The Gear: T-Shirt Collection

A few weeks ago, I mentioned my interest in procuring a Mobile Infantry T-shirt. I actually love cool T-shirts, and they're part of how I express my distinct American-ness here in Scotland. I figured I'd mention a few of my favorites.

One of my favorites is from ThinkGeek, and it's a mashup between the Keep Calm and Carry On phenomenon, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Don't Panic and Carry a Towel. A couple of my other favorites are from 5.11 Tactical, and feature a couple of great quotes: "Ask Not for a Lighter Burden, but for Broader Shoulders"; and the classic George Orwell quote, "We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." Many of my shirts come from Ranger Up, which combines military and patriotic themes with a healthy dose of snark. I mentioned a few days ago that Landlady hooked me up with a Nobody Likes John Kerry T-shirt from Ranger Up in the care package she and Big Dave sent me. I brought a few others with me, including Live Free or Die, The Lord is a Man of War, and several different colors of St. Michael.

I have a Captain America shield T-shirt. I love wearing that one, particularly under my red, white, and blue plaid dress shirt.

One of my favorite web comics is Wondermark, and its writer, David Malki(!), sells shirts through a webstore on Topatoco.com. I have three of them: The Negotiator, after his comic of the same name; My Parents Never Taught Me Arabic, which I can actually read if you give me long enough; and a brown Steam Powered Heart shirt, which appears to be out of print.

When I worked in the Middle East, I started wearing regular T-shirts under my polo and dress shirts in lieu of a plain white one. When I get back to the States, I think I'm going to keep that up, if for no other reason that the motivational factor of knowing that, at any minute, I could rip open my dress shirt and scream at the top of my lungs: "Captain America!" Well, probably not, but you get the idea.

Debacle in Shetland: From Lerwick to Hermaness

After a good night's sleep on the ferry, the MV Hrossey deposited me at the ferry terminal in Lerwick on Tuesday morning. That was the point at which my adventures in Shetland began.

I waited around for a few minutes for the chap (Bob, if I remember correctly) from Bolts Car Hire to arrive to sort out my hire car. As I've insinuated previously, I'm going to have plenty of negative or non-complimentary things to say about Shetland, but I'm going to give credit wherever it's due. I have nothing but good things to say about Bolts Car Hire. They were professional, my car was exactly what I needed, and the price was reasonable. I would absolutely recommend them to anyone who needed to hire a car in Shetland.

My initial reaction to Shetland was that parts of it that reminded me of Wyoming. There was a valley that ran from Lerwick to right around Voe that reminded me of a stretch of territory north of Cody, Wyoming. That was a good thing - I love Wyoming. My goal was to head for the northern end of the Isle of Unst to find the United Kingdom's most northerly geocache. I turned north out of the ferry terminal car park and drove across half of the Shetland mainland, then took a ferry to the Isle of Yell. After driving up the length of Yell (and seeing signs for "Chinese Night" at the Mid Yell Boating Club - whatever that's all about), I took a second ferry onto Unst. Unst is the most northerly inhabited island in the United Kingdom, and is apparently famous for its bus shelter... ? During the brief (ten minutes?) ferry transit from Yell to Unst, I was able to get myself a few feet off of the main deck to snap a few pictures.

The foliage on the Mainland, Yell, and Unst was very brown, and the islands are literally teeming with sheep. They're sparsely populated, like most areas of Orkney. I've not visited many of the islands of Orkney, but I've hit a number of them - more than I visited while I was in Shetland - and Shetland's outskirts seem a bit less kept up than even the remote parts of Orkney that I've visited.

Aside from some vaguely interesting scenery, there wasn't much to see once I got to Unst. I drove through a little village called Haroldswick (or maybe it was Baltasound?), and took a westerly turn to get me nearer to the geocache I was seeking out, and parked at the Hermaness Visitor Center. I learned upon arriving that Hermaness is a national nature reserve, specifically providing a refuge for migratory birds. (All I saw there was seagulls and sheep - lots of sheep.)

The circumstances under which I almost lost my life in the Hermaness National Nature Reserve shall be the topic of my next post on my Debacle in Shetland.

