JS

Anyone else concerned about the OPM hack? I just read an article that the Chinese acquired every SF-86 that has ever been submitted electronically. I was perusing through the one I just did a few months ago and it has some pretty good stuff - name, social, address, and phone number of me and my wife along with address and work history, etc. This info could be used to start up another life somewhere in a pretty bad case of identity theft.

Based on a friend's recommendation, I took the kids to Johnny Rocket's the other day and got a 50% military discount on all food and beverages. Not sure if it was just my local restaurant, but it might be worth a try at any JRs restaurant. Instead of paying almost $20 for an overpriced, dried out kid's burger meal and two milkshakes, the total was only like $10 instead.

Definitely good for the airline resume. The Delta/United application website has one of 6 checkboxes (I think) for safety officer. The other ones are for Chief Pilot, DO, check airman, and FAA examiner. Since only three of those boxes apply to military, it would appear that having one of them checked would get you a leg up on the application.

I just want to give another 2 thumbs down for the Surface RT. In cruise yesterday it was locking up and had to be rebooted. On descent it just shutdown without warning, apparently because it did not recognize the fully charged detachable keyboard/battery that I had attached 20 minutes earlier when the main battery dropped below 20% (you have to detach and reattach the keyboard multiple times to get it to recognize that second battery). And the grand finale, at less than 1000' on final into a certain busy class B airspace, ceilings were 002V004 with "RVR reported greater than 6000," when the approach plate completely blacked out. I swapped to the taxi diagram and it was black too. The captain's plate was the only operable one for that last minute or so of the approach.

Anybody in ACSC at Maxwell right now or graduated in the past year or two? Trying to gather some intel as far as time off, day to day stuff, etc. for the coming academic year.

Bingo! This is actually a very true statement that I argue about with friends all the time. Seriously, cash payers are paying a "premium" by not taking advantage of the 2-5% premium that most prices already include due to the widespread use of CCs. There are still places out there that either won't accept CCs or have a higher rate (coincidentally about 5%) more for using CCs. I was not a big fan of Ramsey either, but I actually think his real point is that you will spend more through plastic because it is easier to use than cash. I have tried it, and I think it is true. If I had to unfurl crinkled dollar bills for every beer at the bar, snack at the grocery store, or meal at the restaurant, it would have a much greater sting and I think I (and most people) will pay less. I don't think Ramsey ever actually argues that you will eventually pay interest/fees even if you are paying the card in full each month. His primary point, I believe, is to live beneath your means. Using plastic us just so much easier that people spend more than they would had they used cash. I am sure excessive lines of credit is bad, but I would imagine the overall amount of credit available to you is one of the biggest factors, plus the amount of credit that you are using. I can see my credit score at all times through this identity guard thing I get through Costo. All 3 of my credit scores are regularly above 800 despite that fact that I have like 10 open credit cards. I notice that when I sign up for a new one, or if any one approaches about 75% of its limit, my credit scores dip below 800 for a month or two. GREAT question. I hadn't researched that exact thing, but I don't think so. I found out the hard way that when using my AMEX blue for my 6% cash back, I don't get shit when I buy groceries at Wally World, Target, Costco, or any other places listed as "discounters." Basically, if you pay full price for groceries at regular name-brand grocery stores, it should show up in AMEX as eligible for the 6% cash back. Other than that, you won't get 6% for groceries bought at convienece stores, Walmart, or other places. Be wary.

Congrats. Deserved.

WTF is a DVD? Does this require some special hardware to use a DVD on my computer, because my laptop sure as hell doesn't have anything of the sort. I would pack my 1TB external HDD of movies for the deployment if the deployed location did not have a media server on their network, or if my hard drive on my laptop was already full of movies/porn.

We asked about this at Delta, and they said to have it current in order for the computer to consider you for an interview. From the horses mouth as opposed to the horses ass.

My interview was 11 months and 15 days after my last First Class medical date. The HR guy in the interview even said something like "you are cutting it close with your First Class Medical date here." So obviously the computer doesn't cut you off if it is more than 6 months old and you are less than 40.

I have heard that too, but I have also heard second hand that folks have been hired at Delta after not flying for 3 years due to a staff tour or something. I have never met anyone who was not in flying status prior to interviewing, so it sort of goes without saying that you should try to get several hundred hours in the past year. But for those who are not able to log those 100 hours, I would say to still apply. The worst that could happen is that they don't email you for the interview. The best that could happen is that your date of application acts as a tiebreaker down the road between two guys in the same scoring band after they rack and stack the applications. Also, a few of us put some time into revamping the gouge that was out there for the Delta interview. So if anyone has an interview coming up with Delta, PM me with your email and a brief description of your background (to eliminate trolls/spammers) and I can share the link with you for the updated Delta gouge. Finally, I was told by multiple internal sources that the key to getting an interview at at Delta is a clerically perfect application (no employment or address gaps, no mistakes in the education section, and current First Class Medical and Passport) and strong recommendations from within the company. PM if anyone has any questions about Delta.

The other day Costco had a three pack of these 300 lumen Duracell tactical flashlights on sale for $15, with batteries included. That was after $4 instant off. I tried a pack, and they are pretty bright. The downside is that they are noticeably bigger than some of the smaller "tactical" flashlights, there is no place for a string type thing to hold it, and it does not have a strobe. But it is bright as hell (about 300 lumen bright, ha), and it seems pretty durable so far. It uses the 4 AAA batteries shown there in the box, and inside it has one of the standard rotary bomb launcher things that holds the 4 batteries in it, just like those cheap tin LED lights have. Overall, for $5 per light, this seems like a very solid flashlight.

Is the discount on top of the already pretty good prices at the BX or at AAFFES.com?

