Too many phonies this week, huh? Grab a bottle and a cigar, and have an open thread.
Weekend Open Thread
69 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”
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Too many phonies this week, huh? Grab a bottle and a cigar, and have an open thread.
Comments are closed.
Since this is an Open Thread, I’m posting this sea story from Shep. Some of you guys may be familiar with the seabag.
Too much truth in this. Ha Ha
There was a time when everything you owned had to fit in your seabag.
Remember those nasty rascals? Fully packed, one of the suckers weighed more than the poor devil hauling it. The damn things weighed a ton and some idiot with an off-center sense of humor sewed a carry handle on it to help you haul it. Hell, you could bolt a handle on a Greyhound bus but it wouldn’t make the damn thing portable.
The Army, Marines, and Air Force got footlockers and WE got a big ole’ canvas bag. After you warped your spine jackassing the goofy thing through a bus or train station, sat on it waiting for connecting transportation and made folks mad because it was too damn big to fit in any overhead rack on any bus, train, and airplane ever made, the contents looked like hell. All your gear appeared to have come from bums who slept on park benches.
Traveling with a seabag was something left over from the “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum” sailing ship days. Sailors used to sleep in hammocks, so you stowed your issue in a big canvas bag and lashed your hammock to it, hoisted it on your shoulder and, in effect, moved your entire home from ship to ship. I wouldn’t say you traveled light because with ONE strap it was a one shoulder load that could torque your skeletal frame and bust your
ankles. It was like hauling a dead linebacker.
They wasted a lot of time in boot camp telling you how to pack one of the suckers. There was an officially sanctioned method of organization that you forgot after ten minutes on the other side of the gate at Great Lakes or San Diego.
You got rid of a lot of the ‘issue’ gear when you went to a SHIP. Did you EVER know a tin-can sailor who had a raincoat? A flat hat? One of those nut-hugger knit swimsuits? How bout those ‘roll-your-own’ neckerchiefs…the ones girls in a good Naval tailor shop would cut down & sew into a ‘greasy snake’ for two bucks?
Within six months, EVERY fleet sailor was down to ONE set of dress blues, port & starboard, undress blues, and whites, a couple of white hats, boots, shoes, a watch cap, assorted skivvies, a pea coat, and three sets of bleached-out dungarees. The rest of your original issue was either in the pea coat locker, lucky bag, or had been reduced to wipe-down rags in the paint locker. Underway ships were NOT ships that allowed vast accumulation of private gear. Hobos who lived in discarded refrigerator crates could amass greater loads of pack-rat crap than fleet sailors. The confines of a canvas-back rack, side locker, and a couple of bunk bags did NOT allow one to live a Donald Trump existence.
Space and the going pay scale combined to make us envy the lifestyle of a mud-hut Ethiopian. We were global equivalents of nomadic Mongols without ponies to haul our stuff. And after the rigid routine of boot camp, we learned the skill of random compression, known by mothers world-wide as ‘cramming’. It is amazing what you can jam into a space no bigger than a bread-box if you pull a watch cap over a boot and push it with your foot. Of course, it looks kinda weird when you pull it out, but they NEVER
hold fashion shows at sea and wrinkles added character to a ‘salty’ appearance.
There was a four-hundred mile gap between the images on recruiting posters and the ACTUAL appearance of sailors at sea. It was NOT without justifiable reason that we were called the tin-can Navy. We operated on the premise that if ‘Cleanliness was next to Godliness’ we must be next to the other end of that spectrum. We looked like our clothing had been pressed with a waffle iron and packed by a bulldozer. But what in hell did they expect from a bunch of swabs that lived in a crew’s hole of a 2100 Fletcher Class can?
After awhile you got used to it…You got used to everything you owned picking up and retaining that distinctive aroma… You got used to old ladies on busses taking a couple of wrinkled nose sniffs of your pea coat, then getting and finding another seat.
Do they still issue seabags?
Can you still make five bucks sitting up half the night drawing a ship’s picture on the side of one of the damn things with black and white marking pens that drive the old master-at-arms into a ‘rig for heart attack’ frenzy? Make their faces red…the veins on their neck bulge out…. and yell, ‘What in God’s name is that all over your seabag???’
‘Artwork, Chief…It’s like the work of Michelangelo…MY ship… GREAT,
huh?”
“Looks like some damn comic book…”
Here was a man with cobras tattooed on his arms…A skull with a dagger through one eye and a ribbon reading ‘DEATH BEFORE SHORE DUTY’ on his shoulder…Crossed anchors with ‘Subic Bay-1945’ on the other shoulder…An eagle on his chest and a full blown Chinese dragon peeking out between the cheeks of his butt… If ANYONE was an authority on stuff that looked like a comic book, it HAD to be the MAA…
Sometimes, I look at all the crap stacked in my garage, close my eyes and smile, remembering a time when EVERYTHING I owned could be crammed into a canvas bag.
— Author unknown
@50 Marine__7002, I’m so sorry you’re still getting whacked. You’ll get sunshine soon.
Do you have enough birdfood on hand?
