"Operation Appendix"

Here’s another rusty recollection from our salty ol’ pal Owyn “Preacher” Bradford. He’s always got some good ones from the good ol’ days …

"This month’s playmate must be outta sight!"

Now this ain't no shit, mates. 1966, Naval hospital Cubi Point PI. It was two days after an operation to remove the remnants of a busted appendix. I had drain tubes in me and all, insides had been fulla infection.

Right after breakfast this chief comes over…

"Heave out shipmate, it's time to turn too for field day."

"Just had an operation, Chief."

"Don't give me that stuff, turn too!"

Just then three-striper doc comes over…

"This man stays in bed, Chief. My authorization."

And he turns away. Chief glowers, bends down and hisses…

"I'll fix you, sonny boy!"

Loud enough for doc to hear, I blurt out

"What do you mean you'll fix me, Chief?"

Doc comes back, takes chief by the arm.

"You come with me right now!"

As to the rest, we can only guess...

"Eval & Fitreps"

Any of you old shipwrecks remember having to write evals or fitreps for your troops? Then there came a point where the Chain-Of-Command (CoC) asked you to write your own fitreps … "Does anybody around here remember if I did anything this year?"  Here we’ve found some great eval and fitrep pearls for you all to enjoy…

"His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of curiosity."
 

"This officer can be likened to a small puppy; he runs around excitedly, leaving little messes for other people to clean up."
 

"This Officer is really not so much of a has-been; as he is more of a definitely won't-be."
 

"This Officer sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them."

"Since my last report, he has reached rock bottom and has started to dig."

"This Officer should go far, and the sooner he starts, the better."

“This officer’s presence aboard my ship is depriving some village of its idiot.”

“This Officer reminds me very much of a gyroscope – always spinning around at a frantic pace, but not really going anywhere.”

“This young lady has delusions of adequacy.”

“When he joined my ship, this Officer was something of a granny; since then he has aged considerably.”

“Since my last report he has reached rock bottom, and has started to dig.”

“She sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.”

“Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

“Got into the gene pool while the lifeguard wasn’t watching.”

“A room temperature IQ.”

“Got a full 6-pack, but lacks the plastic thingy to hold it all together.”

“A gross ignoramus—144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus.”

“A photographic memory but with the lens cover glued on.”

“A prime candidate for natural deselection.”

“Bright as Alaska in December.”

“One-celled organisms outscore him in IQ tests.”

“Donated his brain to science before he was done using it.”

“Fell out of the family tree.”

“Gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn’t coming.”

“Has two brains: one is lost and the other is out looking for it.”

“He’s so dense, light bends around him.”

“If brains were taxed, he’d get a rebate.”

“If he were any more stupid, he’d have to be watered twice a week.”

“If you give him a penny for his thoughts, you’d get change.”

“If you stand close enough to him, you can hear the ocean.”

“Some drink from the fountain of knowledge; he only gargled.”

“Takes him an hour and a half to watch 60 minutes.”

“Was left on the Tilt-A-Whirl a bit too long as a baby.”

“Wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.”

“When she opens her mouth, it seems that this is only to change whichever foot was previously in there.”

“He has carried out each and every one of his duties to his entire satisfaction.”

“Technically sound, but socially impossible.”

“He has the wisdom of youth, and the energy of old age.”

“The only ship I would recommend this man for is citizenship, and even that’s a stretch.”

“Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap.”

(fin)

  

"World of Warships"

I don’t know if any of you old farts are fans of the online game “World of Warships!” It’s a tactical, slow-paced shooter game with Navy ships of all types. The game is free online and allows players to work as a team up to three players. I’m not a gamer but I’m surely fascinated by the computer art. It’s pretty awesome if you ask me. Here are a few pics I pulled that I thought you might all enjoy plus a video link at the end. It’s some really good art that’s almost life-like. Enjoy …

(Click on Video Link Below)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcjDzi3ghtM

"Transfer of Admiral Rickover"

At one point in the time during his career, Admiral Hyman Rickover, the father of the Nuclear Navy, was a commander of a carrier task force, and his flag on the carrier.

For exercise, Admiral Rickover walked a lap around the flight deck every day. It became custom for the sailors to approach the Admiral during his walks, and gripe, complain, etc …, and the Admiral would take care of the problems brought forth by the crew. It was a great morale booster.

Well, the day came when Admiral Rickover was reassigned to Washington, and a helicopter carried him off. The crew was so despondent at his departure that the helmsan wasn’t paying attention to his job, and the carrier hit a sandbar.

I guess you could say they grounded the warship he walked on …

"More Paoli Gems"

I hadn’t posted any of late, but Paoli is probably one my personal favorite cartoonists from back in the day. He’s been published in All Hands around the Vietnam era of the late 60’s and early 70’s. I hope you enjoy these gems …

(fin)

"Screwed Up or Getting Screwed"

Yeah, I know there are many more out there. But I thought I’d list a few of the old sayings I remember from my days in the ol’ Canoe Club when it came to getting screwed. We’ve all been there and done that, so enjoy …

Run she may, but shine she must, There ain't no steam, but there's no more dust.

“I want my chain-of-command to be my gaudamned Pallbearers, just so they can let me down one more fucking time!”

