Tell me a story….

[Mo_Gearhead]

…of days gone by. But it has to be a personal experience about you. It has to be the truth. It can be; Humorous - Sad - Life-altering - Painful - any topic you desire. But it can’t be something that you have previously shared on this Pelican BB. I want something new.
___________________

In the late 1960’s a group of guys I ran with were always hanging out at a local speed shop. It was a small shop in what used to be a gas station. Two work bays, a small office with some storage back behind - the location was in a urban/downtown area. The owner; tuned cars, sold and installed speed parts, rebuilt transmissions/rear-ends …etc. and had a car he drag raced.

It came to pass that he did some work on some guy’s car and for whatever reason the customer was not happy. Though my friend (the shop owner) tried to work out a solution with him, the guy rejected whatever compromise was offered and instead, he started to make threatening calls to his shop. Even called him at his home. Then windows at the shop started to be broken. Some mornings, when he would arrive to open, he would have glass on the floor. Someone was using a pellet (he would find them on the shop floor) gun, in a drive-by from the street in front of the building.

He knew who it was, so he called the police. Their response; No proof? No witnesses? Sorry.

I was nineteen and just a few weeks from going away to boot camp. This “irate customer” was in his late twenties and I knew his name, his car and where he worked.

I got a plain white sheet of typing paper, a magazine, some scissors and glue. From the magazine I cut out an array of individual letters, of differing sizes and fonts, arranged and glued them in what, in the end, looked like some crazy person’s ransom note from a Alfred Hitchcock movie. It read:

“One more broken window and YOU get it… F##KER!”

I placed it in a plain envelope and one evening (he worked nights) I drove over and placed it under the driver-side wiper on his car. I remember it was misting rain and I had a moment of panic as I thought; if that glue separates and the letters release into a tower-of-babble jumble…..?

Apparently the glue held.

Some months later, in written correspondence with a friend back home, I inquired about our friend's shop windows. Curiously, it had ended - about the time I left. (My secret - till now!)

Carry on....

[p911dad]

Good story! I willl try and I hope its not too boring.

In 1966 my best friend(age 19) and I (age 18) decided to go from NY to LA for the summer and get jobs. We took Jim's Plymouth Valiant and set off with $67. and no credit cards. After 4 days we made it and immediately found work in a machine shop sharpening drills for the aircraft industry. It was soon apparent this totally sucked and we decided to head off to Ft Worth to see some cousins. On the day we left LA, a guy we worked with was going to sell us a lid of grass for the trip, BUT we decided we didn't have the $10 to spare and skipped it.

On the way to Ft Worth, we came through ElPaso, and decided to head down into Mexico to ride horses and see a little countryside. On the way back to the border we bought a large jug of Tequila and duly declared it at the border. The nice US customs guy told us at our ages we couldn't bring it into Texas, so he told us to take it back to the supermercado and get our money back, which we did in short order. All is cool, right?

But noooo. On our return to the border station it turns out they figured we had some dope in the car (long hair, from NY, etc) and the same guard proceeded to make us literally take the car apart under his watchful gaze, meanwhile pointing to a stockade nearby with lots of guys looking out at us. Something about 20 years in prison for bringing dope into Texas! When we couldn't get the back seat out, the guard again pointed to the stockade, and said if that seat didn't come out we were going to the pen for a while. Jim and I ripped the seat out, no dope of course, and the guard told us we could go.

I have often reflected on how that one decision could have changed my life forever. If we had spent the $10., it would have been found in the car and our life stories would be very different indeed.

[vash]

i was probably 18 or 19. i was rebuilding a small block chevy with the help of some friends. i was dropping off a set of 194 (202?) heads (we called them camelbacks IIRC). after talking to a bunch of flat track guys..mostly this family Carney. everyone suggested this one particular machine shop. this shop was located in gangland..south EL Paso. near an area, the locals called Segundo Barrio. it was rough. the local gang in the area, i think they were called LOS FATHERLESS. i loaded up the parts into my mom's daily driver. some big ass boat of a car. walked into that shop and it was smokey, dark..and full of the most sinister bunch of guys i have ever seen. i was this tiny chinese kid with an effed up haircut. there were teardrop tattoos, guys openly smoking blunts.. the shop was busy!! i sat down to wait in line..way in back. i saw the beam of light shoot thru the room. one bad mofo walks..no he strolls into the room. this guy looked like he just crawled out of an engine compartment. he was covered with grease and filth. he looked dangerous. i looked down at the ground and he walked to the front of the group. the sea of people parted for this guy. he walked right up the counter..i was NOT gonna say anything stupid like, "hey buddy, the line starts here!".. he walks up to one of those ticket things..DUH!! i didnt even see it. the man read the look on my face right away. he pulled out two tickets..and handed me one. he said, "here..you need to take a number. you're ahead of me". i was floored. to this day..i hope i said thanks..but i cannot remember.