@51 PH2 – ROTFLMAO! Tell Shep THANK YOU for sharing that with us. I’m sending it to my dad (1 year in the Navy, right at the end of WW2).
@52 PH-2 – birdfood for who, me or the birds? I’m trying to drop a few pounds, are you making a dietary suggestion for me? 😀
Great timing on your part, the sun DID just come out. At least, that’s what I think that big ol’ round yellow thing in the sky is. I may have to take a photo of it and Google it just to make sure.
@51 Thank you Ex. I really laughed reading your post. Not being a Navy vet I just don’t have the appreciation for all things Naval. Thank you for that glimpse into life as a sailor.
@54, you know you live in Michigan, when the weather guessers tell you how much snow you have, and immediately begin to worry that we’ll have spring floods because of all the “snow pack”. And, I’m sitting here watching the frost fall out of the sky, just like snow. In the sunshine.
I’ve done what was suggested, still get to inhabit two parallel TAH’s. I guess I’ll just enjoy both of them.
Birdfood is for the birds, unless you’re low on pantry items, Marine__7002.
Glad the sun finally showed up on your shores.
And I found that, with my ergonimically designed shovel, my back does not hurt and it’s easier to shovel that shit.
Is anyone certain that it is only two TAH’s? Could it be this is TAH, and my brother TAH, and my other brother TAH. And cousin TAH, aunt TAH, and uncle louie.
@56 UpNorth: right on target. A co-worker and I were talking about that last night. He lives in an older (50s-vintage) home with a basement, and he’s worried that when the snow starts melting the ground will be so saturated that his basement will start leaking. He’s had problems with it before.
@57 PH2 – I went looking for exactly that kind of shovel after the metal blade on my snow scoop fell off (I’ve done so much shoveling in the last month that the heads of the rivets were worn off). There’s NOTHING in the stores – they’re all sold out. Same with salt – I don’t put any down unless I absolutely HAVE to, but I need some now for the ice that has accumulated on the curb and part of a sidewalk, and there’s NONE to be found. The area municipalities are also hurting for salt, and likely won’t be able to get any more for the rest of the season.
And guess what’s in the long-range forecast for next Sat and Sun?
OWB, that’s it!!! The most recent venture here was interesting. My post, #56, showed up in the “Recent Comments” at the side. When I clicked on it, however, everything from #52 to #58 disappeared. I couldn’t get to the updated posts on this thread from “Recent Comments”, but I could scroll down to “Weekend Open Thread”, and get here. Strange thing, these intertubz.
@#59. Marine, look around for pool supply stores. I know it sounds weird, but most of them carry something called “pool salt”. It’s powdered, and doesn’t work as well as rock salt, but it does work. I ended up with it after all of the stores around here ran out the last time we got a week’s worth of snow.
Commander Phil Monkress at All points Logistics is still avoiding calkls seeking clarification of his claims.
Also, his employees or staff do not respond to calls when called from government or state offices.
Now that is strange.
I wonder how much business they are losing or if they are “all in” on that last contract.
Time will tell, won’t it there dishonorable Colonel? Or better yet Mrs. Smith?
Marine__7002 Table salt also works. Try that and/or the pool salt.
I thought it was Albany and Buffalo, NY that got all the bad snows from the Lakes. We get some of it from Lake Michigan if that ‘plume’ comes straight down the lake, but usually the worst stuff goes over to PawPaw, MI and northeastern Indiana. But this winter, it’s coming straight out of the interior of Alaska and Canada. This winter almost matches the 1978-79 winter, when Chicago got 60+ inches at one go and shut down both airports.
For those of you up in snowy lands, I’ve heard that ammonium nitrate pellets melt ice, too. It’s up in the sixties here, thought I’d pass it on!
@61 Thanks, UpNorth. Woulda never thought of that!
Ace Hardware still has ice melter. http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3994971
They also have that ergonomic shovel: http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3993357
Here’s their number: 1-866-290-5334
@66 Mucho gracias, seniorita. Hitting the nearest Ace before work today.
Lotta snow up here in the Great NW.
Just finished a batch of pasta sauce.
Phildo takes it in the ass.
I think I covered everything.
There’s no sea/war/trench stories yet, so I’m posting this here. It’s from Shep:
When I was in the Navy aboard USS MIDWAY, we were in San Diego for training, etc. I had my old Leica with me everywhere. We went to the famous Hollywood burlesque theater. I was not supposed to take photos. But a “no” was always a red flag to me. I photographed the strippers anyway. I shot a roll and hid it in my sock. Then while shooting a second roll, I was caught! Very embarrassing for an 18 year old. The manager gave me a choice: either I give him the film from the camera or he would call the shore patrol. So I opened the camera and instead of rewinding the film into the cassette, I pulled out the film, much to the anger of the manager! I then went to an Orange Julius and laughed at how my sock contained the real photos!! A couple days later I went back and dropped off several 8X10s to give to the girls! The manager was pissed that he was duped. He asked where I had hid the film. I told him, “in the crack of me arse!” Then I skeedadled out of there. MIDWAY left the next day.