On my Youtube channel.

For the first 6 months or so I was getting a ridiculous amount of views, subscriptions, and video comments but now it's about 10th of what it used to be.

So yeah, check out my stuff.

Here's a video of Marines shooting an insurgent in a counter-ambush operation. The internet is filled with videos of attacks on US forces. I thought I'd balance things a bit.

Warning, this video is violent and may disturb you. Don't watch it if you don't want to see someone die.

In the Seattle and the Puget Sound area, we have Boeing, Microsoft, Naval Station Everett, and the Army base Fort Lewis. Boeing produces civilian and military aircraft, Microsoft produces some military software aside from civilian software, Naval Station Everett is the home port of an Aircraft carrier battle group, and Fort Lewis is a very important Army base that is home to the Stryker brigades and so forth.

I live in an important part of the military-industrial complex, and I'm part of it. I just started working at Boeing (I'm technically in training). My job isn't classified or anything cool like that, but I'm part of one of world's largest and most important aeronautics/defense corporations. It's an interesting thing to think about. A lot of people joke that this would make an excellent target for a nuke attack; so many strategic targets in such a concentrated area.

The branch of Boeing that I work at is in Everett, which is also my hometown. Just a few miles from Boeing is the naval station, home to several US Navy ships, including the USS Abraham Lincoln, a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier (super carrier).

I took this picture at the port of Everett, overlooking Naval Station Everett. It's such a gigantic, awesome ship, it's too bad the camera on my phone sucks ass. You can't really grasp how big it is by this picture, but you get the idea.

Today I went to Anthony's, which is my favorite restaurant.

They are mostly dedicated to their seafood, which is excellent, but their other food is really good as well, especially their steak. So today I decided to get the ridiculously expensive 8 oz filet mignon, which was about $35. The last time I had it was about 8 years ago at my brother's wedding rehearsal dinner, and I had remembered how good it was.

It's quite pricey, but it's worth it. So I snapped some pics, because it was that good, cooked medium-rare, with just the right amount of red.

Pic 1

Pic 2

Mmm... dead animal.

It is superior to yours.

I don't know what's with me and buying/trading-for things that I don't really want or need, but I keep getting weird opportunities to get things for cheap trades, so I just do it.

I made a thread about 6 months ago because I bought an 8GB 2nd Generation iPod Nano from my neighbor for 130 bucks and a bottle of wine. I was going to break it and videotape the destruction, but I ended up trading it for a gas card a few months ago.

But this time I got the new 3rd Generation Nano (also 8GB) from my brother. I traded my old TV for it this time (an old 26-inch JVC CRT). But I might keep this one because it has video and shit, and even though it's still entirely inferior to the Zune (the old one), it's kind of nifty.

Like I did the last time, I decided to take pics of it next to my Zune for contrast.

And I'm not ashamed of it.

See, I've noticed a kind of pattern in styles and trends. A certain product, whatever it is, will be rocketed out of obscurity by a brief, intense period of popularity and later become hated by people when it becomes cliché. People get sick of something, and the intense popularity ends up resulting in an equally intense unpopularity. This only happens with things that are very popular, because other less-popular styles can last longer and be neutral as other styles come and go.

Crocs were the shit a few months ago, but now people think they suck ass. There's a balance that people follow, a trend. But I don't follow it.

I just got a pair of Crocs recently (the model everyone wore) because I discovered that they are incredibly comfortable. I'm about... 5 months late and I don't give a fuck. The fad has died out, so I feel better about wearing them because I almost always dislike things just because they are popular. Crocs are basically meant for warm weather, and well the summer is over and I'm wearing them anyway. I don't have anyone to impress and I'm currently intentionally unemployed so I'd wear fluffy animal slippers if it fancied me.

But the Crocs don't make my feet cold or anything, and the comfort outweighs the possible negatives. I wear them at all times basically other than when I sleep and bathe. I'm wearing them right now, they make my feet happy.

The existence of Orange Chicken.

I made some tonight with sticky rice, I followed a recipe and started from scratch. Except, I probably make it better than the Chinese do themselves by adding a few things to personalize it, and make it a bit spicier. So, in that regard the Chinese are still inferior.

I'm an excellent cook, feast your eyes upon my creation:

Forethought: I've noticed that my blog has naturally become an "I went and did this" type thing, not an "I like this, and that, but I don't like those" kind of blog. So I think I'm going to try and keep it current and true to this concept, because at least once a week or so I go and do something interesting, which will be more interesting for readers.

So, I went to the Seattle Museum of Flight today (Wednesday, technically yesterday). It was cool, I took a lot of pictures of a lot of sweet planes. First off, I have to say that planes, even fighter planes, are way bigger than they appear in pictures on the internet or on TV. They are huge, they are incredible. It's mind boggling how complicated they are, and how we, human beings, can make them freaking FLY.

I've always been interested in planes, but I think that as a society we become so used to the concept that we don't really appreciate their significance. 100 years ago most humans used animals for transportation, now we have flying machines that travel 3 times the speed of sound.

