Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

Pat Tillman, the NFL player who felt so compelled to serve America in the wake of Sept. 11 that he quit football and became an Army Ranger, was killed in combat yesterday in Afghanistan.

The Web is full of tributes to Tillman, and I”m not breaking any ground by writing about his amazing heroism, but his courage, character and sacrifice is so unique, I feel the need to take note of it myself.

You often hear people referred to as “heroic”, “courageous”, “honorable” or whatever. Usually, those kind of terms are thrown around without much merit. An athlete who plays through an injury may be called “heroic” … a cancer patient is “courageous” for putting up with chemotherapy … and we stick “honorable” in front of the names of judges and congressmen for no reason whatsoever.

But in Tillman, we saw a man who absolutely and unquestionably personified those terms. And not because he gave up a job that paid $1.2 million a year.

The honor, courage and heroism of Pat Tillman was demonstrated by a sense of duty that led him to put his life at risk and on hold for the benefit of his country. He was 25 years old when he enlisted. He was recently married and, yes, he had a pretty good job.

However, the deep-held sense of honor and duty in Tillman compelled him to do something to fight terrorism and protect America. He put that duty ahead of his own interests. Not many of us - no matter what we do for a living - would do that.

When I read about Tillman joining the Army two years ago, I tried to figure out his “angle”. It would make a great book once he was done, I figured. Maybe he saw this as a way to cash in long-term. He could be the next host of Survivor when he got back or something.

But then I read a little more. There must be an “honor” gene that people such as Tillman - and his younger brother Kevin, a minor-league baseball player who joined the Army with Pat - carry. The year before enlisting, Tillman turned down more money to leave the Arizona Cardinals because he had loyalty to the team. After enlisting, he refused to give interviews, have photos taken or in any way call attention to his “celebrity soldier” status. He became a soldier, plain and simple.

He didn”t plan to profit from his stint in the Army. He just felt a duty to serve.

Some stuff you might be interested in reading about Tillman:

- Remembering Pat Tillman (nfl.com)
- Remembering Pat Tillman (si.com)
- Doom of the well-known soldier (espn.com)
- The few … the proud (espn.com)
- Original story on enlistment (nfl.com)
- Tillman follows beat of different drum (nfl.com)
- The NFL”s wartime casualties

Thanks to the fine folks at Boing Boing, I came across a musical project today called London, Booted.

London, Booted is kind of like The Grey Album “mash-up” put out earlier this year, but was created as a challenge to DJs. Their mission was to deconstruct, rework, reimagine or otherwise mess around with tracks from The Clash”s master work: London Calling.

With a good bit of angst - driven by my love of The Clash and the really, really bad DJ mixes of stuff I find from time to time online - I ventured over and downloaded the 19 London, Booted tracks and gave them a spin.

What”s come out of this project is a mixed bag, to be sure. Some tracks, such as “Bubba”s Got A Brand New Cadillac” (created from “Brand New Cadillac”) utilize very, very little of the original song; using only enough to qualify as a derivative work (kind of like on Iron Chef when the French chef is given octopus and ends up making regular French dishes with a bit of octopus thrown in).

Other tracks go the obvious route of mixing in another artist”s vocals with the London Calling tracks. “The Power of Rebelution Can”t Fail” (created from “Rudie Can”t Fail”) is a pretty good execution of this technique, and “This Girl Wants a Cheat” puts Christina Aguilera”s “What a Girl Wants” on top of “The Card Cheat” in a pretty entertaining way. But even just a couple of months after The Grey Album, this feels like a tired technique.

But hidden among the so-so cuts are a few absolute gems. “Lost Souls in the Supermarket” (created from “Lost in the Supermarket”) uses electronic beats matching the original”s rhythm and layers on an electronic voice “singing” the original lyrics along with new words hinting at some kind of soul-less world where information is everything. Heavy.

Similarly, “Death or Glory (Zeitgeist Mix)” deconstructs the original and rebuilds it using synth instruments and a great late-1980s synth voice.

Those tracks, plus the “bonus tracks” “Street Profile” (created from “The Right Profile”) and “Super Sharp Card Shark” (from “The Card Cheat”), are my favorite new visions of London Calling in the group.

