{"id":1064,"date":"2006-08-05T06:38:50","date_gmt":"2006-08-05T11:38:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/good-and-bad\/"},"modified":"2006-08-05T06:38:50","modified_gmt":"2006-08-05T11:38:50","slug":"good-and-bad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/good-and-bad","title":{"rendered":"Good and Bad"},"content":{"rendered":"

The good news: Official VM just-about-closest-friend-in-the-world Ian just got promoted to Chief Petty Officer. At first, I thought this meant he was quitting the Navy to become a roadie for Tom Petty, but then I realized that it’s actually “the most significant promotion within the enlisted Navy ranks,” according to Wikipedia<\/a>. I’m hoping it’s accurate, as opposed to this hilarious story<\/a> from The Onion. So, congrats!<\/p>\n

The bad news: One of my uncles in Israel had to flee for the shelters last night. He writes,<\/p>\n

The nightmare becomes reality. At about 2100 this evening (Erev Shabbat) the sirens began to wail. Only my daughter and myself were about and we both made straight for the shelter. The siren seemed to go on for ever. After about a minute silence. A few seconds later we heard a distant boom. More like a thud. We waited a few minutes more and emerged unscathed from the shelter.<\/p>\n

It seems that three rockets fell in the vicinity of Hadera. No casualties reported so far. Spent the rest of the evening watching Clint Eastwood’s recent masterpiece: “Million Dollar Baby.” It was difficult getting the siren out of my mind. Latest news is that the IAF has taken the launchers out but I assume that they still have more launchers. Ah well, tomorrow’s another day. It always is!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I just finished re-reading the first segment of Gravity’s Rainbow, “inspired” by the rocket attacks. It’s “about” the German rocket attacks on England during WWII, focusing on the V-2 rocket. Since that one flew supersonically, the impact would occur before the sound of its approach. Pynchon’s characters (including several behavioral scientists) are fascinated by this concept, with the way our perception of cause and effect gets reversed.<\/p>\n

Of course, in the Middle East, we all have our own problems with sorting out cause and effect. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The good news: Official VM just-about-closest-friend-in-the-world Ian just got promoted to Chief Petty Officer. At first, I thought this meant he was quitting the Navy to become a roadie for Tom Petty, but then I realized that it’s actually “the most significant promotion within the enlisted Navy ranks,” according to Wikipedia. I’m hoping it’s accurate, … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Good and Bad”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literature"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-ha","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":242,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/once-in-a-lifetime","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":0},"title":"Once in a Lifetime","author":"Gil","date":"May 4, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"I saw some of Pat Tillman's memorial service yesterday evening. Senator McCain was speaking when I tuned in, followed by Chief Petty Officer Steven White, who served with Tillman in Iraq. I didn't catch his introduction, but I think he was a SEAL in the Navy.He spoke wonderfully and plainly,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4669,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-nov-20-2009","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":1},"title":"Unrequired Reading: Nov. 20, 2009","author":"Gil","date":"November 20, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Who expected it? Another Friday dose of Unrequired Reading! Just click \"more\"! EIGHT GLASSES OF WINE A DAY?! * * * Best new NYC buildings of the decade? And you included the Hearst monstrosity? Sigh . . . * * * WSJ interview with Russian literature transators Richard Pevear and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Adventures in Gin"","block_context":{"text":"Adventures in Gin","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/adventures-in-gin"},"img":{"alt_text":"bsux.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/bsux.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1006,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/good-thing-ian-didnt-bring-up-his-navy-record","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":2},"title":"Good thing Ian didn’t bring up his Navy record","author":"Gil","date":"June 28, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Last December, Amy & I stopped in on one of the hotels in New Orleans where we were planning to reserve a block of rooms for guests at our wedding. The place was still under reconstruction, but one of the upper floors had just been refurnished, the desk clerk told\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Orleans"","block_context":{"text":"New Orleans","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/travel\/new-orleans"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1586,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/dis-credit","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":3},"title":"Dis-credit","author":"Gil","date":"July 15, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"I bought the DVDs of the first 2 seasons of News Radio a few months back. Amazon had it for around $15 (it's $30 as I check now). It's one of those shows that I never caught regularly, but every rerun I've stumbled across has made me laugh pretty hard.\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=virtualmemories-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B0000ZMH8S","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1162,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/more-congrats","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":4},"title":"More congrats!","author":"Gil","date":"October 16, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"First, Official VM just-about-closest-friend-in-the-world Ian gets his chief petty officer pin, and now he goes off and pops the question to his One True Love! Much congratulations are in order! Go, Ian! In additional friends-of-VM news, my buddy Faiz reveals the true reason he couldn't meet up with me &\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":173,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unhappy-vj-day","url_meta":{"origin":1064,"position":5},"title":"Unhappy VJ Day","author":"Gil","date":"March 18, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"JJ Jackson, one of the initial five VJs on MTV, died yesterday. Condolences to his family and friends.The first concert I ever went to was Asia, back in 1983. My mom's friend John was the band's financial manager. After the show, we got to go backstage to meet the band\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}