“Shipmate.... if you got time to lean you got time to clean.”

Replacements are scarcer than honest politicians and the shame is we’re probably better off for it.

“Between you and me, neither one of us know what the hell we’re doing…”

“Assmosis: The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by sucking up rather than working hard.”

“Always watch whose toes you step on because they may be connected to the butt that you will eventually have to kiss…”

“‘Status quo,’ as you know, is Latin for ‘the mess we’re in…’”

“Nobody ever said you had to be smart to wear khaki.”

“Whatever happened to good old-fashioned military leadership? Just task the first two people you see.”

“There are no stupid questions, just stupid people asking questions.”

"It’s not a lot of work unless you have to do it."

"Kissing his ass may not do anything for you, but it sure makes him feel better."

"I asked him the difference between true and relative bearing. He laughed and said you can't trick me with your fool's errand and walked off."

"I am so far down the food chain that I've got plankton bites on my butt."

“Alcohol is the Bermuda Triangle of our moral compass.”

"In my defense, I was left unsupervised."

"He who strives for the minimum rarely attains it."

"Here we are, United States Sailors, cleverly disguised as responsible adults."

"You only know as much as you don't know."

"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit!"

"The beatings shall continue until Morale Improves!"

“I never understood why they make the Deck force handle lines at Sea & Anchor in their Dress Whites! It’s like putting braille dots on drive up ATM machines…dumb as it gets!”

“If you are in a hurry, chances are the person you are relying on isn’t!”

“Believing that something ought to work is not the same as establishing that it will … but here we are!”

“You know, in this Command, if the world were supposed to end tomorrow, it would still happen behind schedule.”

“Strive for the bare minimum. Remember, there’s no competition at the bottom of the barrel.”

"There are times in your life when you'll have to eat crow. Actually, you don't have to eat it just hold it in your mouth long enough until nobody's watching, and then spit it out."

“Accuracy and attention to detail take a certain amount of time.”


Chief's Mess on an Arleigh Burke ... 

Forward of the Messdecks and Aft of CIC, paranoia became a mental disorder ...

Then there was that old Marine saying ... 

"Ours isn't to ask why but to do or die ... Semper Fi!"

"Good Ol' Boys and Good Times"

Anyone out there leave the Ol’ Canoe Club with a seabag full of memories? I just spent an hour today on Zoom with a group of ol’ shipmates, and I do mean old, from back in our Rainier days. Boy the cobwebs got cleared off the Rolodex of memories didn’t they boys?!?

Our conversations went straight from happy to see your faces shipmates to right down the drain where all our shenanigans rest with the whale shit. We talked about how Jack Daniels was one of our most admired people on the planet, or that waking up in somebody else’s rack other than your own butt nekkit, or being so drunk you pissed on your own Birthday Cake!

And for all you chubby chasers and fatty fans, there’s that time a couple of the fellas hooked up with some lesbians and one of the boys got the fat girl …

“Why is it me that always gets the shit end of the stick?”

“All I know is I looked over and you had a 44-triple-D stuffed in your mouth!”

“She was so big we could use her as a decoy for a whaling ship!”

I wasn’t there, but from what I gather she really tipped the scales. But as they say, big girls need loving too and they love to do the horizontal mambo! I’d given the first ten pages of my address book to have seen that!

“Man she was hairy too! I was so entangled in her thick rug it was like wading waist deep in a grass prairie on a wet soggy day! I swear I tripped over a piece of the last guy’s crank armor!”

“What about that buck-toothed gal that used to work in operations? She was so ugly she’d make a freight train take a dirt road.”

It doesn’t take long for a bunch of shipmates to start talking like a sailor once again after twenty-five years apart. Listening to our conversations you’d swear a one-celled amoeba had a greater IQ than the bunch of us put together…

“I don’t remember it that way… I told her I was gonna shampoo my pubic hair with her saliva.”

“Yeah, remember that gal you went home with on Halloween and her Jack-0-Lantern on the porch had more teeth than she had!”

At the house I think there was a sign above that said “Liqour in the front, Poker in the Rear!”

Then we recalled one night when one of our shipmates we’ll just call “Jeff” was so blackout drunk at the surfer soaked Garnet Strip in Pacific Beach, San Dog, he was on the dance floor at Moose McGilllycutty’s swaying back and forth staggering up behind some cute little Mexican Chica and grabbed a handful of ass. She was there with her boyfriend and about six or more Cholo gangster look’n fellas that were ready to take us all down. If it weren’t for the meaty sized bouncers I don’t think we would’a made it out alive!

Yes, our exploits may be the best evidence to constitute we did not descend from monkeys, but have not yet ascended to them. But hey, at least we never got hung from the yardarms. Here’s to the days of our drunken power fantasies … sucking down suds and getting capsized drunk doing stupid shit Darwin warned us not to do!!!

"Some Shellback Initiation Art"

The ol’ Canoe Club is loaded full of traditions that go way back to the days of Noah and all the zoo animals!  From Sirens to Sea Monsters we’ve got them all, and the Shellback Initiation Ceremony is no different. Here is a collection of unique art I thought shipwrecks might enjoy. I know there is much out there to pick from but I thought this collection was worthy of your tastes … Enjoy!

(fin)