" The Ship with the Flat Tire "

 

In “The Ship with a Flat Tire” we live the misadventures of the U.S.S. Carnation, a ship named after the prohibitionist Carry Nation. Carnation is an Auxiliary Submarine Support ship, (ASS-1), converted from an LST and used to deliver torpedoes to submarines at sea. As for the rag-tag officers and crew, they play a similar likeness to the television series M.A.S.H.  There is, for instance, Commander Nord, who has fourteen children, each named after a ship type or naval station. His Executive officer is Lt. Albert Armageddon Schwetzbaum, whose consuming ambition is to create a public Image for the Carnation and take credit for the ship's Navy Bean Soup recipe Contest. (Winner of the contest is Lt. (jg.) Allison, a peanut butter maniac, whose recipe includes, of course, peanut butter. The central figure is Ensign J. Roger Westbury. The Carnation, whose missions may include the transportation of space monkeys, is under threat of imminent decommission from the service. When the ship is finally ordered to cruise down the Carolinas, it has to head back to port because a rubber inner tube used as a substitute shock absorber for the clutch assembly blows flat. It’s a good read I recommend for those into ol’ Canoe Club humor!