Shh!

 

Posted by lex, on May 6, 2006

 

He’s taking a mid-term.

“Engineering Risk Benefit Analysis.” Decision trees, probs and stats. Binomial, exponential, Poisson and normal distributions. Random number generations, excel spreadsheets and simulations. Graphs.

And he’s not half stressing over it.

So. Shh.

Back To The Index 

Zero Tolerance

Posted by Lex, on Sat July 24, 2004 at 07:00 PM

 

As a squadron commanding officer, I had to discharge two otherwise fine Sailors who had “popped positive” on urinalysis screens for having THC in their systems. They were good kids, from bad backgrounds – the service had been a lifeline for them, a chance to remove themselves from bad situations.

And I had cut that lifeline – sent one back to the gang infested streets of El Paso. The other returned to East Los Angeles. Truly, my hands were tied.

Things I’ve Learned Along the Way

The other day, noticing that my Xfinity bill had just about doubled in 5 years, I went to a local office to see about lowering it. A young woman (funny how all that is relative isn’t it?) went above and beyond looking for “plans” that would lower the bill, and she found one.

Know a definition for “elderly”? One I heard decades ago?

Anyone who is at least 10 years older than you.

George Floyd and the MPD

I’ve had some questions about this from the beginning. The video seen around the world is really damning towards the 4 officers who, having Floyd under restraint and control, suffocated him.

Or to put it more accurately, one who suffocated him while the other 3 did nothing.

The question that I have had from the beginning is what – or who – protected Derek Chauvin, the officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck that killed him?

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.”

People Acting Stupidly?

In the upcoming weeks, I will probably get some time off and was going to travel overseas for a coupla weeks.

Always wanted to see Manaus for some reason. It was, before the 1920s, a true boom town . I envisioned seeing the opera house, where the world’s opera companies made the long journey up the Amazon to perform. People would send their laundry to Paris to be cleaned. Although perhaps my imagination was too detached as the population today is over 2 million. But the rubber boom, which died in the 1920s with the rapid development of more efficient rubber plantations in Southeast Asia, made Manaus for a time one of the richest cities in the world. The thought  just came to me that for a time,  Manaus was the Virginia City of South America.

An Interesting Coupla Days

Yesterday, for lunch I decided to take the less than 10 mile drive to have a hot dog at the Dinky Diner. Both the short drive and the destination is relaxing – usually. Although I live in Sacramento, the short drive down the river and the Sacramento Delta is a world apart.

Laid back is the term I would use.

Just another 15 miles or so is the town of Locke – the only town in America built by the Chinese for the Chinese. And if you are there, you have to try Al the Wops.

Life at the Post Office

I had to mail something to somebody as a thank you gift today.

I try to be selective about when I go to my neighborhood post office. It used to be you could look through the window while you were in the parking lot and see whether there was 50 people in line or nobody.

But then they tinted the windows.

Now you just have to walk in and take your chances. 

So this morning I parked the car and went in.

The Ethics of Bankruptcy

A few days ago, one of the Lexicans on the F/B page posted the story of a trucking company who suddenly declared bankruptcy, leaving its drivers – and presumably the goods they were carrying for their customers, stranded all over the country.

Their fuel cards suddenly would not work in the pumps, effectively stranding them. Leaving them to figure out how to get home to waiting families.

The Beauty of Life at the Alignment Shop

This morning, I was getting an alignment for my car, and a young father and his daughter sat down across from me.

The daughter was 4 – maybe 5, and deeply engrossed in reading a children’s book to herself.  She was smiling and reading to herself, almost singing.

I had wanted to take a picture of this, then felt it to be almost intrusive on something so simple and beautiful.

But if it were a painting, Norman Rockwell would have come to mind.

As I left, I told the father what a cute daughter he had, and he smiled and thanked me. You could tell that he was very proud of her.

And I told the daughter that it was a pleasure to have made her acquaintance.

She smiled.