High Adventure in Edinburgh!

CN Homeboy is a great guy, but he gives lousy advice.

Back in January, I was planning to make a quick run down to Edinburgh to visit an "army navy store" - what we Yanks would call a surplus store - to buy a service sweater - or, as my Marine colleagues would call it, a "wooly pully". It's one of a handful of uniform items the Americans and Brits have in common, and they're fantastic. They're lightweight, warm, durable, go great with a pair of Carhartts, and can be worn under a light or heavy jacket. I had decided that, given my relative lack of intermediate warm clothing, I ought to get a service sweater.

I mentioned this to several of my classmates, and CN Homeboy informed me that instead of going all the way down to Edinburgh, I could go to McKay's in Aberdeen and save myself the trip. Unfortunately, McKay's didn't have a green or black service sweater - they only had light grey. I ended up getting one, but in all honesty, the thing's way too light in color, doesn't match any of my existing kit, and never gets worn. This was the third-worst advice that CN Homeboy has ever provided, following:

Second worst: "This cab stand's got a shorter queue than the one down the other way, and it's only a two minute walk." In fact, the queue was just as long, and it was at least a ten minute walk, uphill, at 2:00 AM.

Worst: "Scotland should secede." I've discussed this one at length.

Anyway, in need of at least one more sweater ("jumper") to give me some options as the weather gets warmer, I decided a couple of weeks ago that the time had come to visit Leith Army Stores/LAS Outdoors on Leith Walk in Edinburgh. On a Friday, on a whim, I decided that I had nothing I needed to accomplish, and gave them a ring to make sure they had them in stock, then had them put one on hold for me. I caught the bus down to the Aberdeen city center, got the noon train to Edinburgh, and was on my way. Once I arrived, I walked downhill, and eventually found the shop. I browsed a bit, then paid for my service sweater and was on my way back up the hill. I enjoyed lunch at the KFC in the Princes Mall in Edinburgh, mainly on account of the Pepsi that came with my meal - for some reason, I've been jonesin' for some Pepsi for a while now - and then decided to kill some time with a couple of drams in the Balmoral Bar, where I'd enjoyed some fine spirits when Gus visited last year. As I drank, I read from Imperial Grunts on my Kindle.

Edinburgh had one more afternoon surprise in store. I decided to use the loo - thirty pence, highway robbery! - before getting on the train to head back to Aberdeen. As I was washing my hands, I saw a guy walk in dressed as Waldo. I figured it was some promotion for a shop or something. When I walked back out into the main concourse, I saw four guys standing together, all of them dressed as Waldo. Then, in the distance, I saw a giant gaggle of them. So, I approached the small group, and asked: "Okay, I'll bite. Why are you guys all dressed up like Waldo?" One of them looked furious, then calmed down and explained that in the United Kingdom, "Waldo" is "Wally". Of course, I had to get my picture taken with these guys, who were getting ready to board a train from Waverley to Haymarket - Edinburgh's other station - for the beginning of a stag weekend (bachelor party in the American vernacular). Unfortunately, a couple of them - including the enthusiastic chap in the glasses who's standing right next to me in the picture - actually missed their stop, and had to stay on the train until the next stop, which was nearly an hour later.

With my high adventures in Edinburgh (which is normally about the most boring city in Scotland) complete for the day, I was glad to get back to Aberdeen. In CN Homeboy's defense, if he'd kept his mouth shut in the first place, I might never have gotten my picture taken with twenty guys dressed up like Waldo/Wally.

The Gear: Fun With a GPS

I used to love my Garmin eTrex. Now, I love my Garmin eTrex Vista. I got the Vista when I was working in the Middle East with the intention of using it for my work, but didn't get the opportunity. I started screwing around with it near the end of my stint, and ended up downloading EasyGPS in order to use the Vista's USB port connect it to my laptop. I ended up figuring out that the .GPX files used by programs interfacing with a GPS utilize XML, which is similar to HTML, which I'm actually pretty familiar with. So, while I've been here in Aberdeen, I've started screwing around with EasyGPS, the .GPX files, and the Vista.

