SOS By Any Other Name

By: Garland Davis

SOS. Not only us sailors but all servicemen came to have a hate/love relationship with it. SOS has many meanings, Save Our Stomachs, Same Old Stuff, Same Old Shit, but the most popular name was Shit On A Shingle. I listened to hundreds of sailor’s piss and moan about this dish, even as they begged for seconds by saying, “I don’t like SOS. But you got to eat something.” Pretty much the same thing they said about Roast Beef and Beef Stew.

There were four dishes that earned the name Shit on a Shingle.

There was Minced Beef also called Train Smash or Red SOS. A simple dish and easy to prepare.

Minced Beef (6 portions)

1 Lb Ground Beef

1 Medium, Onion chopped

1 Tblsp Flour

2 14oz Cans Tomatoes (diced or crushed)

½ tsp of Mace or Nutmeg

Salt and Pepper to taste

Brown beef and onion and drain all fat. Return one tablespoon fat to pot and stir in flour and cook over low heat stirring constantly for one minute. Add tomatoes, increase heat to medium and stir until reaching a boil and thickening slightly. Add Mace or Nutmeg. Salt and Pepper to taste.

Serve over toast slices.

Next was creamed Ground Beef.

Creamed Hamburger (6 portions)

1 Lb Ground Beef

1 small onion chopped

2 Tbsp Flour

1 pint Milk

1 pint Half and Half

Salt and Pepper to Taste

Brown beef and onion and drain all fat. Return one tablespoon of fat to the pot and stir in flour and cook over low heat, stirring constantly for one minute. Add milk and Half and Half, increase heat to medium and stir until thickened. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve over toast slices or biscuits.

Then, of course, there was Creamed Dried Beef also affectionately known as Creamed Foreskins.

Creamed Chipped Beef (4 portions)

4 ounces Butter

4 Tbsp flour

2 cups milk

1 cup Half and Half

6 ounces dried beef, cut into one-inch strips

Pepper to taste

Salt will probably not be needed as the dried beef is salty.

Melt butter over medium heat and stir in flour. Cook for one-minute stirring constantly. Add milk and Half and Half and stir until thickened. Add dried beef strips. Season with pepper and salt if needed.

Serve over toast slices or biscuits.

And lastly, the least liked of the creamed breakfast dishes.

Creamed Eggs (Scotch Woodcock) (4 portions)

4 ounces Butter

4 Tbsp flour

2 cups milk

1 cup Half and Half

6 eggs, quartered lengthwise

Salt and Pepper to taste.

Melt butter over medium heat and stir in flour. Cook for one-minute stirring constantly. Add milk and Half and Half and stir until thickened. Add eggs. Salt and pepper to taste

Serve over toast slices or biscuits.

Bon Appetit!

Pretend Zoomies

By John Petersen

My first ship was an old Fulton class sub tender, USS Proteus AS-19. In the late 50’s, this ship was decommed, put into drydock, and sliced down the middle to insert a 55′ midsection designed to accommodate work spaces and such for the then new Polaris missiles being deployed on submarines (SSBN boats), then recommissioned.

I reported aboard this vessel in 82, and was immediately assigned to R-5 (RADCON) division (this lasted maybe 4 months, got moved to another division due to me being monochromatic anemic. re: iron deficient, not allowed to be around anything that produced zoomies).

Yet, in those short four months, I had fun. We were required to take a tour of the main traffic areas of the ship every four hours, employing a radiac to ensure no funky neutrons have escaped (note: remember those divers watches that had the luminescent green hour and minute markers? If one of those watches face covering broke, that green stuff would set off any radioactive material detector. Sleep well).

This was actually a somewhat boring exercise, and the radiac was a fairly simple device to operate, so one day I decided to have a bit of fun. Part of the rounds took me through many shops, one shop in particular was on the main deck, mid-ships, pretty much open floor port to starboard (MR shop).

I enter this space with my trusty radiac unit set at x10. Walking thru the MR shop, I spot an obvious newbie (you know the type-crisp uniform, not a hair out of place, eyes the size of hubcaps), and as soon as I get to him I deftly throw the switch from x10 to x100, (at x100 the radiac was clicking like a poker card in bicycle wheel spokes). Swing to the side as I throw the switch back and forth between x10 and x100, repeat 3 times. I look at said target with eyes that spell impending doom, tell him NOT to move, and walk briskly away towards R-5.

After about 20 minutes, I casually returned to newbie (who, by this time is ready to break down and cry, yet hasn’t moved an inch), and mention: “Sorry, the radiac malfunctioned. You’re good to go”. I thought that poor kid was gonna pee himself.

(Got my ass chewed out big time for this one, but SOOO worth it)!

Friends and Shipmates

Garland Davis

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Will disown you for running around their house naked in front of a bunch of people none of you have ever met before.

SHIPMATE: Will take cellphone videos and photos of your antics and then get naked and join you.

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Thinks it’s disgusting that you got so drunk you pissed your pants and drowned the phone in your pocket – in his/her bed

SHIPMATE: Upon hearing what happened will say, “That’s fucked – that’s why I don’t sleep with my phone in my pocket anymore.” Then will help you turn the mattress over.

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Will get upset if you are too busy to talk to him for a week

SHIPMATE: Is glad to see you after many years; and will happily pick up and carry on the same conversation you were having last time you met.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS Will decline to loan you money for various reasons.

SHIPMATE: Will give you his last dollar with no expectation of being repaid.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will never ask for food.

SHIPMATES: Are the reason you have no food.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Call your parents Mr. and Mrs.

