Category: DailySocotra

Dot.Com (with Bacon)

I made a call on a major software company with a colleague yesterday. We were just feeling them out on their use of subcontractors, and as part of my campaign to run my battered Rolodex into the ground, was exploiting all my old contacts and colleagues, intending to exploit them to the most practiable manner […]

Four Years

(William Edwin Reddig, born 08 August 1923. Died 02 January 2014). OK- I know I have been a little spotty on The Daily of late, but I have my reasons. This would not be nearly as late as it is, if I did not have an electrifying encounter with Edgar the Turkey Buzzard. He is […]

VERKLEMPT

Editor’s Note: On the 5th of August, a remarkable naval officer and his lovely wife transitioned to civilian life after 33 years of dedicated service to the nation. The ceremony was held at the splendid Army-Navy Country Club’s Five Star Ballroom, overlooking the proud spire of the Washington Monument. As attendee Joe Mazafro noted, it […]

Pot and Kettle

(Acting Director of OPM Beth Cobert). There were some extraordinary speakers at the big Department of Defense Intelligence Information Systems conference in Atlanta this week. The Director of National Intelligence, the Director of DIA, two four-star Combatant Commanders, and people who actually understand all this cyber stuff. Or claim to. You have to admire the […]

Big Data and Dining In

It is another travel day, this time from muggy Atlanta back to the humid hothouse of Washington, DC. I was going to dig out an old Daily about the last time I was in Atlanta, and a pilgrimage I made to the Ebenezer Baptist Church to see the tomb of Dr. King, majestically located adjacent […]

Traveling

Mom: “Where are you going?” Me: “Out.” Mom: “When will you be back?” Me: “Later.” Who knows? May see you soon! Copyright 2016 Vic Socotra www.vicsocotra.com

Mazz-Int

I have to start at the beginning on this, which is a hard pace to get back to, since it was like thirty-five years ago. We are a tight little community, we spooks, and I think we are all grateful that we had a chance to do something we considered honorable in a dishonorable world, […]

OshKosh, B’Gosh

My late father and his brother were both aviation nuts. Dad was a Naval Aviator in the second installment of the last century’s version of the Hundred Years War, and Uncle Jim had been an aeronautical engineer of some repute before he got into the satellite imagery business for the people at Kodak. One of […]

Long Term Care

I am at sixes and sevens this morning. I need to go to the bank and the grocery store- I should go to the Commissary, but the car I am thinking about purchasing is on the showroom floor of the Mercedes dealer by the Harris-Teeter supermarket and the Credit Union. An important note- I do […]

Weather Report

Colleagues, It is a torrid week here in Baghdad-by-the-Potomac, and a decent thunderstorm might help to clear the sodden air- that is the point of these aperiodic reports. You may have heard that I have joined the staff of Syntelligent Analytic Solutions to take over the Intelligence Community Portfolio. I am excited about the challenges […]