USS New Jersey (BB-62): Shellback Initiation by Kevin H., on Flickr

Asked this on the Underway Life Facebook Page:

Haze Gray and underway might be an expression, but what about hazing? It was real life when I was in. What’s your experience?

Here’s a few responses:

-> I don’t know, maybe I was just to close to it or too used to it, but it didn’t seem that bad. Of course if you want to talk about crossing the line or CPO initiation that was a little more extreme in my day than it seems to be now.

-> I was in ’94-’98 when they started to go crazy about the hazing. I feel like I missed out because I couldn’t have my fish tacked on. I believe that I missed out on an important rite of passage.

-> There wasn’t much on the ole Von S. CO didn’t go for that much. Other than dolphins being blessed to ur chest the rest was minimal.

What has your experience been? Ever been schoonered? Painted someone else with prussian blue? Been taped to the piping?

Ship’s Store guest post by Rex Dixon:

I bet a lot of the readers here remember the way the “old Navy” was. Not the clothing store, but the way things were. Back in the day when you waited for the ship store to open once you were in international waters. Since I was an east coast sailor, we’d have once to twice a month operations out in what they called the VACAPES. Wasn’t a code name, just an abbreviation that stood for Virginia Capes.

Once you are 12 miles off the coast of the United States (VACAPES), you are in international waters. Once the ship store opens, everything is sold tax free. Nice. Now back to the days of the old Navy, the main item that went like within the first hour of the ship’s store opening was cigarettes, smokes, etc… At $7 a carton you couldn’t beat that with a stick.

Now that I look back on it, I think that being that I was in the “old Navy” smoking was more or less the defacto standard if not encouraged a bit. Quite strange I’m sure from the more modern 21st Century Navy.

I know another favorite item was all that junk food, cup o’ noodles, pringles, etc… Most of the guys on my ship had 2 lockers, and one usually had their “stash” in it. Guys on my ship. Yes, I know, times have changed! That’s a story for another post though I’m sure!

What items did you like to buy and stock up on when you were at sea? Do you ever wonder how the old Navy compares to the 21st Century Navy? How about those that served in both centuries and saw both Navy’s?

Rex Dixon served 4 years in on the USS El Paso (LKA-117) – gator freighter, 2 Med Cruises, 1 north Atlantic cruise, 1 Gitmo Refresher. Honorable Discharge as E-5 (Radioman). Rex has his own blog Technically Speaking, and can be found on Twitter, @RexDixon.

What was your underway must have?

I was that guy on the boat, the one always reading something. Bible browsing, men’s adventure novel, or 3M manuals, I covered all the bases while underway.

Reading books helped me escape for minutes or hours.  Drifting off to sleep with visions of dragons in your head or even scary clowns was better than pondering oil temps and midrats.

What else was good to have on long runs?

Playing cards takes my #2 must have on the boat. Long runs found us playing endless spades and pinochle tournaments. (okay, maybe on fast attacks we weren’t bright enough for cribbage)  Bonus time with cards is you rarely played alone, though I just have spread the cards for solitaire hundreds of times.

Any creative outlets?

Writing took up a noticeable portion of my off time. It seemed I started more stories, and journals than a guy should admit to. There were poems, diary entries, and rants at people and God. (He gets His own post some day soon.)

Many shipmates were artists of sorts. I was amazed at drawings and sketches more than once. Art for me at the time was doodles during training.

What else?

Board games? Magazines? Collections? And what sort of books? Mens adventure? Love stories? How to guides? And not to be left out, how about you closet musicians?

“As you celebrate the Fourth of July, please keep in mind that many of our Sailors are deployed and can’t be with their loved ones, but they do so in order that our fellow Americans can spend it with theirs. Currently, we have more than half of our ships and submarines underway, including five carriers and six large-deck amphibious ships, and more than 10,000 individual augmentees deployed ‘boots on ground’ around the world in support of overseas contingency operations.” from Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (MCPON)(SS/SW) Rick D. West Independence Day message

Missed many holidays?

Holidays, they are the high points of the year, where everyone celebrates. The Fourth of July is the largest national holiday of the year in the US. Many people plan for months for the perfect evening out.

Neighbors and even friends of a Navy family may miss the fact a loved one won’t be celebrating. Those sailors most likely aren’t just docked in Norfolk or San Diego. Carriers, slow boats, and more are deployed around the world, holiday or not.

Missing the big ones

Deployed for Easter might seem a small loss to some in the Navy, but to many Easter is a sacred day.  I was fortunate when not home for Easter weekend to have captains that encouraged Easter Sunday services.  Our spouses did a video of an Easter party during one deployment. It was a big hit.

Deploying never caused me to miss Christmas. Having duty did infringe a bit though. Not sure how I got lucky over the several years on two boats.

Finally, Fourth of July celebrations were occasionally missed. I never put much value on celebrating until I didn’t celebrate it at all. We did nothing special on either boat.

What did you miss?

So which holidays did you miss? How about beyond that? Miss a bunch of birthdays? Anniversaries perhaps?

(disclaimer – photo by bestrated1 on Flickr licensed as CC)

Gibraltar Monkey by Tojosan, on Flickr

Liberty call can be pizza and a beer or sitting on the beach in Bermuda. There’s times you’ve likely spent an evening in the bar but I think climbing the Rock of Gibraltar was a highlight for me.

What’s your favorite or most interesting liberty call?

The photo, while on liberty at Gibraltar, includes one of the scary monkeys.  Word was the monkeys were very aggressive and disease ridden. Note how we carefully steered clear of them. Of course, they said the same thing about the British soldiers stationed there.

Sharing these memories with friends and family is fun, and often times met by looks of disbelief. Life outside the States and after months at sea can be dang unusual or crazy.

Got a favorite liberty memory? Care to recall it for us? How about one your spouse shared with you?

For this go round, be sure to keep the language PG.

Midrats. It’s like Taco Bell’s Fourth Meal except Midrats existed first and didn’t come in a sack.

What are your memories of Midrats?

Midrats is that meal at Midnight on the boat. It’s breakfast for the guys and gals just getting up to go on the mid-watch and dinner for 3rd watch folks. Midrats is notorious for not being a full blown meal and often more like an overgrown late night snack.

Beans and weenies has to have been my favorite midrats meal. Sure there was the random eggs being cooked, or left overs. Heck, sometimes we even had a sandwich bar.(read lazy cooks)

Nice thing about beans and weenies is it was simple. Throw it in a bowl, toss in some catsup and a drop of mustard. Add a slice of bread on the side. Bam. Meal time.

What was your favorite midrats meal? Were you a cook by chance and if so, what was your favorite meal to serve for the late nights?

Going subsurface Navy makes on think you’ll not have those long gaps between port calls. Boy was I a fool. Our shortest underway periods were as short as a couple of day, up or down the coast, but woah, the longest was too long.

Few things were quite as exciting as pulling into port, any port. Heck, I was happy enough to pull into port for a few hours to load stores. That few hours of daylight was worth the heavy lifting.

My longest underway was about 89 or 90 consecutive days. On a sub you begin to think they outside world is full of ominous clouds and action music. (um, one too many movies?)

What about you? Months? Weeks? Just a few hours with your spouse? Do a quick tour of the bay with your son?