SHIPMATES: Call your parents Mom and Dad.

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Will bail you out of jail and then tell you what you did was wrong.

SHIPMATE: WILL be sitting next to you saying, “Dude…That was fucking awesome…We fucked up but what a laugh!

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Have never seen you cry.

SHIPMATES: Have cried with you.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Know a few things about you.

SHIPMATES: Could write a book with pages of direct quotes from you.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will leave you behind if that is what the crowd is doing.

SHIPMATES: Will stand with you kick the ass of whole crowds that left you behind

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Would knock on your door

SHIPMATES: Walk right in and say, “Dude…, you got any beer?

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will drink your beer and thank you.

SHIPMATE: Will drink your beer, thank you and show up the next day with two cases to replace the six pack he drank.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will take your drink away when they think you’ve had enough

SHIPMATES: Will look at you stumbling all over the place and say, “You had better drink the rest of that, don’t waste it.” Then they carry you back to the ship and put you safely in your rack.

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Will talk shit about you to another person who talks crap about you.

SHIPMATE: Will knock the shit out of people who use your name in vain.

CIVILIAN FRIEND: Knows where you buried the body.

SHIPMATE: Helped you bury the body.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will call you ‘friend’ as a term of endearment.

SHIPMATES: Will call you ‘asshole’ ‘shithead’ or ‘fucker’ as a term of endearment.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Are for a while.

SHIPMATES: Are for life.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Will ignore this.

SHIPMATES: Will forward this to their military buddies.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: Share a few experiences.

SHIPMATES: Share a lifetime of experiences no civilian could ever dream of.

CIVILIAN FRIENDS: attend class reunions every ten years.

ASIA SAILOR SHIPMATES: Flock to Branson in May of each year for the Westpac’rs reunion where they drink, renew old friendships, drink, reminisce, drink, tell sea stories, drink, laugh, drink, tell jokes, drink, and a great time.

Sergeant Guardian Angel

By: Chuck Parker

I’m going to tell my Guardian Angel story. I believe the Holy Spirit works through others to guide us from harm. Some of my shipmates have heard this but I’m going to tell it again.

During the summer 1971 I went home on leave after my first deployment. Mideast.

I’m on my way back to Mayport in whites, proudly sporting a Third-Class crow and the National Defense ribbon.

I was changing planes in Atlanta when an anti-war, hippie bitch spat on me and said, “Fuck you baby killer.”

I think she was trying to hit my crow but got the left side of my face. Bad Fire Control!

Hell flew into me and I was going to beat the shit out of the bitch.

A hand grabbed my right arm and pulled me away. I looked at him, a short black man. Army. He had chevrons and rockers and shit sticks down his left arm. He had 3-4 rows of ribbons.

He said, “You just keep walkin’ boy.”

I said, “I’m going back and beat the shit out of that bitch.”

He said, “That fucking bitch ain’t worth it. Just keep walkin’ boy. Where you going to? Jacksonville. You’re going to get your ass on the airplane and go to Jacksonville.”

He made sure I got on the airplane and left. I think about him sometimes and the difference he made in my life. I’d like to write a book about my Navy experience.

The title would be “You Just Keep Walkin’ Boy,”

Chief for The Day

As told by Gere Sprague

Talking with Gere yesterday. He told me this story.

He was the leading Chief in First Division of an aircraft carrier. He told me that he made it a practice to go to the ship each day, even on weekends to ensure that his division was completing assigned work.

He said he was planning to take special liberty on a normal work day. He told his BM1 LPO that he wouldn’t be there and that the Petty Officer should consider himself the Chief for the day.

He completed his business early and decided to go to the ship to see if BM1 and the division were functioning properly. He arrived there shortly after the noon meal and went to check on the afternoon muster. The BM2 was conducting the muster and making work assignments. The Chief asked where BM1 was. The BM2 told him that BM1 had left the ship for lunch and hadn’t returned.

The next morning, he took BM1 aside and asked him where he went and why he wasn’t there for the afternoon muster.

The First Class replied, “I went to the club for lunch.”

The BMC asked, “Why didn’t you come back after lunch?”

The PO1 said, “Well you told me I was the Chief!”

January 1, 1962

Happy New Year! There wasn’t much to it and by 10 past midnight it was all over. As duty officer, I mustered the crew topside and at Midnight the youngest man aboard rang 12 bells (Normally ship’s bells don’t go past 8). All the other ships sounded their whistles and sirens, and flashed searchlights in the air. It was cold topside and I authorized the medical corpsman to issue whiskey to all hands for exposure, so we ‘spliced the main brace’ in the control room. My only remaining duty was the writing of the first log of the year in rhyme, another nautical tradition:

“Amidst the crowded harbor, filled with ships of gray

Archerfish is lying this chilly New Year’s day.

Yokosuka is the port o’ call on the island of Japan

and Berth One in the Naval Base is where we’re moored to land.

We’re not alone as tied here, we’re in a nest of three,

with Coucal to our port side and Greenfish next to the sea.

Units of the Pac Fleet, yard and harbor craft,

comprise the ships here present, down to the smallest raft.

The Commander of Seventh Fleet is senior here afloat,

in Oklahoma City a cruiser of some note.

We’ve seen the old year vanish, now we’ll do what we can do

to make the world a better place all the new year through.

We were having our first day of bad weather since arriving. Too bad it was New Years, as New Years is a very important holiday for the Japanese. Most places shut down anywhere from three days to an entire week and everyone did their best to enjoy themselves.

C. Lee Walker