Turn About Is Fair Play

I totally have been out of the loop of blogging here lately. My life has been a literal shit storm in the middle of a tornado. I haven't had time to think about anything funny or witty that sucks or is great about military life, because I have just been too busy living it. 

The sailor is on one of those rotations where they are working like crazy to get prepped for inspections. Everything has to be in perfect working, safety condition and pass inspection, so they can deploy. 

I am sure there are a handful who want something to break, so they dont have to go, but that is not really how it works. If something breaks, they will bust ass until it gets fixed. 

So this means that he is working an extremely unreasonable schedule. He goes in at the same time everyday, but he has no idea what time he is getting off. It could be 4pm, it could be 6pm or it could be 10pm. Apparently they Navy does not give a shit that we have plans. 

So the number one thing I have learned by going through other fun times like this is that to not buy any tickets to anything, do not spend any money on anything fun that cannot be refunded. Too many times the Navy has cancelled leave, changed schedules and we are left holding the financial bag because we can't get refunds for whatever we spent money on. 

Not only has my life been a shit storm because of his crazy schedule, but weird things have been going on at work and I have had weird odd things that I am working on in the evenings when I am at home. I have a hard time writing documentation at work because I cannot concentrate. So I try to do it when I am not in the office. 

This week, something is happening that has not happened in over 4 years, he is at home, all alone for a WHOLE WEEK!

My employer sent me to another state for a week long training class. He took me to airport on Sunday. 

Of course the entire time we are walking down the hallway, he is making this "I'm going to cry" puppy face. I've traveled for business before, he has either been out to sea, or it was only 2 days. 

He leaves me at home all alone for weeks on end, but this is the first time that the shoe is on the other foot. 

He is not a messy person, so if anything the house will be cleaner when I get home than when I left. But I do worry about  little details like taking the trash out, and feeding the dog. He hasn't had to worry about that in so long. He just comes home eats and sleeps. Thats about all he has time to do. 

Turn about is fair play, I finally got the chance to leave him at home, and he is not liking it. He was missing me before I even got off the airplane. 

Many times in this relationship I have gone to the airport and waited patiently to pick him up after his flight, Friday night, Turn about becomes fair play and he gets to wait on me. 

Its a small revenge, but I will take it!

The Deployment Blues

Deployments Suck ... Period. End of statement. They are the worst part of any military career. The worst part of the deployment is not what everyone thinks. 

Yes, deployments separate our sailors from home, family, their favorite food, their dog, their life, their favorite truck, regular TV, and many many other things, but the separation is NOT the worst part. It is the togetherness. 
Whenever underways, cruises, workups, or deployments are scheduled, I thank God out loud that it is NOT ME going on that. 
Wives tend to moan and groan, "Oh feel sorry for me, he's gone" ... "He's gone, I am all alone, I have to do everything by myself" ... "He is so lucky, he is visiting foreign countries"

Uh, NO

The hardest part of the deployment is NOT sitting at home and waiting for him, it is not having to deal with the house, the dog and the kids by yourself, the hardest part of the deployment is what HE is going through. 

If you work full time, you go to work, you work 8 hours a day, you come home. End of story. Unfortunately, on deployment you are trapped 24/7 with 300 plus assholes you can't stand. 

Seriously? Me being at home is supposed to be WORSE than him trapped on the ship? No way. 
There is NO WAY that I could handle being stuck at work 24/7 for a WEEK let alone 7 months straight. At the end of an 8 hour day, I HAVE to go home or I am going to seriously hurt myself or someone else. 
When they are underway, and when they are in port, there is no such thing as an 8 hour day. They normally work 12-18 hour days. They get very few hours off in which they still have to deal with the people they work with, eat the crappy food on the ship, (if they are lucky enough to not be working during meal time), find time to go workout with the coworkers that annoy them, then go shower and sleep, still surrounded by people they work with. 

When they finally pull in to some cool port and they get to take a tour and see someplace new, Guess What? You can't leave the ship by yourself, pick one of the assholes you work with that you are the least likely to choke the shit out of, and take him with you. 

Sure, I would love to see all of these foreign countries and wonderful destinations, but there is no way in hell I am going on a field trip with my coworkers. 

I complain he is gone, I hate having to deal with the house, the dog, the yard, and all the household stuff by myself, while he is gone, It Sucks. 
But what he is going through Sucks 1,000 times more. So I just put on my happy face, watch the clock, and Thank GOD that at 5pm I get to go home and sleep in MY BED, and I do not have to spend 24/7 with coworkers. 
I pray every night that he is OK, he gets enough to eat, he gets enough sleep and he gets a few hours off to relax or exercise. 
I'm thankful for what I have. I am VERY thankful for him in my life. I love him more and more each day. I'm also very thankful he is a much stronger person than I am. 

How to Simulate Life in the Navy

How to Simulate Life in the Navy

1. Buy a dumpster, paint it gray and live in it for 6 months straight.

2. Run all of the piping and wires inside your house on the outside of the

walls.

3. Pump 10 inches of nasty, crappy water into your basement, then pump it

out, clean up, and paint the basement "deck gray."

4. Every couple of weeks, dress up in your best clothes and go the

scummiest part of town, find the most run down, trashy bar you can, pay

$10 per beer until you're hammered, then walk home in the freezing cold.

5. Perform a weekly disassembly and inspection of your lawnmower.

6. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays turn your water temperature up to

200 degrees, then on Tuesday and Thursday turn it down to 10 degrees. On

Saturdays, and Sundays declare to your entire family that they used too

much water during the week, so all showering is secured.

7. Raise your bed to within 6 inches of the ceiling.

8. Have your next door neighbor come over each day at 5am, and blow a

whistle so loud that Helen Keller could hear it and shout "Reveille,

Reveille, all hands heave out and trice up".

