Off The Net Later Today -- May 1, 2016

In honor of Bernie Sanders and May Day -- the Day of the International Solidarity of Workers, in the country in which Bernie ... which reminds me ... what is the difference between a sentimentalist and a romanticist. F Scott Fitzgerald struggled over that one:

“I'm not sentimental--I'm as romantic as you are. The idea, you know, is that the sentimental person thinks things will last -- the romantic person has a desperate confidence that they won't.” 

I now get it. I was wondering why young folks were flocking to Bernie Sanders.

Which month as the fewest holidays in the US? May. It doesn't have any. Sure, it has Memorial Day at the end of the month, but you have to wait the entire month so it really doesn't count as a "May" holiday, does it? It's really like the "first day of summer" holiday. And it always falls on a 3-day weekend. Never on a Wednesday which would necessitate taking the whole week off.

School kids are very aware of his: if it weren't for what we used to call "Easter Break" spring would be a bleak holiday season compared to autumn which has Columbus Day, Halloween, The Day of the Dead (actually the "days" of the dead), Thanksgiving, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Year's Eve. I may have missed one or two.

So, I get it. The college kids want another spring holiday, and May First would be about perfect, coming just before finals. One last jetting to Corpus Christi or Key West.

I feel the Bern. May First. The Day of (the) International Solidarity of Workers.Venezuela, tic, tic, tic. Cuba, tock.

I don't know if Bernie is a romantic or a sentimentalist but I'm going to take the afternoon off, lie (lay) under the sun,  pull out my copy of To The Finland Station, contemplate what might have been, and, then, ... fall asleep.

I will be off the net for awhile, celebrating May First, enjoying the solidarity, feeling the "bern" of the sun.

Those following the news are aware that there have seen an increasing number of reports of Vladimir Putin harassing US military warplanes and aircraft carriers.

The photo taken below was from my days while assigned to Bitburg Air Base, Germany, back between 1983 and 1986, somewhere over the North Sea. The "BT" F-15 has a tail number with the last two digits "53." That plane "belongs" to the commander of the 53 TFS, 36 TFW, Bitburg Air Base. The photograph was taken by the flight surgeon sitting in the back seat of another F-15 from the same squadron.

The original photograph is on my bedroom wall; the photo below is a photo of the photo. And, no, I don't have the negative. 

Ah, for the good old days.

No, I don't think the fighters are preparing for in-flight refueling.