Tank birthday, 47+ years

[Paul B]

Jsmkmavity, we have been to all the lighthouses near here, and we have about 15 of them. They offer a tour boat that goes near them, but to get on most of them, you have to anchor near them and swim or SCUBA.

Diving near lighthouses is good because we normally dove for lobsters, and those lighthouses are built on piles of boulders, which lobsters love.

I don't remember ever going to Roatan but we have been diving since 1973 or so and hit most places. But the majority were here in New York for lobsters or wrecks. I think there are 2,000 wrecks off Long Island.

I don't remember where this was but it certainly was not in New York because our visibility is measured in inches and many times is close to zero.



Here is another one.



And this is the Famous Montauk Lighthouse. There is a whaling museum inside.



That white building to the left was used to look for submarines during WW2

 

[Paul B]

If your on Facebook you can watch her talk about her quest to raise money for the charity here.

Atoll, I am not on Facebook. I have a face and wrote a couple of books so I'm good. But I am very proud of Olive and I don't even know her.

Very nice. If I can figure out how to donate to her, I will

 

[Paul B]

I hope I don't get banned from this site because very few of my posts are about fish.

 

[jsmkmavity]

Sub. Most people today just don't know how to have fun.

We dropped that truck filled with beer from a Schnook. Maybe this one, I'm not sure.

We did crash in a rice paddy but me and my Capt. friend who flew this bird, spent the night rescuing the hot, 3.2 beer. I think I only had a 45 with me as I was probably more concerned that they would make me pay for that helicopter than getting shot.

That story is in my book; I don't remember if you read it.

I only rode in a chinook 1 time and that was enough!!! It felt like our pilot was trying to dump us out the back door before landing! I am pretty sure it was her first time flying. She almost took our heads of with the rotors taking off again. I was a 60 gunner but never got to ride on the skid of any copter. Completely different era! I would say you guys back then had all the fun, but you paid for it dearly!

 

[atoll]

Atoll, I am not on Facebook. I have a face and wrote a couple of books so I'm good. But I am very proud of Olive and I don't even know her.

Very nice. If I can figure out how to donate to her, I will

Thats very kind of you Paul. I wasn't fishing for donations at all just showing what a remarkable achievement for a 8 year old.

My daughter her mum is very talented just like your good self and makes all kinds of things. She bought an old caravan and completely refurbished it all by herself.

My 2 sons however are a waste of time when it comes to the like of DIY, I don't know where I went wrong lol.

Her efforts have appeared in national newspapers and the Sunday Telegraph Magazine.

 

[atoll]

Busy making all those broaches.

 

[Paul B]

Atoll. LOL. My son-in-law doesn't even know which end of a screwdriver to use to bang a nail in.

I only rode in a chinook 1 time and that was enough!!!

This is true. They fly like a brick being dragged down a cobblestone road. Unfortunately I flew every few days but I usually flew in a Huey. Here is a crashed one. I don't have a picture of a flying one but I'm sure everyone knows what they look like because they are in all Vietnam movies.

I don't know the details of this crash but this was a common sight. I hope the pilots survived.

I took some parts out of this one so me and my Captain had light in our bunker. I also removed some switches to hook up a really cool communication system for our howitzers and to call helicopters and rear area for support.

I know we didn't have the strict rules you guys have today. We didn't have to dress very well, or at all, as our clothes were usually filthy and ripped. We washed them if we felt the necessity. I washed mine in the bottom of a 50 gallon helicopter fuel drum that I cut with a machete. We also used these barrels for our "bathrooms".

I heated it with helicopter fuel. (This is also in my book)

We also didn't have to use the weapons that they gave us. Some guys cut off the barrel of their M-16 to make a pistol. That was stupid and the thing didn't work automatically like that and wasn't very accurate.

I built my own 30 round magazine from two 18 round magazines and some sheet metal from that crashed Huey. You can see it here and the thing saved my life.



It made no sense to me that our enemy had a 22 round magazine in their AK-47s and we only had 18 rounds. Which Jiboni in our embassy came up with that?

Remember, all my Vietnam pictures are in a clearing in the jungle as I was never in a rear area except to get a tooth pulled. I never saw a building, road, roof, wall, plumbing or electricity the entire year.

Our hair was long also because of the no electricity thing. They did send out a guy every few weeks to curt it with a scissors.

Once we were getting on a fixed wing aircraft and we were carrying a stretcher with dog names Ratsass, two monkeys named Pete and judy, and small spider monkey called Crossbow. An officer who was inspecting yelled at my Captain, saying, " what the heck is that guy doing? This ain't Noah's Ark, This is a combat zone.

My Captain (who I am still friends with ) told him "Sir, please don't say anything to Sargent Baldassano. I don't want to tick him off because he builds all sorts of cool things for us and I don't wantr him to stop so just let him be. And he did.

I loved to build things but I was limited because I only had a machete, pliers, bamboo, wire and a hack saw because I was the COMMO Chief

I built this cool blast wall in front of my hooch.

With this in place, any rocket-propelled grenades they fired at me would hit the bamboo and blow up there rather than hitting the sandbags in front of my space. Of course it only worked once.

I always built something like that in front of whatever we were living in. I helped and lived on 14 Firebases while there which were large clearings that we used to place our Howitzers and other armaments that we fired constantly.

 

[Paul B]

Busy making all those broaches.

Atoll. That is extremely Excellent. I love it.

 

[atoll]

Paul, offer my 2 sons a hammer and they would ask which end do you hold.