Considering I began my exploration expecting to hate these damn DJs for mucking around with one of the top 10 albums of all time, I was pleasantly surprised.

I”m switching to a new format for my weekly bit on LSU Reveille “sex columnist” Jessica Pivik. Hopefully this new, quick-read format will satisfy the appetite of Google searchers while keeping me from having to come up with clever things to write about a most un-clever girl.

This week”s topic: Fetishes

“Shocking” sexual reference: “I have a foot fetish, but I suppose I”d settle for maybe seven or eight inches.”

Sex and the City ripoff line: “I”ve heard men enjoy sex in the same way they enjoy food (fast), but turning your end table into the produce section is a whole other level.”

Expert “quoted” in column: Dr. Susan Block

Googled source of expert “quotes”: Dr. Susan Block”s journal

Safe-sex disclaimer inserted by editors: “And no matter what prop you use for your fetish, condoms should always be included because no one fetishizes (is that a word?) about STDs.”

- Torture yourself with “On Top”

Here”s a shocker:

Atlanta is the worst city in America for spring allergies.

The pollen count that”s put out by the Atlanta media has a scale that goes like this:

0 - 30 = Low
31 - 60 = Moderate
61 - 120 = High
Over 120 = Extremely High

The lowest pollen count for Atlanta so far in April has been 176.

On March 29, the pollen count was 5,156. That”s just over 42 times the level called “Extremely High”. So that made it, what? Insanely High?

I remember that day. I was in my boss” office on an upper floor of our building at about 5:30. Looking out the window, you could very clearly see the tire marks being left in the yellow/green pollen as people left the office for the day. The pollen dust on my car was at least a quarter-inch thick, and it blew off in a mighty cloud as I drove home.

Tonight, I stumbled across one of those online destinations that I get hooked in to deeper than a Louisiana chemical plant worker playing video poker.

It”s the National Map Viewer brought to you by the fine folks at the U.S. Geological Survey.

Essentially, it”s a big, click-to-zoom database of all sorts of geographic images, maps and other thingys (pardon my technical language). The cool thing is that for a lot of metro areas (including Atlanta), included in the image set are really detailed aerial photos run through some process called “orthoimagery” that … well … changes the image … into … some kind of … …

OK, I have no idea what “orthoimagery” is. But, as the very well-written federal government explanation clearly states:

Alrighty.

So anyway … here in Atlanta you can drill down to some pretty damned detailed images, and download them for free (my tax dollars at work).

To wit:

That”s my old house in the center there. And that”s the wife”s old red car sitting in the driveway/yard out front.

Kind of freaky, ain”t it?

The metadata that downloaded with the image even tells me when the photo was taken - April 7, 2002. Hey, that was the day after our wedding! At the time, the wife and I were still in NashVegas doing a post-ceremony brunch with her family.

And, that same day, a plane was flying over Atlanta taking hi-res images. Or, in fed-speak:

Who knew?

The TSA is considering doing away with the post-Sept. 11 restriction that lets only ticketed passengers past airport security checkpoints.

“Why would they do that?”, you might ask.

Is it because the TSA recognizes that there”s no harm a non-flying person who goes through a metal detector can do on the concourse that a flying person can”t also do? No.

Is it because the TSA wants to allow folks to be able to meet friends and families at the gate rather than out at baggage claim? Not really.

No, the TSA is considering relaxing this rule because business is hurting at the 100-store shopping mall inside the Pittsburgh airport.

The mall, you see, is inside the security area, meaning only people going to or coming from flights can shop there. And since Sept. 11, 2001, business is down about 12%.

Don”t get me wrong. It”s stupid to stop people meeting passengers from going up to the gates for “security” reasons. I like that the rules keep the concourses from getting so crowded and the security lines from backing up, but there”s no legitimate “security” reason to keep the general public on the backside of the concourses.

But the change (if it happens), is being prompted by a loss of retail sales? Yeah, that”s about right for the federal government. I imagine it doesn”t hurt Pittsburgh”s efforts to relax the rules that the head man in charge of homeland security is their state”s former governor.