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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Aside from the lucky contractor who made the redesigned plugs, who exactly had fun here? Generally, the word "fun" in military operations describes anything but.
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Feb 1, 2021 07:58
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Godholio posted:Generally, the word "fun" in military operations describes anything but. FUN hosed up, nominally Etc.
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Feb 1, 2021 08:04
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Godholio posted:Generally, the word "fun" in military operations describes anything but. Oh, I know, but I felt like asking a rhetorical question regardless.
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Feb 1, 2021 08:26
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quote:The entire time this is happening, his phone is ringing off the hook. Senior NCOs want to know what this thing is. Now officers are calling to ask him. Our squadron commander showed up pissed, because the Colonel asked him what the pin did and he “had to stand and explain that he had no idea, like he’s some sort of blind rear end in a top hat leading a bunch of other blind assholes”. I absolutely believe this part. I also wholeheartedly believe that said Colonel probably didn't give the smallest poo poo what the pin did but the Sq/CC sent everyone into a tailspin because he assumed the Colonel wanted to know. I worked with a Captain who would go down the dumbest loving hypothetical rabbit holes and it was the most infuriating thing I've ever had to deal with. It stemmed from her being wildly incompetent at her job*, knowing this, and trying to cover her bases by asking me for every possible thing that can happen (before ignoring my advice anyway). Also expecting me to do all the research and heavy lifting about her nonexistent problem so that she could slap her name on it, send to the commander and pat herself on the back. My job quickly went from managing my folks without an officer, to managing an officer and keeping her away from my folks. When another MSgt got back from deployment and I gave her back the position I warned her about the Captain. But I did caveat that maybe it was me that was the rear end in a top hat and it was just a personality conflict. Within a week I found that MSgt at her desk in tears telling me that she couldn't take the Captain anymore. I drug her immediately to our Chief's office and laid out how lazy, incompetent and toxic the Captain was. They responded, predictably, by moving her to a bigger flight. Their SMSgt came over to ask how she was, and after we described her behavior she replied with "you motherfuckers." *Her previous job was being an exec to a four star and her actual qualifications essentially boiled down to "secretary"
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Feb 1, 2021 15:01
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I think this is the thread for thisThat Works posted:Silver lining In 2011, my entire squadron was talking about silver in the same way everyone is talking about gamestonk now. One lieutenant, who I'm pretty sure had a degree in like, history, wrote a newsletter about silver trading options. There was a conservative bent to it all, because those drat [democrats] in Washington were spending all of our money and we would need to wheelbarrow "fiat" money to get bread soon. They convinced my NCOIC, who had north of 15k in student loans at 3.5% APR, to shovel 10k in deployment money at, and I'm not exaggerating, the peak of that 2011 run. He losted roughly half his investment in 3 months. He wasnt alone, half the squadron officers lost north of 10k.
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Feb 1, 2021 16:38
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How does that compare to the guys who bought a bunch of Iraqi dinars? It always seemed like a bad idea to me, but more than a few guys on my former contracts dumped cash into them.
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Feb 1, 2021 16:55
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The Rat posted:How does that compare to the guys who bought a bunch of Iraqi dinars? It always seemed like a bad idea to me, but more than a few guys on my former contracts dumped cash into them. I knew a captain that bought into the Iraqi Dinar scam. He had the audiotape of "Art of the Deal" playing in his V6 Camero on the way to lunch once.
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Feb 1, 2021 17:02
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Wild T posted:I absolutely believe this part. I also wholeheartedly believe that said Colonel probably didn't give the smallest poo poo what the pin did but the Sq/CC sent everyone into a tailspin because he assumed the Colonel wanted to know. I was flight line avionics on A-10s fixing com/nav/ecm and I had this happen to me several times. We had one aircraft that we had been troubleshooting all day and had it narrowed down to one or the major system components when the squadron commander came by one on some random walkthrough with his entourage in tow. He asked about the issue and some novice questions about the system and then after we explained the parts of the system he asked about some small periferal part that we hadn't tested but had enough experience to know could not cause the issue. We stated as such and then the Commander went on his way to look at whatever else he was doing. A bit after he left though out maitenence unit OIC, who had a degree in physical fitness showed up and asked us when we were changing the part. We were all confused and explained again that the part could not cause the issue we were having, but as far s he was concerned since the Commander asked about it we had to change the part to rule it out, no questions, just do it. A bunch of wasted time later, one perfectly good part changed out, and all the required signatures and paperwork done for no reason and the system was still broke the same way.
