How’d you like your eggs, hon? With waffles.

During my visit to the Mississippi coast last week, I was taken aback by the number of Waffle Houses I spotted.

If you’ve ever been down South you probably recognize Waffle Houses by their bright yellow color and big picture windows. While they are open 24/7, the zero hour for them is whatever closing time is in their area. Since there are a dozen or more casinos on the coast that are back up and running since Hurricane Katrina, the diners are probably hopping at least some time throughout the day.

Many Waffle House diners are a favorite for those seeking “drunk food.” Some say eating a greasy early breakfast after an evening of drinking helps “soak up” the alcohol. I doubt that is the case but eating and drinking coffee helps make one a well-fed and wide-awake drunk.

I don’t know what the alcohol sales laws are in Mississippi these days. Back when I was stationed at the Navy Seabee base in Gulfport during the late 1970s, the general statute was that one must be 18 or older to buy beer and wine, and age 21 and up to buy liquor. I am sure that has changed as for age, but I don’t know about the hours legal for consumption. I remember drinking beer at sunrise in the bar where my late friend Betti worked. That is kind of like Louisiana laws where, at least in my younger days, one must only show that they were alive.

Map through Creative Commons. Copyright By Nik Freeman
Map through Creative Commons. Copyright By Nik Freeman

Waffle Houses are more than just a “Southern thing” or curiosity. Since they are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, the stores serve as a gauge for FEMA during disasters. If Waffle House is closed, things have got to be bad.

I came across this map by a geographer named Nik Freeman that shows Waffle Houses by density in “quads,” or quadrants, on U.S. Geological Survey maps. This information is run here courtesy of Mr. Freeman through Creative Commons. Freeman was able to figure where the most Waffle Houses were located. The top 21 quads showed the Atlanta area with 132, Fort Worth was fifth with 25, and the lower end of the top 21 was a tie with Raleigh, N.C., Little Rock, Gulfport, Biloxi and Pensacola all with 16 Waffle Houses each.

Although this information was compiled in 2012, the data helps show that I was not imagining Waffle Houses were everywhere in the Gulfport, Biloxi area. As a matter of fact the Gulf Coast from Gulfport to Pensacola (via Alabama) contained a whopping 86 Waffle Houses over a width of only about 100 miles. If you go “down South jukin’ and lookin’ for a peace of mind,” as Lynyrd Skynyrd suggested, at least you’ll find waffles and eggs cooked to order. You will also find some nice waitress who will call you, “hon.”

Whether you are jukin’ or just drunken head to the Gulf Coast and find the nearest Waffle House. You’ll have no trouble finding one.

 

One veteran’s view: Houston VA parking worse than ever

Yesterday I hit the big 6-0. I suppose now that I am officially an old man means I should be grumpy. Well, I’ve got new for you. I’ve been grumpy for a long time now.

One matter which gripes me today that has pissed me off for a number of years now is the parking situation at the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Houston.

It has been quite awhile since veterans who use the Houston VA hospital were told of progress in, if not alleviating the parking problems, making a dent in the chaos which now seems worse than ever. In 2013, the head of the Houston VA hospital crowed about how well the parking situation has been handled by instituting a valet service:

“First and foremost, we encourage all Veterans coming here for an appointment to take advantage of our free Valet Parking service,” said Adam C. Walmus, the Houston VA hospital director.  “The Valet allows Veterans to exit their vehicles in front of the Medical Center and come right in.  You really can’t beat that.”

Can’t beat it, huh? Why yes you can, Doctor. You can beat it all to hell and we will likely keep seeing the same old, same old problem.

Houston VA Hospital: The more things change the more they look like things.
Houston VA Hospital: The more things change the more they look like things.

When one walks up to the main entrance of the hospital a long line of non-moving automobiles is the first thing that is seen. That would be your valet parking. That sight, plus another vision greeting patients is the number of seemingly disorganized individuals who wander around like lost geese and who are looking for the car they are to take to the valet parking lot. Those would be your “valets.”

The parking situation confronted upon driving into the hospital complex is not “us vs. them” but instead, “patients vs. employees.” It appears that half of the parking spaces is for the employees with another area for various transportation and doctors close to the hospital. Then there is the valet parking in which the lost individuals seen at the entrance turn into dangerous-looking people who seem as if they would start banging on your car if you even thought about entering their lot.

Then, there is the patient lot. Actually, it is more than one lot, or so it appears, but nothing is in certainty there because there is usually only one gate with cross arms open. Most of the time, well, some of the time, a patient can take a ticket from the dispenser, the gate opens and you can park. Some of the time. And then after an appointment, the clinic where you see a medical person will validate that ticket. Some of the time. More often than not there is a VA police officer who will let you in so that you may park. Some of the time.

