Not much to say, I'm still working on Highway Blues (It's coming along nicely, heh, heh...) but I have a whole stack load of homework and thus cannot visit dA with any sort of regularity anymore...

But I will be back.

Continued from Science:

General Jumper, Chief of Staff USAF is probably the only person to have flown both the Typhoon and the Raptor. According to the link in the last journal, while the EF (Eurofighter) is more maneuverable, the Raptor is better overall because of its stealth features.

But hey! When you pay a third of the cost and with still excellent perfomance, why complain (plus the standardisation of fig types across most of Europe, barring France which uses its indigenous Dassault Rafale is a boon for logistics)?

However, and there is always a however, because these 'modern' (let's face it, Australia, the UK and even the US use >40 year old planes, F-15, F/A-18, Tornado etc.) planes were designed in the 80's (according to a source in Grumman I know) they were designed to fight a continental, conventional war in Europe with NATO battling the USSR and the other Warsaw Pact countries. That scenario has almost no chance of resurrecting itself from the ashes of the Cold War, let's face it, all the wars we've been fighting since even the 60's have been against a smaller, less technological advanced enemy which uses asymmetrical warfare (Vietnam, Gulf I & II, Afghanistan, etc.) where there is no point flying around the most high-tech funkiest aircraft decked out with all the whizz-bang techno shit we can put on it.

So let's see here...the USAF has just bought a plane capable of taking on hordes of Sukhois and MiGs and avoiding enemy radar and doing all sorts of other cool stuff, but hello, Iraq doesn't have anything that can even take on the oldest American warplane, and besides, their entire airforce was destroyed by cruise missiles anyway!!

Let's look at the other enemies (China isn't one because they're less Red now or some other shit, they still have apalling human rights and the Taiwan situation isn't any better), particularly Iran, Nth Korea and the Palestinians (that is if they attack Israel and the US comes to help, the Anglosphere always go to war with each other so don't worry, any war the US fights Australia and the UK will too). Nth Korea's military is a joke, same story with the rest of the 'Axis of Evil' as George so eloquently puts it.

The war will be fought with cruise missiles, stealth bombing and special forces as the spearhead, and legions of marines to do the heavy lifting. There is no real need to buy a high-tech arse spanking machine to fight that sort of war, an update of a proven design or continued manaufacture of an existing design is way more than suffiencient for that sort of war. The Raptor, put simply, is a colossal waste of money. They should've just built it for technological purposes.

But this fact doesn't detract from the ultra-leetness of the F-22. It is, put simply, a leet plane. It's is quite enjoyable matching it up to ther modern planes and seeing how well it does, plus admiring how expensive and high-tech it is is quite amusing. God, the US Armed Forces spend so much money it's not funny.

Anyway, this whole thing basically turned into a short essay on warfare as I see it, but thanks for tuning in anyway folks.

I'll talk about Science. Okay, more on military aircraft than anything, but yeah.

The latest and greatest fighter (fig from here) from the good ol' US of A is the F/A-22 Raptor, or now that it is in service, the F-22A Raptor (I'm a stickler for proper designations). This baby is fast, supercruisable, stealthy as heck and very dangerous. The only problem is that it costs somewhere bewteen US$120-170 MILLION dollars. Way to spend taxpayers money.

However!

According to some study somewhere somewhen, the F-22 is capable of shooting down 15.1 Su-35s for every one Raptor lost. In a real fight, it couldn't really but it is conceivable that it could sit back and lob AIM-120s or AIM-9Xs or whatever they use nowadays at the planes and then run like buggery when they come for it, but let's face it. If you don't engage WVR and fire the gun (Within Visual Range) then you have no balls. Okay, not really, personally I'd opt for BVR (Beyond Visual Range) engagements because there's a better chance for survival and plus I wouldn't get my arse pounded for losing a multi-multi-multi million dollar machine.

Apparently, some think the Raptor is maneuverable, in fact, the most maneuverable fig out there. Well, I'm not an EXPERT but I know enough to tell you that canards and x/y-thrust vectoring is better than only x-axis thrust vectoring alone, the two examples being the Su-37 and the Eurofighter Typhoon (or whatever they call it nowadays) in the former category, and our friend the Raptor in the second. Many debate the maneuverability of the Raptor, but this account [link] clears it up somewhat. The statement is rather ambigous, but I think he's saying the Typhoon is much more

To be continued.

Well, almost skooltime for me! I will be talking about songs I like in this post, so listen up.