During my recent trip to Shetland, my goal was to spend most of my trip finding geocaches. That's another story for an upcoming post in the series on Shetland, but I've written about geocaching in Aberdeen before, and one of the ways I've been learning more about the system is by taking the data off of the Geocaching website, creating my own waypoints by hand in the .GPX XML file, and then loading those waypoints onto my Vista. Since Wikimapia also uses the decimal coordinate system that the .GPX files use, I've used a combination of the Geocaching website's coordinate converter and Wikimapia to create waypoints.

Here's an example. On the western end of Aberdeen, you've got two different locations of note: SYHA Aberdeen, and the Gordon Highlanders Museum. Back in October, I went back to the SYHA hostel where I stayed in 2004 to get a grid on my GPS. That waypoint is listed below, with the pointy brackets ( > and < ) replaced by squared brackets ( ] and [ ) to keep Blogger from getting confused. That top portion in bold is the part with the coordinates.

[wpt lat="57.14252391" lon="-2.12983816"]
[ele]46.509[/ele]
[time]2012-10-04T20:23:53Z[/time]
[name]SYHAAB[/name]
[cmt]04-OCT-12 21:23:53[/cmt]
[sym]Flag, Blue[/sym]
[type]Flag, Blue[/type] [extensions]
[label xmlns="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/gpx_overlay/0/3"]
[label_text]SYHAAB[/label_text]
[/label]
[/extensions]
[/wpt]

So, let's say that I want to change the waypoint from SYHA Aberdeen, and use it to create a new waypoint for the Gordon Highlanders Museum, which I visited with Gus in November. I get the coordinates by finding the museum on Wikimapia (possibly with the help of Google Maps, which has a better search function for locations within cities). Here's the link from Wikimapia:

http://wikimapia.org/#lang=en&lat=57.137497&lon=-2.146432&z=18&m=b

So, by taking that 57.137497 and -2.146432, and plugging it into that top line, and then changing a few more items, we get this:

[wpt lat="57.137497" lon="-2.146432"]
[ele]46.509[/ele]
[time]2012-10-04T20:23:53Z[/time]
[name]Highlanders[/name]
[cmt]04-OCT-12 21:23:53[/cmt]
[sym]Flag, Blue[/sym]
[type]Flag, Blue[/type] [extensions]
[label xmlns="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/gpx_overlay/0/3"]
[label_text]Highlanders[/label_text]
[/label]
[/extensions]
[/wpt]

I usually put in something standard for things like time, date, and elevation. Elevation's a bit tougher to get from online maps, and doesn't really matter as much as the coordinates themselves when you're trying to navigate using a GPS handset. Before I went up to Shetland, I loaded waypoints for ten geocaches. A couple of weeks ago, I went through all of the waypoints currently contained on my Vista, reformatted them for manipulation in Excel, organized them into categories (and identified a few of them with vague names/labels), and saved them to a text file for future use. The intent is to have a list of important waypoints - for example, seventeen geocaches for an upcoming trip to Oman - that can be copied and pasted into a .GPX file and then loaded onto my Vista as needed. It also allows me to both backup and store waypoints I no longer need (for example, my old apartments) without taking up memory in my Vista itself.

Next on my agenda to figure out is how the XML for tracks works. You set the GPS to record your movement from one place or another, and it creates a track. If I needed to pre-load a specific route between two or more waypoints, I'd do it by finding a bunch of locations and then stringing them together as a track. I need to figure out the order by which track points ("trkpt") and track segments ("trkseg") fit within tracks ("trk") to tell the GPS where to draw the line. It shouldn't be too hard, I just need to screw around with a sample track. This will also help me to understand how to do honesty traces, which I read about a few years ago and would really like to learn how to do for my risk management work. In the mean time, having successfully loaded those geocaching waypoints into into my Vista was a great step in the right direction.

Around Aberdeen: Gurkha Kitchen

I was hanging out with CN Bones on Wednesday, and ended up parting company near her place. I've been trying to walk more lately, so I decided to go for a bit of a constitutional. While walking down George Street - Aberdeen's second high street after Union Street - I made an astonishing discovery. What's that? A Nepalese restaurant? And it's called the Gurkha Kitchen? And they deliver? They have a website and everything?

