Where were we......Oh yeah....Mexico City and heading south.
I have always been fascinated by the way different people, when suddenly put together like our little group, would shake down and settle out into different factions and sub-groups and unlikely friendships. Here is some info on some of the people and how things were beginning to shake down by the time we reached Mexico City.
It looked to me like there wasn,t much hope for the elitist group from the State Dept and Pentagon. We were just unfortunate enough to have been given a group that lived in their own world and had very little understanding of the working class military. That first meeting had been a disaster and it was going downhill from there.
As for the Air Force Contingent, I was pleased with the way we were shaking out. That little riot at the airport had really pulled us together. It was "us" against "them" there for a few minutes and now "usn's" were a little tighter knit unit. The crew chiefs had thanked the rest of us profusely for helping to protect their little tweety birds. Crew chiefs get real tetchy when someone tries to mess around with their airplane. It may be just a piece of machinery to everyone else but to a crew chief, it has its own personality and they kind of get to thinking about them like you would a pet puppy.
Young Lieutenant Bond had morphed from a quite, polite young officer to a celebrity after his amazing display of fisticuffs during the riot. Riley claimed someone had been feeding him gunpowder that made him turn mean. So he was now called gunpowder. It is always a good thing when nicknames start appearing. Well, not always, but usually.
The aircrew going out on the town with the rest of us had been a good thing, even if we did end up eating at Denny's. Geeezzzz!
We really got lucky with our new Commander, Major Jackson. His put-down of the pompous Maj. Fetchit that first day made him a hero with us. But the crowning glory was when the co-pilot let it slip that Jacksons nick-name was "Stomp". This was because he had very big feet and years ago and someone just naturally started calling him Stomp.
Now lets face it.....when you have a unit commander named Stomp and a maintenance officer named gunpowder, you just have to feel like you belong to an elite unit and are bound for glory.
And then there was Squeaky, our little squeaky voiced sheetmetal man. I dont know who put the nickname on him but it fit and he seemed to take pride in it. Squeaky was becoming something like a mascot and not in a derogatory way. He seemed to think that his leadership of the faction that forced me to eat that slop in Denny's restaurant rather than some good real mexican food gave him extra stature. Maybe so.....but anyway....in his odd sort of way, Squeaky was beginning to fit in.
As for me, I had repeatedly saying what I thought was a cute saying which goes like this: "I hate to be an A$$hole men, but my position calls for it." So my nickname had become A$$hole. Ahhh, what the heck.
Us working class types were at the airport by 10:00 the next morning, pre-flighting and checky-checking the birds. Pilots and everyone else arrived later for a 1:00 PM take off.
Inside the transport, the Washington cadre congregated at the front of the airplane near the galley. Stomp and his crew sat farther back near my bunch at the rear of the seating area, just in front of the closed off bedroom area.
Right after take-off, Major Fetchit, came tripping down the isle past Stomp and informed Lt. gunpowder that it had been decreed that all travel iteniraries would all be filled out exactly the same and all would show take-off time as 1:00 PM Without thinking, gunpowder said OK but then I said "Whoooaaaaa up there a minute. We came to work at 10:00 AM. If we show 1:00 PM as start of work, then we dont get paid per diem for the meal we missed." Now you would think that would be easy enough to understand but in Fetchit,s administrative type of mind, it just screwed everything up. He did so wont all those little pieces of paper to show the same thing. As he was agonizing about it, I guess Stomp Jackson had heard enough.
Jackson stood up, tapped Fetchit on the shoulder, crooked his finger for Fetchit to follow him and both of them went up forward where we could see a somewhat animated conversation taking place between the Pentagon Bird Colonel, Fetchit and Stomp. In that conversation, Stomp firmly took command of what he was supposed to be commanding and from that time on if any word was coming down to us on from on high, it would have to come to Stomp first. And it would come from the Colonel, not Fetchit.
That just tickled us to death as Stomp was explaining it to us. We were all grins untill he said "and there will be no openly disparaging remarks made by any of you about Major Fetchit." We didnt have anything to say to that so he nodded and went back to his seat.
As we were coming into a Nicaragua airfield, we were flying right by and over an active volcano. It was huffing and puffing and the danged thing was blowing perfect smoke rings. Just like someone smoking a cigarette and puffing a little circle of smoke, that volcano was blowing a big one. The field we landed at was kind of isolated and looked for all the world like something operated by our clandestine services, CIA for instance, or some outfit under contract to the CIA.