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Feb 1, 2021 17:21
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-Zydeco- posted:I was flight line avionics on A-10s fixing com/nav/ecm and I had this happen to me several times. I don't know anything about this, but it sounds like a problem that needs me and my leadership!
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Feb 1, 2021 17:34
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The Rat posted:How does that compare to the guys who bought a bunch of Iraqi dinars? It always seemed like a bad idea to me, but more than a few guys on my former contracts dumped cash into them. Silver is still a traded commodity when you go to sell it, although at a loss. Unlike trying to arbitrage currency, which is something left by the rest of the market to hyperspecialized investors, most of which would never touch hyperinflationary currencies like the dinar from a provisional government that does currency changes almost annually. Where Eagles Dare
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Feb 1, 2021 17:49
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The Rat posted:How does that compare to the guys who bought a bunch of Iraqi dinars? It always seemed like a bad idea to me, but more than a few guys on my former contracts dumped cash into them. I know a woman that was still buying Iraqi dinars last year because Trump or something. I tried to explain that it is a scam to no avail.
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Feb 1, 2021 18:06
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-Zydeco- posted:A bit after he left though out maitenence unit OIC, who had a degree in physical fitness showed up It was at this moment my heart filled with dread.
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Feb 1, 2021 18:32
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I spent a decent amount of time in Iraq. Even the Iraqis didn't want the Iraqi dinar.
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Feb 1, 2021 20:55
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Iraqi shop on base happily took dollars and sold crafts made out of dinar and sold straight dinar at a terrible mark up. Bought an Iraqi flag and some Wild Tiger, still regret not buying a picture of Sadam though.
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Feb 1, 2021 23:56
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I bought a fat stack of Saddam era dinar for like 10$. I knew I was getting ripped off, but poo poo, I didn't mind. I still have a bunch somewhere.
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Feb 2, 2021 00:29
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Cenen posted:Iraqi shop on base happily took dollars and sold crafts made out of dinar and sold straight dinar at a terrible mark up. Bought an Iraqi flag and some Wild Tiger, still regret not buying a picture of Sadam though. I just bought lovely cigarettes and bootleg dvds
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Feb 2, 2021 00:31
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bulletsponge13 posted:I bought a fat stack of Saddam era dinar for like 10$. I knew I was getting ripped off, but poo poo, I didn't mind. I still have a bunch somewhere. no worse than a shot glass or a fork from a kitch shop
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Feb 2, 2021 00:44
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TK-42-1 posted:no worse than a shot glass or a fork from a kitch shop That's the way I felt about it. There was a sandwich cart guy we kinda looked out for, and he became a fixture near us in 03. Pointy Talky. Baghdad was cool because most knew a little bit of English. "How much?" "Uh...2, 2, 2$" 2 pepsis, 2 sandwiches, 2 dollars. gently caress yeah. We got sandwiches from him fairly regularly. Really nice guy. A unit passing through stops through, and ask if he is safe to eat from. "How much?" "1, 1, 5$" he looks at me, smiles with a thumbs up. gently caress yeah my dude. Get paid. Next day, I roll over with a handful of one's, waiting for the price gouge. He never raised the price on us. I really hope he had a long, healthy life.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:00
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bulletsponge13 posted:That's the way I felt about it. I always felt wicked bad for people like this and seriously hope for the best for them. There was a cool Iraqi police dude we worked with and one night leaving the fob he gets mugged by other iraqi police, they took everything but his clothes from him. Afterwards he joked that he would beat us back to kuwait with his family and I seriously hope him and his family are safe.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:12