I give the preface “Some of the time” because it is honest. Prior to an appointment a couple of weeks ago, I spent 45 minutes driving around in circles within the parking lot. Luckily, the clinic I went to had understanding staff. It was at my appointment where a couple of nurses said patients were not the only ones doomed to a parking lot hell. These employees said they both will have to drive around for minutes at a time in order to find a space.

If the patients can’t find a place to park and the nurses can’t find a place, then who can park?

I became so upset driving endlessly around that day I finally called the VA police, who are over parking. I had once sent a complaint about the parking and a sergeant called and told me that things were improving. That was a couple of years ago. This time another lady, I don’t remember her name or title, actually came out to help me find a parking spot. I don’t know if her action came from actual concern or if it had anything to do with my statement that I was about to call the Houston TV stations and have them out here to do a story.

The unnamed lady finally had the police let me through a barricade and I was able to park in a spot that was set aside for emergency room visitors. There was a limit of 30 minutes of parking in that spot but I was told not to worry. That didn’t stop me from worrying, of course. But when I reemerged a couple of hours later, my truck was still parked there, unmolested.

I don’t know why parking has grown so out of control at the Houston VA. Maybe many more veterans are being seen, something I have heard but have not yet verified, or the person or persons responsible for the “improvements” in the department of parking affairs were incompetent. Maybe there is are a little bit of both factors at play combined with those forces of which I do not know. That is certainly possible because the VA has become a seemingly less transparent agency than in the past.

A new multi-space garage is supposedly under construction. It was seen some time ago as if it was the answer to all problems. Although, it might just be that the facility could become obsolete as soon as it is finished.

I don’t know if it ever occurred to those in charge of the hospital or its parking that having to drive around in circles for nearly an hour is definitely not helpful for one’s mental health. I am no doctor, but I would guess such stress can’t be healthy for a patient’s physical well-being either. Just as I am chewing on a piece of jerky right now, perhaps those folks in charge of parking or the hospital or both need to chew on this problem for awhile. Or might I say, may they might need to do even more chewing.

 

 

 

In case you wondered, I’m on vacation!

First leg of my leave was Biloxi/Gulfport in coastal Mississippi. The first two years or more of my Navy years were here in Harrison County, Miss. This was just one place I frequented. I will write more when the spirit moves me!

The Three Rivers area near Gulfport, MS. The sandbars and cold water brought us Navy boys to the Little Biloxi River, north of Gulfport, MS. This is one place I found in searching for my old haunts this weekend.
The Three Rivers area near Gulfport, MS. The sandbars and cold water brought us Navy boys to the Little Biloxi River, north of Gulfport, MS. This is one place I found in searching for my old haunts this weekend.

Area Coast Guard officer faces wide range of possibly harsh punishments

UPDATE: A U.S. Coast Guard panel found Coast Guard Chief Warrant Officer Richard M. Clark innocent of all charges with the exception of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman. The information on a sentence was not immediately known.

(Note: As happens sometimes, I edited after a previous version was published accidentally. If you are confused, well, sorry.)

“It suffices to add “military” to a word for it to lose its meaning. Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.” Georges Clemenceau.

Whether area Coast Guard Chief Warrant Officer Richard M. Clark will feel that way in eventual proceedings remain to be seen.

The above quote was attributed to Clemenceau, who was twice elected as French Prime Minister during the first bloody 20 years of the 20th century. The total saying is perhaps more important than its latter sentence part, which came to “modern” usage during the Vietnam War.

The late journalist Robert Sherill penned a book named for that latter sentence of the French leader’s quote. I bought “Military Justice Is To Justice, As Military Music Is To Music” in a bargain book bin most likely in Mississippi during my first Navy assignment. The book explored a number of military justice cases which were widely seen as unjust if not abominable. It was a book I kept in mind as I worked in my second assignment which was a legal yeoman on a destroyer based in San Diego. It is a book I would recommend for any young person who is joining or has recently joined the armed forces.

I was what today would be seen as a “paralegal” in civilian terms. I only saw so-called “non-judicial punishments” which could land one in some hot water, but mostly the hearings which were conducted by a unit or ship commander is similar to misdemeanors in the non-military world. It would be some 30 years later before I saw a court martial. I was then a newspaper reporter and those accused were Army soldiers tried at Fort Hood, Texas. One military court was that of Spc. Charles Graner, who was allegedly the ringleader of abuses that took place at Abu Ghraid in Iraq.

Clark, now serving in Galveston, might indeed see hard time if convicted for the charges he faces. His sentence might possibly even eclipse the six and a half years of a 10-year sentence Graner served in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Certainly, any victims in the Clark case might hope so. But one never knows what a court martial panel, the military jury, will hand out.

