It’s amazing what some of us ol’ salts had to do for amusement in the Ol’ Canoe Club! While plowing through the Seven Seas life can get pretty boring at times and every so often you got to do something to relieve the monotony!! Somewhere, somehow, someone down the road decided…
“What the hell!”
… and started doing talent shows on the fantail!!!
I’m not talking about your run of the mill garden variety ‘Who’s Got Talent’ like you saw on that ‘Dirty Dancing’ flick with ‘Babys’ sister sing’n the Hula Hana or Spongebob’s Squidward doing his best rendition of Horatio Hornblower! And I’m sure many of you non nautical types imagine squeaky clean Crackerjack qualified liberty hounds doing the Copacabana by Barry Manilo!! NO… it was noth’n of the sort… well, for the most part anyhow!!!
A good ol’ talent show on the fantail could be one helluva premier event during a six month Westpac! There’d be bands playing, Dunk The CMC, Barnacle Bill The Sailor Burlesques, Men doing the Victoria Secret Runway Show, and other skits, spoofs & lampoons of whatever floated your fancy!! It was the one time you could take a shot at anyone and get away with it... No subject or person was off-limits!!!
Some of the talent was pretty good too…
There was some kind of selection process they put you through to see who was flamboyant enough to have talent! Guys lacking flippity flap razz-a-ma-tazz stage worthy ability, bed wetters, whiners, and anyone who entertained the slightest desire to be stationed on shore duty need not apply!! The system, Gauddamn it, sorted out the truly gritty & gifted and packed the rest to stand watch elsewhere… unless you had a sense of humor… then you got to partake in the audience!!!
For last place you got garden trowel castration! Second to last you’d be locked up butt nekkit in an enclosed space with every gal on ‘The View’ for a week… or two!! Never mind… I think I’d rather be castrated or even put through a rectal Cobra insertion exercise before dealing with the Crew on the View!!!
I was wrapping myself around a cup of joe at the CSC console in CIC when the TAO came up, put his hand on my shoulder…
“Chief, you need to lay to the flight deck when you get a chance for relief!”
… Unfortunately the show was over by the time I’d made it topside! But I got a grandstand view on video of the spectacle as a must watch just for me to see!! Apparently the Missile Officer, my Divo, mustered up a skit of me on the Nordic Elliptical doing his best Tony Little rendition on the Gazelle!!!
“Whew… WoW… YeeHaw… You Can Do It… You Can Do It!”
I had never laughed so gauddamned hard in all my life! He looked like a total buffoon jumping up, down, back & forth like a damned Dallas Cheerleader on Crystal Meth…
“Whew… OOH Yeah… I’m gonna get it… I’m gonna Power Through This… Whew!”
I mean, who writes this shit anyway?!? The dialog… the bantor… I gotta say, those technical skills… they were amazing!! I must be one helluva Acrobatic Exhibitionist to do some of that stuff!!!
One of the greatest gifts of partaking in the ol’ Canoe Club are all those memories and the rogue rapscallions you shared them with! Killing Time underway … we got pretty damned good at it!!!
During Sea & Chancre Detail on the fantail a group of us used to sing Doo Wop. Called ourselves The Shitcan Boys. They wouldn't let us have one to light. On a more sappy note 40 guys on the flight deck of John Young Christmas Eve 92 somewhere in the IO singing Christmas Carols.
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