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Pine Cone Jones posted:I always felt wicked bad for people like this and seriously hope for the best for them. There was a cool Iraqi police dude we worked with and one night leaving the fob he gets mugged by other iraqi police, they took everything but his clothes from him. Afterwards he joked that he would beat us back to kuwait with his family and I seriously hope him and his family are safe. It's always such a poo poo situation for those guys. We had one who ran the shops on our compound there at the end of 19 and going into 2020 when all that rocket poo poo started going in earnest and there was talk of us pulling out completely. Dude just started living on he compound and hiding in the bunker next door to his shop with the fuelers every night when bottle rockets were raining. Real cool guy, had a house in San Diego and everything and just came back to Kirkuk to try and make as much money as possible selling us wild tigers and protein powder.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:25
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Nearly every Iraqi I met, I wish no ill on. They were regular people in a lovely, nearly impossible situation. Most were kinder to me than I deserved given the situation. Living in the city we became quasi-residents. Our "camp" which wasn't named, didn't even have a full company, and most days we spent 12 hours driving around the community, talking with people. It was great. I lived in the most IED sector of Baghdad at that time. We hit a handful, but were warned by the locals of at least a half dozen others, because we did everything we could to treat them the way we wanted to be treated. And we knew that every time we pulled a trigger, we were creating two more bad guys in OUR neighborhood. We could have easily been over run, or sniped like E Types in our little place. We were able to have some normalcy because we acted like loving human beings. I get sick when I read about how other dudes acted. I remember feeling no sympathy when an MP unit passing through hit an IED, because they had come through a bit earlier, and hosed up our neighborhood, driving like it was GTA and popping warning shots into parked cars and Taxis for no reason other than to shoot. I miss those people. I miss that city, that country, the bit of culture I got to experience. I loved it. I hope that one day I can go back, and the place can know peace and stability. I remember a woman chastising me- "We hated Saddam! He was a monster. But we had power! We had water! Now we have bombs! Why?" "Ma'am, I'm a Jundi. I go where they send me." "And George Bush sent you here. Not any different than us under Saddam." I still hear her voice, and how she pronounced Saddam. More than an accent- there was an inflection that created a lasting memory. At least nearly everyone who I spoke with understood that I was a Jundi, and I do what I can to help who I can, but I was a very small cog in a very large, complicated machine.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:38
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In 2004, one of the local carpenters built beds for the GIs as a sideline. 50 bucks for a really well made frame (out of admittedly garbage wood), which was a huge relief from cots. About a month after I got mine, he disappeared. He showed up again a month later with the $5 a day laborers; I asked the translator and he said that Sadr followers beat the poo poo out of him and stole all his tools, and told him if he went back to work on base they'd kill him. He disappeared again a few weeks later. I found out later from a UAV pilot I befriended on guard duty that he was found floating in the Diyala River. Just a poo poo hand for everyone there.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:39
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canyoneer posted:I don't know anything about this, but it sounds like a problem that needs me and my leadership! The funny thing is that trusting people to handle their poo poo makes life so much easier. I feel overpaid in my current position because all I have to do is maintain my quals, shoot the poo poo with people to make sure they're doing alright, and volunteer to take blame for stuff that isn't my fault but it doesn't matter because nobody really cared about it anyways. The Rat posted:How does that compare to the guys who bought a bunch of Iraqi dinars? It always seemed like a bad idea to me, but more than a few guys on my former contracts dumped cash into them. Heh, I have a 25 saddam dollar bill stuff in a book somewhere. Memory behind it is fuzzy because alcohol was involved, but it was supposedly seized in a cache during early OIF. One or some of the guys who found it kept a couple stacks as souvenirs and slowly gave them away as an icebreaker or whatever at parties. It's spent the past decade as a bookmark
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Feb 2, 2021 03:01
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I get all kinds of currency gets used for arts and crafts but when a cottage industry pops up around it that’s probably a bad sign. I feel for the Iraqis we didn’t have it too bad being in the middle of the desert and during a time when the government had requested our assistance is cleaning up the problem we had a big hand in creating but yeah I gotta go with the consensus of they mostly seemed like good people caught in an absolutely hellish situation. Heard horror stories from the fobs in the middle of nowhere about when the ISIS fighting died down the Iraqis got bored and Iraqi fight club started up. Apparently first rule of Iraqi fight club though is to bring a pipe or a cinder block because those dudes were caving in bones and then dragging their buddies to the American hospitals.
