Air Crash

This is from the email archive. Happy Friday!

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My ex-wife started taking flying lessons about the time our divorce started and she got her license shortly before our divorce was final, later that same year.

Yesterday afternoon, she narrowly escaped injury in the aircraft she was piloting when she was forced to make an emergency landing in Southern Tennessee because of bad weather.

Thank God our kids were with me this weekend.

The NTSB issued a preliminary report, citing pilot error: Judy was flying a single engine aircraft in IFR (instrument flight rating) conditions while only having obtained a VFR (visual flight rating).

The absence of a post-crash fire was likely due to insufficient fuel on board.

No one on the ground was injured.

The photograph below was taken at the scene and shows the extent of damage to her aircraft.

She was very lucky.

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O-State Football Game

Last weekend, my wife and I got to go to the Oklahoma State vs. West Virginia football game with my dad, my oldest nephew (12) and niece (10).

Behold... the Cowboy marching band, hiding behind a curtain of flags:



Niece and Nephew had a great time, despite the fact that Nephew is actually an OU (University of Oklahoma) fan. He was all decked out in orange, hooting and shouting and loving every minute.

Well, *most* minutes... Then we ran across these wonderful little "Just Say NO" shirts. For some reason, they were not available at any official merchandise stands. *cough* *cough*

Niece and I both got one. Nephew shook his head sadly.

I was treated to a "Rapid-Fire Nephew Comedy Moment". It went something like this:

"Uncle Jeff, what's green and smells like red paint? Green paint."
"Want to hear a dirty joke? A white horse fell in the mud."
"A magician was driving down the street, and then he turned into a driveway."

I love that last one. Very clever.

The wind was swirling like crazy inside the stadium. Bits of trash were constantly being caught in the wind and blown across the field. Niece and Nephew made a game of it for a while. "There's one! There's another one! The ref is chasing that one!"

I spoke up. "I haven't seen this much trash on the field since the last time I saw OU play." I got the stink-eye from my nephew. :)

Concession stand drinks came in souvenir cups that say "2011 Big 12 Champs - 2012 Fiesta Bowl Champs". Very cool. As we left, Dad told the kids, "Go grab a couple of those cups that people left in the stands."

"A couple" of cups rapidly turned into a stadium-wide scavenger hunt. Dad finally yelled at them to quit, but not before they had gathered up 80 cups.



That stack is only 15. That's what my wife and I brought home with us. 65 more went home with the kiddos. Gramma and her dishwasher were not amused.

The little treasure hunters also found a poster and a sticky soda-soaked foam finger. Naturally the "Uncle Jeff hold this!" came before the "Oh and be careful because it's sticky."

We had a great time. It won't be too long before middle nephew (currently 6) will be old enough to join us, too.

Good times. :)

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Oppan Gan-Nerd Jeff, Take 2

Arg. OK. So, it's hard to crop out a background, especially since I don't have a photo studio in my home and have no interest in having a photo studio in my home. Fine.

Here ya go...



Click into for the larger versions. Crop out the white, feather the edges, you're all good.



Send your creations to jeff . w . mcclung @ gmail . com.

That is all.

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Photoshop Jeff: Oppan Gan-Nerd Style!

You know what my favorite parts of the Gangnam Style video are?



It's when he's doing that amazing horsey dance with nobody (or nearly nobody) around him.



This dude is wonderfully hysterically wonderful. He's just gotta dance, baby! Rain or shine, with or without an audience, that lasso's gotta FLY!



I also love how coordinated his backup dancers aren't. But I digress.

I gotta dance!!!





This may be the easiest Photoshop Jeff ever. Just pluck out my background and make me dance somewhere. Doesn't matter where.

Remember, click into those images for a larger version of the picture.

My long-time readers know that I have very strict posting rules. If you send it, I gotta post it. Go for PG13 or less, please. :) Have fun, and send your Photoshopped goodness to:

jeff . w . mcclung @ gmail . com

In a week or two, I'll collect up all the pics I get and feature them here.

