[Wornears]

Fisherdude:

I was approached by an NSA guy while in college. We were in a senior level Latin American government class. He was an older student in his 40s, and I had just returned from about a year working in Brasil and spoke fluent Portuguese and Spanish then. ('77). We had a very interesting conversation one afternoon when he asked me if I had ever heard of the NSA and considered working for them.

I had a "Secret" clearance at the time and had certainly heard of the agency -- I'd worked near some of those big "Elephant cage" listening antennae in AK, and also worked on Sheyma, AK island on the Aleutian chain where over-the-horizon ballistic missille detection radar (BMEWs, Cobra Dane) aimed at the Rooskies operated. I politely declined his offer of sponsorship.

I started college as a EE, too, but working overseas corrupted me and I graduated with an English degree with a Math minor. As far as my family was concerned (lifer USAF dad, and dutiful mom) -- I did the equivalent of applying for Russian citizenship. Took a looong time for that to get accepted.

Sandy G.: Having lived near USAF air bases all my formative years, and having a dad get called on alert more than once in the '60s, I got to experience those laughable "Duck & Cover" movies and exercises in elementary school. I can remember how we used to practice getting under our desks and pretending that was going to help protect us from all the blown-in glass.

When working on Shemya, AK we used to joke that the last transmission from there was going to be, "This is Shemya, we have an unidentified . . . . bzzzzzzz"

You can only hope it's that quick.