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Feb 2, 2021 03:16
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Guest2553 posted:
Oh this was in 2010-11, so it wasn't even the historical Saddam dinars, it was what the current regime was issuing. Still seemed like a bad idea to me.
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Feb 2, 2021 03:29
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The Rat posted:Oh this was in 2010-11, so it wasn't even the historical Saddam dinars, it was what the current regime was issuing. currency is generally a bad investment regardless of the circumstances as some inflation is a good thing. This is why gold as a currency is a really stupid idea, as capital investments need to not only be profitable, but more profitable than the rate of deflation
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Feb 2, 2021 04:24
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MonkeyWash posted:I know a woman that was still buying Iraqi dinars last year because Trump or something. I tried to explain that it is a scam to no avail. When I was working at a startup in San Francisco, the office cleaner guy was really nice and we'd chat whenever he was around. One day he got conspiratorial and told me about his retirement being Iraqi Dinar. Now this is a dude in his 40s who does gigs through an app to clean places, in one of the most expensive cities in America. He was certain he was in for a lottery winner amount of money, just as soon as...the government? Or someone...does something...to make Dinar skyrocket in value. I knew vaguely that it was a scam but had no particulars and didn't want to discount his dream or his retirement that he was clearly all-in with. I hope you're doing ok Melvin. Anyone have the brief dinar summary?
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Feb 2, 2021 05:35
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The story is that the dinar is about to appreciate spectacularly against the dollar so you can buy them with dollars and then buy dollars with the now more valuable dinars in the indeterminate future. Sometimes the wrinkle is that the current dinar will soon be replaced with a new dinar, which will be exchanged 1:1 with current dinars but the new dinar will have a much better rate against the dollar than the current dinar. They’re based on referencing the rapid recovery of the Kuwati dinar after the first gulf war, though Kuwait was in a very different place than Iraq is post Gulf 2.
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Feb 2, 2021 05:42
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Theres nothing about oil backing in there or something? Forex is a terrible way to make money unless you're cheating. If you start fishing around in the bargain bin of unstable countries you may as well just burn your money.
lightpole fucked around with this message at 06:16 on Feb 2, 2021 |
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Feb 2, 2021 06:14
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lightpole posted:Forex Wasn't that the porno mag in Mass Effect?
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Feb 2, 2021 06:18
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Fornax
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Feb 2, 2021 06:31
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bulletsponge13 posted:Nearly every Iraqi I met, I wish no ill on. They were regular people in a lovely, nearly impossible situation. Most were kinder to me than I deserved given the situation. Living in the city we became quasi-residents. Our "camp" which wasn't named, didn't even have a full company, and most days we spent 12 hours driving around the community, talking with people. It was great. I lived in the most IED sector of Baghdad at that time. We hit a handful, but were warned by the locals of at least a half dozen others, because we did everything we could to treat them the way we wanted to be treated. And we knew that every time we pulled a trigger, we were creating two more bad guys in OUR neighborhood. This part is something I've tried to tell people here and other places I've lived. I want so very badly to go back as a normal goddamn human. The culture and country is beautiful, and people deserve to live good lives free from fear. The amount of acquaintances that shied away from the topic after that is pretty sad, but gently caress their feelings they need to know how poo poo actually is outside of their bubble. If I even get one person to see how hosed up and wrong the info they were fed was, then that's better than nothing. I think at least my parents, of all people, listened to what I had to say.