Wow, you summed up my exact thoughts very succinctly. Not to totally derail this thread, but I have had many a deep conversation, over many a bourbon or beer, about how dumb all of these petty insurance things are. I always say, if it is not preceded by life, house, or car (if your car is worth more than you can afford to replace it), then you are throwing away your money. By definition, you have enough money to self-insure all these things without having to pad someone else's pockets. I am always astounded at how some of my smartest friends who clearly understand math, one with a Master's in operations research, argue vehemently about how cell phone insurance is somehow good. He, and many other smart people, always seem to come back to the argument that they (or their wives, more often) are an above average risk to losing their phones, and somehow they are going to come out ahead with the insurance scam. Ha ha. During said arguments, I would always throw out rough numbers like "they probably price these scams so that for every dollar they bring in, they probably pay out $.50 to ensure they have a hefty profit margin." Well, a few months back, Clark Howard said he had read some research that the average payout that the cell phone companies and Best Buy makes on these warranty/insurance scams is something like 9 cents for every dollar they rape the public out of with these gimmick coverages. UFB! That is the business to be in.

So I am getting a little more serious about taking the Macbook Air plunge. I stopped by the BX today, and they have the 4GB RAM/256 GB SSD version for $1189, which is only $150 more than the refurbished one on this link. That probably makes it close to a wash after taxes. The downside about the BX is that they apparently don't have the option to get the 8GB RAM or the 512 GB SSD hard drive. Just to clarify, it is not possible to add/remove RAM or hard drives from the Macbook Air due to everything being soldered to the motherboard, right? I am just trying to figure out if I need the extra RAM and SSD or not. Also, do most people really have the protection plan thing? I am a strong believer that virtually all insurance/warranty/protection plans - especially on electronics - are major scams. Especially after you do the math. At a glance, it looks like Apple wants to get about 1/4 of the total price of the laptop in exchange for a 3 year warranty thing. The math seems pretty stiff to me - is there really greater than a 1 in 4 chance that this thing will shit the bed on me in three years? Something tells me that Apple, like the cell phone companies, have already crunched the numbers on this and know for a fact that the failure/replacement rates for these things is much, much lower than that, thus they are pocketing most of the premiums that they take in.

Pretty good articles, but like the second one says, Russians have been using some form of stealth and trickery for ages. So have the Germans. So has the United States. So has the British, Ottomans, Prussians, Romans and Greeks for centuries. I think this type of soft warfare is exactly what we have to look forward to with the coming conflict with China as well. The enemies are always going to attack us/more powerful alliances asymmetrically, just we have done to our enemies in wars past as well.

That's not a bad price considering apple's usual high prices. Question - are guys able to get their CAC readers to work in the Mac? I know in the past, guys in the squadron were unable to use it. Not that I would want to do work from home, but I am not a total regular at the base. Also, what is the latest with running Windows? A while back, parallels seemed to be a pretty good option, but it had a bunch of quirks. Is the mac/windows dual system pretty solid these days? As you can tell, I have been wanting to take the plunge for years based on what I have heard about Macs, but have not quite had the nuts big enough to pay 3 times what I paid for my current laptop in order to get into a Mac.

I personally found Laphroaig very similar to Lagavulin. I would say Laphroaig was a little more smokey, but they are both in the same family, if you ask me. Smokey, peaty, etc.

Wow. I may have missed it in the article, but whey are they selling it?

So what did Gordo make you do on the checkride? DId you have to do the lazy 8s, chandelle's, and all of the other stuff by the book?

How much preparation did you put into the single engine add on before going out with Gordo? I spoke with him a while back to do the same, but never followed up. How many flights did you do to prepare?

Yeah, you don't say. I think the article said they came back from Africa, so that kind of explains the skinny moniker. Also, I think the article said that a normal pre-flight walk around would not have discovered the body, which is definitely possible.

Maybe we are talking about two different things, but they want to give me a non-A letter that is good for only one day. The reg you quoted talks about a non-availability for the entire TDY. It seems to me that they are trying to work around the system and get you to move back on base by giving you a non-A for only one day as opposed for the entire stay, which is probably what they are supposed to be doing. So again, maybe I am missing it, but if the non-A letter is only good for one night, how does Para 2 that I quoted entitle you to stay in contract lodging for the entire TDY?

I am trying to figure this out as well. At a certain AMC/AETC combined base, the lodging folks are telling me that I have to stay on base for 3 days, then they will cut a non-A letter for 1 day only, then I will have to move back on base for the remaining 15 days of my TDY. They asked me three times if I was a student, which I replied all three times that I was not. Makes me think there is some kind of student policy about being forced to move back on base. So, in reading the JTFR and these posts, here is where I think this is covered, as someone else already posted: "1. A member ordered to use GOV’T QTRS on a U.S. INSTALLATION (as opposed to a town/city) is required to check GOV’T QTRS availability (through the CTO) at (not near) the assigned U.S. INSTALLATION. 2. The member is not required to seek/check for GOV’T QTRS when TDY to a U.S. INSTALLATION/ RESERVATION after non-availability documentation has been initially provided. 3. Example: A member, who is required to check QTRS availability on arrival at a U.S. INSTALLATION, does so and certifies non-availability, or is issued non-availability documentation. The member cannot be required to re-check later for QTRS availability at that U.S. INSTALLATION during that TDY period there. See par. U2570." So, in playing devil's advocate, how could I justify staying off base the remaining 15 days with a non-A for only one day? The JTFR says I have to show "non availability documentation," in order to not have to come back on base, but it doesn't specify how many days that non-available documentation has to be good for. In other words, what makes the above quote about the non-A not having to state 100 days true? I could easily argue (if I were a finance weenie) that your non-A does indeed have to state 100 days, otherwise you are not complying with the "non-availability documentation" requirement of the JTFR.