Here's the pics of the planes:

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- SR-71 Blackbird (American) -

This is basically my favorite plane, it's the fastest in the world. It was used for reconnaissance during the Cold War but has since been decommissioned because stealth > speed these days.

1. Front
2. Front - zoomed
3. Under- right side
4. Right Engine
5. Under - front (Small Chinese people in the picture for scale)
6. Front - above
7. Back-drone (you'll see 3 thrusters in the back, one of them is actually the D-21/M-21 drone plane that is mounted to the top which is the only one now in existence I heard.)
8. Cockpit-outside
9. Cockpit- inside (I'm sitting in the seat)
10. Cockpit-inside 2 (holding the stick)

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- B-47 Stratojet (American) -

This was one of the first jet-powered bombers and was designed to bomb the shit out of the Soviets in the 50's. It was unique in that it had a crew of only 3 and was one of the first planes to incorporate high-end radar, high end navigation, and computer assisted fire control/bomb guidance. It's a huge plane, the pictures can't really capture how big it is.

1. Right side
2. Front
3. Front-right

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- RQ-3 Dark Star (American) -

This is a stealth UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle). It was top secret for a while but has since been declassified and is kind of a novelty because it was never put into service, but it's the SWEETEST looking plane. Very sci-fi looking.

1. Bottom-right front
2. Back
3. Back-left
4. Right side

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- AGM-86B (American) -

This is actually a long-range air-launched cruise missile which can have either a nuclear or conventional warhead. What makes it special is that it flies below radar, over 1,500 miles to a target, using radar to sense the terrain. Sweet only one pic though.

1. Right side

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Uodate!
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- A-6 Intruder (American) -

This was a very versatile jet back during the Cold War, and is still used today. It was mainly used for penetrating enemy airspace for ground-strike missions but its derivatives are are still used for electronic warfare; radar jamming, radio jamming etc..

1. Left side
2. Front right
3. Bombs (Sweet)

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- F-4 Phantom (American) -

This is regarded as the first "modern" jet fighter in the world, first using missiles entirely, and relying on instruments to engage the enemy rather than visual site. This tactic proved troublesome during the Vietnam war when it was up against the MiG 21, but the kill ratios were still pretty lopsided against the MiGs.

1. Front
2. Front right
3. Left side
4. Left engine
5. Pilot suit

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- AV-8 Harrier (American/British) -

1. Right side
2. Right side zoomed
3. Left side

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- F-14 Tomcat (American) -

Universally regarded as the worlds most successful naval air-dominance fighter of all time. This is the plane in the movie "Top Gun".

1. Right side
2. Front
3. Left side

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- MiG-21 (Soviet/Russian) -

This was one of the first modern Russian jets, which was the name rival of the American F-4 Phantom during the Vietnam war. It was much smaller, lighter, and more nimble but lacked in technology (and training of its pilots).

1. Front
2. Left front
3. Right side
4. Back
5. Pilot suit

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- F-86 Sabre (American/Canadian) -

1. Front
2. Front left

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- MiG-15 (Russia/Soviet) -

1. Right front

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- MiG-17 (Russian/Soviet) -

1. Right
2. Right zoomed

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WWII-era fighters
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- F4U Corsair (America) -

1. Front let
2. Right
3. Piston engine

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- Focke-Wulf Ta 152 (German) -

1. Front right
2. Front right (2)

More coming soon (again)....

And yesterday as well. I hadn't gone for a while so I was excited about it all week. Yesterday I bought a shitload of ammo (12 boxes of 25) and a shitload of clays (2 boxes of 135) and my friend brought about half of that. I had some left over, so we went again today but to a closer place.

We went north near a town called Darrington yesterday, which is up in the mountains, where we launch clays off of a cliff and shoot them out over the valley. We shot for about 4 hours, and we also shot my old stereo to bits for fun, which I recorded.

In fact, I recorded a bunch of video clips yesterday of us doing trick shots. I was planning on posting them, but for some odd freaking reason they were absolutely fuzzy as hell. The looked fine when I watched them on the camera, but when I put them on my computer they get all pixelated, with high contrast and everything got really bright. They got even worse when I uploaded them to Youtube. The crappy quality made it hard to see the clay pigeons in the air, and it was impossible to see them break and release the cloud of dust that they do. So I decided to scrap that project, and I didn't bring the camera today (maybe next time).

I had the day off so I went to the range early today.

I was getting bored of shooting the Beretta 92 9mm, and I was feeling a bit saucy so I decided to use the range's Springfield XD in .45 ACP.

As always, I killed the shit out of the target, I'm an excellent shot. I used the "2 in the chest, 1 in the head" pattern several times at 30 feet, from a standing position, shooting two sets of 3 shots within 5 seconds.

I've decided that when I turn 21 I will be buying an XD, it's one of the nicest, most solid and accurate handguns I've ever fired. Usually guns chambered in .45 ACP are a bit clumsy, especially high-capacity ones, but the XD is so smooth, has very good ergonomics, and felt like I was firing a much less powerful round due its action that soaks up recoil.

I was proud of my shooting today, so I tacked the target to my wall.