I made many things in my time like you. I made all kinds of toys etc. A rocking horse, a fort, a double blackboard and easil a Barbie house amongst others.I don't have any photos of those my Ex wife has them all. I might get them someday.

 

[atoll]

Am saddened that I have 2 intelligent sons who have little idea when it comes to manual creativity. One of my sons has just been promoted to factory manager the other is high up in local government. SHEEEESH!

My daughters run rings round them both when it comes to DIY and artistry.My daughters take after their dad of course. My sons, well who knows, probably their mother .

Photo taken a few years ago of my 5 with 2 sets of twins. The daughter in the middle isnt a twin. They have all done very well in life, hardworking and dedicated.

 

[Paul B]

LOL, Thats a Village.

 

[atoll]

LOL, Thats a Village.

As long as they aren't the village people lol

 

[vlangel]

Vlangel, Nice picture, I love it. Your story is similar to mine. I met Dale the first time when she was 12. Being I am not a Perv, I didn't date her because she was a kid and I wasn't interested. We just happened to be in a wedding party together. Also, her Dad was a combat Veteran of WW2 and he would have killed me, rightly so. I would have done the same thing if some dirtbag wanted to date my 12 year old Daughter.

A friend of mine since kindergarten, got married to Dale's cousin so we were both in the party. I went out with her cousin who was 17 at the time.

I got drafted in the Army just before my 19th birthday and left for basic training.
Before I was sent to Vietnam, I came home for a 30 day leave and I re-met Dale.
I didn't know how old she was because I have a lousy memory and everyone told me she was 17.

So we went out for those three of weeks. For our first date, I took her for a ride on the Stated Island Ferry as I had no money or car insurance. I went off to Nam for a year and in that time, our Mothers became very good friends so Dale and her Mom would visit my Mom all the time.

Me and Dale exchanged letters every week and I was thinking I would ask her to marry me when I came home not knowing she was like 14 or so.

For a year after I came home I still didn't know. (I'm not that bright and all her friends were 17 or 18) I would drive her home from high school and thought she was a senior. She wasn't.

We waited until she was 18 to get married. (we never lived together or anything like that as that wasn't done much in those days and I'm glad we didn't)

I also know that she wouldn't go for that "or anything like that".

I took this picture of her in a mirror when she was 18 and we just got married.



We just had our 52nd wedding anniversary but she was in terrible pain then so we didn't do anything.

What a beautiful story of yours and Dale's courtship! I love to hear folks whose love has stood the test of time! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Freenow54]

Thank you guys. I appreciate it.

The top of this table is a white oak slab from a tree that was cut down near here. It has red lights under it.



The fireplace and the entire steel wall is on rollers so I can move it to paint. I built it out of heavy srteel and brushed the steel to get those swirls. The "smoke stack" I built out of a copper gutter and the mantle was a bunch of 2x10"



This is a money machine. You put in old tools and paper and out comes gold and money.



This root washed up on my daughters beach on the Hudson river.



Now it's this table. I just love to build but I ran out of places to put stuff so my wife doesn't want me keeping steam punk things. I have to hide them.

Thanks for making my favorite model I will forward my address to you so you can ship it. I like the skeleton its a Tang. You have to reprogram your money machine there are no pennies any more sorry

 

[Freenow54]

I have 9 grandchildren one of them Olive who is 8 started a buy a broach in aid of charity cancer research yesterday. She asks for £1 UK pound about $1.25 donation for a broach to buy one ( it costs her more than 1 pound for the materials) She will get her brownies charity badge for her efforts.

Most people give her a lot more. Here target was to raise £100 Within just one day she has raised £750 about $1025 of your funny money. Olive has had to rope her mum in to help make them to meet the demand. She is making them in lots of different colours to represent the different cancers. Every penny made is going to cancer research.

To say am very proud of my 8 year old granddaughters is an understatement.

If your on Facebook you can watch her talk about her quest to raise money for the charity here.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/17wbZQENgv/
If your not on Facebook here is what she says.

Hello everyone!

My name is Olive, I’m 8 yrs old and I’m a Brownie!
Today I want to tell you about something cool I’ve been working on.

I decided I want to help raise money for cancer research, because helping people is important and I like doing kind things.

So… I’ve been busy making macramé cancer awareness ribbons!
They come in lots of different colours, and each colour stands for a different type of cancer —
like black for skin cancer , grey for brain tumours , and pink for breast cancer. Pink

I’m doing this as part of my Brownies charity badge, and for this badge the suggested donation is just £1 — and the best part is that 100% of the money goes to cancer research!

If you’d like a ribbon, you can order one by commenting below, and you can donate using the link here.

Thank you so much for supporting me and helping make a difference!

Black- skin Grey- brain Pink - breast Cancer blue- prostate
Yellow- bone Lilac- testicular
Red - blood Green -Liver cancer gold - childhood cancer

Donate to my page today and help bring forward the day when all cancers are cured. https://fundraise.cancerresearchuk.org/page/olives-macrame-ribbon-fundraiser

Without getting into it do they accept pay pal ?

 

[atoll]

Without getting into it do they accept pay pal ?

They do indeed.

 

[Freenow54]

Without getting into it do they accept pay pal ?

done good for her

 

[atoll]

done good for her

Thank you so much for your donation, very much appreciated. She is homing in on £1000 in donations 10 X her origional target. Olive her mum and the brownies are amazed and over the moon.

 

[Paul B]

You have to reprogram your money machine there are no pennies any more sorry

They are very easy to solder.

 

[Imrahilwjz]

My kids helped me build this last summer. Not as fancy as your creations, but functional(ish) and good experience for them. The baby pic was just in the middle of these pics and I couldn't resist