Brand new buddies

[Kevin Trotter]

As I am middle aged and decrepit so much of this Hi Tech stuff is new to me. When I was in high school we had one computer hooked up to 15 schools

and if you didn't speak fortran or cobol you were out of luck. With the help of our insrtuctors we could do silly stuff like play chess or predict football scores but you needed to input data using punch cards and it took about three days if you didn't make a mistake. That is why I have become so enamored with the people in this community , you take for granted that the computers you know so well are more powerful than the ones that sent Apollo to the moon. But more than that the ability to trade opnions and ideas with people so far away , well , rocks.

My job as a D/A therapist puts me in contact , (intimate contact) with 35 people per week who entrust me with thier deepest darkest secrets.

After I get home the last thing I want is more human contact (wife and daughter excepted), and up

until I started playing this wonderful game , I'd isolate banging away at Playstation or N64 for hours(pretty pathetic huh?) Since then I feel fortunate to be able to interact with some truly interesting and brilliant people thru BC3000. Thusly, I don't feel we've been properly introduced so I'm including a few interesting facts about moi and hope anyone bored enough will reciprocate.

1). I was once hit in the head with a hatchet.

my best bud and I used to watch Daniel Boone on tv and each show would start with him throwing an axe thru a tree. My friend missed and I ended up with a boyscout hatchet 2inches above my left eye.

2) I am a second degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do. I used to compete in the northeast region of the US and once beat a member of the AAU

karate team in a match when I was 17 y/o. Sadly I am now fat and havent seen my feet in five years.

3) I was a witness in a mob murder trial.

Yes it is true a found a wallet of a bag man named A. Palermo who had been murdered in 1966. I was six years old and the actual trial didn't take place until 1977.I actually had a death threat while in grade school and all I remember was that I got out of school early and got ice cream from the Erie Police. I didn'y actually see anything ,I just found his wallet where they dumped his body (no I didn;t see his body)

4) I can eat fifty hardboiled eggs. Anyone who saw Cool Hand Luke can appreciate this momumental feat. However my roomate in college did not appreciate this heroic act as much as I did and I still owe him apologies.

5). One of my best friends is worth 200 million dollars. My mentor , friend and sensei,

one Billy Blanks of Tae Bo fame is loaded. I knew him when he lived in a housing project on west 38th street in Erie Pa and worked part time as a janitor at the Booker T Washington center. I know his wife Gail his stepdaughter Shelly (who used to put cerel up my nose when I feel asleep on thier couch the night before tournaments) and his son Billy. I remember how we always knew he would be famous one day> I remeber how he used to do 1000 push ups and situps before bed every night.

I remember how he once picked up a little boy whose finger had been cut off by accident and sprinted 20 blocks to get him to the hospital so his finger could be re attached and I mostly remember how brutal are practices were in his basement 3-4 hours no breaks. While I haven;'t talked to him in four years I wil always thank him for teaching me the importance of not quitting cause he never did.

well that is allthe interesting stuff , I hope some of you will feel free to unburden yourselves and not think me too crazy

[Guest Grayfox]

wow Race. Glad to meet ya i wouldnt mind sharing some of my "personal" life with my online brethren (and sisters) so here goes.

I was born and raised in Las Vegas, NV. I accidentally cracked my best friend in the head with an aluminum baseball bat when i was in 3rd grade. i was swinging at a T-Ball and missed, and he happened to be standing right behind me and WHACK!... i lost track of him after he moved back to chicago 3 years later.

I once met Tony Spilatro when i was 9... a few years before they found him and his brother beaten to death in a cornfield. (for anyone who has seen Casino, Joe Pesci was Anthony Spilatro). My father still "converses" with his "waste management" friends back in Philadelphia... if you dont know what that means, dont ask

i joined the army 10 days after my 18th birthday as a 12B combat engineer. My job was to put in mine fields and wire obstacles, and to generally blow stuff up. I was stationed with the 326th Engineer Battallion, 101st airborne in Ft Campbell, KY for 2 years, then i was transferred to Ft Knox Ky for a year and a half. i have seen conflict in Haiti , and have witnessed things i did not think that mankind was capable of doing to himself, things that still wake me in the middle of the night. I was in a vehicle accident in Haiti, where the vehicle rolled over and our heavy equipment box that was inside of the vehicle came loose and crashed down on 5 of us crushing my knees in the process (no more running for me )

before the accident, i was a very avid hockey player, and rugby player. i still bear the scar above my eye where i was accidentally cut by another players stick lol.

I was married for 2 years and had a son. on our second anniversary, my wife left me and the baby for someone who had money. i have been raising him ever since (and to all you single parents out there, especially men, i salute you).

currently i am working as a rent-a-cop in a casino in the shady part of vegas until my son starts first grade this year, then i can go back to school and get certified as an IT fool and then get paid for what i do in my off time :)No i havent shot anyone, but i came close twice. luckily the people involved had the sense to drop the weapon they were holding, and keep me from sending them to meet st peter... im tellin ya, crackheads are the worst people to negotiate with.

thats all i can really think of. try not to laugh too hard lol

[ 02-22-2002, 10:58: Message edited by: Grayfox ]

[Kevin Trotter]

Thanks for the reply Fox , I'm glad to know someone eles is out there. I must admit your "Waste mgt" story is more interesting than

mine and Casino is one of my favorite flicks.

I can also relate to the guarding aspect as well. I served in the USAF and was posted in Athens ,Greece for 18 mos (Overseas long tour ribbon) in the 7206 Security Police Sq. I have humped a few aircraft in my day, mostly Navy EP-3's , c-130's and a few C-5 Starlifters with an occasional F-14 when the big carriers were in up at Nea Makri. I had the good fortune to get a tour on the New Jersey on it's way to Lebennon in

81(maybe 82') and see fire control up close and personal. The only time I had to draw my weapon

was when some numbnut slicksleeve put a round in an EP-3 on the Flightline in front of the Sac det.

Seems he was bored and was playing quick draw and was to scared to come out after he shot that plane up. Didn't get to shoot him though.

In an interesting aside , the KKE (the Greek Communist party ) once hosted a protest in front of our base and had about 20,000 people surrounding Helenikon for a couple days. We had to establish a perimeter about 10 yards from the hurricane fencing that circled the base, pretty standard stuff, except that the BC and the OIC of my unit decided they didn't want an international incident and as a result only senior NCO's and officers had live rounds. Here we were parading around with a bunch of greeks screaming "Amerkani exo vase!" (American's leave the base) with no live rounds pretty hairy huh?

Good luck with the job till school starts I have a two year old and I don't know how you manage on your own. Stay strong bro and thanks for sharing. Anybody else?

[echo]

Hi race

Nice to meet you. I am the first registered (my claim to fame) and one of the few females you'll find around here. welcome!!

Grayfox, I salute you! Your son is a lucky boy!

I really don't have a mob story but I am reading a book about Whitely Bulger and the FBI.

[Guest Grayfox]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Race Bannon IV:

I had the good fortune to get a tour on the New Jersey on it's way to Lebennon in

81(maybe 82')

---

no kidding? then odds are you probably met my brother in law. he was onthe Jersey when they shelled Beirut back into the stone age. if im not mistaken, i think he was working in the engine room.

small world indeed

oh and thank you for the compliment echo, i really appreciate it Go Sox