I tried to provide a link but couldn’t. Go to Google maps, just enter Aschaffenburg, Germany. You should be able to zoom in from there. A lot has changed in the past 30 years, though.
And I stand corrected – my wife and I watched that parade from Hofgartenstrasse. We were across the street from the huge park in the middle of the city.
While stationed at Whidbey Island NAS in the mid 70’s, I got into the only trouble I have had during my 4 years in the Navy. I exited the chow hall one blustery morning and did not notice that an officer had passed me going in the opposite direction. He stopped me and let me have it, he primary statement being that I did not have to salute him, I had to salute the uniform. A few weeks later I was approaching the same officer. I stopped, snapped to attention, and gave the sharpest salute a guy can give. For some reason my brain went into a deep freeze and instead of an appropriate greeting, I barked out “Good morning uniform!”.
Later that day I was escorted to my division officer’s office. He was reading the report when I walked in. I stood waiting to for the axe to fall. Suddenly he started laughing, looked at me and said he had never heard of anyone saying that before. I explained the brain freeze and hoped the punishment wasn’t going to be too bad. I got very lucky, no Captain’s Mast, just a weeks restriction to the base.
It was 1967, in Vietnam. I was in the 1st Division Army Band and we had a base adjacent to the Korean compound. Now, Army bands are more than just Marching Fools; they are expected to provide music for ALL occasions, from formal award ceremonies to strip shows (yes, we did, but that’s another story). In our band were some very good jazz musicians with professional Hollywood backgrounds and we had a great “big band” or “stage band” with the 5 trumpet, 4 trombones, 5 sax plus rhythm configuration.
The Koreans were nuts about American music and jazz in particular. One day we were invited to play at their EM (Enlisted Men’s) Club. We gave them such a concert and were surprised to see men (there were no women on the compound) dancing jitterbug-style with other men while we played. We assumed it was a cultural difference.
After the performance, as we were packing up to leave and most of the audience had filtered out, a Korean sergeant told us in sign language to grab our favorite bottle(s) from the bar and join the rest at the big table so he could show us some “Training Films.”
Jeez…training films, hunh. Guess that bottle might come in handy, so we followed instructions. Out came the projector and on the screen appeared some naked ladies and a German Shepherd dog who…but you get the idea.
None of us spoke Korean, and the Koreans spoke little English. But the music and stag films were a universal communication device and no other language was necessary.
Ah, memories.
Extracted from here to remove junk not relevant to this thread: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2456646&postcount=3
My dad was USAF. During the first year of my life, he was stationed at the end of those islands in Alaska. (probably listening in on Russian communications)
Anyway, it was tiny ‘base’, only about 20 men and one dog. Naturally, things were a little more relaxed.
One day, my dad is in the ‘BX’ (the store), My dad is a sargent, he is talking to the another Sargent who is running the store and smoking a cigarette. The Captain walks in and addresses the other guy.
Sargent, that sign reads “No Smoking” and this man is smoking. What are you going to do?"
Other sargent replied
“Well, I guess I’m going to take this damn sign down.” and he pulled it off the wall.
They all laughed and went about their business.
I don’t have stories that will match what I’m seeing here, but one story did prove I have a bit of a vindictive streak, when called for.
I was stationed, in 1976, at Camp Humphries in South Korea. I was there as part of the ASA(Army Security Agency) a classified job involving language skills and radio listening.
My supervisor, Sgt. T, comes along and asks if I’d be willing to represent the unit in the quarterly Soldier of the Month contest. He had to put a warm body forward and nobody else wanted to. So I said I would. All the contest involved was going before a board and answering military related questions. I was given a copy of the questions(not all of which would be asked.) I figured I’d study it some, but wasn’t going to be fanatic about it
Then Bill, a jerk from another unit, and a Frank Burns clone if there ever was one and also in the contest, asked me “Who put you up for this?” Huh, didn’t he think a woman could win?
Oh, didn’t I tell you? I was the only female in a field of sixteen other contestants. From the moment of Bill’s snide remark I studied the hell out of those questions. I friggin’ memorized seven full sheets of material. I found two other gals in the barracks who’d been up in past quarters, and they’d pretend to be the board, asking me questions and critiquing my mannerisms.
I went last of all seventeen of us, and answered all questions put to me. I was dismissed and left the interview room, going down the hallway to return to the other contestants. But I was called back and told I’d won, and that before I’d come in two others had been tied, with one incorrect answer each. And one of those was Bill. He turned an interesting shade of green when we were all informed. I still have the US Savings Bond I won as part of my prize. That night all my friends were buying me drinks and I vaguely remember asking them for the cherries in their drinks. They were laughing too, as I was known not to hardly drink at all, but hey, if someone else wants to buy I wasn’t going to hurt their feelings.
I wrote up one of my favorite stories here.
Opening para:
Driving through Checkpoint Charlie was like driving off the set of a color
movie and into film noir. The sky was gray. The buildings were gray. The
clothes were gray. The people were gray. They shuffled along, slumped over,
looking very tired. Mostly people ignored us, but some walked by and without
turning their heads, winked or raised an eyebrow to say hello–knowing full
well that if they got caught they would be arrested and possibly never seen
again.