Previous Photoshop Jeff events can be found here. Keep on horsey dancing!

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Leftover Candy

Last week, M16 brought in a LOT of leftover Halloween candy. He started handing it out to everybody.

P-Ziddy tried to refuse. "Yeah, because none of *us* have any leftover candy." M16 ignored him and kept shoveling out mounds of little unwelcome fun-sized nuggets.

"I brought leftover candy of my own," I said, glaring. M16 left me alone. But everybody else got candy piled on them.

Later, M16 wandered out of the office for a few minutes. K2 and P-Ziddy looked at each other. "Are you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?"

They returned all the candy to M16's desk. Some was in a desk drawer. Some in his chair, some in his tissue box, and one on top of his monitor, where it instantly started to melt.

M16 was stunned. "OK, OK, I won't hand out anymore."

P-Ziddy wasn't done. "Did you find the ones under your keyboard?" M16 looked. "Ah, here they are."

"Did you find the ones behind your stapler?" "Sheesh, guys."

"Did you find the ones we stuck in your jacket pockets?" "Oh, c'mon..."

My turn. I grinned. "Did you find the piece they stuck down the front of your pants?"

Eyes wide. "No way!"

The best part is, he nearly looked.

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Halloween Paper

Halloween was fun this year. I saw a kid dressed as a Rubik's Cube, another as a Vampire Pirate, and I even saw a middle-aged man toilet paper his neighbor's truck.

I'm not making any of that up.

Late in the evening, one of my neighbors walked over to say hi. "Got any candy left?", he asked. "I do, but your costume stinks so you're not getting any." Everybody had a ha-ha.

A few minutes after he wandered off, my wife and I saw him come back outside with a roll of toilet paper. He wandered over to the house next door and started papering the truck.

"What are you doing?!?" Neighbor Guy just smiled and pointed at the house. "He didn't hand out candy this year, so I figure he deserves this."

My wife and I deliberately loitered as visibly as we could under our porch light, so it would be obvious that we were not involved. "Is he gonna guess who did that?", my wife wondered. Neighbor Guy grinned and replied. "He'll know. I'm gonna text him!"

Neighbor Guy wandered off, chuckling. "I've still got a half a roll left!"

"Keep it," I advised. "You may need it later tonight."

About a minute later, there was a shout from inside Victim Neighbor's house. He ran outside and started shaking a fist in the general direction of Neighbor Guy's house.

I love my neighbors. I'm also very glad I parked in the garage.

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Starfury Model... COMPLETE!

That's right, true believers! I finally got around to finishing the thing.

I lost a lot of enthusiasm for the project after I saw how horrible the paint job was turning out. The decals fared a little better, although they are much more impressive if you don't look at them very closely.

With that in mind... uh... here's a close-up.



Yikes! Sorry about that. I should mention that all of these pictures are clickable for larger versions. That said, I don't recommend clicking that first one. The blur only gets worse.

The one smart thing I did was to start on the underside of the model. I wound up re-gluing that decal later and it's better, but the ones up top were done after I kinda figured out what I was doing.

Speaking of the top, here's a progress shot...



I gotta say, those long narrow decals were not fun. I thought the itty-bitty tiny little ones were a pain, but those long ones were a special kind of wiggly pulling breaking re-gluing challenge.

And now, two logos...



There's the main attraction, the "Black Omega". And the top-side version of that Earth Alliance logo, much better attached than the one on the underside.

Here's a nice overhead shot of the model.



Try not to notice how off-center the decals are, OK? :)

I think Starfury's were meant to be seen from one side or the other. It gives a better sense of how the ship moves through space. Plus, it also nicely obscures how imperfect those decals are...



So, there you have it. The Starfury model adventure is complete. I now have my very own Black Omega Starfury, which is not quite fit to see the light of day. It looks alright from a distance, but up close it looks like it was assembled by a tipsy ten-year-old. :)

Even so, it was fun and I'm glad I did it. I'm also very, VERY glad it's done.

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