TheLastColdBeer

Happy Birthday Tom, have a grand day!

Hey Pain, Happy B-day! Have a good one, see ya on the dm server later.

Happy Birthday Woody! Have a wonderful day!

Happy Birthday Simple, have a great one!

Yeah, I'll agree LaBob, you're simple minded. Pert near' retarded in my book. Read a lot of what you've said in the past w/o comment. But this time I'll agree. Maybe Dean has a point.

OK boys & girls. I've contributed to a personal IRA for twenty years. Quite successful. Now I'm contributing to a corporate 401k, and so is my wife, at her place of employment. This prevents us from contributing to personal IRA accounts, whether Roth or traditional. What this does, is force ME, to start all over from scratch, at the nooby level of investment, and forbids me from contributing to my IRA, or even transfer my IRA, with pre-tax funds. This completely sucks. Within the convoluted mess of the IRS, I can't transfer an existing IRA to a new 401k w/o selling off the mutual funds that have made me financially secure. I'm a little bit annoyed, especially at the IRS for not providing for this situation. Apparently, in the YOU-ESS-of-AAYE we don't have anyone that has been saving for retirement on their own. Anybody else encounter this? Fidelity is very understanding, but not condescending to keeping American mutual funds under their brokerage. The IRS won't allow a transfer of IRA to 401k w/o taxing as capital gains. Kinda beats the point of retirement savings on a pre-tax level. What cha' think?

Happy Birthday Fire, and make sure you have a grand & wonderful day.

Happy Birthday Dolphin, have a wonderful day. RIP, be a good boy today.

Yes lads, freedom of speech died here in the nineties with the coming of "hate crimes". This is a poorly defined set of laws that can be construed to mean anything the prosecuter needs to argue a case. Any dissent can be argued as "racist", or with hateful intent. In any case, I was deeply alarmed and saddend by the events in Canada. Condolences, and solidarity toward our northern neighbors.

Condolcences to you and your family puppy. This is part of life, just not the part we enjoy. Been a decade since my father passed, and twenty one years since mom died. Feels like yesterday.

Thx @@codpiece I have quite a few books on Guadalcanal. One book I'd recommend is The Last Battle Station, it deals with the east Asia squadron, the loss of the Phillipines, and the invasion of Java. Nobody knew what became of HMAS Perth & USS Houston until survivors were found as POWs in Japan. Sad stories, but they need to be told, and remembered.

Yeah, SOB's comment reminded me of this: When my wife & I walked Mall Road, through Admiralty Arch, and I saw Nelson's column, I said, "look, Nelsons' ". She said "who was that?" Pretty much spoke for the American system of education. Ahh well, I'll lift a pint later for you, always need a good excuse anyway.

LOL Sob, I know, just trying to get a rise out of yea.....

Yeah Loader, too bad our kids aren't taught our own history. Here's a pic from my archives. That's the New Orleans, caught a torpedo from the Tokyo Express, and lost everything from B turret forward. Amazes me the horrific damage that ships took in that conflict, and survived. Those boys had gumption.

And what county would ye be in SOB? I'm a guessing sheep....

I dunno Loader. The loss of U.S.S. Hornet wasn't exactly the navy's proudest moment. Burning and abandoned, and left for two Japanese destroyers to finish off. Guadalcanal was a horrific series of naval encounters that cemented the Imperial fleet's fate. And that was before the Essex class came online, along with the Hellcat, Avenger, and Helldiver to seal naval air supremacy. A lot of brave sailors went down with great ships. Wasp, Astoria, Quincy, Vincennes, Atlanta, Juneau, along with many destroyers in the night actions around Savo. My uncle Melvin & his best friend Paul Davis served during that campaign.

Happy Birthday Dean! Make the most of your wonderful day!

Hey Puppy, prayers for you, your father & family.

Barnes needs a bailout award. Whenever his ratio looks bad in game, you'll see a "brb", and he's gone.

Thoughts & prayers for you, your Dad, and your family. Take care Randall.

Oh, and I'm wrong. It's powered by a Wright-Cyclone 2600. Pratt's, Wrights....once you get a couple rows of cylinders, they start looking alike to me.

Should have looked earlier, but here's a vid of the Avenger at our local airport. also, a facebook link. https://www.facebook.com/pages/TBM-Avenger-Inc/92937686933?sk=timeline&ref=page_internal boys & their toys....

We have a Grumman Avenger that flies every Sunday (in summer) out of Peru, IL. This airport is only a mile from our house, so we get to hear the beautiful sounds of a Pratt 2800 thundering overhead weekly. I always loved big radials, can't get enough of their sloppy idle.

Go to Reno for the air races. Nothing like watching Pratt & Whitney's & Merlins duke it out. http://airrace.org/