A Carroll “Lex” LeFon Primer

Who was Carroll LeFon?

The best description of Lex that I’ve heard is “Imagine Hemingway flew fighters…and liked people.”

Index – The Best of Neptunus Lex

In Memory of CAPT Carroll “Lex” LeFon, and the Wonderful Community He Fostered

Welcome. The idea was floated that a ‘talk amongst yourselves’ blog would be a good addition to for the Non-Facebook Crowd. Here it is.

9/11: An Airline Pilot’s Memory of that Day

Posted on September 11, 2021

Some of us were reminiscing what we were doing that morning 20 years ago, and one Lexican had a particular poignant memory. With his permission to post this, here it is.

“On this date, 20 years ago I was a young captain on the MD-80. We got up early for a trip from Houston to Tampa. It was my leg and the second day of a four day trip. It was a beautiful bright morning and clear skies at both Houston and Tampa airports. A great day to fly and what I thought at the time would be an easy leg. Like the fateful United and American flights that would go down that day, and were departing at about the same time as I was, the last thought on my mind was a hijacking. There were no warnings. No memos to keep a “heads up”. Nothing.

Cathedral

Posted by lex on September 11, 2007

Remember.

Never forget.

Back To The Index 

For Those That Served In Afghanistan

OK.  Take a deep breath and put your mind in neutral. 

Yes-Afghanistan has fallen and we left a lot of blood there.

No-You and our combat casualties did not serve in vain.

You shined a light in some of the darkest places on the globe.

 You did your job. You supported righteous endeavors.

You ensured tens of thousands of terrorists never died from old age.

You showed, for a brief shining moment, what American values are all about.

A moment some others may not be able to share.

You did this in obscurity and without public note, but to those that witnessed, you made a difference that will resonate far past your absence.

You were an American displaying what we as a Nation are surely all about.

Above all else, you were supremely, demonstrably honorable.

Many others cannot say that.

You brought smiles to countless people who otherwise would have nothing to smile about.

 For a moment in time.

The “agonizing reappraisals” can be left to policy makers, historians, and the American people. Not your job.

Rest easy, You, those that served, gave our dead and wounded meaning by your presence and participation in something greater than yourself.

You are and were our Praetorian Guard-providing purpose and pride to a Service in which many others, acting on a higher plane, could not match the honor.

You well served the small band of family you were with as your successors will wherever they are asked to serve. As they surely will.

Our Nation depends upon its well of citizens willing to serve for all of us, not just some of us.

Causes and policies will change, but the quality of your service will not and cannot.

That would be a betrayal to what serving is all about and for which we, the 99% who do not fight, expect.

Others may have cause for judgement. You do not.

We have no choice.

You do.

Rest easy.  You can sleep well. Some other citizens may not.

                A Vietnam veteran

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This was posted in our Facebook Group today.

Well said.

Viewing The World As Richard Feynman

Richard Phillips Feynman was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superfluidity of supercooled liquid helium, as well as his work in particle physics for which he proposed the parton model. For contributions to the development of quantum electrodynamics, Feynman received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965 jointly with Julian Schwinger and Shin’ichirō Tomonaga.

Feynman developed a widely used pictorial representation scheme for the mathematical expressions describing the behavior of subatomic particles, which later became known as Feynman diagrams. During his lifetime, Feynman became one of the best-known scientists in the world. In a 1999 poll of 130 leading physicists worldwide by the British journal Physics World, he was ranked the seventh-greatest physicist of all time.

A few days ago, one of the Lexicans posted this to the Facebook Group:

The Jaguar E-Type’s 60th Anniversary

Somewhere floating around my home – I believe the upstairs loft, is a somewhat faded picture of a boy in a suit, sitting in the driver’s seat of a British Racing Green 1963 Jaguar E-Type. He has a slight shy smile.  It was my 16th birthday, and my father asked me what I would like.

I wanted to rent an E-Type and enjoy it all day. Even called rental companies in the Bay Area to no avail. I guess I was a bit naïve, although Hertz was renting the Shelby GT-350, so why not? There are many stories about that, including the time a customer returned one minus the Shelby-prepared 289 engine and put in some wheezy tired 289 from a pedestrian Ford station wagon.

Needless to say, Hertz didn’t make any money on its “weekend racer”. But it became a legend, so much so that Ford made a commemorative GT350H a few years ago.

Bosch

There are few TV series that I have enjoyed so much as to see them again (through streaming). The 7th and final season of Bosch (Amazon Prime) is out, and I have been going through the entire series again before enjoying that final season. For me it has been a series to be savored.

I’ve had a friend for years I would call a cinemaphile. Had a collection of over 1,000 movies in his library and wanted me to have a cinematic education. We got up to Hondo (1953) before he moved out of state.

Over the years I have recommended the occasional police movie or series only to have him tell me “I hate Cop and Doctor shows”.

But he has always had an exception. He enjoyed House for a “doctor show”, and upon my recommendation enjoyed Bosch. Bosch isn’t a typical “cop show”.

Why do I so enjoy this series?

Craig’s Most Excellent Birthday

…and a bit of recent Napa County history

From time to time, I have come across some tales that I have felt should be put to paper (or at least digital binary bits), so others can hear of it.

Our car club has a monthly drive that has been popular for some years. The host will plan a route somewhere in No CA and people are advised of it via email. They can show up Sunday mornings or not, no reservations required.

The drive for August was a drive through the back roads of Napa County, culminating at a Napa County institution in St Helena, Gotts Roadside. To call Gott’s a “hamburger stand” does it an injustice, although gourmet hamburgers is the main faire. How many hamburger stands offer a complete wine list?

After all, this is the Napa Valley.

It is best that Lex did not see this

Because he would be angered at what has become of his beloved Navy…

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9783807/Navy-disarray-focusing-diversity-training-warfighting-report-says.html

A Fourth of July Message for These Polarized Times

As I was reposting so much of Carroll “Lex” LeFon’s work, I came to realize how timeless some of it is. Even though he has been gone from us for 9 years, he can still be in the national conversation. As I was reposting his work, I thought it would be nice to time a few of his posts for the days long ago that he originally posted.

This is one of them that just popped up today, 14 years ago from the time he originally sent it to the blogosphere. I must have told WordPress a few years ago to (re)post it today.

I had forgotten about it.

I was just re-reading it, and felt that he could have written this today.

Think this polarization is something new to this country?

Two of the country’s founders, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, one an aristocratic Virginian and the other an established New Englander, had different ideas as to the direction the country should take.

Sound familiar?

The 2 didn’t speak for 15 years.

Lex wrote about this with more eloquence than I could offer…

Happy 231st, America!

Posted by lex, on July 4th, 2007 Three holidays define the summer months, with Memorial Day at the beginning, Labor Day at the end and the Fourth of July angling towards the middle. The outer markers “belong” in some sense to constituencies of their own, but the Fourth belongs to all of us.

And if we are today deeply divided, dissatisfied even in unprecedented prosperity and always eager to find fault, we can at least take some solace in the fact that it was ever thus: Thomas Jefferson and John Adams were co-signers of the Declaration of Independence, both sat on the committee that drafted it and Jefferson himself it was who turned the document of American independence from a laundry list of imperial grievances into a work both eloquent and startlingly radical: