Trick Quip to Seattle

I took a couple of days off to go to Seattle and see DEVO. It was Reading Break, so Lianne was happy to go too! This time we went on the Victoria Clipper - usually this is far too expensive but in the off-season they have some deals. We got transport there and back and two nights in the Ramada downtown (not great, but close to everything we needed) for about $320. Saved going on the Coho ferry, driving almost three hours to get to Seattle, and then parking at a hotel. The only problem is that the Clipper's schedule is very inconvenient if you are going to Seattle - it only leaves Victoria at 1700, and only leaves Seattle at 0800, so a day trip is impossible, and an overnighter just silly.

Anyway, we left on Sunday, and came back on Tuesday. Monday we shopped around for a bit - we went to the surplus place on 1st Avenue where I got Aki a birthday present (Russian gas mask in its original container, filter still in its wrapping paper) and Lianne bought me a black M-65 field jacket (Chinese Alpha Industries copy fo the real article, but well enough made). Then we looked around in the Pike Place Market and went to Left Bank Books, my favourite lefty bookstore down there (http://www.leftbankbooks.com/) and got a few things (wishing I had gotten that Dori Seda biography after all), then lunch and out to Wallingford to Archie McPhee (http://www.mcphee.com/), where we always go but seems to disappoint just a bit each visit because there are so few weird old items left - the first time I went, in the late 80s, the store was full of bizarre old ephemera and surplus weird stuff, which I liked. But I did get an East German M43-feldmutze style cap and a Lenin all-day sucker. Then Lianne wanted to look for some clothes at Nordstrom's etc. so I went down to the Barnes and Noble and got a copy of US Army FM 3-07, Field Manual for Stability Operations, and looked around for some other things. Every second book in their "Current Affairs" shelf was something by some foaming right-wing moonbat, including four different titles by Glenn Beck.

Then it was time to go back and change for the concert - DEVO at the Moore Theatre, which I think is where we saw Kraftwerk in 2005 [check - no, it was the Paramount, in 2004]. They were playing two nights in each city: the first night they would play the entirety of their first album (Are we Not Men?) and the second night the third (Freedom of Choice). I like that album better, so this was the night we went. First we met our friends Lissa, Angie and Susan and had a drink and some izakaya snacks beforehand.

We were up in the gallery but not too nosebleedy, not a bad view. I had made two molds for casting Devo energy-dome style pins, like this



but 2-D, an inch wide and in tin. I made two models, one plain and one with "DEVO" marked on it. I made about 20 of these, painted them up with spray paint or nail polish, and gave them all away, to our friends and to people I saw wearing energy dome hats at the concert.

The show was great. I have been listening to Devo continuously for almost thirty years, was even in the Official Fan Club and this was the first time I had ever seen them live. For a bunch of pudgy nerds pushing sixty, they have still definitely got it! They had some character wearing only underwear and the Goofy Face rubber mask they called "Spudsie Pud" who came out with show cards to announce each track. Mark Mothersbaugh flung a few Energy Domes into the crowd, and after the album was done vanished from the stage for a few minutes and then came back as Booji Boy. They played a few more pieces but nothing from the new album, the last piece was a long version of "Beautiful World" and at the end of it Mark started digging out handfuls of little Superballs and beaming them into the crowd. One made it all the way up to the balcony, where it bopped Lianne above her left eye, then vanished!

As we were saying goodbye outside the theatre, someone with a digital camera and microphone setup came up to me and asked my opinion about the show and what I thought about Devo. Apparently they were making some kind of documentary or tour film, as I signed a model release later. But I bet I end up on the cutting room floor, AGAIN (http://ltmurnau.livejournal.com/60416.html, http://ltmurnau.livejournal.com/139044.html). Why, oh why did I tell them I liked "Mr. B's Ballroom"?

Going home was uneventful - we had left Akito on his own for two days and the house was in fine shape when we got back, just some dirty cooking pots and TV dinner shells. He got himself to school and all. He seems to be growing up well - yesterday, after we got home from the Remembrance Day parade, I went out with him on his first day of doing his paper route, which is also his first paid job!

So, not a bad time.

TMI = Too Many Infantry!

I never thought I would see something like this....

Canadian military no longer accepting infantry recruits

By Matthew Fisher , Canwest News Service
November 12, 2009 12:10 PM

KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan — So many young Canadians want to become trigger pullers in Afghanistan that the army is not accepting any new infantry recruits at the moment, according to the army's top general.

"I am 1,600 infantrymen over my establishment," Lt.-Gen. Andrew Leslie said Thursday, adding that the high numbers of recruits who want to "serve at the tip of the spear . . . completely refuted" any notion that there were problems getting people to serve in a wartime army.

"I still want young Canadians to show up at recruiting offices, but it just so happens that right now if you want to join the infantry, we're completely full," Leslie said.

The military also has many more volunteers for Afghanistan duty than there are places, the general — an artillery gunner by trade — said during an interview conducted after he had spent several days "outside the wire" in Kandahar with combat troops.

Canada's three infantry regiments have about 6,000 infantrymen, so these units — which have traditionally suffered the most in battle, as has been the case in Afghanistan — are presently more than 25 per cent oversubscribed.

To correct this unusual imbalance, the military is "slowing down recruiting for regular forces infantry for the next year or two," Leslie said, adding that the army is "encouraging folks from the infantry" to transfer to military jobs where there are still shortfalls, such as vehicle technicians and fire control system technicians.

So many Canadians still want to be part of the country's first major combat mission since the Korean War that the number of recruits and their quality is like nothing Leslie has seen in his three decades in the armed forces.

The military's success with recruiting follows a long television advertising campaign that has frequently highlighted the combat side of military operations. The ads, which have often run during hockey games and other sporting events watched by young men, have depicted troops taking part in missions on land and at sea in distant places that were made to look something like the Middle East or Southwest Asia.

"I find myself in a unique position in comparison to most of my fellow army commanders across NATO," Leslie said. "I have more volunteers every tour than I have positions. To come to Afghanistan is a competitive process."

The keenness of many soldiers to serve in Afghanistan may also be having an effect on attrition rates. For the infantry, the rate has fallen to 10 per cent from 12 per cent over the past 18 months, the general said. Across the entire army, attrition is down to eight per cent from 10 per cent, he said.

An informal survey of troops who have been in Kandahar during the past few months found many of those serving in combat arms were already angling to return to the Afghan province one more time with the battle group or as army or police mentors before Canada's combat mission is supposed to end in the summer of 2011.

The desire to get back to Afghanistan one more time is especially true of the last two infantry units scheduled to serve combat tours here — the Royal 22nd Regiment — the Van Doo — and the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.

© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service

I have to say, I find this amazing, as in my experience the infantry regiments were always understrength. And while 6,000 may seem a lot, remember that the Metro Toronto Police alone has over 5,700 "trigger pullers".