NS13Jarhead

Remember, if you crash and walk away five times, you are considered to be an enemy ace.

You didn't happen to see a red Ferrari sitting around, did you? I was stationed on the north side of Oahu (Kaneohe Marine Base) during the Magnum PI timeframe. It seemed like half of the fighter pilots had red Ferrari 308s. Too bad for them that the Magnum moustache was beyond Marine Corps uniform regulations.

Completed the war?!?! I'm just trying to survive one week!

I believe Dej may have deliberately placed the portraits in their respective locations. Based on the outcome of the engagement, Hawker's is in the sky (Heaven?), and Richtofen's is on the ground (as the survivor). It may be that he didn't have photos of the men facing in the proper direction to look toward the center, or the looking outward may have been an artistic choice. Seeing that I can't even color inside the lines in a child's coloring book, I really can't say much about about artistic intent. But I do agree that it is a wonderful image and an appropriate memorial to Hawker as well as one of the most notable dogfights of the early part of the war.

Nice card. Believe it or not, it's more expensive than the last two computers that I bought (the ones I bought for my kids, not for me )

My suggestion has nothing that has to do with the actual simulation. But I'd like to be able to see a preview of the skins to be selcted as the default. There are so many to choose from, it'd be nice to see them before selecting and going into a mission.

For inspiration, read about Frank Luke, who shot down 14 balloons and 4 airplanes in ten sorties flown on eight flying days during a period spanning just over two weeks. Apparently someone is making (or has just made) a film, called "The Stand" about Luke's last flight.

We've got a mega IKEA here near me outside of Washington DC. IKEA is generally made fun of here in the US, although most college students couldn't survive without it. As a matter of fact, Matt Groening (creator of the Simpsons) spoofed IKEA in his series, Futurama http://www.futurama-stream.com/season-5/episode-6-less-than-hero. The IKEA reference is about 1:40 into the clip. Still makes me laugh.

A toast to all who did their duty. To those who came home, and to those who did not. Salute!

I had an old Datsun 240Z that I used to adjust the timing on without a timing light. It had a "straight six" engine and dual side-draft carburators. I would turn the distributor cap (advance or retard the spark) until it sounded "right". Then I would go to the back of the car and feel the exhaust for any excessively powerful puffs of gas coming out and very gently twist the distributor until it evened out the exhaust flow. I wonder if the pilots could have done something similar based on the location of the end of the exhaust pipe being almost within arm's reach?

Inspired by the first post, some of my office mates and I decided to do World War II as a bar fight as well. After the last bar fight, America decides that it needs to be the bartender and bouncer and moves behind the bar. Germany comes to and sees everyone drinking with his money and sees Austria sitting in the corner by himself. Germany, angry that Britain, France, and America took his wallet grabs Austria and makes him stand next to him. Germany then does the same to Czechoslovakia. On the other side of the room, Japan punches China. After a while, America tells them to knock it off. Germany signs a bar napkin telling Britain that he is done moving people over to his side of the room. Germany sucker punches Poland, claiming that Poland started it. Russia says he will help and ends up punching Poland from the other side. France and Britain begin swinging at Germany. Germany pushes Britain through the door and knocks him into the pool. France is also shoved through the door, but comes back in wearing a new beret and decides to hang out with Germany. For no apparent reason, Russia slaps Finland. Italy gets into a fight over the toys in the sandbox out back, gets a bloody nose and cries to Germany for help. Germany and Britain get into a tug of war over Italy’s sandbox. Britain and Germany begin throwing rocks at each others’ houses. Because Russia helped him with beating up Poland, Germany sucker punches Russia. While everybody is looking at Germany and Britain, Japan puts China into a headlock and begins punching his head. America tells Japan to knock it off and tells him he’s had too much to drink and he’s cut off. Japan jumps over the bar and punches America. And Britain. And France. And the Netherlands. Germany shakes his fist at America and makes a rude noise. America jumps into Germany’s sandbox and falls flat on his ass. Italy laughs at him. Because America is mad at Germany, America punches Italy. America, Canada, and Britain rip off France’s new beret and punch Germany. America, Britain and Australia gang up and start shoving Japan back into a corner on the other side of the room. Germany taps America on the shoulder and says, “What’s that over there in the snow?” Then he kicks America in the behind when he’s not looking. Everyone piles on Germany until he passes out. America hits Japan in the face with a baseball bat like Capone did in “The Untouchables”. Twice. As Japan is on his way to the floor, Russia shakes his fist at Japan, thinking he’s joined the fight and that he’ll be able to go through Japan’s wallet after the fight’s over. After Japan and Germany wake up, America, France, Britain, and Russia move into Germany’s House. America also moves into Japan’s house. America buys drinks for Germany and Japan until everyone is happy again.