i learned right there and then..i understood the saying. "never judge a book by it's cover". lesson learned and i still refer to it every day.

[BE911SC]

Desert Storm. KC-135 copilot. Sunrise after two long sorties in 24 hours. Headed back to Riyadh southeast along the west coast of the Persian Gulf. Autopilot on, slaved to the INS navigation system. Aircraft Commander asleep, Navigator asleep, Boom Operator asleep. I'm on watch making sure nothing happens. Sun comes up and glares into my face from the left side windows. I slouch down to get out of the sun and realize I might nod off. No, I can handle it I tell myself. I nod-off once and catch it. Then I nod-off and stay there. The airplane arrives over the point where we turn west toward Riyadh and I feel the jet start the turn.

The navigator had programmed the waypoints into the INS for the route home and then put his head down on the work table and went to sleep. One of the big no-no's for navigators was inputting the waypoints out of order and causing a wrong turn situation. Our nav was very competent and was practically the backbone of the crew during the war but we were all exhausted, daily, and something was bound to happen.

So, the airplane is in the turn toward Riyadh but it's taking longer than it should. I was conscious enough, eyes closed, to know that it was about a 120-degree heading change to our right, westward, but it felt like a longer turn. I felt the airplane roll out and now the sun was in my right eye. I thought that isn't right and literally forced myself awake. I saw it immediately: the airplane had made a 180 and was headed back to the previous waypoint. I pressed the Interphone switch and calmly said, "Hey nav, what's wrong with this picture?" The nav snapped up and right away said, "Ahh ****." We fixed it and headed home for breakfast and a few hours sleep.

[GH85Carrera]

Back in the late 70s Coors Beer was real popular in the south because it was not available in the store, and because of Smokey & the Bandit. I was driving my 74 914 2.0 back home to Alabama after a visit to Oklahoma. I was single and had little luggage so I packed the car with Coors. You can fit a lot of beer in a 914 with one suitcase in the passenger seat.

I had a flat tire in Mississippi and had to unload a trunk full of Coors Beer to get to the spare tire. I had just finished getting the flat tire back in the trunk and the beer loaded back in the trunk when a state trooper pulled up. I quickly closed the trunk as he walked up. Remember the cop from Smokey & the Bandit? The trouper was his big brother. Mirror glasses and the thick southern accent. He asked if I had any problem and I pointed to my mismatched tire and wheel and said I just changed a flat. He looked around and saw I was done so he just said "drive safe" and I promised I would. I was real glad the trunk was closed or I would have heard "You in a heap O' trouble now boy"

I could sell the Coors for three times what I paid for it. A lot of it rode in the rear trunk right over the heat exchangers. Some cans would swell up from the heat. It did not matter, I sold it all and paid for most of the trip.

[Heel n Toe]

We had an '89 Taurus wagon with a 3.0L for several years in the mid-90's... first thing I did was put gas shocks and 225x60x14 Dunlops on it.

One day on the way to work at about 40 mph, a kid ran out in front of me (on foot)... he was about 20 feet in front of me... he was running down the median with his back to me and it was strange that it happened, because I had seen him look back when I was 150 yards from him... so I thought he knew I was coming. I was in the left lane the whole time.

He made his cut like a tight end breaking toward the middle from the left side of the line. I gave 2/3rds to 3/4ths pressure to the brake and cut right, then let off the brake as I corrected back to the left just after missing the kid to keep from trashing the front suspension on the curb to the right of the right lane, then applied the brake again as I turned back to the right slightly as I straightened it up.