Hachi machi. This changes everything.

I still love Lionel's, and eat there once or twice every week. And I've figured out how to order from Papa John's (spoiler alert, it's not that tough!). Even so, the ability to diversify a bit with Nepalese food - which is delicious - is a welcome change of pace. I checked out the Gurkha Kitchen's menu online (web/PDF), and on Thursday night I ordered the momo dumplings, some saag paneer, pilau rice, and two strips of plain naan. The naan wasn't the best I've ever had - more on that in an upcoming post - but it was pretty good, and the rest of my meal was fantastic. I will most definitely be ordering from the Gurkha Kitchen again.

I have a sort of unhealthy obsession with Nepal, similar to my unhealthy obsessions with Orkney and Oman. When I worked in the Middle East, one of my duties was overseeing a team of about forty guys, most of whom were from Nepal. I have never had a bad experience with someone from Nepal. They're extremely polite, efficient, trustworthy... I just can't say enough good things about these people. I'm about the most ardent American patriot that most people are likely to find, but I'll admit freely that I'm more likely to enjoy the company of someone from Nepal than I am to enjoy the company of other Americans. My Nepalese team (and their Indian, Bangladeshi, and Sri Lankan colleagues, though most of the team was from Nepal) always had my back, and I took that seriously then, and continue to take it seriously now. Someday, I will visit Nepal.

Nepal is perhaps most famous for the Gurkhas, legendary soldiers - probably the best soldiers on the planet - who most famously fight for the British Army in the Brigade of Gurkhas, but also in the Indian Army and the Singapore constabulary. One of today's best independent journalists, Michael Yon, spent time with the Gurkhas back in 2009 (I, II, III; warning, Yon's website has been subject to malware attacks in recent months, don't click unless your virus software is up to snuff), and noted not only their professionalism and effectiveness as a fighting unit, but also their ability to communicate with Afghans by speaking Hindi. In recent years, Nepalese/Gurkha soldiers have been subject to criticism for allegedly causing a Cholera outbreak in Haiti, and for beheading a dead Taliban commander. I prefer to focus on the legends surrounding their tireless service - and more recent stories, like Sergeant Dipprasad Pun winning the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross by fighting off thirty Taliban single-handedly, at one point by beating them with his machine gun tripod after he ran out of ammunition. The Nepalese are eager to exploit the reputation of the Gurkhas, but the truth is that every Nepalese person I've ever met has embodied the character that makes the Gurkhas so legendary in the first place.

As it turns out, CN GBU-16 is also a pretty big fan of the Nepalese. In conjunction with the St. Machar Rotary Club (Aberdeen has multiple Rotary clubs!?), GBU-16 and some of her colleagues raised nearly £1500 (their goal was £500!) at a casino night at one of Aberdeen's churches-turned-pubs, Soul Casino on Union Street in the Aberdeen city center. About a week later, GBU-16 and two of her colleagues left for a month in Nepal to deliver the funds and oversee some of the initial construction of a library for a Nepalese primary school. I was in regular contact with GBU-16 during her trip, and although it was a great challenge for her, she had the time of her life. (She was also gracious enough to bring me two gifts: a 7th Duke of Edinburgh's Own Gurkha Rifles pin from the Gurkha Memorial Museum in Pokhara, and a Gurkha hat with a Brigade of Gurkhas pin from a shop in Kathmandu. In the very near future, I foresee the two of us having an SND study session in the SOC while eating chow delivered from the Gurkha Kitchen.

Oddly enough, another Nepalese restaurant turned into a pivotal element of the recent debacle in Shetland... But more on that later.

Debacle in Shetland: Travel by Ferry

Before my trip to Shetland, I'd taken the MV Hrossey twice: once in 2004, and then again back in October. The Hrossey and the MV Hjaltland constantly rotate on the run up to Shetland, stopping at Kirkwall on some of those runs. For this trip to Shetland, I elected to get a cabin on both legs of the trip so that I could get some sleep and a shower before arriving in Shetland, and back in Aberdeen. I was on the Hrossey ("Rossey") for the trip up on Monday, and on the Hjaltland ("Yaltland") for Wednesday's trip back down.

