It's ok John. Beth is just saving up her money for the BIG mug.

Sexy sells...what can I say?

BTW, my lead will last about 5 minutes. Of course, not having an example of it on the site (it used to be there) will help draw attention to the cannon-cocker one.

Even as I type, I gaze upon the glory of your beloved Hawg on top of the page...

It's a random script. Just refresh enough times, it'll show up.

Huh! How come I didn't notice that before? It took a while to get to the Hawg, and the (forgive me in advance for the lack of terminology, John) cannon(?) came up a LOT. I think this is proof that Random does not equal Evenly Distributed ;-)

If you're convinced it's the scarf, wrap that ostrich-feather boa around the crossed hydrants...

Back in the REALLY old days, the scarf actually had a purpose...it could be used to a) help keep you warm in the open-air cockpits of the day; b) help you detect an uncoordinated (improper rudder inputs for the bank angle) turn, and/or c) wipe the oil off your face that would slowly accumulate over the course of a flight.

Now they're all decorative, of course, usually representing the unit you're in and not worn in flight--fire hazard and not a wise sartorial addition to your wardrobe if you eject. The nail in the coffin was a guy who was choked to death by his scarf after it got into the slipstream...can't remember the type airplane but it was a tandem two-seater and the guy in front didn't know what was happening until after landing.

And then Isadora Duncan did a copy-cat and garnered all the publicity.

How about a series of mugs with the funny pictures on them, and the winning captions? You know, the "floating" tank, the power-diving Chinook, etc. The world needs more funny.

Is Twitchy Bill's picture as small on the real mug as it looks in the picture? It looks kinda squished.

AFSis - Different photo--the one on the mug was taken right after a hard landing and I really was squished.
But I'm getting better. Almost up to 3'5", according to the Flight Doc; pretty soon I'll be too tall to fit into an F-16 cockpit...

Instapilot, I beg to differ.

The story I read had it that the scarf's purpose was to ward against chafing of the neck while swivelling the head heatedly in all directions, looking for people trying to kill one and/or people to kill. I think Billy Mitchell complained about the improperly tanned dog fur in the collars of the US Army Air Service flight suits which gave some fliers boils on their necks. Ya need every advantage in a fight, it would be a horrible dang thing to get killed because you were distracted by a physical sensation while yer cold-blooded opponent was lining up his shot.