My left rear was probably close enough to him to tap him on the a** as I went by him... I know he felt the breeze for sure. That car handled great for its size... and all I did was react on instinct based on years of driving and a bit of autocrossing (with other cars). And knowing the limitations of the car.

Strangely enough, I was calm as I drove on to work... you'd think from something like that, I'd have been shaking like a leaf... if he had waited one more second to make his cut, he'd have been toast.

I woulda loved to have seen how it looked from outside the car... a wagon doing that sort of emergency lane change swerve maneuver.... would've made great material for an advertisement for the car.

[Noah930]

I've noticed a couple of these stories involve being 18 or 19 years of age. Interesting coincidence...

I was in college. Everyone whined about the cold upstate New York winters, so I decided to do something about it. So I signed up for Sea Semester. Instead of spending your college semester on campus, you would spend 6 weeks studying in Woods Hole, and 6 weeks on a sailing research vessel. I picked a time of the year (the 3 months after Christmas) that the ship was in the Caribbean. That just happened to coincide with the 3 coldest months of winter.

So one night while we were sailing off the shore of Jamaica, the line to the taffrail log somehow got wrapped around the propeller. We usually tried to sail as much as possible, but the next morning we were planning on making port so we would need the use of the motor. This was a research ship so often the ship would heave to to allow for a science experiment to be performed. It was probably during that time the line became fouled. Rather than just cut the line and hope nothing was still wrapped around the prop, the captain asked me if I would be willing to go for a swim to try to free the line. Sure, why not, I thought.

So I hopped overboard with one other girl. We had a knife and a flashlight. I went down a couple times but simply couldn't stay down long enough to free the line even though it was only wrapped around the propeller once. What I didn't realize (duh) was that we were sailing. 3 or 4 knots may not look like much when you're standing on deck. But it's a little different to be trying to swim in the open ocean to keep up with a ship even at that low speed. I got tired, started treading water to take a breather...and then realized I was being left behind! Whoops.

I suddenly remembered all those man overboard drills and hearing about how hard it is to find a black-haired basketball-sized head bobbing in the middle of the ocean at night (I was the one with the knife, and the girl who was clinging onto a line trailing from the side of the boat had the flashlight). Then I realized I had nicked my finger (with the knife?) and was bleeding. And I thought about how sharks can smell a drop of blood in the water from 4 miles away (or something dreadful like that). And it would be embarrassing if we had to sound a real man-overboard alarm and wake up the entire crew for that.

Encouraged by those thoughts, I got a second wind and swam like mad to make it back to the boat. By that time someone had tossed over a life ring with a line attached to it, so at least I could rest. I made a couple more stabs at retrieving the line, but in the end just settled for cutting it free from the prop. And then it was another mad dash from stern to midships to get to the ladder they had dropped over the side for us.

I was pretty amped up for about an hour afterwards. Being left behind in the big dark ocean didn't seem like fun. But hey, these are the things you seem to do when you're 18 or 19, right?

[tevake]

You may have been 18/19, but the Captain wasn't. No way he should have sent anyone over the side untethered in the dark! What was he thinking?

But then, Once we were sailing off the east side of Kauai on a mellow day. And came upon a bird trashing in the water. It was tangled in some net. My regular first mate, and good buddy, wanted to go in and free it. So we sailed back and hove to along side.
He swam over and got the boobie untangled with only minor pecking damage.
Once back aboard he said that while there near the net, he had look down and seen lots of fish. They do gather around flotsam like that. Once fish are gathered like that who else is usually around? The Land lord/man in a gray suit, thats who. Whoops, my bad.

Cheers Richard

[speeder]

I'll have to think of a good one that won't open a cold case file. Thinking...

[Seahawk]

I was in an H-60, flat hatting over the desert, fighting another 60.

Both crews has been through MAWTS (a Marine school) and were WTI's, but we were off the reservation flight-wise, just dicking around. Port to port passes at 200ft agl and the fight was on. Never good since we both always sought the deck.

After the merge, I got low ASAP and rode a ridge line, , saw what I wanted in the terrain and then jinked left, then right, bunted off the ridge and dropped the nose of the helo, pivoting around to engage the other helo...think 20 degrees nose down, 45 degrees angle of bank to start, bleed off airspeed, pull a bunch of collective, get the nose up and follow the other guy as power and angle of bank allow.

