Back from Deployment.

[MikeH]

I guess these navy guys understand the oceanography, and leave the geography part to the army guys.

I am not so sure about that. I once got asked where in Japan is Pearl Harbor.

That left me baffled in so many levels.

 

[Ken1988]

I was in a ramen shop a few days ago and there were some US sailors sitting next to me. We got to talking about ramen, and I mentioned that the ramen we were eating was Hakata-style Tonkatsu from Kyushu. One guy asked if Kyushu was in China. I informed him that Kyushu was one of the four major islands of Japan. He said, “Oh.” I guess these navy guys understand the oceanography, and leave the geography part to the army guys.

Probably the sailors knew the kanjis to the extent that they mixed up China with the region east of Kyushu.

 

[Frenchy]

Probably the sailors knew the kanjis to the extent that they mixed up China with the region east of Kyushu.

Yeah totally. Thought the same

 

[Keihan]

Ask me anything, suffice to say, taking a shower WITHOUT shower shoes and going to a spa. OMG!!!

Glad you're back safe. Try not to blow your entire deployment bonus with your pants around your ankles. And I DO NOT miss shower shoes, no sir.

 

[Keihan]

I was in a ramen shop a few days ago and there were some US sailors sitting next to me. We got to talking about ramen, and I mentioned that the ramen we were eating was Hakata-style Tonkatsu from Kyushu. One guy asked if Kyushu was in China. I informed him that Kyushu was one of the four major islands of Japan. He said, “Oh.” I guess these navy guys understand the oceanography, and leave the geography part to the army guys.

In the Army you learn to make your bed, clean your rifle, hope there are Marines nearby in case there's any real fighting and make sure the NCOs don't catch you stealing rations or cigarettes or other such treasures. In the Navy, you learn to shine your shoes, iron your uniform, walk with your head ducked down and find all the best dark secluded corners on the sub so the NCOs don't catch you giving your bunk mate a reach-around.

I kid, I kid. Enlisted men in all branches learn to give reach-arounds.

 

[Mischa Maxwell]

Glad you're back safe. Try not to blow your entire deployment bonus with your pants around your ankles. And I DO NOT miss shower shoes, no sir.

OMG. I can’t bear any more shower shoe discussion today. My younger sister picked up a Plantar Wart while studying and living at a ridiculously exclusive and expensive Australian university. My family WhatsApp group has been off the chain this morning with her shrieking about catching a ‘foot STD’ and everyone else trying to calm her down. Apparently the most effective way to kill them is a piece of banana peel with duct tape over the top for weeks on end. I’m going home for Christmas and will be using one of the other bathrooms...

 

[IchigoDave]

You need to do what I did for shower shoes back when I deployed onto a gator freighter.
Buy three or four pairs of shower shears.
Cut the straps off all of them except one pair.
Get some contact cement and glue them together.

 

[Frenchy]

OMG. I can’t bear any more shower shoe discussion today. My younger sister picked up a Plantar Wart while studying and living at a ridiculously exclusive and expensive Australian university. My family WhatsApp group has been off the chain this morning with her shrieking about catching a ‘foot STD’ and everyone else trying to calm her down. Apparently the most effective way to kill them is a piece of banana peel with duct tape over the top for weeks on end. I’m going home for Christmas and will be using one of the other bathrooms...

A Plantar Wart? Damn there are things I wish i hadn’t learnt about !

 

[Keihan]

OMG. I can’t bear any more shower shoe discussion today. My younger sister picked up a Plantar Wart while studying and living at a ridiculously exclusive and expensive Australian university. My family WhatsApp group has been off the chain this morning with her shrieking about catching a ‘foot STD’ and everyone else trying to calm her down. Apparently the most effective way to kill them is a piece of banana peel with duct tape over the top for weeks on end. I’m going home for Christmas and will be using one of the other bathrooms...

I've got some advice for your sister. Do not bother with the banana peel and tape (or aspirin, or apple cider vinegar, etc.) wives' tales, as they simply don't work on plantar warts.

Living in Japan and constantly walking around locker rooms and onsen I used to score the occasional wart on my foot. Generally speaking, if you catch them when they're small, they're easier to kill. However, plantar warts (categorized simply by their position, usually on toes or soles of the feet) can become particularly stubborn if you let them grow, and even worse, large enough to breed satellite warts around the original one.

Usually, when I caught one of them, I'd use the home cryo-therapy kits like Dr. Scholl's Freeze Away. That's basically an air-duster can with a q-tip on it that freezes, then you hold it on the wart. However, in order for it to actually work, you must ignore instructions. The box will tell you to hold it on for maybe 30 seconds? I'd hold it there for two minutes, or until the tip was no longer cold. Then repeat. Then repeat. That usually killed the wart after two or three freeze sessions. The area turns into a callus, the wart turns black and then it simply falls off.

