. Nice, relaxing ride, and I did not tax myself overly.

South of Dam Neck Road, there is an awful lot of debris in the canals. Sadly, Virginia Beach does little to maintain their waterways [one feeder canal has a water pipe going across from one side to the other, about two feet above the water's surface!! Gotta go around....] At one point, there was a collection of several logs and branches, and much assorted other crap. Next thing I knew, the boat was rolling severely to the left. Sadly, no photographic record exists, for I surely wore a priceless look as I slid into the [dirty, smelly] water. No kidding, the boat was submerged most of the way with it's bow straight up in the air! [In retrospect, I think that my paddle lanyard, which is on my left, got tangled and somehow upset the apple cart. I've replayed it in my mind several times, but this incident did not unfold in slow motion!]

I clung to the log and managed to free my boat and laboriously get it to the bank. My paddle was tethered, so it came along for the ride. Whew! Getting the boat up the bank was quite an undertaking as it contained a lot of water. Note to self in the [hopefully unlikely] event that it happens again: Drag the boat out stern first. A Pelican Pursuit has a nice drain plug in the stern, but none in the bow. Tired [heavy!]. Wet and in a bad mood. My aqua shoes are great for water, but the soles allow sticks and stones to annoy the soles of my feet. Bugs. My hydration backpack has floated about ten feet down stream and lodged against the bank, so I used my paddle to hook it through one of the arm straps and retrieve it, setting it next to my boat.

All the while, I saw my Pelican Case floating along with the current. This is actually good news, for it contains my wallet and Blackberry phone. Thank goodness it did not sink!! Anyway, the Pelican case is wonderfully watertight and floats - mine cost $12, if I remember correctly. So, I take my paddle along and go off walking along the shore. About 200 yards away, there is a small feeder canal, which I have to cross in order to keep going. There's a log stretched across, so I walk across it, using my paddle kinda like a gondola pole. You guessed it - it the middle, I lose my balance and fall into the canal. Great. Keep walking. About 100 yards ahead there is another collection of logs and branches, stretched across the main canal. Sure enough, there it is. My Pelican Case is resting against a log. Near the far side of the canal, maybe twenty feet out. Too deep to wade out [maybe eight feet?]. So, back to the boat, managing not to submerge or tip whilst going over the bank into the water [Thank you, Lord!]. Down to the logpile, and unceremoniously snag my case. My wallet and phone are dry. Seriously, get a Pelican case. Get a Pelican boat, too - good stuff!

I decide to head back [in retrospect, Princess Anne Road is only a half-mile ahead, but I had expended a lot of energy and wasn't overly clear-headed, and I stand by that decision]. Getting back through the logjam where I had rolled was a nervous moment, but went without incident. By the way, I had not mentioned it, but I always wear my PFD [life vest] when in the boat. I am sure one might point out many errors in my narrative, but going without my PFD is not one of them. I won't drive without wearing my seatbelt, and I won't kayak without my PFD. On the way back, I have to fight the current for a while, but once high tide has passed, eventually the current favors me again.

Yes, I am tired and stiff [and sore!] - after all, it was a 14 mile journey. But, a good workout and a good experience. The mud, leaves, sticks and smelly stuff all washed away nicely. No injuries, no equipment damage, and nothing lost. Whew! A good day, all in all. I consider it fun. [and, yes, I'll be kayaking again. Soon!]

BMD and What to do?

Another successful test for the Navy's Ballistic Missile Defense program out in Pac Fleet.... We are well past MAD [Mutual Assured Destruction] and I feel that the number of unreasoning, nonlogical players in the ballistic missile world [much as we all despised the Soviet Union, they DID reason and did not ever launch ballistic missiles against anything we protected] makes having some sort of ballistic missile shield [namely, a system which actually works] a good, common sense item.

Now that we have dispensed with the obligatory stating of where I stand on the issue, let's consider the possible impact upon the fleet, particularly the number of hulls available for various missions. Ballistic Missile Defense can be seen as a national strategic asset, similar to the concept of the SLBM [Sub-Launched Ballistic Missile].

Here's my chain of reasoning: Nuclear response capability is seen as a strategic asset. Providers of same are tasked with a deterring strike as their overall mission. As an example of this, consider the SSBN, the missile firing submarine which deploys to a given geographical region and drives around that area, silently, waiting.... Waiting for the order to empty it's silos and head for home [if it still exists, but that's another discussion for another day].

Following this reasoning, we get the Aegis Cruiser equipped with the ballistic defense versions of Standard Missile. Does this ship then get assigned to patrol the waters roughly between Alaska and Hawaii, waiting for the instance of some illogical regime to launch ballistic missiles in the direction of the US? [North Korea, for instance.] Let's suppose for a moment that the Navy has two zones to patrol, and two ships for each on a rotational basis, making a total of four ships that are now not available for the Navy to use for all of the other missions the Navy undertakes. The fiscal budget is tightening. Will a Democratic President and Congress pay for the Navy to have four additional ships? That's a lot of money, folks.

What should the Navy do? Downplay the BMD mission, letting it slip to the various air and land-based contenders? Play up the BMD, risking having fewer hulls for everything else that what is optimal? What are your thoughts on this matter?