Military Photos

The D Space
Another great site for military photos, and discussions is
Military Photos .NET
The site has its usual selection of rabble rousers, but also has a lot of US troops, including those deployed to Iraq posting on there.


If you go there, and are NOT squeamish, do not forget to check out

Jizz Monkey's photo album... Jizz is deployed with the deuce four in Mosul ... which i believe is the same unit that is covered by Michael Yon's blog one of the best i have read, and one of the few that gives an unadulterated picture of what is going on in iraq (both positives and negatives) - no BS politics here..just the soldiers point of view

More Rhea Dialogues

The D Space

Me: Rhea do you want to go to Home Depot?
Rhea: No.
Me: No “Daddy.”
Rhea: No Daddy.
Me: Please?
Rhea: No Daddy.
Me: Why not?
Rhea: Cause I am very busy today daddy.
Me: (laughing) Oh Pleeeese ? Daddy really wants tyou to go with him…
Rhea: (Sternly and gesturing with both her hands) Daddy, when someone says no to you, then you should leave them alone.
Me: Quiet, stunned silence.



Me: Rhea, do not go into that room…mommy’s sleeping.
Rhea: Looking at me challengingly and slowly closing the door.
Me: Rhea, do NOT go into the room.
Rhea: Still looking pretty bold…
Me: Rhea, I’m telling you, do NOT….
Rhea: Closes the door and runs off into her room, to play with the toys.
Me: (now in Rhea’s room) Rhea did you not hear me say “Do not go into that room”
Rhea: But…
Me: (increasing inflection) Did you NOT hear me say “Do not go into that room”
Rhea: But But..
Me: Did you or did you not hear me say “do not go into that room”
Rhea: (frustratingly) “Daddy you can’t say all the words.”


Rhea with her new typing toy (it’s got a keyboard)
Fiona: You like your new toy Rhea?
Rhea: Yes, mommy, I love my kemputuh
Fiona: (laughing) that’s great…
Rhea: (typing) Look mommy, I’m kemputuhing


Rhea: Daddy can we buy a Dora toy?
Daddy: No Rhea, We don’t have money for that.
Rhea: (Gesturing with her hands like Dora does) Maybe we can go to HEB and buy some money.



Rhea: Where’s Maggie? (Neighbor’s dog)
Daddy: Maggie’s gone to heaven.
Rhea: Did she go up to God?
Daddy: Yes
Rhea: How did God take her?
Daddy: You know I don’t know…
Rhea: Maybe God took her in an airplane high up in the sky?


Rhea: Daddy have some of my hotdog
Me: No Rhea, you eat it, it’s your dinner, and it’s yummy.
Rhea: But daddy, you can have a bite of it
Me: No Rhea, you eat it.
Rhea: But you can eat it too daddy.
Me: Ok I will (take a bite)
Rhea: (looking at hotdog) you have a big mouth daddy.

Rhea To Elmo:
“You sit here Elmo; no moving, ok?
No Elmo, it’s not a *timeout*, but you have to sit here, ok?”

Fiona: (Putting Rhea to bed) Mommy and daddy are going out to watch a movie.
Rhea: But Aaja and Aaji will be outside?
Fiona: Yes, they’ll be outside.
Rhea: So if I want to call out to anyone I should call out to Aaja and Aaji?
Fiona: Yes, Rhea. But you won’t need to call anyone.
Rhea: Yes, but if I need to call someone and get a flashlight, I’ll call Aaji and Aaja? (yes, Rhea’s discovered aaja’s flashlight).

Rhea: Do you want some ice cream?
Fiona: Sure, what flavors do you have?
Rhea: Chocolate, Strawberry and Framilla (vanilla and formula?)


Fiona is eating dinner at the small dining table. Rhea is eating her dinner at her small play table.
Rhea: Mommy what’s his name?
Fiona: Who?
Rhea: Him, mommy what’s his name?
Fiona: Who are you talking about?
Rhea: Him ( pointing towards the table)
Fiona: Rhea I don’t know what you are talking about. Who’s name? Come here and show mama please.
Rhea: (Points) HIM.
Fiona: Oh him, he’s the *salt shaker* (we have a pig shaped salt shaker).


Every night Rhea says her prayers, and dutifully asks the lord to bless her baby brothers(in addition to blessing her friends at daycare, her "jumping mattress" , her toothbrush and her dora chair)Last nite, after Rhea was done praying, as she always does , she kissed her baby brothers.
And then proceeded to ask Mommy, "How will the baby brothers come out mommy?"
"Oh, they'll take them out at the hospital"
"But how will the hospital take them out mommy? They don't have any screwdrivers..." . Yes, we had spent all morning changing the old batteries on all of her toys.