The hotel in Managua was no where near as grand as the one in Mexico, City. I did see a chance to eat some real south american food though so I ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, figuring that had to be the real stuff. The waitress didnt speak english but she shook her head no but I shook mine yes. So she delivered me a bowl of cornmeal mush with a boiled checken neck in it for flavor. I figured well, what the heck, win some, loose some but all the guys were having lots of fun at my expense untill I started describing in detail about the snakes and monkeys I had eaten during survival training. I went into great detail about how I had to kill the little monkey with a little bitty stick but how slowly beating him to death lick by lick like that softened him up and made for easier cooking and eating. And then Me and Riley started extolling the virtues of the grasshoppers we had eaten in Saudia Arabia the year before. Fried straight up or dipped in batter or for desert with a sweet, thick date syrup. Yum, Yum. Squeaky was beginning to turn kind of green down there at the end of the table. I dont know why, his every meal on the whole trip had been French Fries and Coke. Breakfast, dinner and supper, it was french fries and coke. Squeaky was determined that Montezuma wasnt going to get no revenge on him. He said he figgered that any grease hot enough to fry french fries was hot enough to kill any microbes or molecules or whatever it was that old Montezuma was using to spread his revenge around with.
The high muckledy mucks had at first decided we should all stay in the hotel that night cause Nicaraqua was not a very friendly place for americans. But when they were told that there was a "quality lounge" just up the street, they headed for it. The didnt leave word as to whether we were to still be quaranteed in the hotel or not but we figgered what was good enough for gooses was good enough for us ganders. These folks were obviously qauality folks and I think it was only natural for them to gravitate to a quality lounge. Riley asked me if I had ever been to a "quality lounge" before and I told him no, where I grew up in Texas and Louisiana they didnt have nothing but beer joints. We had good, better and best beer joints but not what I would consider quality. Some of us decided it was time we partook of some of the better things in life, like a quality lounge, and off we went.
The quality place had a bar down one side of the room and a bunch of stuffed furniture down the other. That overstuffed furniture was probably the lounge part of the place. The diplomatic core was busy drinking and passing this really cute little red headed girl from lap to lap. She was really a shapely little doll and those old leechers were getting in a lot of patting and rubbing as they passed her around. Im sure that bunch had some saving graces but if so I never noticed any. I thought I heard the little girl ask them to buy her a drink but I didnt see them doing it. I asked the bartender and he looked disgusted and said no. "Thats cheap," I said. He agreed. I bought her a drink so she abandoned the butt rubbers and came and stood and talked with me as she drank her weak tea drink. Then Riley bought her a drink and then the next guy on down the line. She and the bartender knew why we were all doing this, to make up for the sleazy way the butt rubbers had treated her plus she spoke good english and was good company. We were hoping that the diplomatic corps was catching on that we were making up for their shortfall in diplomatic skills. Stomp said for us not to disparage them verbally, but we didnt figger there was any thing wrong with setting a good example for them.
Then destiny struck. Down at the end of our line at the bar sat Squeaky. Squeaky had had two canned american beers, still on the run trying to stay ahead of any revenge being spread around by Montezuma, he had refused to drink any of that nasty old mexican or south american stuff. Two beers was more than enought to lite Squeaky's candle. When it came time for Squeaky to buy the little red head a drink, it must have been love at first sight. When this tiny little girl with the squeaky little voice met this sawed off little runt with the squeaky little voice, it was as if the heavens opened up and a bolt of lightening struck the quality lounge there in Managua, Nicaragua. Squeaky bought her one drink, then two and so on and so forth while partaking of another snort or two himself.
As the diplomatic team filed out the door, they stared in amazement at the scruffy little guy who had stole their lap warmer. Squeaky was lip locked at the time and didnt see them file past.
Most of the other guys left but me and Riley stayed there to chaperone Squeaky. I turned my head just for a moment and the next thing I know Squeaky and the red head is almost out the door. Its hard to walk and stay lip locked at the same time but they had managed it.
I dashed up there and caught Squeaky by the seat of the britches but it took me and Riley and the bartender to seperate him and the red head. Little Red was insisting that she would return him to the hotel after she had used him up but I told them we couldn't take a chance on it. At the expense of two broken hearts, Riley and I dragged Squeaky back toward the hotel
Squeaky was mad clear thru and thru, also drunk, even using some grown up cuss words and swearing that if Riley wasnt holding him back he would be whipping some old A$$holes A$$. Squeak, Squeak, Squeak.