All at, in this case, 50 feet above the desert, in the mountains. I started the maneuver at 140kts and 15ft...I bunted at 10 feet over the ridge. It always worked.

As an aside, our crewman had figured out a way to hook up his Sony Walkman into the comms of the helo (he was good, via VOX I think) and Give Me Shelter was playing in my helmet.

Jamming over the desert, at speed, with the Rolling Stones as accompaniment, is so Apocalypse Now lame I almost didn't tell this story.

Mid way through the maneuver, I began to lose energy in the main rotor, began to "droop" in helo speak. I was settling with power and I was beginning to lose tail rotor authority. I had gone from 140kts to very little forward ground speed, in a turn. Lots of red lights.

I had done all the calcs, knew my weight and power ratings for each engine, density altitude and power required, etc. This is ME, this stuff happens to pogues, not me.

A lot went through my mind, mostly how to get out of trouble, trouble I had caused. I rolled wings level, reduced power and hoped that, even though the ground was sloped, I'd get some ground effect love.

Reducing power is very counter intuitive, but the only way out. Thank god for training. The Sikorsky shuddered and then shuddered some more. trying to fly. I briefly considered landing, but the slope was too much, I would have rolled.

More shudder then slight progress...I stop losing rotor speed. We are going to fly again.

We gain some airspeed, then altitude, the whole episode, from droop to flying again happened in perhaps ten, twenty seconds tops. Remember, this is nearly a nine ton aircraft

My co-pilot and crew forgive me instantly, remind me that we have gained an advantage over the other helo, so go.

From goat to go, the margin between the two is what I remember.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by Noah930

Being left behind in the big dark ocean didn't seem like fun.

Oh God, that reminds me of the time I thought I'd been left behind in the deep dark ocean.
I was snorkeling off Cozumel with a group of about 24 people. Four small boats with six of us to a boat. Ours was last in line. The other boats dropped their snorkelers off on the reef and moved over to a place where there was a gap in the reef to anchor. Our boat driver didn't know what he was doing and dropped us off near the anchored boats. I paddled around for a while and all I could see on the bottom was what looked like somebody's unmowed lawn in a bad windstorm. I came up, kind of pissed because I was supposed to be on a reef, and looked around and - nothing. No boats, no land, no nothing. After a bit of panic I located one, then another, and then all the other five in my group. We got together and we were all panicked and perplexed. It was like something out of a horror movie. The boats just disappeared! We floated there alone in the middle of the ocean and waited for the sharks. After what seemed like forever one of the boats found us and they picked us up.
What had happened was the anchor place was a gap in the reef and there is a strong current there as the tide comes in and out. Our idiot boat driver thought it was over the reef and told us to get out there. The tide was coming in and the current started sweeping us toward the beach as soon as we got off the boat. As soon as it turned, it would have started carrying us out. They had been looking for us for about half an hour. It still creeps me out to think about it.

[rcecale]

Originally Posted by Seahawk

I was in an H-60, flat hatting over the desert, fighting another 60.

Both crews has been through MAWTS (a Marine school) and were WTI's, but we were off the reservation flight-wise, just dicking around. Port to port passes at 200ft agl and the fight was on. Never good since we both always sought the deck.

After the merge, I got low ASAP and rode a ridge line, , saw what I wanted in the terrain and then jinked left, then right, bunted off the ridge and dropped the nose of the helo, pivoting around to engage the other helo...think 20 degrees nose down, 45 degrees angle of bank to start, bleed off airspeed, pull a bunch of collective, get the nose up and follow the other guy as power and angle of bank allow.

All at, in this case, 50 feet above the desert, in the mountains. I started the maneuver at 140kts and 15ft...I bunted at 10 feet over the ridge. It always worked.

As an aside, our crewman had figured out a way to hook up his Sony Walkman into the comms of the helo (he was good, via VOX I think) and Give Me Shelter was playing in my helmet.

Jamming over the desert, at speed, with the Rolling Stones as accompaniment, is so Apocalypse Now lame I almost didn't tell this story.

Mid way through the maneuver, I began to lose energy in the main rotor, began to "droop" in helo speak. I was settling with power and I was beginning to lose tail rotor authority. I had gone from 140kts to very little forward ground speed, in a turn. Lots of red lights.