Rhea playing pretend with Fiona:
“Mommy, I will be the mommy and you will be THE Rhea”

Scene: Hot summer day, I’m dressing up Rhea for bed.
Rhea: “Who are you going to feed?”
Daddy: “Wha..?”
Rhea: “Who are you going to feed daddy?”
Daddy: “What do you mean Rhea?”
Rhea(now pointing to my bare chest):
“Who are you going to feed?”
Me(Laughing): “No one Rhea, only mommy feeds your baby brothers”.
Rhea: “Is that because she has long pointed breasts?”

Rohan and Ryan Progress

The D Space
I always thought Ryan was more mischievous than Rohan, but not really..

Rohan just does it in his own quiet way..
He now calls out "Addda" (for Dadda) whenever he sees me in the morning, and of course, at random times during the day.
He as also learnt to turn on the master bathtup water..Its not really a tap, we have this "waterfall" thing, so its really an easy to move, matallic knob, with a small blue dot on it that Rohan finds fascinating...
He crawls real fast to the bathroom, everytime the door is open and then turns on the tap....
If you shut the bathroom door , while he is on his way to it, then he will start bawling...It really means a lot to him..since we have a "waterfall" tap, through which the water comes out, well like a waterfall, it makes a lot of noise.That noise scares Ryan, but it doesn't stop him from encouraging Rohan..So once the tap is on, Ryan's there too, and they are both shouting encourgement to each other...And that shouting really echoes in the bathroom...theyre both like King Kong in there..

Ryan now says bye, more like "Bah" with a Texan drawl....and he occasionally waves as well...
Everytime he hears the garage door open, he responds with a "Bah".
Sometimes he says "Bah", and you can tell,he's scanning his brain cells to figure out what else he has to do, oh yeah "wave the hand".

Rhea's her usual calm self, with the occasional meltdown "You are making me very angry" and storming off to her room..though that usually happens before bedtime when she has to take a bath..cos she wants to keep playing..

Tonite, we are going to the Trail of Lights so that should be a lot of fun...Fiona will probably be home with the boys, while Rhea, Mum, Dad and me will go...it will be pretty chilly, probably about 2 degrees celcius, so i don;t think the boys will enjoy it too much..
Rhea claims she'll say hi to Santa, but we shall see...

The D Space

The D Space
I thought this post on texags was funny

Texags Link

10 steps transforming a normal, happy Aggie into a basket case:

Step 1. Wake up one morning and find out that Gibbs will probably be our next DC

Step 2. Wake up next morning and find out that Darnell could be our next DC

Step 3. Ask self, who the heck is Darnell?

Step 4. Read every post on Texags and start to find out more about Darnell.

The heart rate starts to increase. Anger is coming on me.

Step 5. Download Notre Dame media guide and find out Darnell's failures at Notre Dame after finding out that he was their DC

Step 6. Read several on-line news articles about the failures at t.u.

Anger building. No longer able to function at work.

Step 7. Get e-mails and phone calls from sips that know me that remember Darnell and start laughing.

Go out and kick the tires on my truck, get in car and let out screams.

Step 8. Download the media guide from WMU as final piece of information to putting together a chronical Darnell's failed past 16 years of coaching. Send information via e-mail to both Byrne and Gates as well as several in my network.

Feel a little better from venting. Can go to sleep.

Step 9. Wake up next morning and read that Darnell was rejected from NC State for their vacant DC position and was also rejected from LA MONROE for their vacant DC position!!

Start crying

Step 10. Find out that our great leadership is so ashamed of this hire that the are not going to announce our new coach via press conference, but do it via a internet website.

Total mental breakdown achieved.

This is really where i am at this point...Went through 1-10.
Of course as someone in this thread mentions..

"aggie football is a 12 step program so step 11, load gun, step 12 pull the trigger"

Where is the tight?

The D Space

Some of rhea's dialogues...
This was the first funny one that i remember ...

Once when dropping her off to daycare, in the Mustang (she normally sits in the Passat), I heard her ask, “Daddy where is the tight?” I thought I misheard her so I asked her to repeat what she said. “Daddy, where is the tight?”So I looked in the rear view mirror and saw her looking above the window next to her. Looking for the “Jesus handles”, which are on the Passat.
When we are on a slope on the road, we always have her “Hold on tight” to the Jesus handles. Rhea couldn’t find the “tight” to hold
on to in the Mustang :-)

She was 2 then , and she'll be 4 in January, 2006. She still calls it a tight, i still call it a tight, and Fio still calls it a tight...
I can't wait till she's 18, in college, and out for a drive with her friends and asks them why their car doesn't have any tights...

Old Boy , or is it Old Gal network going strong

The D Space

Watch this paragraph from this link mysteriously dissappear...

[Edited later]
Actually the link no longer works...It was on texags.....
But it referred to Kim Franchione, mentioning almost a year back that her best friends husband was fired...