I have always been fascinated by the way different people, when suddenly put together like our little group, would shake down and settle out into different factions and sub-groups and unlikely friendships. Here is some info on some of the people and how things were beginning to shake down by the time we reached Mexico City.
It looked to me like there wasn,t much hope for the elitist group from the State Dept and Pentagon. We were just unfortunate enough to have been given a group that lived in their own world and had very little understanding of the working class military. That first meeting had been a disaster and it was going downhill from there.
As for the Air Force Contingent, I was pleased with the way we were shaking out. That little riot at the airport had really pulled us together. It was "us" against "them" there for a few minutes and now "usn's" were a little tighter knit unit. The crew chiefs had thanked the rest of us profusely for helping to protect their little tweety birds. Crew chiefs get real tetchy when someone tries to mess around with their airplane. It may be just a piece of machinery to everyone else but to a crew chief, it has its own personality and they kind of get to thinking about them like you would a pet puppy.
Young Lieutenant Bond had morphed from a quite, polite young officer to a celebrity after his amazing display of fisticuffs during the riot. Riley claimed someone had been feeding him gunpowder that made him turn mean. So he was now called gunpowder. It is always a good thing when nicknames start appearing. Well, not always, but usually.
The aircrew going out on the town with the rest of us had been a good thing, even if we did end up eating at Denny's. Geeezzzz!
We really got lucky with our new Commander, Major Jackson. His put-down of the pompous Maj. Fetchit that first day made him a hero with us. But the crowning glory was when the co-pilot let it slip that Jacksons nick-name was "Stomp". This was because he had very big feet and years ago and someone just naturally started calling him Stomp.
Now lets face it.....when you have a unit commander named Stomp and a maintenance officer named gunpowder, you just have to feel like you belong to an elite unit and are bound for glory.
And then there was Squeaky, our little squeaky voiced sheetmetal man. I dont know who put the nickname on him but it fit and he seemed to take pride in it. Squeaky was becoming something like a mascot and not in a derogatory way. He seemed to think that his leadership of the faction that forced me to eat that slop in Denny's restaurant rather than some good real mexican food gave him extra stature. Maybe so.....but anyway....in his odd sort of way, Squeaky was beginning to fit in.
As for me, I had repeatedly saying what I thought was a cute saying which goes like this: "I hate to be an A$$hole men, but my position calls for it." So my nickname had become A$$hole. Ahhh, what the heck.
Us working class types were at the airport by 10:00 the next morning, pre-flighting and checky-checking the birds. Pilots and everyone else arrived later for a 1:00 PM take off.
Inside the transport, the Washington cadre congregated at the front of the airplane near the galley. Stomp and his crew sat farther back near my bunch at the rear of the seating area, just in front of the closed off bedroom area.
Right after take-off, Major Fetchit, came tripping down the isle past Stomp and informed Lt. gunpowder that it had been decreed that all travel iteniraries would all be filled out exactly the same and all would show take-off time as 1:00 PM Without thinking, gunpowder said OK but then I said "Whoooaaaaa up there a minute. We came to work at 10:00 AM. If we show 1:00 PM as start of work, then we dont get paid per diem for the meal we missed." Now you would think that would be easy enough to understand but in Fetchit,s administrative type of mind, it just screwed everything up. He did so wont all those little pieces of paper to show the same thing. As he was agonizing about it, I guess Stomp Jackson had heard enough.
Jackson stood up, tapped Fetchit on the shoulder, crooked his finger for Fetchit to follow him and both of them went up forward where we could see a somewhat animated conversation taking place between the Pentagon Bird Colonel, Fetchit and Stomp. In that conversation, Stomp firmly took command of what he was supposed to be commanding and from that time on if any word was coming down to us on from on high, it would have to come to Stomp first. And it would come from the Colonel, not Fetchit.
That just tickled us to death as Stomp was explaining it to us. We were all grins untill he said "and there will be no openly disparaging remarks made by any of you about Major Fetchit." We didnt have anything to say to that so he nodded and went back to his seat.
As we were coming into a Nicaragua airfield, we were flying right by and over an active volcano. It was huffing and puffing and the danged thing was blowing perfect smoke rings. Just like someone smoking a cigarette and puffing a little circle of smoke, that volcano was blowing a big one. The field we landed at was kind of isolated and looked for all the world like something operated by our clandestine services, CIA for instance, or some outfit under contract to the CIA.