Eric Clapton - Layla
Not only is the riff very memorable, the lyrics tell a good story and of course Duane Allman and Eric Clapton are always godly on the guitar. Personally, I don't like the coda much, but that's just my opinion. I'm an emotional type of person. Or maybe I'm not, and I'm just lying. Who knows?

Eagles - Hotel California
A masterpiece in song writing, and of course the solo is very cool. It inspired me to write 'Highway Blues', check it out, it's my featured deviation.

Queen - I Want To Break Free
My favourite song of all time, the lyrics speak for themselves. Well composed, too.

Queen - Spread Your Wings
Catchy, I love the refrain. Somewhere I can identify with that song.

Aerosmith - Cryin'
While critics may not like power ballads in promoting classic rock, I happen to think this one is the best out of all power ballads. Stunning emotion (exemplified in the singing and harmonica solo), I love the harmonica solo.

Vienna Teng - Gravity
I heard this first in an AMV, it really moved me (the song and the AMV, check out [link]). Very nice lyrics, catchy melody too.

The White Stripes - The Denial Twist
Just incredibly catchy.

I reccommend all you deviants to check out these songs, through methods noble or dastardly. Okay, don't dowload these songs, the artists do need to eat ya know!!!

I cradled the limp head of Makoto in my arms and tearlessly wept behind my mask. The poor boy's body was riddled with blunderbluss rounds and laced with vicious cuts from what was obviously a cutlass. I couldn't protect him, even after I promised his dying mother I would. While Makoto was skilled for his age, he was no match for the incredibly dangerous Red Brigade, a pirate group based off the Fleshy Fly, a corsair known for her seemingly invunerable hull.

It all started when my ninja clan, Yukitsume (Snowy Claw) was assigned the task of stealing the Imperial Yeti Seal Seal (never fight a Yeti Seal alone, fellow ninja) from the manor of Jan Svalbard, a ruthless viking. Unfortunately, our employer's name was Pink Beard, obviously a pirate posing as some sort of mercenary contractor, and he assigned the Red Brigade the same task. The results were messy. Us ninja, always careful, quiet and organised, had infiltrated the manor silenty and without using 'wet' tactics, were about to nab the Imperial Yeti Seal when suddenly those idiotic pirates burst through the front gate using a cannon and many barrels of gunpowder and proceeded to murder everyone not wearing an eyepatch (ironically most of their team hadn't been on many adventures and thus hadn't lost their eye yet, which meant lots of casulties all around).
The feces had hit the air conditioning and ten guards and six pirates stormed into the room we were operating from. Most of the clan we hidden in the roof while Kenichi, Makoto's older brother, was stealing the Seal. He didn't have enough time to say 'Kuso' before getting annihilated by rifle and blunderbluss fire exchanged between the guards and pirates. Makoto was with us at the time, I had foolishly let him go along so he could learn something about ninja operation but all he saw was his only remaining family member getting killed. He wanted to jump down into the room and cut the pirates to bits, but I knew his anger would've made his movemnets sloppy and clumsy, easy pickings for the drunk and rowdy pirate scum.
Alas, it was futile as the roof collapsed as we tried to escape. In the ensuing fight we ninja were too much for the pirates, battle hardened killings machines we are. Unfortunately some idiot brought along fireworks and most of us were blown to kingdom come.

We escaped after cutting through legions of pirates and guards, myself only staining my black suit once when a stupid pirate decided to kick me with his wooden leg when his blunderbluss jammed.

I layed down the head of the dead Makoto. He had foolishly ran off to avenge his brother even when I had explicitly told him not to, I had even posted guards to protect him, but he was better than I had anticipated. Just not as good as battle hardened pirates.

My hand reached for my noise bomb. I threw it to the ground and it exploded with an almost deafening noise. Immediately, twenty ninja appeared by my side. I could tell they were shocked by the appearance of the dead Makoto, but as ninja they were extremely disciplined.
"Fellow clansmen. We must avenge the deaths of the Kunoichi brothers, the last descedants of a noble ninja bloodline. We are well trained, easily a match for the drunkards calling themselves 'pirate'. No matter how many parrots or wooden legs they throw at us, we ninja shall prevail. After all, we have bushido on our side..."
"Uh boss, isn't that samurai who have bushido?"
The ninja who uttered those disgraceful words neck suddenly split open, spurting out blood all over the floor. As leader of our clan, I was of course the most powerful. And I hated samurai.
"Nobody says the 'S' word in our sacred clan hall...NOBODY."
I heard one or two gulps.
"Alright ninja, let's move."