Thanks for sharing. Carl appears to be a bit of a goof. Always smiling at the camera. Based on his attitude in the photos (as compared to the other pilots), I'd bet he was the Jasta's "class clown"

Well, I've been busy doing other things - work, shuttling kids around, and using most of my computer time feeding my addiction to StarCraft 2. Well, long story short, while I'm sittng at the indoor pool with my kid for 2 hours at a time, 4 days a week, I've been going through re-reading some books of mine. One of them, "To the Last Man" by Jeff Shaara is a First World War "historical fiction" novel. Where the story follows real characters, but creates likely, but unrecorded, dialogs based on the situations and personalities of the characters. The four main ones are Raoul Lufberry, Manfred von Richtofen, John Pershing, and a fictional U.S. Marine, Roscoe Templeton. Anyway, the parts about Lufberry and Richtofen got me re-energized about WW I aviation and I pulled the old Saitek X45 out of the bottom desk drawer and fired up OFF again. I'd forgotten just how much of a challenge it is. I promptly killed off two pilots in two days. I need to reenlist in Jasta 11 with my trusty Albatros D.II. Crewchief, please have it painted red for me.

Very nice job with the color (or is it colour?). It looks just like many of the period pieces that I've seen.

Yep, just wating on V4Friend to get back from vacation or for 1.4 Beta to get posted to his website.

I downloaded and installed it - no problems. It seemed to be able to track me as I move my head around, but I couldn't get it to DO anything in OFF. I thought I might not know what I'm doing (yeah, that's never happened before) or had some sort of conflict with my Saitek X45 programming. So I checked back here to get the website to see if there was any info or manual. But I see from some of the previous posts that I'll most likely have to wait for the next update to have it work with OFF. If this works, it'll be a great enhancement of my flying pleasure.

Zeppelin and Handley Page 0/400 bomber. They'd both make excellent targets!

Congratulations and Semper Fi! Well done, brother. For those who are unfamiliar with it, the Navy Achievement (now called the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement) Medal is for exceptional personal performance. As such it is based on individual merit, and requires a justification to be submitted up the chain of command and has to be approved by a commander at the appropriate level. The medal itself looks like this:

I'm guessing Rise of Flight because the video title is "Two 1080p projectors, Eyefinity & Rise of Flight". But of course, that's just a guess.

Very nice! By the time you're done it'll be almost life sized.

From the Weekly World News (famous for the BatBoy series), found at supermarket checkout counters all across the US: FRANCE – One fisherman is going to have to find a very big fishbowl for his latest catch! This isn’t the type of goldfish you buy your kids at the pet store. Fisherman Raphael Biagini reeled in what is believed to be a 30-pound koi carp in France, where the fish is quite popular. The carp gives off the appearance of a giant goldfish thanks to its vivid orange color. While the picture is a few months old, it’s blazing through the Internet thanks to an article from the U.K.’s Daily Mail. There is speculation that the picture is a fake. Given the fact that online hoaxes are a dime a dozen, these fears aren’t farfetched. However, according to Ken Peterson, communications director at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, this isn’t out of the realm of possibility. If a koi has the right amount of food and enough space to grow, he says, there’s no telling how big they can get. Koi carp have indeed grown a lot bigger. John McCosker of the California Academy of Sciences points out that, according to FishBase.org, the largest koi on record weighed almost 90 pounds (also caught in France). Despite all of these facts, it still seems a little odd that Biagini isn’t struggling at all with the fish. As one commenter to the Daily Mail points out, it seems as though the fisherman is holding the fish the way somebody would hold a 1-pound package. Well, you tell us what you think…

I was watching a show the other day about the Battle of the Somme and heard something similar about the British attitude towards the ground pounders. The rear echelon headquarters deliberately did not attempt to improve the quality of life for their men in the trenches - apparently the brass was afraid that if life was too comfortable, the troops would be hesitant to leave their trenches and go over the top. Whereas the Germans were building nearly complete cities underground with ammenities unheard of on the other side of the lines.

Nine years ago I was minding my own business at USMC Headquarters, which is about 1/2 mile uphill from the Pentagon when the plane hit. That plane came in at about 30 feet above my building, clipped a street lamp on the way down and then hit the Pentagon. We heard a "thump" but thougth it was just some of the ever present construction. Then the fire alarm in my building went off and we all went outside, not knowing that anything had happened, just chalking it up to the construction guys hitting the wrong wire in the course of their repairs. When we got outside, there was a huge black cloud over the Pentagon and a large amount of smoke and flames near the helicopter landing pad. We didn't find out for a little while what had actually happened. And that's when everything changed. And, oh, yes, the 11th is also my birthday.

It's about 40 years old, but Richtofen's War kept me fairly entertained when I was a kid and sparked my interest in WWI. It even models torque effects on turning. But at age 10 I never could understand why an airplane should turn better to one direction than to another.

This is a fairly good explanation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bpIbdZhrzA&feature=related