The hotel in Managua was no where near as grand as the one in Mexico, City. I did see a chance to eat some real south american food though so I ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, figuring that had to be the real stuff. The waitress didnt speak english but she shook her head no but I shook mine yes. So she delivered me a bowl of cornmeal mush with a boiled checken neck in it for flavor. I figured well, what the heck, win some, loose some but all the guys were having lots of fun at my expense untill I started describing in detail about the snakes and monkeys I had eaten during survival training. I went into great detail about how I had to kill the little monkey with a little bitty stick but how slowly beating him to death lick by lick like that softened him up and made for easier cooking and eating. And then Me and Riley started extolling the virtues of the grasshoppers we had eaten in Saudia Arabia the year before. Fried straight up or dipped in batter or for desert with a sweet, thick date syrup. Yum, Yum. Squeaky was beginning to turn kind of green down there at the end of the table. I dont know why, his every meal on the whole trip had been French Fries and Coke. Breakfast, dinner and supper, it was french fries and coke. Squeaky was determined that Montezuma wasnt going to get no revenge on him. He said he figgered that any grease hot enough to fry french fries was hot enough to kill any microbes or molecules or whatever it was that old Montezuma was using to spread his revenge around with.
The high muckledy mucks had at first decided we should all stay in the hotel that night cause Nicaraqua was not a very friendly place for americans. But when they were told that there was a "quality lounge" just up the street, they headed for it. The didnt leave word as to whether we were to still be quaranteed in the hotel or not but we figgered what was good enough for gooses was good enough for us ganders. These folks were obviously qauality folks and I think it was only natural for them to gravitate to a quality lounge. Riley asked me if I had ever been to a "quality lounge" before and I told him no, where I grew up in Texas and Louisiana they didnt have nothing but beer joints. We had good, better and best beer joints but not what I would consider quality. Some of us decided it was time we partook of some of the better things in life, like a quality lounge, and off we went.
The quality place had a bar down one side of the room and a bunch of stuffed furniture down the other. That overstuffed furniture was probably the lounge part of the place. The diplomatic core was busy drinking and passing this really cute little red headed girl from lap to lap. She was really a shapely little doll and those old leechers were getting in a lot of patting and rubbing as they passed her around. Im sure that bunch had some saving graces but if so I never noticed any. I thought I heard the little girl ask them to buy her a drink but I didnt see them doing it. I asked the bartender and he looked disgusted and said no. "Thats cheap," I said. He agreed. I bought her a drink so she abandoned the butt rubbers and came and stood and talked with me as she drank her weak tea drink. Then Riley bought her a drink and then the next guy on down the line. She and the bartender knew why we were all doing this, to make up for the sleazy way the butt rubbers had treated her plus she spoke good english and was good company. We were hoping that the diplomatic corps was catching on that we were making up for their shortfall in diplomatic skills. Stomp said for us not to disparage them verbally, but we didnt figger there was any thing wrong with setting a good example for them.
Then destiny struck. Down at the end of our line at the bar sat Squeaky. Squeaky had had two canned american beers, still on the run trying to stay ahead of any revenge being spread around by Montezuma, he had refused to drink any of that nasty old mexican or south american stuff. Two beers was more than enought to lite Squeaky's candle. When it came time for Squeaky to buy the little red head a drink, it must have been love at first sight. When this tiny little girl with the squeaky little voice met this sawed off little runt with the squeaky little voice, it was as if the heavens opened up and a bolt of lightening struck the quality lounge there in Managua, Nicaragua. Squeaky bought her one drink, then two and so on and so forth while partaking of another snort or two himself.
As the diplomatic team filed out the door, they stared in amazement at the scruffy little guy who had stole their lap warmer. Squeaky was lip locked at the time and didnt see them file past.
Most of the other guys left but me and Riley stayed there to chaperone Squeaky. I turned my head just for a moment and the next thing I know Squeaky and the red head is almost out the door. Its hard to walk and stay lip locked at the same time but they had managed it.
I dashed up there and caught Squeaky by the seat of the britches but it took me and Riley and the bartender to seperate him and the red head. Little Red was insisting that she would return him to the hotel after she had used him up but I told them we couldn't take a chance on it. At the expense of two broken hearts, Riley and I dragged Squeaky back toward the hotel
Squeaky was mad clear thru and thru, also drunk, even using some grown up cuss words and swearing that if Riley wasnt holding him back he would be whipping some old A$$holes A$$. Squeak, Squeak, Squeak.
and get to writing