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Feb 2, 2021 06:39
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That's one of the biggest American tragedies - the fact that such a small percentage of the population ever leaves this country (except to go to garbage tourist hotspots like Cancun where they treat the local 'help' like slaves) to experience another country's culture and people. I credit living in Sicily for two years in the early 90s during my father's command tour with giving me the experience of being humbled living in another country as a guest, not a citizen. So many people on the base never left it - they were afraid of stupid bullshit like getting kidnapped by the Mafia or simply didn't want to engage with or experience an environment where people didn't speak *their* language. If/when they *did* leave the fenceline, it was on heavily-scripted and chaperoned MWR trips where they practically had grown-rear end adults and their spawn on leashes giving them a sanitized "Sicilian experience" at places that had been found to be "ugly American"-friendly with bilingual menus and/or staff that spoke English. Most Italians hated Americans. Until you tried to speak their language - then their faces lit up because *you* were making an effort to ingratiate yourselves to *them* instead of expecting the opposite. They would then bend over backwards to help you. At two points, the base commissary ran out of two staples. The first was milk. But Parmalat (DHT milk) was still plentiful and a viable stand-in until the supply problem was solved. The second was truly  -worthy. Olive oil. In loving *Sicily*. The proto-Karens wanted English language-labeled olive oil.Of course the country you live in is "the greatest country on Earth," when you've never had the ability or agency to visit any other country. BIG HEADLINE fucked around with this message at 06:58 on Feb 2, 2021 |
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Feb 2, 2021 06:49
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I felt bad for soldiers who never got to have an overseas tour, but I have nothing but contempt for the people who couldn't crawl out of the bubble in OCONUS. We got lucky enough to get an offpost apartment in Bavaria, and we immersed ourselves in that poo poo for 3 years. I'd have stayed in if I could have stayed there. Buddy of mine's wife wanted none of it. We took them to a fantastic Greek place in our town, she bitched that the menus weren't in English. She bitched that she couldn't get a hamburger. My wife ended up telling her off, she huffed away with husband in tow. Someone else in the restaurant anonymously bought us two glasses of wine after that 
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Feb 2, 2021 06:56
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GD_American posted:She bitched that she couldn't get a hamburger. My wife ended up telling her off, she huffed away with husband in tow. I was young, but my first experience over there with something like this was when the Skipper's kid (who was a year or two younger than me but had been in-country for a year and change at that point) asked for "pepperoni" on his pizza at a squadron function. I think this was the night following the change of command where my father became XO, so we'd been in-country less than a week at that point. I still remember the look of utter horrified confusion on the waiter's face since "pepperoni" is not a thing in Italy. The suggestion is made that the kid can just get a basic Margherita cheese pizza or get italian sausage, the word for which is close enough in English as it is in Italian (salsiccia). NO, the kid wants PEPPERONI and he's about two more attempts to convince him otherwise away from a classic American brat tantrum. No one knew enough of the language to suggest a similar topping, like salami or prosciutto. And to be honest, not many people cared. Everyone was off-the-clock and tying one on to varying degrees. They finally order the kid his pizza and when it comes out his mother cuts him a slice. It's an outdoor restaurant and it's dark as the only lighting is coming from glorified tiki torches. The kid starts screaming and coughing and sputtering. They'd put ultra-hot giardiniera *peppers* on his pizza. I hated that little poo poo and every instance I was forced to interact with him, so every time hence when he annoyed me I thought back to this first impression of him.
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Feb 2, 2021 07:10
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That's awesome, and 100% not a mistake on their part
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Feb 2, 2021 07:40
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 Every Italian that I talked to when I was visiting Naples (and the rest of Italy, in fact) was incredibly helpful even if they didn't speak English (sometimes especially if they didn't speak English) so I can't imagine how much of a little poo poo that kid must've been.
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Feb 2, 2021 08:21
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:
Last I checked of him, he had gotten a DUI. Which tracks.
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Feb 2, 2021 08:42
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I once joined a rig in Tunisia that had just arrived from the Gulf of Mexico and very unusually they had sent the whole crew over to man it. Talking to the guy who did the admin onboard apparently out of about 60 guys who joined 50 had never had a passport as they had never been out of the US and 30 of those had never been out of Louisiana.
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Feb 2, 2021 10:16
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BIG HEADLINE posted:Last I checked of him, he had gotten a DUI. Which tracks. It really does. Also I know for a fact that at least a few Neapolitan pizza places will serve an equivalent to pepperoni pizza if you bother to look at the menu. It's usually called spicy salami or some such thing. I found that on my first visit to a random pizza joint.
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Feb 2, 2021 11:15
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