Many years ago, my family took two cruises aboard the Royal Caribbean cruise ship MS Viking Serenade, which Wikipedia (the undisputed and infallible source of all knowledge) claims was built as a "cruiseferry" in the first place. At any rate, the cabins aboard the Hrossey and the Hjaltland remind me of the ones my family slept in aboard the Viking Serenade. The Hrossey and Hjaltland are considerably smaller, of course, with only two decks of space available for passengers to move about.

Deck five consists of berths and the reception desk, while deck six has a forward lounge, movie theater, gift shop, midships bar, and aft dining room. An observation deck on deck six, abaft the dining area, overlooks the mooring gear on deck five, as well as the area behind the ship. In addition to other available menu items, the dining room makes a point of showcasing Orkney beef and Shetland lamb. Another observation deck, possibly on deck eight, gives a much more extensive view restricted only by the ship's exhaust stacks and bridge. With camera in hand, on both the sailings, I was the last man standing on the upper observation deck once we'd departed.

The service is operated by under the Northlink Ferries brand, the contract for which was taken over by Serco Group PLC, which submitted the winning bid to the Scottish Government in what has become a somewhat controversial development among the Islanders. Regardless, the Northlink crews provide a great service, and although my October sailing to Orkney left me pretty nauseous, my other three passages have been excellent. My first cabin had two berths and a porthole, while my second cabin was internal and had four berths. I know what you're all asking yourselves, and the answer is: "Yes, of course I slept on the top bunk. Who wouldn't?"

Care Packages from Home

Care packages from home are a great thing. They arrive very rarely, and only generally when solicited. I've gotten a couple of them lately, one solicited, and one unsolicited, and I want to take a moment to thank those who sent them.

About a week before Easter, I got an unexpected package. Inside the wrapping was some tin, and in all honesty, I can't remember what its original contents had been. When I received it, it contained both children's artwork and cookies - two different kinds of molasses cookies, to be exact. My friend Jenny had asked via Facebook whether I would eat raisins, and had offered no more information after I'd answered in the affirmative. She made me two kinds of molasses cookies - with and without raisins - and sent them. They had sort of a pumpkin spice quality to them, though I don't know how they were actually flavored. They were delicious; but, more than being delicious, they were a great reminder of my friendship with Jenny and her husband, and out many great adventures together as undergraduates.

The other great care package I received a couple of weeks ago was sent by Landlady. I needed two items: a Nobody Likes John Kerry T-shirt, and a copy of The Bear Went Over the Mountain by Lester W. Grau. Landlady shoved a bunch of additional stuff into the box, to include a can of Spam(?), a bar of soap that allegedly smells like beer, and several other sort of "hometown" items that I'll leave up to the imagination. In exchange, by the end of this week a box full of "FORIEGN STUFFFS" - the original exchange rate for sending the John Kerry T-shirt - will be winging its way back across the Atlantic to thank Landlady (and Mr. Landlady) for their generous contribution.

Brilliant.

Physical Training Plan

A while ago, I noted in this post that some of the items I intend to read in the next couple of months include the following:

Naval Special Warfare Physical Training Guide

Naval Special Warfare Injury Prevention Guide

Special Operations Nutrition Guide

Ranger School Prep

One might look at all of this and assume that I intend to pursue a future career in special operations. No, certainly not. What I do hope to do at some point, however, is complete the BUD/S Warning Order workout, which is designed to prepare guys for initial Navy SEAL training. I don't ever expect to get to that level of physical fitness, mainly because I hate running (love swimming, sort of enjoy hiking) and I'm addicted to eating as many empty calories as I can shove into my face in a given day. I would, however, like to be in better shape than I am now, and to feel better about both my physical appearance and my health. Hopefully, between slightly improved weather and less time taken up with classes, I'll be able to make it happen over the summer.

I also suggested to CN Warden that we might be able to organize a group to exercise together. CN Ness exercises, and CN Homeboy is a pretty avid runner with a half marathon or two under his belt. I'm always more likely to hit the gym when a little accountability is involved.