However, about two years ago I got the plantar wart from hell. I probably subjected it to a dozen freezing sessions and every time it would callus, turn black and fall out...and then regrow again in a few weeks even bigger than last time. It was just set far too deep and I couldn't get to the entire root. After a couple of months of this, I came across a discussion on plantar warts and a number of folks who experienced the same situation as myself swore by a product named Bazuka.

It's basically the same concept as all the other wart killing acid gels, only much, much more potent of a formula. So potent, in fact, that apparently it's not approved for sale in America. I had to go through a UK seller on Ebay to get my hands on some, but believe me, it was worth the hassle.

My routine was every night after my shower, I would place a drop of it covering the wart then set my foot in front of the fan and let it dry. The gel actually hardens into a white scab. The instructions say this is good enough and to just leave it, but I didn't trust that it would stay on for an entire day--plus I didn't want tiny acidic scabs falling off in my bed or socks--so I purchased some of that liquid bandage stuff like New Skin and applied that over the hardened Bazuka gel scab and then let that dry as well.

I would repeat that every night and holy shit, the entire area started turning snow white and the individual wart brown/black, and after two or three night's worth of applications, I'd take a small scissors or pen knife and start picking away at the dead skin. Entire chunks of brown wart would fall out. I think I kept this up for about a month until finally, FINALLY, one day I dug out what looked like the end of the dead brown root and there was a pink hole left. Still paranoid, I continued for a couple more applications until there was no more brown in the white dead skin.

And that's that. No more wart.

I was so pleased I purchased another tube of Bazuka from the same seller, for the next stubborn wart (and it will come, sooner or later) that resists freezing.

And Bazuka is dirt cheap...less than $10/tube. Your sister can thank me later.

 

[Keihan]

You need to do what I did for shower shoes back when I deployed onto a gator freighter.
Buy three or four pairs of shower shears.
Cut the straps off all of them except one pair.
Get some contact cement and glue them together.

Gator Freighter?? Man, you must've lived one hell of a life! I think more than a few of my buddies enlisted and deployed on one of those fuckers, and I was always jealous when they told stories about docking in the P.I. and raising absolute hell. Even one of my drinking buddies, a retired CDR, has some utterly filthy P.I. tales that only come out after about three bottles of wine. And here I was always told that officers behaved themselves...

If you think shower shoes are bad for enlisted guys, go hang out at a federal agency academy men's locker room with some new 1811s in training. Basically no different than a group of sheltered pussies at OCS, grooming and preening and plucking so they look pretty for their credentials photo shoot. And comparing their pretty, plush shower sandals. No warts were caught in that shower.

 

[IchigoDave]

Gator Freighter?? Man, you must've lived one hell of a life! I think more than a few of my buddies enlisted and deployed on one of those fuckers, and I was always jealous when they told stories about docking in the P.I. and raising absolute hell.

I enjoyed myself back then, no doubt. Today even though I have greater financial means than I did back then I really don’t go out and raise hell. It certainly was the wild wild West back then. Put it this way; 15 minutes after stepping off the boat for my first port call in Thailand I was balls deep.








In a female, you sick minded people.

 

[Keihan]

In a female, you sick minded people.

Whaaaat?? What's the fun in that???

But seriously, I worked with a guy who spent years in Thailand with Army Intel, and also know some guys who spent lots of time in-country "with the State Department," as they're apparently instructed to say, and their stories sometimes put the P.I. stories to shame. I'm actually concerned as I make my first trip to Bangkok in March, and I'm really hoping NOT to have my very own Hangover II moment.

"It's not called Bang-CUNT, baby!!"

 

[Frenchy]

Whaaaat?? What's the fun in that???

But seriously, I worked with a guy who spent years in Thailand with Army Intel, and also know some guys who spent lots of time in-country "with the State Department," as they're apparently instructed to say, and their stories sometimes put the P.I. stories to shame. I'm actually concerned as I make my first trip to Bangkok in March, and I'm really hoping NOT to have my very own Hangover II moment.

"It's not called Bang-CUNT, baby!!"

so... errrr... do you guys actually work there? Like fighting bad guys and all?

 

[Keihan]

so... errrr... do you guys actually work there? Like fighting bad guys and all?

Not me! No, like a pussy, I sit safely behind a desk--occasionally stopping to leer at an intern--and bear witness to the uselessness of government and elected officials, then smugly reassure John Q. Public and his family that everything will be just peachy for them. Keep voting and paying those taxes and you'll be just fine!!

 

[Frenchy]

Not me! No, like a pussy, I sit safely behind a desk--occasionally stopping to leer at an intern--and bear witness to the uselessness of government and elected officials, then smugly reassure John Q. Public and his family that everything will be just peachy for them. Keep voting and paying those taxes and you'll be just fine!!

Ok i see why the US is spending about 3% of GDP on the military and Europe only half of that. Maybe instead of bitching and moaning that we should pay more, the Donald should consider wasting less

 

[warubuta]

A Plantar Wart? Damn there are things I wish i hadn’t learnt about !

it just a fucking wart on your foot. Better than on your nose or your ball sack, right? And for the record, LIFE is a STD, and its fucking fatal.