In The Navy (On the Boat), Part 29 (the end)

The Boat was soon slated for overhaul at Portsmouth New Hampshire. I had no desire to do that and was considering changing Boats (easy enough to do if you want to stay at sea), when I was called to volunteer for ILO duty.

ILO stands for Integrated Logistics Overhaul and was a nice way of saying you would be a paper pusher. Myself, JT and a few others from other departments on the Boat were given the task of getting all new tech manuals for the new systems that would be installed after overhaul was done.

I took the job, sounded like skate duty, which it was. It took us some getting used to, having a “day job”. We spent weeks searching through Micro-fiche slides for manuals. Once we had the part numbers we had to fill out the paperwork to order them and send that off to whoever. We learned all about the Navy’s purchasing system, which was kind of interesting. I think since then, all of the branches of the Military consolidated all of the systems into one, which makes perfect sense, considering a lot of things are common between all of the services.

Once the manuals started coming in, we had to get them all onto the shelves and insert any changes or revisions that came along with them. This was a never ending process, because changes came out all the time. Later, I was actually writing changes for several parts of the Weapons System when I was working for a DOD contractor.

There were other people getting all of the new spare parts that would be needed and they stored these in big bulky cardboard boxes for shipment later. Some parts were small and others were huge, valves and the like. My Boat was being modified during overhaul to include a bank of Tomahawk Vertical Launch (VLS) tubes http://hypersonics.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/800px-verticle_launch_cells.jpg (this is on a Destroyer, but it’s the same stuff on a Sub, except the outer hatch). More; http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/m-109.html

One guy there doing ILO for a different Boat liked to play Chess, so he and I started playing. It was immediately evident that he was much better than I was, so things turned into Chess training for a while. He was a good teacher and I learned pretty quickly. JT got into it too and soon we were all playing. We got pretty good and would have great Chess parties where a bunch of would drink ourselves silly and play stupid chess.

To continue getting Sea Pay like everyone that went to Portsmouth with the Boat, we had to go up once a month and spend a few days doing whatever. Usually we wound up standing a watch at a barracks or on one of the barges. I only went down to the Boat if I had to, it was messy and everything was torn apart.

If we had free time, we would go exploring the town and the old prison there on base. There were signs all over to stay out because of asbestos, but would that stop us?? No.

The prison was what you basically see in any Alcatraz movie, but in a much messier state. We almost got caught in there a few times by base patrols, but got out through a side exit away from the threat.

I was nearing the end of my time in the service and had decided to get out. I was already a 1st Class Petty Officer and didn’t like the idea of moving up to Chief. I started identifying DOD companies and began sending out resumes. I went to a small firm in New London to help with the Resume and I still use the format they gave me today. There was no internet back then, so all of the searching was done manually. Just calling companies that I had heard of that did business with the Navy.

I must have mailed out 20 or 30 resumes and finally got a hit from a Company in Maryland. They flew me down and put me up at a nice Hotel. Everything went great and I got the Job offer. I had no clue what the cost of living was in Central Maryland, but the offer was a lot more cash than I was making in the Navy. I didn’t account for that fact that the housing I was provided by the Navy would go away. My family was in financial distress for quite a few years after I got out.

I won’t take credit for this; I heard it from someone else. The day this guy was leaving the Navy, the Captain asked him to reconsider and the guy said he had already done that. Then the Captain asked what he would do when he got out and the guy answered “Cartwheels”. That’s funny.

The Navy paid for my move to Maryland and the family got setup in a small apartment, not too far from where I would be working. I was done with the Navy, so I thought. The DOD contractor I worked for and bounced around within, was knee deep in Navy work. I worked on a lot of different projects and learned a lot of different technical skills, including some of the first PCs and the early internet days, which lead me to where I am today.

The Navy is not for everyone, nor is any branch of the military. If you don’t like guns and being bored most of the time, stay away.

The End. http://www.navy.mil/navydata/media/anchors.mp3

PS, if you liked this little tale, please leave a comment and if you include an email address I will get in touch with you. I will remove the comment so BOTs don’t get your email address. I hope everyone reading enjoyed this. It was a great and terrible part of my life.