9. Have your mother-in-law write down everything she's going to do the

following day, then have her make you stand in the back yard at 6am and

read it to you.

10. Eat the raunchiest Mexican food you can find for three days straight,

then lock yourself out of the bathroom for 12 hours, and hang a sign

On the door that reads "Secured-contact OA division at X-3053."

11. Submit a request form to your father-in-law, asking if it's OK for you

to leave your house before 3pm.

12. Invite 200 of your not-so-closest friends to come over, then board up

all the windows and doors to your house for 6 months. After the 6

months is up, take down the boards, wave at your friends and family

through the front window of your home...you can't leave until the next

day you have duty.

13. Shower with above-mentioned friends.

14. Make your family qualify to operate all the appliances in your home

(i.e., Dishwasher operator, blender technician, etc).

15. Walk around your car for 4 hours checking the tire pressure every 15

minutes.

16. Sit in your car and let it run for 4 hours before going anywhere. This

is to ensure your engine is properly "lighted off."

17. Empty all the garbage bins in your house, and sweep your driveway 3

times a day, whether they need it or not. (Now sweepers, start your

brooms, clean sweep down fore and aft, empty all trashcans over the

fantail)

18. Repaint your entire house once a month.

19. Cook all of your food blindfolded, groping for any spice and seasoning

you can get your hands on.

20. Use eighteen scoops of budget coffee grounds per pot, and allow each

pot to sit 5 hours before drinking.

21. Have your neighbor collect all your mail for a month, read your

magazines, and randomly lose every 5th item.

22. Spend $20,000 on a satellite system for your TV, but only watch CNN

and the Weather Channel.

23. Avoid watching TV with the exception of movies which are played in the

middle of the night. Have the family vote on which movie to watch

and then show a different one.

24. Have your 5-year-old cousin give you a haircut with goat shears.

25. Sew back pockets to the front of your pants.

26. Spend 2 weeks in the red-light districts of Europe, and call it "world

travel."

27. Attempt to spend 5 years working at McDonalds, and NOT get promoted.

28. Ensure that any promotions you do get are from stepping on the dead

bodies of your coworkers.

29. Needle gun the aluminum siding on your house after your neighbors have

gone to bed.

30. When your children are in bed, run into their room with a megaphone,

and shout at the top of your lungs that your home is under attack, and

order them to man their battle stations. ("General quarters, general

quarters, all hands man your battle stations")

31. Make your family menu a week ahead of time and do so without checking

the pantry and refrigerator.

32. Post a menu on the refrigerator door informing your family that you

are having steak for dinner. Then make them wait in line for at least an

hour, when they finally get to the kitchen, tell them that you are out of

steak, but you have dried ham or hot dogs. Repeat daily until they don't

pay attention to the menu any more so they just ask for hot dogs.

33. When baking a cake, prop up one side of the pan while it is in the

oven. Spread icing on real thick to level it off.

34. In the middle of January, place a podium at the end of your driveway.

Have you family stand watches at the podium, rotating at 4-hour intervals.

35. Lock yourself and your family in your house for 6 weeks. Then tell

them that at the end of the 6th week you're going to take them to

Disneyland for "weekend liberty." When the end of the 6th week rolls

around, inform them that Disneyland has been canceled due to the fact that

they need to get ready for Engineering-certification, and that it will be

another week before they can leave the house.

36. In your grim, gray dumpster (refer to #1), with 200 of your

not-so-closest friend (cite par. 12) regardless of gender, suffer through

PMS!

37. Sleep on the shelf in your closet. Replace the closet door with a

curtain. Have you wife whip open the curtain about 3 hours after you

go to sleep. She should then shine a flashlight in your eyes and mumble

"Sorry, wrong rack."

38. Renovate your bathroom. Build a wall across the middle of your

bathtub, move the shower head to chest level. When you take showers, make

sure you shut off the water while you soap down.

39. When there is a thunderstorm in your area, find a wobbly rocking chair

and rock as hard as you can until you become nauseous. have a supply of

stale crackers in your shirt pocket.

40. Put lube oil in your humidifier and set it on high.

41. For ex-engineering types: leave the lawn mower running in your living

room eight hours a day.

42. Have the paperboy give you a haircut.

43. Once a week, blow compressed air up your chimney, making sure the wind

carries the soot onto your neighbors house. Ignore his complaints.

44. Every other month buy green or red marine primer and put it in a paint

sprayer. Spray it over the roof of your house onto your neighbors

car. Ignore his complaints.

45. Lock wire the lug nuts on your car.

46. Buy a trash compactor, but use it only once a week. Store the garbage

on the other side of your bathtub.

47. Get up every night around midnight and have a peanut butter and jelly

sandwich on stale bread.

48. Set your alarm clock to go off at random during the night, jump up and

get dressed as fast as you can making sure you button up the top

button on your shirt, stuff you pants into your socks. Run out into the

backyard and uncoil the garden hose.

49. Once a month, take every major appliance apart and put them back

together again.

50. Install a fluorescent lamp under the coffee table and then get under

it and read books.

51. Raise the thresholds and lower the top sills of your front and back

doors so that you either trip or bang your head every time you pass

through one of them.

52. Every so often, throw the cat in the pool and shout "Man overboard,

starboard side" Then run into the house and sweep all the pots and

dishes off the counter. Yell at the wife and kids for not having the

kitchen "stowed for sea."

53. Put on the headphones from your stereo set, but don't plug them in.

Hang a paper cup around your neck with string. Go stand in front of your

stove. Say ... to no one in particular "Stove manned and ready" Stand

there for three or four hours. And say again to no one in particular

"stove secured." Roll up your headphones and paper cup and place them in a

box.