Comet Neowise
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Just want to brag about my physical activity yesterday (9/13/2020). That's a 7.3 mile swim around Beavertail Point in Jamestown, RI. It took me a little over five hours. But, at 59½ years old...I think that's OK. I've run several 26.2 mile marathons in my life, done bike rides in excess of 100 miles, and many other swims of not quite this distance. I did this event last year (slight course change made it a mile longer this year). As such...I trained up for it appropriately starting in February. But this swim...this might have been the toughest physically demanding event I've ever taken on. That middle three miles south of the point...essentially out in Block Island Sound...was very rough with 6' to 8' swells. Those conditions probably added :45-:60 minutes to my finishing time. My accompanying kayaker had difficulty staying upright. There were 15 swimmers that started, I was the oldest. Only 9 finished. Dan
From the Wildcat Creek to the Salween River (And back)
From the Wildcat Creek to the Salween River (And back) In December of 1940 the depredation of world war had not yet involved American military forces. There was American involvement – specifically in Asia – but it was in the form of mercenaries working for the Chinese government. China was being ravaged by the advancing Imperial Japanese forces and could muster only limited resistance. Three years earlier, in 1937, retired U. S. Army Air Corps Captain, Claire Chennault had been asked by Chinese leader Chiang Kai-Shek to help organize, train, and advise the Chinese Air Force. After months of negotiations Chennault answered the call and took with him a few hundred former U.S. military fighter pilots. This group of mercenaries became known as the American Volunteer Group (AVG) and acquired the nickname The Flying Tigers. In Lafayette, Indiana…about the same time Chennault began negotiating with the Chinese, Richard Force was finishing his scholastic career. He had attended g...