Wednesday, November 26, 2014

‘THANKSGIVING RECIPE FOR A SAILOR’


Take one civilian, slightly green
Stir from bunk at early hour
Soak in shower daily
Dress in blue jacket
Mix with others of his kind and
Grate on Chief's nerves
Toughen with boot camp
Add liberal portions of beans and soup
Let stand on watch
Bake in 110 degree temperature
Let cool below zero
Season with courage and loyalty
Top with pride... and
Garnish with decorations
Serves 350 million people

… For extra spice add copious amounts of bourbon, rum, tequila, or scotch… or whatever else floats your boat!!!

Saturday, November 22, 2014

'Even Numbered Chiefs'


This was a segment of Entry #17 in my charge book when I made Chief… it was a humorous jab at some of our Seniors… or was it!! (You Decide!!!)

“SENIOR CHIEFS ARE THE WORST OUT OF THE ENLISTED RANKS. FUCK 'EM. IF MY CAREER CHOICE DID NOT CATEGORICALLY ENTAIL A SENSE OF DISCIPLINE I WOULD UNQUESTIONABLY THUMP AN EVEN NUMBERED CHIEF IN THE HEAD… YOU SMUG BASTARDS!! I'LL BET THEY GO HOME AND SUCK DICKS FOR FUN!! GOD FORBID THEY HAVE CHILDREN… FUCK!! THAT WOULD FURTHER CONTAMINATE THE GENE POOL OF HUMAN KIND!! GAUDDAMED THE SONS-A-BITCHES!!! EVERY BREATH AN EVEN NUMBERED CHIEF TAKES, HE WASTES OXYGEN. PLEASE TAKE HEED AND HATE ON SENIOR CHIEFS!!!”

'Your Job'



ONE THING I LEARNED OVER THE YEARS... YOUR JOB IS THE LEAST IMPORTANT ONE ON THE SHIP! DON'T BELIEVE ME?!? JUST ASK ANYONE ELSE!!!

Friday, November 21, 2014

'Sleep'n Sailors'


A sailor can, and will, sleep anywhere, anytime

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

‘Roving Patrol’


Now how many of you ol’ Crackerjacks out there remember pulling the ol’ four hour Roving Patrol Watch?!? That was the best Gravy Train on the Watchbill! You got to roam the passageways your entire watch shoot’n the shit with all your cohorts while armed like a bandit wandering the decks!!!

You’d walk the entire ship, spending plenty of time in the crews lounge or up on the bridge playing with the helm, or hang’n out on the smoke deck! Ever so often the Section Leader might put up a sticky note for you to find or have you initial a placard or two when you showed up at certain security points!! But for the most part you were just lolligagg’n and skylark’n like most shipmates do best!!!

You see the whole idea was to keep a good eye around the ship just to make sure your sorry ass checked in about every thirty minutes or so with the OOD at various times! But you didn’t want to be the one who didn’t show up to the Quarterdeck on time!! That would be an all out fail…

Yep… the dreaded ‘Security Alert’ would get called away! You didn’t want to get caught day dream’n four feet away or watching the BooB Tube down in the lounge when you should’a been making your rounds!! Damn… especially if it was after TAPS!!!

But it happened time and again! I’d been late on a few occasions! Lucky for me I was close enough to the Quarterdeck running my ass off that the OOD saw me coming and declined to call Security Alert away!! But when you didn’t make it, it was as if you’d turned the planet on it’s corner and all the fellas wanted to bury you for making them have to get outta there comfy positions and play chase the bad guy for fifteen minutes!! Yeah, it was one hell of a way to endear yourself to your shipmates!!!

I sure wasn’t the only unlucky sumbitch out there! This scenario happened at least every other day import!! I remember one particular duty day on the Ol’ USS Baglady… The night was warm and humid, full of hormones and a serious lack of promise, and not much judgment! I’d just went to the sink from the rain locker in the forward head brushing my teeth when all the sudden…

“Security Alert… Security Alert!”

… sounded over the 1MC!

“Reason for security alert, Rover failed to report!” 

Then out of the shitters… pull’n his dungaroos up like it’s know one’s business and a ripped up ol’ nekkit girlie magazine that looked like it’d made it’s rounds through anchor windless a dozen times…

“Hey shipmate… don’t forget your holster & weapon hang’n off the door!”

This is where the said ‘Rover’ started running towards the Quarterdeck as exuberantly as a pyromaniac starts fires!! Then after gett’n his but chewed by the CDO… the poor son-of-a-bitch had to face the Chief Section Leader! Back in those days Chiefs were the kind’a fellas that could probably tear the hind leg off of Godzilla!!

“Son, if your thoughts were any shallower I’d suspect your brain pan of being a cookie sheet! You’re a gauddamned case of Darwinian reversal... you dipshit!”

“Sorry Chief… I was just taking a dump and lost track of time!”

“Yeah I’m sure that’s all you were doing in the shitter… not sure rather to be amused or annoyed!”

The things My Chief used to say… funny, irreverent, caustic, and usually right on the money! And we fell prey in an exhilarating sense by being where we weren’t supposed to be at the right place and time!! Yes those were the days… I don’t guess we saved the world or cured cancer… but it was a pretty gauddamned good run anyways!!!
 


Thursday, November 13, 2014

'A Sailor And His Beer'


A sailor will walk 10 miles in a freezing rain to get a beer but complain mightily about standing a 4-hour quarterdeck watch on a beautiful, balmy spring day.

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

What Is A Vet




A special one for Veteran’s Day…

Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye.
Others may carry the evidence inside them: a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the leg—or perhaps another sort of inner steel: the soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity. Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking.
So, what is a vet?
He / She is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers didn't run out of fuel.
He / She is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel.
She-or he-is the nurse who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang.
He / She is the POW who went away one person and came back another—or didn't come back AT ALL. He / She is the TRADOC drill instructor who has never seen combat—but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and gang members into soldiers, and teaching them to watch each other's backs.
He / She is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand.
He / She is the career logistician who watches the ribbons and medals pass him by.
He / She is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns, whose presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor dies unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep.
He / She is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket-palsied now and aggravatingly slow—who helped liberate a Nazi death camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold him when the nightmares come.
He / She is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being—a person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to sacrifice theirs.
He / She is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known.
So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country, just lean over and say, "Thank you." That's all most people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded or were awarded.
Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU."
-      Author Unknown…