My favorite military experience is second hand many times over, I think it was originaly a ‘humor in uniform’ bit.
It seems a general whose aircraft was refueling in Greenland was on the ground too long suit him. He asked to see the crew responsible. One parka’ed airman comes in with story about sewage lines being needed to be thawed before the sanitary systems on the aircraft could be emptied.
“Well, hurry it up, or you’ll be sorry.”
“Sir, with all due respect, I’m an E-1, and I’m sucking shit out of your aircraft in Thule, Greenland. What exactly were you envisioning doing to me?”
This story about the USS Dixon is one of my best. It’s rather long, and there are pictures, so click through to read the whole thing.
Interesting.
Quoting Tripler: “get blowed up”
Is it only soldiers who say this ?
I find myself saying it that way myself, like: “you are three miles from the blowed up church.” even knowing that correctly, it should be: “. . . the blown up church”.
probably this is a question that will never be able to be answered, civilians never have occasion to say either blowed up or blown up.
Good talking to you soldier. I think I answered my own question.
correction: american civilians . . . . .
Just remembered one more…
When I got to my first overseas duty station, I was very green. I was in the USAF, Aircraft Armament Systems MOS, and I was assigned to the Weapons flight of the 480th Tactical Fighter Wing at Spangdahlem AFB (52TFW) in Germany. The whole flight line, except for the central maintenance area, was a series of numbered hardened aircraft shelters (half-dome looking hangar areas) three or four to a hard stand, and stretched from end to end about 4 miles long connected by taxiways.
When I was there, the base had 2 squadrons of F-16 (including mine) and one squadron of F-4gs that were in the process of being fazed out (we were the last active duty squadron flying them I think - we later got them replaced with F-16s and gained another squadron of F-15s from Bitburg later). There were two squadrons (mine and one other) at one end of the base, then the central flight control area with towers and a big holding pad for transports and such, then the other squadron on the far end. We often shared parts with the other F-16 squadron.
My crew chief ordered me to go down to Shelter 2 and pick up a bomb rack, driving a jammer bomb truck which is basically a one-man vehicle with a set of long arms off the front that can pick up bombs and hold them in place for loading on wing racks on the F-16; it’s slow and diesel powered and open to all the elements. Shelter 2 was the far end of the base; through 2 security check points and about two or three miles away. It’s cold and blustery and spitting rain, so I hunch down and go all the way down the base to shelter 2, counting them off as I go starting from Shelter 98. I was so new, however, I didn’t realize that the 81st, at the far end of the base, was the only squadron which didn’t fly f-16s.
So I was cold, wet, and grumpy on my way back up to our end of the base and I saw my weapons crew coming back up the other way in a van, laughing at me. So I flipped them off. Just as they turned a corner, and our maintenance officer, Captain V, turned the other corner right in front of me.
I finally catch up with them, tell them what happened, and they start razzing me - man, you’re gonna be in so much trouble, etc. I start panicking a bit, getting more and more worried that Captain V thought I was flipping him off. We get back to the maintenance shed, and unbeknownst to me, my crew chief goes upstairs and talks to Capt. V and says I wasn’t flipping the Capt off, I was flipping off my crew, etc… Capt V says no problem, that’s what I thought.
Then my crew chief comes back down, says to me “Capt V is incredibly pissed, he wants a piece of your ass. You better go up, and report to him, and then apologize.” So I go upstairs, knock on the door, stand in front of Capt V at attention, salute, and give the reporting statement Sir, Airman T reports as Ordered and get this halfway out of my mouth before Capt V says I didn’t ask to see you, go away.
This is when I knew I’d been had, and it was the start of a long period of my load crew and others taking the piss out of me for months. It got pretty ridiculous - like when I was told to go to the Security Police barracks and ask for some K9P, or sent to the logistics warehouse on base and asked for some Flightline, but I was the unlucky soul to be far and away the most junior guy around for a while so caught the short end for about 6 months until we got another couple of new recruits in.
Then I did exactly the same to them as was done to me 
So we’re getting kitted out at Catterick camp.
In front of me is Henry, QM sarge says “Boots, what size?”
Henry: “Size 9 with a broad fitting”
QMS: " ??..here try these 10s"
Henry got kicked out before we finished basic
My dad, as a young Navy photographic officer in the late 1950s, on several occasions took a transport plane and film crew from Washington to Marine Air Station Cherry Point, NC, where they would film state-of-the-art flight simulator equipment in operation, for use in various aviation training films.
One day, on learning that some simulator footage was needed, dad simply arranged the crew, the gear, the plane, and took off without notifying Cherry Point that they were coming. Hey, they had the simulator; where was it gonna go?
Well, guess what.
There Ensign Doug was, with a plane, flight crew, several photographers’ mates and a U.S. fuckton of motion picture equipment, all dressed up and no place to go but back to Washington. There his skipper had some trenchant commentary for him about the need to assume nothing, and prepare for anything.
