The Fateful class reunion

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He was a widower and she a widow. They had known each other for a number of years, having been high school classmates and having attended class reunions in the past without fail.

This 60th anniversary of their class, the widower, and the widow made a foursome with two other singles. They had a wonderful evening, their spirits high, with the widower throwing admiring glances across the table and the widow smiling coyly back at him.

Finally, during one dance, he picked up the courage to ask her, “Will you marry me?”

After about 6 seconds of careful consideration, she answered, “Yes, yes I will!”

Needless to say, the evening ended on a happy note for the widower. However, the next morning he was troubled. Did she say “Yes” or did she say `No`? He couldn’t remember. Try as he would, he just could not recall. He went over-and-over the conversation of the previous evening, but his mind was blank. He remembered asking the question, but for the life of him could not recall her response.

With fear and trepidation, he picked up the phone and called her. First, he explained that he couldn’t remember as well as he used to Then he reviewed the past evening. As he gained a little more courage, he then inquired of her, “When I asked if you would marry me, did you say “Yes” or did you say “No”?

“Why, you silly man,” she replied, I said Yes. Yes, I will! And I meant it with all my heart!”

The widower was delighted. He felt his heart skip a beat.

Then she continued. “And I’m so glad you called. I couldn’t remember who asked me”.

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friday Firesmith – Eighty Years Later: The Bomb and The Surrender

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Contrary to one of the many myths that surround the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in August of 1945, none of the aircrew of either plane committed suicide or became insane after the bombing.

In 1985, a navigator on one of the planes that accompanied the bomber that dropped the bomb on Nagasaki did commit suicide, and was despondent over health issues he had, as well as the bomb.

The dropping of the two bombs might have, or might not have, convinced the Japanese to surrender. The Russian invasion of Manchuria, in fact, was a greater cause for concern to the Japanese than the two atomic bombs. Japanese troops deserted en masse in front of the Soviet Army, which was well trained, well equipped, and had the element of surprise on their side.

Also, in the Battle of Okinawa, which ended in June of 1945, almost 8,000 Japanese troops surrendered. While a small fraction of the up to 100,000 soldiers on the island, many believed the Imperial Japanese Army could see defeat as inevitable.

On August the 6th, a bombing raid destroyed the last functioning oil refinery in Japan, reducing their ability to produce fuels of any kind to zero. They imported 100% of their crude oil, and American submarine actions had reduced imports to 1% of their capacity in 1941.

The Battle of Okinawa, saw the first massive use of kamikazes against the Allied Fleet. The Japanese hoped enough ships would be hit, and sunk, to dissuade an invasion of the Japanese home islands. But the kamikazes, even when they did strike a ship, rarely did enough damage to sink that ship. American naval vessels in particular were heavily armed with antiaircraft batteries. Moreover, American ships were built to take a lot of damage before sinking, and American damage control teams were superb in both putting out fires, and repairing the damage done to their ships. Earlier in the war, the USS Yorktown was thought to be sunk twice by the Japanese before being torpedoed at Midway. The damage control teams on the Yorktown kept that boat afloat after taking damage the Japanese were certain would sink her.

In August of 1945, eighty years ago this month, the Japanese Empire was turning to dust. The Soviets were in China, the Chinese were getting stronger, the Allied Fleet was unstoppable, the American Air raids using incendiaries were killing hundreds of thousands of people, there was no oil, and then atomic bombs were dropped on two cities.

Would the Japanese have surrendered if the A Bombs had not been dropped?

Yes, I think they would have. The idea of letting the United States Marie Corp land in Japan and wreakthe havoc upon the Japanese homeland that they had in some many other places had to give the emperor pause. The Marines and American Army had thousands of veterans while the Japanese had very few.

As the battleship Yamato slipped under the sea in April 1945, the dreams of Japanese Empire went with it. I think the Japanese would have surrendered in August of 1945, simply because anything short of that would have meant the end of their entire culture.

Yes or no? Do you think The Bomb pushed them over the edge or was The Reason?

Take Care,

Mike

A Soliloquy on sleeping soundly

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I’m a night-owl. I have been as far back as I can remember. And all my adult life I’ve had to get up early for work, or if I was working an afternoon shift I got up early to swim before work instead of after. I’ve been retired for almost 6 years now, and I live alone, so I’m finally able to indulge myself in going to bed about 2 or 3 in the morning and getting up whenever, usually about 10am.

I live on the 12th floor of an apartment building and my windows face a street, a pool and skating rink complex, an elementary school about a block away, and the backside of a strip mall. Between kids, trucks backing into a loading dock, road traffic and people in my building and neighboring apartments moving around to start their day, there’s a bit of morning noise. Not conducive to sleeping late.

My solution was a box fan. It was my white noise machine. I put it on my dresser and turned it on high and it drowned out most sleep-disrupting sounds. 

Until it died two weeks ago.

I was staying with a buddy in his cabin in the mountains for a week, so when I got home I thought I’d try doing without the fan to see if I really needed it. It turned out I needed it a lot. The apartment building next to mine decided it was time to repave and repaint their parking lot. The arena is having some maintainance done which involves cutting metal with a grinder, but only in the morning. The lawn guys mow the City parks and nearby green strip at the crack of early. And there’s the unknown idiot in my building who likes to check his car alarm a dozen times on his way out.

Yesterday I bought a new box fan. Last night I got to bed just before 3am after turning the fan on high, and fell asleep with a smile on my face. I woke up this morning feeling great, no sleep interruptions at all. Happy, happy, happy. 

I looked at the clock on the headboard. 

It was 7:15am.

Thanks, Daryl!