(Vic meets the Colonel in Yokosuka, 1980, Larry Jensen, RIP, and lovely Paula Brown, and a pensive Paula in watchcap.)

So, Florida State apparently beat Auburn in the last seconds. That would have been news to me last night, but my head was lolling in its customary place and when my eyes drifted shut, the War Eagles of Auburn were still up.

Oh well, put away the pads and the helmet for the winter. We are going to have to get used to basketball again, and that is not going to be interesting until March. That would be on the other side of the Big Chill, which is paralyzing the capital.

News-and-weather on the Eights is moaning about the wind chill- and I am here to tell you that it is colder than crap out on the patio at Big Pink. They say the sub-zero temps will shackle us for another day or so- and then back to the fifties.

No weather trolling here this morning, or snide shots at the First Lady and Ms Jarrett, who are extending their vacation in the Islands with a jaunt to Maui, while the President returned to the City with the girls to get back to work or school. Time to get focused again. I feel curiously adrift with it all.

In my case, I wound up focused on a place far away where it was warm all the time, a place we called “GONZO Station,” just north of the Equator, when the Iranians started their long war with us with the seizure of the US Embassy in Tehran. It seems like so many conflicts have come and gone since those days, and yet that one continues as vibrant and nasty as ever, though the NY Times announced the startling news from the Islamic Republic that there may be some common ground with the Great Satan.

I don’t know about that. I do know we were getting ready to do something rash, and the President sent the mighty nuclear aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN-68) and her escorts to join our merry bunch of Japanese Gypsies on Midway (CV-41).

(L-R, clockwise: Nimitz and Jouett (CG-29) approach Midway- underway replenishment Old School, Phantoms Phorever).

(Nimitz and Jouett, helos dance and an E-2 Hawkeye goes flying.)

(Aircraft carriers! And Go-Fast jets!)

(Fun in the Fleet. We are planning what became the mess at DESERT ONE, operation EAGLE CLAW down in Mission Planning- at least the carrier part. We had the big helos on board that would ferry the rescued hostages to us at sea).

(Home in Yokosuka. We left the Nimitz to do the rescue attempt herself. We have been at war with Iran ever since).

Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303Adrift