I had done all the calcs, knew my weight and power ratings for each engine, density altitude and power required, etc. This is ME, this stuff happens to pogues, not me.

A lot went through my mind, mostly how to get out of trouble, trouble I had caused. I rolled wings level, reduced power and hoped that, even though the ground was sloped, I'd get some ground effect love.

Reducing power is very counter intuitive, but the only way out. Thank god for training. The Sikorsky shuddered and then shuddered some more. trying to fly. I briefly considered landing, but the slope was too much, I would have rolled.

More shudder then slight progress...I stop losing rotor speed. We are going to fly again.

We gain some airspeed, then altitude, the whole episode, from droop to flying again happened in perhaps ten, twenty seconds tops. Remember, this is nearly a nine ton aircraft

My co-pilot and crew forgive me instantly, remind me that we have gained an advantage over the other helo, so go.

From goat to go, the margin between the two is what I remember.

I haven't heard anyone talk like this since I retired from Marine Corps aviation over 12 years ago. The only thing missing was the hand gestures, simulating aircraft position and attitude! Thanks for the flashback!!!

Randy

[Evans, Marv]

I told this story once on here a long time ago, but it's kind of a fun story. It was '73 & I was staying in Tikal, Guatmala in the Tikal Inn for around a week when I was traveling in Mexico & Central America. It was run by a German lady about 30 years old who was sweet on me from the time I got there & we passed a lot of time in conversation. One evening the tourists were sitting in the sitting room talking. A worker guy went from the hall into the kitchen. It turned out he was stealing beer from there. An old guy who was the maintenance man walked from the hall, looked into the kitchen & ran in. Immediately there was a commotion. It seemed to go on for a while, so I went to see what was happening. The guy & the old man were struggling, with the young guy holding a knife & the old man holding onto the guy's wrists. I went into the kitchen, grabbed the guy's hand holding the knife, rolled it out of his hand, turned him & flipped him over my shoulder onto the floor. I rolled him over I put his right arm in a hammer lock. There weren't any police, only the military. So they were called & took the guy to the brig for the night & let him out the next day.
That day the lady told me about a marimba party & dance in the village & asked if I wanted to go. I said I'd like to, so we & some of the other gringos went that evening. When we walked in, the first thing I see is the guy from the night before with his buddies. They didn't do anything, but kept eyeing me while they got drunker & drunker. The German lady asked me if I thought she should dance with any of the Guatamalan guys if they asked her. I advised her I didn't think it was a very good idea (she was blond & good looking). After a while an older guy came over & asked her to dance. She turned to me & told me the guy was the mayor there, so she thought she should dance with him. They danced & after that about 5 guys came over. She told me one of them was the chief of police, so she thought she should dance with him. After they danced, about 10 guys came over pushing, shoving, & elbowing to get in to ask her to dance. It was getting really out of hand, so I told her we should get out of there. We rounded up the other gringos & left. We had to cross a field that was open & totally dark, and I kept a watch behind us. I was relieved nobody came after us. I guess by that time they were too drunk, which was good. I was relieved to get back to the hotel.

[Crowbob]

A story of a different sort. My mother passed last month so I painted a picture of her and gave it to my sister yesterday:

email to Sis,

I meant to tell you more about the picture but we became distracted. I have photographically documented this painting's progress just as (lately) all the others', but that is another story.

Anyway, this picture is about mom's wryness and sense of humor. Her smile in this painting is very subtle but catchable from various angles. It is my very first serious attempt at portraiture and was difficult to give away. You have two originals by my hand so far as I know. K..... has four; S....has one; along with the many others I have distributed throughout the years. There may be more than a hundred by now.

At my funeral, some reasonable attempt will be made to gather these pictures' owners and through their pictures, displayed before me and before all others present, I can show my love. Yet again I digress.

The painting:

Throughout, the process of painting this picture was interrupted as my tears would not let me see. Weeping, laughing, and a lot of actual crying-type tears. They passed. I worked. They came and I stopped. They passed. I worked. They came again. They are as much a part of this painting as the pigment, oil and canvas.

But yet, my tears could not be nearly so profound as your must be.

Put them in the picture and be done. End of story.