At 15:13 10/26/2000, John Klun wrote:
>David was probably in the Navy or connected to the Maritime industry-
>After all,
>he lives in Rhode Island and you can almost see the ocean from anywhere in the
>state...  ;-)

Well, I *did* spend about six years in the Navy (as a Hospital Corpsman) --
but I never went to sea.  I've been to sea in small boats a little.  Mostly
I'm interested.  I spent much of 1989 and '90 listening to SITOR (ShIp's
Telex Over Radio) because it was interesting and I wasn't good for much
else at the time.  I have several hundred pins in a map where I could log a
position, and a couple thousand more intercepts without positions.  I once
heard the QE II order 60 dozen sets of Wedgewood Clipper for delivery on
arrival in NYC four days hence -- figured they must have taken quite a
wave, as that's enough china to serve about two-thirds of the
passengers.  Also a fairly frantic telex from a self-positioning drilling
rig whose computers had gone nuts and were driving the thing around in
circles.  And some other neat stuff.  Dropped a dime once on a ship that
was planning to flush its cargo tanks in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and
*particularly* didn't want the Canadian CG to know...tsk tsk.
<g>  Generally the more interesting the telex, the worse the reception.

david
David Beierl - Providence, RI
  http://pws.prserv.net/synergy/Vanagon/
'84 Westy "Dutiful Passage"
'85 GL "Poor Relation"