This football season has been full of drama in two ways for me. One has been all our tight games, and the other is that some of our friends in the coaching professions have been through such hard times. I've been visiting with Mary Barnett, the wife of Colorado's coach Gary Barnett, through the ups and downs they've endured all year. And then my close friend Sandra Darnell's husband Gary got fired at Western Michigan.

We coached with the Darnells at K-State. From there Gary became head coach at Tennessee Tech and we moved to Southwestern College in Kansas, but then Gary hired Dennis as his offensive coordinator and we were in Tennessee with the Darnells two years. When a friend gets fired, or any coach really, my thoughts go quickly to the families of all the coaches on the staff because you know they usually are all going to go out with the head coach.

It helps when you've been in the profession a while because you have a perspective about when it's time to go. It's not like when you're younger and you don't know what's going to happen next.


Aah yes..now we see why your loving fraud husband hired him Kim...

More on Gary "Loser" Darnell

This is freakin insane....
I cannot believe this is happenning...
I have never been this mad..EVER...

We are going to hire Gary "LOSER" Darnell for our defensive coordinator..
This guy has a proven record of failure..
The only reason, that i can see him being hired is because he is Fran's friend, and Fran wants to make him some money..
There can be NO OTHER REASON...

Gary Darnells resume:
One year at KState, sompleace else , and Notre Dame ( he was benched , halfway thru a game by Lou Holtz, because his defensive calls sucked) He was fired mid season. He was fired after one year at all three places...
His last record, was at a directional Michigan school, where he went 1-9 his final year.
He spent the last year sitting on his couch, in a remote michigan town.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/colleges/texasam/stories/121605dnspotamulede.12684713.html

In mid-February, Darnell said he talked with North Carolina State coach Chuck Amato about that school's defensive coordinator position. Amato eventually hired Steve Dunlap, who had spent the four previous seasons at Syracuse.
Then in March, Darnell interviewed for a position with Louisiana-Monroe.
Defensive coordinator Bob Trott left the school for an NFL job. ULM coach Charlie Weatherbie ultimately promoted Kim Dameron, whom he hired in January, to fill the vacancy.


So to get this straight, we are hiring a guy who was rejected by NCState, and LousianaMonroe.

It gets better.
Darnell, owns the record for being the D-ordinator for 2 of the 3 worse defensive performances at the University of Texas.

Listening to him on 1300 the Zone, the local sports station in austin where his defence was descibed as and i quote
"slow passive zone defense"
"read and react"
"bend but don't break"

so we interviewed two candidates;
Gary gibbs LB coach for the bcowboys and former head coach at OU.
And this loser.

I really think, Fran believes his time is up, and he is setting up his friends and cronies for retirement..at the expense of the 12th man....

Un frikkin believable..Gary Darnell for DC!@#!@!$

Un frikkin believable..
The Aggies , no wait, Coach Franchione, wait can't call him a coach any more, just Fran, is thinking of hiring Gary "Failure" Daniel as the new D coordinator for the Aggies.
Gary has a proven record, of failure..
1 season at Wake and Notre Dame (where he was fired mid-season), he is arguably the worse defensive coordinator in tu history.. (2 of tu's 3 worst defensive performances have been under Darnell). So i guess that should make him feel at home with Fran. 3 of ATMs 4 worse defensive performances , have also been under Fran.

And his last stint was at a directional Michigan school, where he went 1-10. Heck the guy isn't even coaching, he spent the last year in some remote Michigan town, fly fishing...

But he's good enough to be ATMs defensive coordinator.

oh the other choice, Gary gibbs LB for the Dallas Cowboys. Fran offerred 300,000, and he wanted something around 340,000. So for 40,000 dollars, the Aggies decide they want a failure, as opposed to the LB coach of a professional football team.


The 9-1 sips, fired their DC, and hired Gene Chisik, the DC from an undefeated Auburn team. Maybe there's a reason why the sips are playing for the NC, while the aggies are in the toilet bowl..

Really, what does Fran have to do to get fired ?

Bharat Rakshak plug

My blatant BR plug..
must plug BR... http://www.bharat-rakshak.com

I spent a lot of time working on while in school ... I worked on the Navy page, and hosted it from my school webpage.
Its grown a lot since then, and is an awesome site, for knowledge about the indian armed forces..

The forums are very good too, well moderated, and well informed..plus a large number of knowledgeable users, ex servicemen, reporters and learned people in general...

We were just lazy

We always wanted to do this, now I did..
So Fifi can post about the 3 Rs in our life, and i can whine about not being able to see the kids enough..and the stress at work, and talk about everything else in lfe.
Plus sooo much easier than a web page...
In the words of Dora the Explorer - "We did it"