The charges against Clark allegedly happened while he was stationed in Port Arthur, Texas, in my county and about 15 miles from where I live. The warrant officer faces:

  • Five counts of aggravated assault with a loaded weapon.
  • Three counts of assault and battery.
  • Two charges of sexual assault and aggravated sexual contact.
  • One count of DWI.
  • One count of obstruction of justice.
  • Four counts of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.

The specifications, as the above mentioned counts of an article, included in an updating of Article 120, Rape, in the “Uniformed Code of Military Justice.” The definitions of the article now incorporate more widely used terms in the civilian justice system such as aggravated assault. The areas of sexual assault are also broadened, or are more specific. This includes touching and what is known in the civilian world as “date rape.”

A particularly quaint definition of “sexual act” has also been broadened. The definition during my time read: “Penetration, however slight, is sufficient to complete the offense.” Today, the definition of a sexual act is:

 (A) contact between the penis and the vulva or anus or mouth, and for purposes of this subparagraph contact involving the penis occurs upon penetration, however slight; or

 (B) the penetration, however slight, of the vulva or anus or mouth, of another by any part of the body or by any object, with an intent to abuse, humiliate, harass, or degrade any person or to arouse or gratify the sexual desire of any person.

 It is definitely more graphic.
Clark’s case was referred after an Article 32, which is similar to a grand jury investigation. He faces a general court martial where punishment options for those offenses Clark alleged committed range from fines, bad conduct and dishonorable discharge, to hard labor in prison.
Defendants in a court martial can have an appointed military attorney as well as a civilian attorney at no cost to the government. And something to remember, as the Coast Guard release rightly points out:
 “Charges are accusations against the individual and the accused is presumed innocent unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt by the military justice system.”

I brake for accident victims

Yesterday was pretty odd. I may write more about a couple portions of yesterday that deserve more thought and time. I’ll just leave it at that before I start explaining myself.

I stopped to get a late lunch at James Coney Island in east Houston after visiting the VA Hospital for more tests. Upon leaving I eased onto the far outside lane of the Interstate 10 access road. It looked like smooth sailing as a long line of cars were interested in the lanes which turned left and underneath an overpass of the street that intersected. I saw one reason for the cars turning left.

There was someone flat on his back in the middle of the access road just maybe a few feet from the cross street. I drove by the person. I looked at him and looked at what was a crushed bicycle on the side of the road. There was at least one young guy who stood next to the victim. But that was about it. I decided to stop and see what, if anything, I could do.

As I later explained to a Houston cop and a volunteer firefighter who stopped at the scene, I was once certified as an emergency medical technician for about 10 years. There didn’t seem to be much I might do that would help this young man on his back, helmet on his head, and a cell phone to his ear. The prostrated young cyclist was laughing when I approached him. That unnerved me for just a second. But he was telling someone on his cell who might have been his mother that he had been hit by a truck. Then he started crying. I quickly saw why.

The other young man, who was standing, was on the phone as well. It sounded as if he was trying to tell 911 what was happening. It turned out that this fellow was driving the truck that struck the man on the ground. I quickly saw that the victim’s right foot was not where a normal foot might be had he been merely lounging on the access road. His foot was a good 30 degrees from normal. It’s very likely his ankle was either broken or was dislocated.

I tried and succeeded in asking the victim if he was hurt anywhere other than his foot or leg. He said it was just his leg.

I couldn’t help but notice that his bicycle helmet had some kind of black marks on it. These may have been a portion of the tire tracks from the yellow truck that hit the bike rider. I didn’t touch his helmet. I didn’t touch anything. This is because, first, do no harm. I wanted him as immobile as possible so the ambulance people could get him on a back board and onto the “bus.” I did try to look in his eyes. I looked for signs of a possible head injury because it seemed at least a bit of the helmet seemed to have taken a hit. His eyes looked okay and nothing, not even blood, seemed as if it was coming out anywhere. That could be a bad sign, or a good one.

A fire truck finally came up with what I knew were paramedics. I asked the cop if he needed me for anything else. He asked if I saw the accident and I told him I didn’t. I decided it was time to get going. The officer thanked me for stopping.

I didn’t know what to say to the victim. I started to walk off but said something like “Hey, take care, bud.” The victim said: “Thank you, sir.”

Those words made it seem like I had done something to help. Well, I guess I did in just being with the victim and taking an interest in him. Whatever it was, he seemed to appreciate whatever I did to help.

What a day. I have a feeling the injured guy was going to be okay once he was all looked over and fixed up by the medical people.

I took away a couple of lessons from that scene. First, if you are in doubt as to whether or not to stop for an accident then maybe you should stop. You don’t have to go into full rescue mode. Second, and this one is for me as well: wear a helmet.