Naw, more or less, it’s kind of slang influenced by a little American Southern drawl. Most folks I know would say, “you are three miles from the destroyed church.”
‘Blowed up’ is something you would say to a friend standing next to you, when you slap him in the chest with the back of your hand, smirk, and say, “Jimbo there dun’ got himself blowed up!”
Tripler
Me = not blowed up.
Many years ago(Late 70s or early 80s I think)when clocks were actually run by clockwork and pendulums and all the other time oriented hardware we received two clocks for our vehicles that had the appearance of solid brass,ships chronometers and were literally six inches deep but when you opened them there was only a tiny plastic mechanism and a small torch battery.
Though the norm today at that time it was astounding and obviously cutting edge technology so everyone in the squadron had no choice but to go and have a look and marvel at them.
Which is why I think that one of bosses had bought them in in the first place.
(Obviously we didn’t get out often enough)
This was before the British Army had Special Forces Group as an organisation so our total and absaloute leader was the Director S.A.S who only answered to the P.M.
D.SAS was due to make an informal visit to us,no bullshit involved but it was a chance for him to weigh us up generally.
Of course a distinguished visitor like him had to be shown the latest example of scientific miracle working so the young officer showing him round duly opened the back of the clock with the fateful words “You really must see this sir its quite amazing”
To reveal a large piece of paper taped to the backplate on which somebody had written in block capitals “NOSY CUNT!”
I swear before god on my mums soul that this actually happened,not nearly happened,or could have happened or was lucky it didn’t happen.
The young officer was gobsmacked and stood there speechless with his mouth open,D.SAS. totally unfazed said "Yes amazing I really must get one for the missus.
This was in the days before
When I was the Chief at a public works station, they gave me my very own Ensign to play with. He was a nice kid and very earnest, and my job (and the job of every CPO) was to make sure he didn’t fuck things up too badly and actually learned something about leadership.
So one day he calls me and says something to the effect of “Chief, would you mind coming over to my office if you’re not too busy?” My reply: “Goddamnit, Ensign, you’re the officer and I’m the enlisted man. Just say, ‘Chief, report to my office NOW!’”
Says he: “Okay…Chief, report to my office on the double!” My answer, of course: “I ain’t got time for that shit.” and I hung up. He was a lovely shade of red by the time he got to my office.
The first two flight simulators I worked on were built in the '50s, and were housed in trailers. They rarely ever moved – never at all by the time I began work on them in the late '70s. Nowadays the simulators don’t move around, but you would have to block a time slot, because they’re all so busy all the time.
One time my brother puked in the office of the Commandant of the Marine Corps. He and his unit went to Washington for some reason, had an obligatory tour of the Pentagon and various meet & greets, but had caught a stomach flu a couple days before which he thought he could just tough it out. Guess he didn’t.
One of the many fire-fighting systems on board a ship is known by shorthand as the “fire main”, and that gets carried over to a lot of shore commands with their sup’d up sprinkler systems as well. Twenty minutes before the workday ended, some obscure component related to this caught on fire, which we got to say the fire main caught on fire. The system was shut down, work secured, smoking lamp put out, etc. Nobody got hurt, but not a lot of people got to go home that night either.
I could tell you about people. Lots of different kinds of people. I could tell you about a roommate, in the barracks, a Seabee BU type who was big on that “lover in every port” thing. Dude had like 50 hats, many different colors but all the same standard type of hat, each hat matched to belt, always broke as shit. Never bought his own stuff (unless it was a hat), slick on excuses why he needed to borrow mine. Money, shoe shine kit, tooth paste, soap, towel, underwear… once after a field exercise he was taking a shower and asked me to come check his head for lice for him. Interesting guy.
There’s not much wrong in getting a tattoo, or even a tattoo on your lower back. Religious-themed tattoos are very common in the military. But a crucifix tramp stamp? It was supposed to be part of a much larger and cooler thing that never got finished, he explained to me, but he still got no small amount of hell from people about it.
I could tell you a little about ships. Like the Kearsarge, a.k.a. the Freaksarge.
I worked with a guy that had been an officer on the Baton Rouge. When I reading Blind Man’s Bluff it mentioned the collision between the Baton Rouge and a Soviet sub.
I thought about it for a minute and realized that my co-worker was onboard at about that time.
the next day, I went into the office, and said
“You were driving that day, weren’t you”?
“huh?”
“You were driving that day, weren’t you”?
He thought for about 5 seconds and said
“No, it wasn’t me, I was in line for chow.”
He knew right away what I was talking about. 
[hijack]
I’ve always meant to ask: what exactly is a smoking lamp? I always thought it was like the little indicators they have on airliners when, back in the day, they used to allow smoking on airline flights. (::bing:: . . . the Captain has turned on the fasten seat belt sign, and turned off the smoking sign. ::bing:
Is that what is it? Just a set condition where you can smoke up on deck?
[/hijack]
Tripler
Wait, should I be using “hijack” tags in a military-themed thread? It sounds mutinous, but it ain’t. . .