What you're watching

[EndtheMadnessNow]

So I started watching "The Old Man", and find it's pretty good. I have to wonder who their technical advisor is - parts are pretty damned right on the money, eerily so, while other parts are pure fantasy, I suspect in the vein of "artistic license" to make it more dramatic. For example, the scene where cargo planes drop the 4 crates of sniper rifles into Afghanistan under Soviet occupation would never have happened. The US was jittery about "international incidents" and "direct confrontations" that would have heated up a Cold War considerably, so no US cargo overflights of Afghanistan  in those days. Everything was smuggled across the border, either on donkey back or in dilapidated trucks not worth noticing through the Khyber Pass and internally through Muj held places like the Salang Pass.

I have to admit, a massive cargo plane flying low and kicking parachute equipped crates out of the cargo hold on an overflight is far more visually dramatic on film than a crate-laden donkey bouncing it's ass up a mountain trail is.

A running theme of the show seems to be an examination of the age-old question: "what's in a name?", something I can identify with.

Fascinating, and very entertaining.

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Yea, after 6 episodes I'm digging that show.

Christopher Huttleston - CIA consultant. LOL, blank slate IMDB bio.

Christopher Huttleston and Jeff Bridges attend The Old Man" Season 1 NYC Tastemaker Event at MOMA on June 14, 2022 in New York City.


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How to Build the Ultimate Bug-Out Bag

"Your kit should be no heavier than what you can carry comfortably," says Christopher Huttleston, a retired CIA officer who spent more than two decades doing intelligence work before he was brought on as a technical consultant for The Old Man. He helped inform key pieces of the plot, as well the scene in which Bridges's character grabs his own bug-out bag and hits the road in a hurry.

Huttleston also suggests having a regimented, consistent way of packing--and knowing exactly what's in the bag at any given time.

Jack Tomarchio - Former Army Judge Advocate General (JAG) Attorney, and Deputy Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis Operations at Dept. of Homeland Security. Bio

Siddiq Barmak - Subject Matter Expert on Afghan Affairs.