Bits and Pieces

To my faithful readers (meaning just myself because it has been forever since my last post)...

The past few months have found me in various states of repair because chaos has decided to take over life. The short version is that I now have no appendix, missed 4.5 weeks of work due to further illness, and really hate fresh dog droppings on my dress shirts. So now I am one dress shirt fewer, have a 5 inch scar (which is totally brutal from my 10 staples!), and am thankful every time I can stand without the world spinning faster than it should (Scientists say: "about 1,038 miles per hour").

The New puppy is super cute and is basically potty trained. She is more mellow than Zoe. I hope to make a Star Wars shot with her as I did with Zoe in my March of 2006 with Zoe Wars (oh, and my Darth Vader suit has improved since then).

My recent bit of excitement comes in the form of a helmet and a coin (soon to be accompanied by more artifacts). My history students connect with history better if they can hold it in their hands so my collection of Confederate Money, Nazi money, etc. has slowly been growing. My most recent purchase is an M1 infantryman's helmet from Vietnam. It is the same style used during WWII (Band of Brothers etc.) but was much cheaper than one used in WWII. I haven't done all of the research on it yet but what I have found on the helmet so far is that it was in Vietnam by an army infantryman from '69 to '70 used by one of 5 different people (who I am currently trying to track down to see if I can identify which person was the one who owned the helmet).

It has a double shell with the outer one being steel and the inner fiberglass. The double shell design saved many people because a bullet would pass through the steel but get trapped between the fiberglass and steel. Therefore, saving a man's life. Of course a direct hit was usually fatal but the glancing bullet wouldn't hurt as much with this option.

SO enough nerding for now! Cheers to all my readers (...just me when I'm bored).

greekspeedoman